Matthew 16:23

But he turned and said unto Peter, Get thee behind me, Satan: thou art a stumbling block unto me: for thou mindest not the things of God, but the things of men.

There was kindness (and a reprieve) for Peter in the Lord's reply. Instead of saying, "Get thee hence? as he said to Satan previously (Matthew 4:10), he said, "Get thee behind me!" Peter was commanded to forsake his role as instructor and resume that of a follower. Peter's place was behind Christ, as a devoted disciple, not in front of Christ, a position as assumed when he objected to Christ's words about his approaching death and resurrection. One may feel a certain pity for Peter. With all his God-given insight into the total identity of Christ as God's Son, he must yet awhile remain ignorant of how Christ's death was necessary and was the "sine qua non", without which no man ever born could have the forgiveness of his sins.

Peter was apparently thinking that, from the earthly viewpoint, Jesus surely did not deserve anything to happen to him which the Lord had just mentioned. From the earthly view, Peter was right; and Christ correctly diagnosed his mistake by saying that Peter was thinking of the things of men rather than of the things of God. The things of God would be clear to Peter much later, when he would write, "Who his own self bare our sins in his body upon the tree, that we, having died unto sin, might live unto righteousness" (1 Peter 2:24).

One lesson of stark and overwhelming power that flows out of this strange rebuke of Peter is that temptation does not always come through one's enemies, but may also come through the most faithful and intimate of earthly companions. Peter's sad role in this incident shows how easily the best of friends and the most intimate of loved ones may become the instruments of evil, however unintentionally. Jesus' firm words to Peter suggest that the temptation to himself in that case was sharp and persuasive, since it was founded in earthly logic, fortified with the natural repugnance to death in the mind of Christ, and rejected out of hand by his best disciples. The temptation, conveyed through Peter's words here, remained and was present in that bitter cup in the Garden of Gethsemane (Matthew 26:39).