我们说过，当我们领受了神的计划的异象以后，接着发生的事情是那异象会死去。原因是我们内心必须先培养出基督徒的品格，神才能够在我们的生命里面实现祂的计划，而这只能够借着由神把我们的异象带到死地来完成。很多基督徒都因为神这个奇特的策略而感到迷惑，神是借此在我们里面建立「活像基督」的品格，这再一次给我们说明「生命之先必有死亡」的真理。

请紧记，撒但在这种情况总是特别活跃的，因为牠的目的是让你以个人的力量来实现那异象。但是当你这样做的时候，结果只是恼人的冲突。还记得亚伯拉罕遇见甚么事吗？他没有等候神在最好的时候实现异象，而是透过撒拉的使女夏甲来为他诞下儿子以「帮助」神完成祂的应许（创十六3-4）。结果是引起以撒和以实玛利之间的冲突，这冲突甚至一直延续到今天。

在今天的经文里面，我们看见彼得被撒但利用，劝耶稣基督不要去面对加略山的死亡，但耶稣看到彼得的意念的真正来源，于是回应他说：「撒但，退我后边去吧！」有一位作者对这段经文评论说：「撒但往往利用与我们最亲密的人来『保护』我们，以防碍我们执行神呼召我们去做的事情。」哪怕我们那些最亲密的基督徒朋友有时也不明白这个道理，就是在我们为了神的计划而活之前，我们必须先对自己死去。

We are seeing that once we have been given a vision of what God wants us to do for Him, the next thing that happens is that the vision dies. The reason for this is that Christian character must be developed in us before God can accomplish His purpose in our lives, and this can only be done by God bringing our vision down into death. Many Christians have been baffled by this strange strategy which God uses to develop Christlikeness in us, but it is yet another illustration of the principle that death must precede life.

An important thing to remember is that Satan is extremely operative at this time, for his purpose is to get you to fulfil the vision by your own human effort. And whenever you do this, you will finish up in conflict. Remember what happened to Abraham? Rather than waiting for God to bring the vision into being at His own time, he tried to "help" God by having a son through Sarah's maidservant, Hagar (Gen. 16:3-4). The result of that was conflict between Isaac and Ishmael - a conflict that has continued to this day.

In our reading today, we see Peter being used by Satan to talk Christ out of facing death on Calvary, but Jesus recognised the true source of his ideas and responded with the words: "Get behind me, Satan!" One writer comments on this passage: "Satan often uses those who are closest to us to 'protect' us from what we know God has called us to do." Even close Christian friends sometimes fail to understand that before we can live for God's purposes, we must die to our own.