Matthew 26:63–75

⁶³Jesus kept silent.

Then the Chief Priest said, “I command you by the authority of the living God to say if you are the Messiah, the Son of God.”

⁶⁴Jesus was curt: “You yourself said it. And that’s not all. Soon you’ll see it for yourself:

The Son of Man seated at the right hand of the Mighty One,

Arriving on the clouds of heaven.”

^65–66At that, the Chief Priest lost his temper, ripping his robes, yelling, “He blasphemed! Why do we need witnesses to accuse him? You all heard him blaspheme! Are you going to stand for such blasphemy?”

They all said, “Death! That seals his death sentence.”

^67–68Then they were spitting in his face and banging him around. They jeered as they slapped him: “Prophesy, Messiah: Who hit you that time?”

Denial in the Courtyard

⁶⁹All this time, Peter was sitting out in the courtyard. One servant girl came up to him and said, “You were with Jesus the Galilean.”

⁷⁰In front of everybody there, he denied it. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

⁷¹As he moved over toward the gate, someone else said to the people there, “This man was with Jesus the Nazarene.”

⁷²Again he denied it, salting his denial with an oath: “I swear, I never laid eyes on the man.”

⁷³Shortly after that, some bystanders approached Peter. “You’ve got to be one of them. Your accent gives you away.”

^74–75Then he got really nervous and swore. “I don’t know the man!”

Just then a rooster crowed. Peter remembered what Jesus had said: “Before the rooster crows, you will deny me three times.” He went out and cried and cried and cried.