Just A-Passin' Through--1 Peter 2:11-12 (1 Peter Series)

            Here in our neck of the woods, we live not far from where the old Santa Fe Trail used to cut across the prairie. I did a little research on the trail this week, and I discovered that a number of travel diaries from that time mentioned a popular spot for crossing the Arkansas River that is located just south of where the Ingalls Feed Yard is today.

            Many people crisscrossed back and forth through this area, but today, apart from some ruts in the ground and some towns located where trading posts had been, we don’t see a lot of evidence that they were ever here. One major reason is that our area was not their destination. They came through, but they were just passing through; they were travelers, with their eyes and their dreams fixed somewhere else.

            Today, the Apostle Peter is going to challenge us to consider how we think about ourselves in this present phase of life in a fallen world. Do we live as if this present phase of life is permanent, or do we see ourselves as travelers – just passing through this present time heading onward and upward to a better home? Your answer to that question will make a profound difference in the way that you live your life.

            In 2:4-10, we learned some important things about the way that God sees us. He sees us as objects for honor because of our faith in Jesus Christ. He sees us as members of a holy and royal priesthood, members of a chosen race and a holy nation, a people for his own possession who are called out and called upon to proclaim his excellencies. Now, in 2:11-12, we’re going to receive a strong challenge concerning the way that we see ourselves.

1. What I Am—A Sojourner and Exile

            Notice the tenderness and passion in the first words of verse 11: “Beloved, I urge you.” Peter is writing with the same love and urgency that you might use in speaking to your children about something that’s very important. What is so important to Peter? First of all, that we realize what we are in this phase of life – sojourners and exiles.

            A sojourner is someone who is only in a place for a short time. He doesn’t go to a lot of trouble to settle in, because he’s not planning to stay there forever. An exile is someone who is living outside of his homeland, and often times, he is doing so against his will.

            The nuance in that word gives us an interesting and provocative way to think about our lives in this present phase. It may be appropriate and healthy for us to think of each day of life right now as a day in which we are living here against our will; in other words, that we would really rather not be here, but in our true homeland, which is heaven.

            Remember how the Apostle Paul said in Philippians 1 that “to die is gain.” It is gain – it is better than, it is superior to continuing to live in this fallen world. In that same chapter, he also said that “[his] desire was to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better.” So perhaps when we wake up every morning, our very first response should be to say, with a very heavy sigh, “Oh – I’m still here! I was really hoping I’d be home by now!”

            Perhaps you remember taking trips with your family when you were a child. Sometimes when you were in the car and really anxious to get home, your parents might’ve said, “Just go to sleep for a while, and by the time you wake up we’ll be home.” Sometimes you would try that but you would wake up too soon; you would wake up while you were still on the road. Do you remember what that felt like? Do you remember how disappointing that was?

            If I truly am a sojourner and exile in this world, perhaps I should feel a little bit of that disappointment each day that I wake up here. Let’s call it a holy discontent over the fact that we have to wait one more day to see Jesus. Perhaps that should be our first response every morning, but as Paul also taught us in Philippians 1, that thought can and should be quickly overtaken by the realization that we have so many opportunities to do good in the name of Christ while we are still here. So that disappointment shouldn’t be with us all the time, but if we never feel it, then perhaps we need to reconsider what it means to be a sojourner and exile in this phase of life.

            Now if I view myself as a sojourner and exile here in this world, my lifestyle should reflect that, shouldn’t it? My lifestyle should be different than that of those who do live as if this fallen world is their home, those who have settled down and gotten comfortable with the values of this fallen world and its goals, dreams, and pursuits.

            So here we come to a moment for some very sobering reflection. What does my lifestyle truly reveal? Do I live as someone who has not made this fallen world his home? Think of yourself as being on trial defending the claim that you do live as a sojourner and exile here in this world. Let’s call some witnesses, and think for yourself of what these witnesses might have to say about your claim:

·         What does your calendar have to say about it? Do you spend your time on exactly the same things as those who are at home in this fallen world?

·         What does your storage room have to say about it? What kind of stuff are you carting through this life, and how much of it? If you literally had to take all of your personal possessions with you on a trip, would you look like someone who’s just passing through or someone who’s looking to settle down for a good long while?

·         What does your budget have to say about it? Do you spend your money mostly on things that only relate to this phase of life, or do you spend your money mostly on things that will yield dividends in the next life?

            I want to ask you to give all of these questions some serious thought and reflection over the next few days and weeks. Ask God to help you accurately assess whether you’re living like an exile or whether you’re making yourself at home in this world. We need His help for that kind of reflection because it is so easy for us to fool ourselves and become blinded to the true nature of our lifestyles. So please – do not just set this question aside quickly and easily and go about your merry way. Ask yourself – am I truly living like an exile or am I making myself at home in this fallen and temporary world?

Now that Peter has reminded us what we are, he proceeds to tell us what we should do in light of that fact.

2. What I Am To Do

a. Abstain from the passions of the flesh

            The whole of verse 11 says [READ v. 11]. The Apostle Paul gives us a thorough list of the passions or desires of the flesh in Galatians 5:19-21, where he writes, “Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these.” All of these desires are trying to stake a claim within our hearts in various ways, and notice how Peter describes their efforts – he states that they are waging war against our souls.

            One of the main reasons that we might remain vulnerable to temptations like this is that we do not appreciate the fact that we are in a state of warfare against our souls. We know that those behaviors that Paul listed are wrong and we hope to avoid them, but are we really doing battle against them? Are we really seeking to crush those desires whenever we see them attempting to gain more ground in our lives?

            Just imagine if an enemy were to openly declare war against the United States, yet we did not even go to a heightened state of alert. Would we not be vulnerable to attack? Would we not be foolish to dismiss the danger of someone declaring war against us?

            Then my friends, do not downplay Peter’s warning. Sinful desires are at war against you – the question now is are you at war against them? How do we wage this war? The first step is to maintain lines of communication with your commanding officer – the Lord Jesus Christ. Every soldier knows how important communication is inside a war zone. If a soldier on the battlefield is cut off from communication with his commanding officer, he is in a very dangerous and vulnerable position. He cannot communicate his needs, he cannot ask for help, he will have to make decisions from within the fog of war without the benefit of the big picture of the battlefield and the additional intelligence that his commanding officer has.

            Likewise, it is vital that you remain in communication with the Lord Jesus Christ. If you do not pray daily and seek wisdom from the Bible daily, you will be in a very weak position from which to do battle against your sinful desires. So make sure that you keep open and clear lines of communication with the Lord Jesus Christ through Bible study and prayer.

b. Keep your conduct among unbelievers honorable

            Since Peter has just reminded us that we are just passing through this present phase of life, we could possibly get the idea that it’s not all that important how we act during this present phase of life since it isn’t our true home and we’re not going to be here forever. Think about when you go on a vacation. Usually on vacation, you’re not overly concerned about how you look or how you act because you’re not going to be there forever. You’ll probably never see the people that you run into ever again, so you’re not overly concerned about looking nice or making friends.

            But according to verse 12, we would be wrong to think that way about this present phase of life. Here Peter writes [READ v. 12]. I don’t really have to remind you that increasingly in our own country, we are spoken against as evildoers. We will not embrace the popular idea today that homosexual behavior is okay, and for that reason many people have branded us as hateful bigots. They say we are actually doing evil or wrong by holding the conviction that we do.

            How does Peter call us to respond? By keeping our conduct honorable. We have to show people by our actions that their accusations are not true. We have to show people by the way that we live that we have good will toward everyone – even toward those with whom we disagree.

            I’m not sure if Peter had this exact thought in mind, but I think we have to change people’s minds by our conduct today because many people will no longer listen to our words. Many people have already decided for themselves that our beliefs are hateful and bigoted, so they won’t be very inclined to give our beliefs a fair hearing no matter how clearly and persuasively we express them.

            Clear and persuasive arguments for our beliefs are necessary, but I think more than anything, people are just going to have to see through our conduct that the way of Jesus truly is the way to abundant life – life that is characterized by peace of mind, hope, joy, and the kind of sacrificial love that Jesus himself has modeled for us. People are eventually going to realize that the fruit of an ungodly lifestyle is bitter and poisonous, so we need to be able to show them a stark difference through our lifestyles. We need to be able to show them that the fruit of a godly lifestyle is pleasant and sweet and desirable and satisfying.

            And let us not overlook the purpose that Peter mentions for all of this – that they may see our good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation. That statement seems to be a description of unbelievers coming to faith in Jesus Christ because of the example they see in us. We have to remember that our desire for those who disagree with us should always be that they would come to faith in Jesus Christ.

            It is not easy to maintain that kind of mindset when people are throwing unfounded accusations against us. It’s much easier to grow angry and bitter toward them and to take a perverse delight when we see them face the inevitable consequences of sin. But we need instead to follow the example of Stephen from Acts 7. When his enemies were literally throwing rocks at him to kill him, he cried out and said, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.”

            We must ask God to help us maintain a tender heart toward those who accuse us of being evildoers. Otherwise, our conduct toward them likely will not be honorable. It will likely be tainted with anger and pride and perhaps even thoughts of revenge. That kind of behavior is no different than their own, and thus it will have no power to draw them toward embracing Christ as their Savior.

            We are just passing through this life on our way toward a better home and a permanent one. But let us never forget that one of our goals for this journey is to bring as many people with us to that better home as we can. In that sense, we are not supposed to be only travelers through this world but trail guides, calling other people to follow along with us as we head toward the high country to find homes of peace and rest.

Great Faith in the Love of a Mother--Matthew 15:21-28 (Mother's Day Sermon)

            On this Mother’s Day, I would like to look with you at the story of one of the greatest women of faith in the whole Bible. Now, each of you probably has your own idea about which woman I may be thinking of. Some of you are likely thinking, “We’re about to look at the book of Ruth!” That’s a good guess, but that’s not where were headed today. Now that you’ve heard that, you’re probably thinking, “Oh – we’re going to study the story of Esther.” Another good guess, but wrong again.

            I would tell you the name of the woman whose story we’re going to read today, but the truth is the Bible doesn’t tell us her name! In fact, she was a woman who was not even supposed to be alive. Let’s find out about her, shall we? Turn with me to Matthew 15:21-28.

            This passage is in the Gospels, so of course it is recording an incident from the life of Christ. Verse 21 begins by telling us, “And Jesus went away from there and withdrew to the district of Tyre and Sidon.” Before we continue, let me explain a bit about why Jesus was headed to that area.

            The district of Tyre and Sidon was north of Israel and was actually a different country. If you think of Israel as the United States, it would be as if Jesus had traveled into Canada at this point. The Gospel of Mark makes it a bit more clear that Jesus had crossed the border at this point in time seeking some rest and relaxation for himself and the 12 disciples. They had been engaged in ministry continuously for some time, and they were beginning to wear out.

            Here’s what Mark 6:30-33 says about that stretch of time: “The apostles returned to Jesus and told him all that they had done and taught. And he said to them, ‘Come away by yourselves to a desolate place and rest a while.’ For many were coming and going, and they had no leisure even to eat. And they went away in the boat to a desolate place by themselves. Now many saw them going and recognized them, and they ran there on foot from all the towns and got there ahead of them.”

            So they were trying to get a bit of rest, but it was proving to be impossible to get away from the crowds. The same thing happened again just a few verses later in Mark 6:53-55: “When they had crossed over, they came to land at Gennesaret and moored to the shore. And when they got out of the boat, the people immediately recognized him and ran about the whole region and began to bring the sick people on their beds to wherever they heard he was.”

            After all this, Jesus decided that they truly needed to get away from it all, so the beginning of this same story in Mark 7:24 says this: “And from there he arose and went away to the region of Tyre and Sidon. And he entered a house and did not want anyone to know, yet he could not be hidden.” It’s important for us to realize, then, that Jesus had not come into this area to do ministry, either through teaching or healing. Remember that detail, because it will help us understand what is to follow in this story.

            Back in Matthew 15 now, verse 22 begins with, “And behold.” Don’t rush over that like it some throwaway word! It’s like Matthew is saying, “You’re not going to believe what happened next!” And what did happen next? “A Canaanite woman from that region came out and was crying, ‘Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David; my daughter is severely oppressed by a demon.’”

            Two facts in this verse make this whole situation highly ironic. The first is the fact that this woman was a Canaanite. The Canaanites were ancient enemies of the people of Israel. They were the people who lived in the land of Palestine during the time of Joshua and the Conquest, the people whom the children of Israel were supposed to wipe out completely through battle. Now please understand that when God gave that command, he was not being mean-spirited or bloodthirsty or prejudicial. That command was a judicial act on the part of God, who is the rightful judge over all the earth. He was passing a judgment on the Canaanites because they were exceedingly wicked people. Yet the Israelites did not fully obey that command, and so the Canaanites continued to live in various parts of the Promised Land, which allowed this woman to be alive at that time and in that place in order to cry out to Jesus.

            The second fact is that this woman called Jesus the Son of David. If you do a search for that phrase in the Gospel of Matthew, you’ll discover that the religious leaders were outraged when anyone suggested that Jesus was the Son of David because that title connected him to all of the prophecies about the Messiah from the Old Testament. To call Jesus the Son of David was at least the beginning of faith in him, and in the Gospel of Matthew that affirmation was only made by the unlikeliest of people, such as blind beggars on the side of the road and this Canaanite woman.

            But Jesus responds to her in a way that seems a bit surprising [READ v. 23]. Now the sense seems to be that the disciples were saying, “Lord, just give her what she wants and get her out of here! It’s embarrassing having this woman carrying on like this!” What tremendous compassion from the disciples! A lot of concern for the woman, right? Their request basically amounted to, “Lord, use your power to get this nuisance away from us!”

            But Jesus reminded them of something in verse 24 when he answered them, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” That statement might sound a bit cruel or even bigoted to us, but we need to see it from a different perspective. Jesus had not been sent into the world to heal every person on earth at that time who was sick or demon-possessed. Please do remember that, because if that had been Jesus’ mission, then unfortunately we would have to say that he failed, because he never made it any further out of Israel than this.

            His first purpose in coming to earth was to offer to the Jewish people the kingdom that had been promised to them in the Old Testament. That’s why his earliest recorded sermons said, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand!” It was not his highest mission to heal everyone he encountered, but to offer salvation first of all to the Jews, then the through them to the rest of the world.

            Also, with this response, I have to think that Jesus was setting the disciples up to see something they really needed to see – an example of great faith. Jesus told them several times in the Gospel of Matthew that they had “little faith,” so they needed to see great faith in action. Undoubtedly then, part of Jesus’ intention in verse 24 was to set up what came next.

            Let’s see what did happen next [READ vv. 25-26]. That statement almost sounds a bit rude, doesn’t it? But since it comes from the lips of Jesus, we have to conclude that he did not mean to be rude or prejudicial or hateful.

            I think Jesus was perhaps making that statement as kind of a proverb or a cliché, just like we sometimes say things that wouldn’t be very kind if you took them literally. For example, imagine that you were about to leave your house to run an errand and your spouse said, “Could you run this by so-and-so’s house?” You might possibly say something like, “Sure! If I’m going to go into town, I might as well kill two birds with one stone.”

            Now, you’re not really comparing that other person to a bird, and you’re certainly not talking about killing them! You’re simply using a proverb or a cliché, and I think that may have been the attitude with which Jesus made this statement. The statement itself was really a reminder that the woman did not have a right to ask this question. That didn’t necessarily make the question entirely inappropriate, but she could not lay any particular claim upon Jesus and expect him to oblige her request. In other words, Jesus was stating that she was not entitled to receive a blessing like this, not even in the way that the Jewish people could have made a case for receiving God’s blessings based on his promises to them.

            The woman’s reply revealed her trust in Jesus because she made it clear that she was not coming to him with an entitlement mindset at all [READ v. 27]. Notice how she agreed with what Jesus had said before she humbly made her request again. If I could paraphrase her statement, I think I would say this: “You’re right, Lord! You are not obligated to do this for me, and I can’t claim any right to receive this blessing, but I just know that with you, there are plenty of blessings to go around!”

            In other words, she was asking Jesus to help her not out of any obligation, but out of his mercy and grace. That’s an illustration of saving faith right there! When we ask God to forgive us of our sins, we are not asking for that because we feel we’re entitled to it. Rather, we are appealing to God on the basis of his mercy and grace, which is precisely what this woman was doing here.

            Jesus saw that clearly of course, so he complemented her and granted her request [READ v. 28]. This woman was a great example of faith because she appealed to Jesus on the basis of mercy and grace, not from any attitude of entitlement or obligation. That’s what set this woman apart from about everyone else in the Gospel of Matthew. The Jewish people had come to feel entitled to God’s blessings despite the fact that they were failing to obey him in many ways. But this woman understood the attitude that God delights to honor – an attitude of simple trust in him, through which we simply cast ourselves upon his mercy and grace.

            Finally today, notice how this woman exemplifies so many of the qualities that we appreciate about our mothers. She was persistent in seeking help for her child. She was not going to give up until her child’s needs were met! She was also very humble, and how many times have we seen great humility from our own mothers! They have frequently embraced thankless tasks simply out of their love for us. And many of us have seen in our own mothers examples of great faith in God. Make sure to thank your mothers for these things, and may we all learn from the great example of faith that we have seen in this Canaanite woman.

Walking in Redemption, Not Rejection--1 Peter 2:4-10 (1 Peter Series)

            Rejection is never a fun experience, no matter what the circumstances are. Perhaps you apply for a job and don’t get it; perhaps your friends decide that they don’t want to be your friends anymore; perhaps you express your feelings for a member of the opposite sex but your affection is not mutual; perhaps you audition for something or perform or submit something for evaluation and you don’t get the part or the score you are hoping for.

            Rejection is never pleasant, but when we face it, we need to remember to consider the source. Just who is it who has rejected me? How important is their opinion really, and is it even correct? In times of rejection, we have to remember to assign the most importance to those who have an opinion that truly makes a difference in the grand scheme of things.

            As we’ve been studying the letter of 1 Peter, we’ve been listening in on one side of a conversation between the Apostle Peter and some Jewish believers in Christ who were facing rejection because of their faith. In our passage for today, Peter is going to remind these believers that the reality about them was precisely the opposite of what other people might have been saying about them. It was also precisely the opposite of the way that these believers themselves may have been feeling about their status and role in this world.

            Though they were objects for rejection in the eyes of some people, they were objects for honor the eyes of God. Let’s see how Peter develops this thought today in a way that would’ve been particularly special for these Jewish believers – by appealing to numerous passages from the Old Testament.

1. God sees you as an object of honor and part of a new work He is doing in the world (vv. 4-8)

            Let’s read through these verses first in order to get the full context before we take a bit of a closer look at these word pictures [READ vv. 4-8].

            The main word picture in these verses is that of God building a temple. Temples, both in ancient times and today, are considered to be the dwelling place of a god – or, at the very least, the place where human beings can have some access to the deity who is worshiped in that temple. So the idea is that we as Christians collectively are the dwelling place for the living God.

            According to the text, the cornerstone for this spiritual temple is none other than Jesus himself. Now when we read the word “cornerstone” here, we shouldn’t think of what we sometimes call a cornerstone today, which is usually little more than just a piece of decoration for a building. Modern cornerstones typically make no difference whatsoever for the shape or the stability of the structure, and they may actually be the last feature of the building that’s put in place.

            But in ancient times, a cornerstone was precisely the opposite – it was the very first stone that was laid, so the rest of the building was literally built around that stone. That stone would dictate the shape of the rest of the building, so it had to be a stone that was quarried well to ensure that it set the proper angle for the walls that would be built around it.

            So Jesus is the first and most significant stone in this spiritual temple. Now, to us, that’s no surprise, but according to the text this fact is a bit ironic because Jesus had already been rejected for precisely that role by some other people. Historically, the religious leaders of the Jewish people in the first century – like the Pharisees and Sadducees – were the first ones to reject Jesus, but since that time everyone who has rejected him would fall into this category of those who do not believe, those who have stumbled and have disobeyed the word.

            Now before we go on to look at a twist in this word picture in verse five, let’s step back and make sure we understand what Peter is doing. He is setting up a contrast between two different groups of people – those who believe in Jesus and those who do not. What he’s emphasizing is that the true reality of life is exactly the opposite of what the unbelievers thought it was. They had rejected Jesus; they had considered him unworthy to be the cornerstone for their lives, and so, they had rejected not only Jesus but they were also rejecting those who followed him.

            But in the eyes of God the Father, Jesus was certainly not an object to be rejected because he was chosen and precious. And since Jesus is a person worthy of honor in the sight of God, those who believe in him are likewise considered to be worthy of honor. We are destined for honor according to verse seven, and we will not be put to shame according to verse six.

            So Peter’s basic message to his audience was, “Look – those who have rejected you because of your faith have gotten it all wrong! They think you deserve shame and disgrace, but in the eyes of God – the one whose opinion truly counts – you are honorable and will not receive shame from him, but praise.”

            One application of this message for us is to make sure that we always allow God’s opinion of us to define the way that we think about ourselves, not the opinions of others. Here’s the truth for you to hang onto throughout your life – other people may lie about you, but God never does. So if his word says that whoever believes in Jesus will not be put to shame, that’s the truth! You are not destined for shame, then, but for honor! If other people call you a fool because you embrace Christ, that’s a lie, because God the father embraces him and calls him chosen and precious. Other people may lie about you, but God never does! Everything he says about you in his word is true.

            We need a healthy dose of this today because of the increasing rejection we are facing in our country for following Christ and upholding Christian values. Christian ethics about the family and sexuality are being openly mocked and rejected today, so much so that the narrative in the media and in our wider culture is that you are obviously a hateful bigot if you still live by and promote such values and standards. This situation seems likely to only increase, so we need this reminder today that those who reject us because of our faith and its teachings have gotten it all wrong! Their opinion could not be more wrong, because God, who defines right and wrong and has made reality, considers us objects for honor because of our faith in Christ. We are not and will not be rejected by the One whose opinion truly matters, so even if we have to deal with rejection from others for a little while, we have to remember that their rejection of us is based on a lie, not the truth.

            Now, a moment ago, I mentioned that verse five presents us with a bit of a twist in this whole word picture of a spiritual temple. The twist is this – not only are we the spiritual temple, but we are the priests of that temple as well, able to offer spiritual sacrifices to God through Jesus Christ. I bet that comment was very significant to the Jewish believers who first received this letter, and they probably appreciated it more than we might – at least initially.

            Within Judaism, most of those Jewish people could not have been priests because the priesthood was open only to members of the tribe of Levi. Only the Levites had that honor – it was not available to anyone else. But within Christianity, every Christian is called a priest, and in this verse, we have that position because we are each able to offer the sacrifices of the New Covenant to our God.

            According to the New Testament, we could say that the sacrifices we offer are the acts of obedience that we perform for God. We do not simply offer animals, but rather we offer our lives themselves as sacrifices, with all of our goals and dreams and aspirations and hopes. We place all of these things in the hands of the Lord and dedicate them to his glory.

            Now why did Peter add this little twist into his word picture? Why did he also point out that we are not only the temple of God but the priests of that temple as well? I think perhaps he did it to show that Christianity is not in any way deficient compared to other religions.

            Christianity was very different from all of the religious activity that surrounded these Christians in the Roman Empire. It was very different from both Judaism and the worship that was practiced for the Greek and Roman gods because – outwardly at least – it lacked the three main elements of worship in all of those religious systems – namely, a temple, priests, and sacrifices. Christianity has no temple, no central place where we must go in order to have access to God. It has no priesthood, at least in the sense of some believers having unique access to God that isn’t available to all believers. And we offer no animal sacrifices.

            Now I wouldn’t be surprised if some of the people who rejected these Christians to whom Peter was writing made fun of the believers for these things. They probably thought that Christianity was deeply flawed because it didn’t have the external trappings of the other religions in the Roman Empire. But according to Peter, Christianity was not lacking in any way compared to these other religions. We do have a temple, a priesthood, and sacrifices, they are just different and in fact superior to the elements of those other religions. Our temple is not limited to just one place; it can be found everywhere! Our priesthood is not just a small group within our fellowship – it is the whole group! Our sacrifices are not offered once and then gone forever – they can be offered again and again, and they have much more power to actually bring about change in the world.

            So despite what these believers may have heard from those who rejected them, neither they nor their religion were deficient in any way. They were objects of honor in the sight of God, and they worshiped in a manner that was far superior to that of everyone else around them.

But not only does God see us as priests to serve Him…

2. God sees you as a messenger of His glory (vv. 9-10)

            I think verses 9-10 would have been deeply moving for these Jewish believers because they are so rich with allusions to the Old Testament. Each of the titles we find here had been used of the nation of Israel in the Old Testament [READ vv. 9-10].

            Peter’s point in these verses is quite clear—as members of the Church, this new spiritual temple, they were living out the role that had been given to the nation of Israel in the Old Testament. Remember—these Christians were apparently from a Jewish background. Many of their family members had perhaps been telling them that they had betrayed the people of God by following Christ. But as we saw before, their opinion could not have been further from the truth. They were God’s people precisely because they had embraced Jesus by faith. They were now living as the people whom Israel was supposed to be all along.

            Now lest we think that a passage like this means that God is finished with the nation of Israel, as though He has cast them aside completely, we need to understand that other passages in both the Old and New Testaments teach us that this is not the case. God still has big plans for the nation of Israel, but when their leaders rejected Christ, the nation could not be used by God in that condition. So God has ceased to carry out His work through them for a time, but He will once again use them in a great way in the future.

            Perhaps a sports analogy will help clarify their status and their relationship to the Church of today. Every sports team has its starters, the players whom the coach wants to have on the court or the field for the majority of the game. But if the starters aren’t following the game plan or they’re not performing well, the coach will take them out for a while and put in the subs.

            You can think of Israel as being kind of like the starters. God’s desire for them was that they would follow his game plan, his commandments, and that they would accept the Savior whom he was sending to them. Unfortunately, they chose to reject him, though God in his foresight and wisdom used even that rejection to bring about good, since it brought about the death and resurrection of Christ.

            But since the people of Israel did not follow God’s game plan, He has put them on the bench for a while, so to speak. Today he is accomplishing his work through people who are defined not by a single ethnic identity but by faith in Jesus Christ. We are presently carrying out the role that was meant for Israel, but just as every coach wants to get his starters back in the game, God has plans to carry out his work through Israel once again.

            So we are not permanent replacements for the nation of Israel, but for now we have been given this great task that is laid out at the end of verse nine – to proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. This is why God has called you and me and put us into the game, so to speak. This is his intention for his great work of salvation in us – that he might also do a great work through us.

            These privileges we have of being destined for honor and of being a special people in the eyes of the Lord have not been given to us just for our own benefit and enjoyment. With these treasures comes a tremendous task – the task of being God’s messengers and ambassadors in this world. How keenly are we aware of the excellencies that God has put on display by calling us out of darkness into light – traits like his goodness, justice, holiness, mercy, grace, and love.

            Christian, never forget – other people may lie about you, but God never does! They may reject you for your faith and thus communicate ideas about you that are not true. So do not walk in that rejection; do not let it define the way that you think about yourself. Rather, walk in redemption. Live as a child whom God treasures and wants to use to do a great work in this world. Look at yourself at all times in that light, and then live to proclaim the excellencies of the one who has called you into that light from out of the darkness.

Outdo One Another in Showing Honor--Romans 12:10 (Being the Body Series)

            Sometimes in life, you can have so much of a good thing that you fail to appreciate any one individual part of it. I think that’s what it can feel like sometimes to read Romans 12. Romans 12 contains so many profound lessons for the Christian life, and it gives us these lessons at a nearly break-neck speed. In verses nine through 21 in particular, the Apostle Paul peppers us with one brief yet profound command after another.

            It can be difficult to appreciate them all, so today I want to hit the pause button and focus on just one, which we find in the second half of verse 10 – “Outdo one another in showing honor.” Now perhaps you’re thinking, “Where did you just read from, Pastor Tim?” If you were following along in a different translation as I read, then you surely noticed that your translation may have used rather different words than mine. Notice the differences between these common translations:

·         ESV: “Outdo one another in showing honor.”

·         NKJV: “…in honor giving preference to one another.”

·         NASB: “give preference to one another in honor.”

·         NIV: “Honor one another above yourselves.”

·         NLT: “…take delight in honoring each other.”

            If you ponder the meaning of those phrases – like “giving preference” or honoring one another “above yourselves” – you end up with a very similar picture. But I’d like to unpack this wording from the English Standard Version: “Outdo one another in showing honor.”

            At first, it probably sounds funny to think of “outdoing” each other in something like showing honor, as though we’re actually competing with each other as to how well we’re living out biblical commands. But rest assured, we are not talking about some strange competition here.

            The idea of the Greek verb is that of taking the lead in something; being out front. If we think of honor as showing appreciation and esteem, I think we have a pretty good paraphrase for this command – “take the lead in showing appreciation and esteem.” Now how exactly would you take the lead in something like showing appreciation to others? I think we could apply this thought in a couple of ways.

1. Don’t lag behind!

            We don’t want to pass up opportunities to show appreciation to each other when those opportunities present themselves. The opposite of showing appreciation is probably being ungrateful, and that’s a character trait that we certainly don’t want to embody in our lives. When you express appreciation, you’re letting someone know how much they mean to you or how thankful you are for something that they did for you. We don’t want to pass up opportunities like that because it’s the right thing to do – not to mention that such gestures can go a long way in building a great friendship with someone.

            We certainly don’t want to have the reputation of being ungrateful. It’s my understanding that in the service industry, Christians have a reputation of being very stingy in giving tips. I have no idea where that stereotype came from, and I have no idea how true to life it is, but I think we all agree that we want to have the reputation of being generous people – people who show appreciation when acts of service are performed for us.

            I believe this thought also sheds some helpful light on the Christian concept of duty. When I think about serving God or even serving you, it’s appropriate for me to think to a certain degree about fulfilling a duty. I think ultimately we want our motivation for service to go beyond duty to delight (in other words, I serve God and others because I delight to do so) but nevertheless, the reality of our duty to God is there to push us along even when we don’t delight to do what we should.

            But when someone else serves me, I shouldn’t think just in terms of that person doing their duty. In other words, I don’t want to camp out on the thought that says, “I expect other people to serve me – after all, that’s their duty as a Christian!” Let them worry about their duty to God – on your part, you should view their service as a gift and thus be thankful for it and express that appreciation.

            I hope we do a good job of this as a church toward all of you who volunteer in various ways, but if we’ve never made our appreciation known to you, please accept my apologies and know that your contributions are not overlooked. We consider your service to be a gracious gift to us all. Please pray for the leadership of our church that we, too, would be faithful to carry out this command and express appreciation when it is due.

A second way that we could apply this command would be to…

2. Take the initiative – don’t simply respond to the initiative of others.

            One of the hallmarks of Christian behavior is that it is proactive, not reactive. In other words, I am not supposed to treat you merely in the same way that you treat me, so that if you treat me poorly, I will treat you poorly in return. Rather – and we all know this from the Golden Rule – I am supposed to treat you the way that I would want you to treat me – whether you actually treat me that way or not!

            So if a person has never shown appropriate appreciation to you, you don’t have to let that fact stop you from showing appreciation and esteem to them. Now of course, I’m not talking about flattery here. I’m not talking about twisting or exaggerating the truth – I’m talking about situations when appreciation and esteem are actually deserved. When they are, express that! Don’t let a good thing go unsaid when it should be said.

            We so often miss out on the life-giving power of encouraging words because we leave them unsaid. You might often think about how much you appreciate someone and you might often think very highly of them, but how often do you express that to them? Again, I’m not talking about flattery, I’m really just talking about faithfulness – faithfulness to obey the command just like this one here in Romans 12:10. Faithfulness to take the lead in showing appreciation – not simply to return such expressions when they are given to you, but to be the one who will plant life-giving seeds for the soul through words of appreciation, gratitude, and thankfulness.

            We of all people should be known as a grateful people because we know that every good thing we have is a gift from God. We know to give our appreciation and esteem to him – let’s make sure we don’t fail to give the same to the people who bring God’s good gifts to us through their service.

"See How They Love One Another!"--1 Peter 1:22-2:3 (1 Peter Series)

            As the second century of Christianity began to unfold, the faith had spread throughout the Roman Empire—particularly to some of its great cities, like Rome and Carthage in North Africa. At that time, Christians were the objects of great suspicion from their neighbors and government officials because they had given up the behaviors of their previously pagan lifestyle.

            Wild rumors had begun to circulate in some places about what Christians actually taught and did in their meetings together. To clear the air and defend the good name of Christianity, a church leader in Carthage named Tertullian wrote a brief explanation of Christian practices and a critique of the unjust accusations that had been made against them. In his work, he wrote at one point that these attacks against Christianity were made out of jealousy, because Christians displayed a character of life that their pagan neighbors did not possess. His statement highlighted a quality that will be the focus of our study of 1 Peter today.

            Here is what Tertullian wrote: “It is mainly the deeds of a love so noble that lead many to put a brand upon us. See how they love one another, they say, for they themselves are animated by mutual hatred; how they are ready even to die for one another, they say, for they themselves will sooner put to death (The Apology, ch. 39).”

            There is much food for thought in that quote. If people outside our church today were to take a careful look at us, would their overall impression be, “Those people sure love each other!” If people slandered our Christian faith, could we say, “You know, they’re probably a bit jealous of us because we have such a good thing going on here with our love for each other.”

            Regardless of where we might think we are with respect to a goal like that, it’s always good for us to remember that that kind of mutual love is, in fact, one of our goals as a church. When we think about that kind of love, a couple of important questions come to mind: what does that kind of love look like, and how can we sustain it? Peter is going to touch on those questions in our text for today, so let’s take a look at how he answers them.

1. Build upon your baby steps (1:22)

            In verse 22, Peter affirms the steps that these believers had already taken toward loving one another, and he calls on them to round out their love with passion and purity [READ v. 22].

            I’d like you to notice one thing about Peter’s language in that first phrase. He wrote that they had purified their souls by obedience for a sincere brotherly love. That word “for” indicates the purpose or goal behind their obedience. In their obedience for the Lord, they had this goal in mind of obeying not only for their own benefit, but to build up a mutual love within their Christian community.

            I think persecution had taught these believers just how much they truly needed each other. They may have been having a difficult time just meeting their own daily needs, so their experience taught them that they badly needed to band together.

            This is a goal that we need to keep in mind as well as we as individuals seek to grow in the Lord. Obviously there is an individual element for each of us in our relationship with God, but we need to remember that our individual relationship with God does not exist merely for our own benefit. We must always deal with this inescapable fact that we have been placed into the body of Christ – a fellowship with many different parts that have different functions, yet they are all designed to work together as one.

            So as I seek to obey God in my life and you seek to obey God in your life, we must remember that one of the goals of that process is not simply that I might hold the hand of Jesus more tightly, but that I might also tighten my grip with you as well – that I might become better equipped to show love to you.

            In his command, then, Peter explains how to fill out or round out our love for each other. He says, “love one another earnestly from a pure heart.” The word “earnestly” speaks of a deep-seated passion or drive. Your translation might say “fervently,” and that’s a good word. The word “fervent” comes from the Latin word for boiling. We could paraphrase this command, “love one another with a love that is boiling over,” or “a love that has reached the boiling point.” Water that is boiling has much more energy and potency to it than water that is simply at room temperature.

But how can we get that kind of life and drive flowing through our love, and how can we maintain it? That is what Peter explains in verses 23-25.

2. The Lord can use His word to sustain our love for each other (1:23-25)

            [READ vv. 23-25] Make sure you don’t miss Peter’s basic argument here. He states that we can love one another earnestly because the seed from which our new life in Christ sprang is imperishable. It is lasting. It is not like our physical strength, which is wasting away and perishing, rather it is constant, always pulsating with life, and thus our love can always be alive and fervent as well.

            Now the Holy Spirit is the source of our new life, but the channel or the conduit or the pipeline that he used it to send new life to us was the word of God – God’s message from himself about himself to mankind. This is the same channel that God still uses today to accomplish spiritual work in our lives, so God’s full message to us, found in the Bible, causes this book to have a unique quality about it that makes it unlike any other book in the world.

            That’s why we call it the “Holy Bible.” The word “Bible” comes from the Greek word that simply means book, but obviously, God’s word is a special and unique book, and thus we call it the Holy Bible, or the holy book. And because God continues to do work in our lives through the message of this book, he has protected it and preserved it so that it will remain forever.

            Let me give you just one example from history that reveals how carefully God has preserved the Bible. During my recent trip to Israel, one of the sites we were able to visit was Qumran, the place where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found. Many of the Dead Sea Scrolls were copies of the books of the Old Testament, and these copies were written in the centuries just before the birth of Christ.

            Prior to the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, the oldest copy of the Old Testament in Hebrew that archaeologists had ever found was from 1000 A.D., or 1000 years after the birth of Christ. So the Dead Sea Scrolls gave us copies of the Old Testament in Hebrew that were 1000 years older than any copies we possessed before. And when the text of the Dead Sea Scrolls was compared to the text of the manuscript from 1000 A.D., it was seen that the text was virtually identical, which served as further confirmation for our conviction that the message we read in the Bible today truly is the same message that Moses wrote and that Isaiah and Daniel wrote and so forth.

            God has miraculously preserved the Bible for thousands of years now because it is the channel through which he accomplishes his spiritual work in our lives. That process of God’s work in our lives is what allows our love for each other to be sustained with such a deep fervency. It’s not so much that simply reading a book fuels our love for each other, but it’s the fact that the author of the book is still alive, and in fact he has sent his own spirit to live with in our hearts. So the author of the book takes the message of the book and makes it become a living reality in our lives.

            So our power to love one another is not fading away as our physical strength is. It remains within us and is fed as we read the word of God, because the author of the book makes it a reality within us as we yield to his will.

Now we may still have a question about what it looks like to love one another from a pure heart. This is what Peter goes on to describe in the first part of chapter 2.

3. A pure heart comes from putting away evil and feeding upon what is good (2:1-3)

            In verse one, Peter gives us a good list of attitudes and behaviors that defile our hearts and thus need to be put away in order for our hearts to be pure. Notice how these attitudes and behaviors could all undermine and compromise our relationships with each other [READ v. 1].

            It’s not hard to see how these attitudes and behaviors cannot coexist with love. Malice refers to having evil intentions toward someone. Deceit, of course, refers to lying or trickery. Hypocrisy is what results when we try to hide things like malice and deceit with a good face, pretending that all is well between us and the person for whom we have malice in our hearts. Envy makes it difficult for us to work for the good of someone else because we’re jealous of the good that they already have! Slander is a very active effort to harm someone else through the things that we say about them.

            Peter’s solution is for us to put such things away from us. The word picture behind that verb is the action of taking off a piece of clothing and setting it aside. When your clothes are really filthy, you don’t just put something else on over the top of them. No – you take them off and replace them; you change into something else.

            Likewise, when you discover one of these attitudes or behaviors in your own life you need to lay it aside and go on without it. You must not tolerate it and carry it around with you any longer. Let these things disgust you the way your clothing might disgust you if you got filthy while working cattle or if you had a good workout with no deodorant on. Put these things away from you! Confess them to God and ask for his forgiveness, and if you have done harm to someone else, like through slander for example, then confess your sin to that person, ask for his forgiveness, then try to undo any damage that your words may have done.

            Having put those things away, we are then ready to grow in a different direction. Let’s see what Peter writes in verse two [READ v. 2].

            Your translation might say something like “long for the pure milk of the word.” The only difference here is a question about the translation of one word in the Greek text. The ESV translation here makes a bit more of a general statement about spiritual growth, but the point really ends up being the same. God accomplishes his work in us through his word, so we must long for his word if we desire to see his work in our lives.

            Peter tells us to make our longing like the longing that newborn infants have for milk. How intense is that longing? Do infants send a message like this: “Hey mom, I think I might be feeling a little bit of an empty stomach coming on here, so if you think about it, maybe you could pencil me in for a feeding here in a little while. I don’t really want to butt in on everything else that you have going on, so whenever you can squeeze it in, that’s fine. Meanwhile, I’ll just remain calm and totally peaceful as I wait patiently.”

            Is that how infants long for milk? Of course not! They demand it, they cry out for it, they act like they’re instantly going to die if they don’t have milk now, now, NOW! If they don’t have their milk, nothing will satisfy them until they do.

            My friends, if we are going to have a pure love for each other that is at a fever pitch, that is boiling over, we need to realize just how desperately we need to feed our souls with the word of God. The Bible is the channel through which God accomplishes his work in our lives. It is the way that he offers his promises to a whole new generation. It is the way that he corrects our thinking so that we can be transformed by the renewing of our minds. It is the way that he points out our faults and our flaws so we can put them away and grow in a different direction – grow until this salvation that God has given to us actually starts to have a good fit on us, so that the status of being a child of God actually comes to fit us rather well.

            Peter closes this little section in verse three with another motivation for all of this that is a stroke of rhetorical genius. He says that we should put away sinful things and long for the pure spiritual milk “if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good.”

            Peter isn’t really questioning his audience’s experience with the Lord so much as he is drawing them in to have them reaffirm it. When we read these words, the idea is that we will say, “Wait a minute! What do you mean ‘if indeed?’ I’ve tasted that the Lord is good!”

            When I make that affirmation, what have I just done? I’ve just taken Peter’s bait! I’ve just affirmed that what he said is true, and that I really should live the way he is describing. If I have tasted that the Lord is good, how can I do anything but long for his pure spiritual milk? Any other response would be improper, so with this little rhetorical flourish, Peter leaves us with no choice but to agree that we should love one another earnestly from a pure heart and long for the pure milk of God’s word. Any other response toward our good Lord would be improper. May God help us to have such loving and such longing!

The Peril Behind the Privilege of Calling God Your Father--1 Peter 1:17-21 (1 Peter Series)

            I imagine that, at some point in time, we’ve all thought about what it would be like to be the child of someone rich or famous. What would it be like to be the child of someone like Bill Gates, someone with more money than I can even imagine? How about the child of a movie star like Tom Cruise, or someone with great power and influence like President Obama?

            As Christians, we get to reflect an awful lot on the fact that we are children of God – and that reflection is a great privilege and encouragement! We very much enjoy reflecting on the protection that God provides for us and his promises to provide for our needs.

            But as Peter is going to remind us in our passage for today, there is a perilous aspect to this relationship that we may not reflect on quite as often, but we should, because it provides a significant motivation for us to behave in the proper way. I’d like to jump right in to a closer look at our text today without reading the whole text first, so we can allow Peter’s logic to unfold just the way that it would have for his original audience the very first time that they read this letter.

In the first part of verse 17, Peter calls upon us to consider just who it is that we appeal to as our father.

1. Who are you calling Father? (v. 17a)

            [READ v. 17a] Here Peter is reminding us about a father’s right and responsibility to evaluate how his children are acting and, by implication, to discipline them if necessary. After all, a good father doesn’t just hand out goodies all the time, right? He teaches and trains and guides and disciplines when it is necessary. You can count on the fact that God is going to act like a good father, so he too evaluates our actions and disciplines us when necessary.

            Peter’s main point of emphasis here is that God evaluates or judges us impartially. He doesn’t play favorites with us as he evaluates us. So, for example, I can’t harbor a sinful habit and say to myself, “Yes, but I’m a pastor! Surely that earns me the right to have God cut me a little slack!” It doesn’t work that way. Life is not Monopoly – no one gets a “get out of jail free” card or something like that. Nor can you follow a sinful path and say to yourself, “Surely God won’t hold me to a very high standard! After all, it’s not like I’m a pastor or something!” Peter is very clear with this statement – God does not play favorites; he is an impartial judge.

            So if there’s no wiggle room here – if there’s no chance for us to turn on the charm and get out of God’s fatherly discipline – how should this reality affect our behavior? We know from passages like Hebrews 12 that God takes his fatherly role as a disciplinarian seriously – what kind of perspective should that give us on our lives?

2. Live with a healthy fear of your Father (v. 17b)

            [READ v. 17] By “exile,” Peter is talking about our lifetimes in this world, when we are living away from our true, heavenly homeland.

            Now, the fear of God is a concept that can easily be misunderstood – and it often is! Many people have embraced one of two misunderstandings of this concept. The first misunderstanding is that we should fear God because he’s actually out to get us – that he watches over us just waiting for a chance to zap us into a pile of dust.

            I remember an old Far Side cartoon that pictured God sitting at a computer. On the computer screen was an image of a man walking underneath a piano that was being lifted up the side of the building. As God watched the scene unfold, he prepared to press a button on his keyboard that was labeled “smite,” apparently to send that man off into eternity.

            I understand the attempt at humor with that cartoon, but that picture kind of represents the way that some people actually think about God. They think of him as a cranky old man who doesn’t want anyone to have fun, and if we make one simple misstep in our lives, he’ll turn us into a pillar of salt.

            The second misunderstanding is that fear of God and love for God cannot possibly coexist in our hearts. This misunderstanding says that with fear and love, we have an either/or situation – we can either fear God or love God, but supposedly we cannot do both.

            Both of those misunderstandings are inaccurate, and let me explain why. As children of God, we don’t need to think that God actually has any harmful intentions toward us. He is not out to hurt us or out to get us, so we don’t need to fear that he has bad intentions in mind. The reality we must affirm, however, is that he is willing to discipline us out of love, and that discipline can be quite severe if God decides it is necessary. It could involve illness, it could involve financial ruin, it could involve broken relationships, and it could even involve death!

            Though God’s discipline is always colored by his love and mercy, he will not spare the rod, so to speak, when he knows that it is necessary. Many of us can understand this balance between fear and love by thinking about our relationships with our earthly fathers. This is not a perfect comparison, of course, because our earthly fathers are not perfect. And for a minority of us, we may actually need to overlook a lot about our earthly fathers in order to get a better understanding of God as our father.

            But for many of us, we know from our own experience what it was like to love our fathers and yet have an appropriate fear of them at the same time. We knew they loved us and had good intentions in mind for us, so we loved them for that. And yet, we knew that the claws could come out when necessary, and we feared that discipline.

            We should live with a similar, healthy fear of the Lord. Yes – we have the privilege of calling him our father, but he is not someone to be toyed with. We should not think that we can get away with things because we are children of God. In fact, we should rest assured that we will not escape discipline for our misdeeds – and we know that precisely because we are children of God, and he is faithful to discipline his children whom he loves.

Another factor in this healthy fear of the Lord is the remembrance of the priceless payment that God gave to save us.

3. You know full well the high price your Father paid to ransom you from bondage (vv. 18-19)

            [READ vv. 18-19] When Peter refers to “the futile ways inherited from your forefathers,” he’s referring to all that Judaism had become just prior to and during the lifetime of Christ. It had become little more than a collection of traditions and rituals that had become something of a substitute Savior for the Jewish people. That’s why they were largely only looking for God to send them a political leader and a military conqueror, and it’s why the leaders of the Jewish people in particular completely misidentified Jesus when he came into the world.

            But these Jewish Christians had been delivered from that futility which blinded their countrymen from seeing the Savior. They had been ransomed from it, just like a hostage is a ransomed after a kidnapping with some form of payment. And the payment that God gave did not consist of something as cheap and relatively worthless as silver and gold, but it consisted of something far more valuable – the precious blood of Christ, the only one in all of history who never sinned, the only one to ever give perfect obedience to God the father, the one about whom the Father said, “This is my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased.”

            Peter’s point is this – if God paid such a high ransom to make us his children, don’t you think he’ll take offense when we don’t act like his children should? Should we not expect to be corrected by our father?

            I cannot say it any better than the author of Hebrews, so I’ll ask you to turn with me to Hebrews 10:26-31 and follow along with me as I read [READ].

4. Living in these fortunate times makes your connection with God possible (vv. 20-21)

            You’ll remember that back in verses 10-12, Peter revealed how the Old Testament prophets dearly desired to know what we know about God’s plan, and to live through all that we are living through. Since Christ has already come once to this world, we are living in fortunate times. Let’s read what Peter said [READ vv. 20-21].

            The Father’s plans for the Son were already in place before He even created the world. Time went by for millennia, many generations came and went, and who should have the privilege to be around after Christ had come? Why, these believers in the 1^st century, and all of us today!

            Simply because of when we live, we can not only believe in God, but believe in Him through Christ, knowing of the Lord’s resurrection and his glorious ascension into Heaven. We have a hope that is more informed and more triumphant than anything that Old Testament saints had.

            And don’t you think, my friends, that since we know more, since we have greater spiritual resources through the Holy Spirit, don’t you think God expects more out of us? If we live in such a privileged time, shouldn’t our lives reflect that? Shouldn’t our lives reveal that we are taking full advantage of the privileges that we enjoy now between Christ’s first coming and His second?

            This is yet another reason for us to live with the fear of the Lord in our hearts. It is a biblical principle, my friends, that to whom much is given, much shall be required. Truly, we have been given much! We can call upon God as our Father, we have been ransomed at a high price from lives of futility, and we have been chosen to live now, during these privileged times in which God’s eternal plan has already moved forward in such powerful ways.

            All of this should strike within our hearts a healthy fear—a fear of failing the one who gave His Son’s own sinless blood for our salvation; a fear of incurring the discipline of one who judges impartially; a fear of squandering the days we have been given in these privileged times.

            Let us remember today that we cannot receive the privilege of being children of God without also accepting that peril that comes with that relationship. God disciplines every child whom He receives, but only as needed, of course. May we allow a healthy fear of His discipline to cause us to live in such a way that we do not need to face it.

Clear Thinking and Clean Living in Light of God's Plan--1 Peter 1:13-16 (1 Peter Series)

            Last week, I was putting together a puzzle with Adrianna. It was a puzzle we had never done before, and we just had all of the pieces in a baggie – we didn’t have the box for the puzzle at all. As we were putting it together, I found myself wishing that we had the box so we could look at the picture on the front of it and see how this whole thing was supposed to look. As you all know, it’s very helpful to have that picture on the front of the box to show you what the puzzle is supposed to look like when you finish it.

            When it comes to God’s plan for us as his children, he has already given us the picture on the front of the box, so to speak. We don’t know about every twist and turn along the way, but we know what things are going to look like for us when God’s plan is all said and done. The culmination of God’s plan for us is going to be joyous and beautiful and glorious.

            So far in the book of 1 Peter, we’ve read about the apostle’s description of the plan of God for our salvation. He’s emphasized that the fulfillment of this plan is certain – that there is an inheritance being kept for us, and we are being guarded for it. He wrapped up this first section by telling us that this plan that God has for us makes us the envy of the very angels in heaven!

            Beginning with verse 13 of chapter 1, Peter is now going to instruct us about how we should live in light of this great plan of salvation that God has for us. It is not only a truth to sit and savor – it is also a truth to send us into action in some very particular ways. In our passage for today, will begin to see that:

Central Idea: Our knowledge of God’s plan for us should lead to clear thinking and clean living.

Follow with me as I read 1 Peter 1:13-16 [READ].

1. Pull your thoughts together and focus them on the grace that is coming to you (v. 13)

            You might be able to tell from the wording of verse 13 that Peter’s main point is this command for us to set our hope fully on the grace that will be brought to us at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Remember that in the Bible, hope is not mere wishful thinking; it is a confident expectation and anticipation of something that you are looking forward to. In this case, Peter reminds us that we’re looking forward to the grace we will receive when Christ returns.

            This undoubtedly is a reference to the whole package of blessings that we will receive at that time. There will be the awesome experience of seeing Jesus with our own eyes – this one whom we have loved even though we’ve never seen him. We will enjoy being with him, and, as Peter mentioned in verse seven, we stand to receive praise and honor from him based upon our obedience to him today.

            Peter tells us that the anticipation and longing in our lives is to be set fully upon the return of Christ. That must be the moment that we are looking forward to more than any other – more than any plans that we’ve made for the future, even more than good things like having more kids or having grandkids or retiring. There must be nothing that we are looking forward to more than the return of Christ.

            Why is that? Because of this simple principle – what you desire to have the most tomorrow will determine what you prepare for today. Your desires for the future will impact the way you behave today.

            I remember speaking with a young lady once about the return of Christ. As our conversation went on, she said to me, “I can’t wait for Christ to return, but I hope I can get married first.” Think for just a moment about what that young lady was really communicating. I don’t believe she was trying to downplay the significance of Christ’s return, but what her statement really communicated was that she wanted to get married more than she wanted Christ to return. She could have said, “I can wait for Christ to return if it means I’ll get married in the meantime.”

            Now, I certainly understand the desire to get married. That desire hit me hard after I met Carmen, and I think the desire is even stronger for ladies! But what’s the danger in desiring marriage more than you desire the return of Christ? Well, you might be very tempted to resort to sinful ways of getting the attention of the opposite sex, or you might settle for the first person who shows interest even if that person doesn’t have the makings of a great spouse according to biblical standards.

            Anything that we might desire more than the return of Christ will bring along with it strong temptations to disobey Christ’s commands. And so, if we can set our hope fully on the return of Christ, we will find ourselves preparing for that moment more than any other, which in turn will lead us to live in the proper way.

            But how exactly do we see to it that our hope is set fully on the return of Christ? That’s what Peter tells us how to do in the first part of verse 13. He uses an interesting word picture in the first phrase of the verse. In Greek, it literally says “gird up (or pull together) the loins of your mind.” He’s referring to the way that the Jewish people would adjust their clothing when they needed to get down to work rather than leisure.

            The typical outer garment for a Jewish person was a long robe that stretched all the way down to the feet. When a person was getting ready to do something active, something that might require more freedom of movement, they would pull up the bottom of that robe and tuck it into their belt so it wouldn’t get in the way of their feet and trip them up. That action was similar to what we might do when we roll up our sleeves if we are about to do something dirty, or when a track athlete removes his or her warm-ups to get ready for an event. So we might say that the idea is that we need to pull our thoughts together so that none of them trip us up.

            This statement is a call for us to carefully assess the way that we think about every part of our lives. We don’t want to leave any loose ends in our thinking that might trip us up. So for example, perhaps a person might be thinking in a biblical way about how to start a family, but he’s not thinking biblically about how to grow his business, so consequently he gets tripped up – he starts to pursue some unethical and sinful ways to do business.

            Or perhaps a person thinks in a biblical way about how to work for his boss, but he’s not thinking biblically about something like retirement, so he becomes greedy and falls in love with money. So as we look toward the future, we don’t want to set our hope on Christ’s return in only three fourths of our lives or any other fraction. We want to pull together all the loose ends of our thinking so that none of them trip us up.

            Peter also tells us that part of setting our hope fully on Christ’s return is to be sober-minded. That statement emphasizes clear thinking – careful reflection on life that is not clouded by ignorance or any of the other hindrances that might characterize those who don’t know God’s message to mankind.

            We are not in that predicament, are we? We know God’s word, his message or revelation to mankind. We know his commands, and so we have a clear guide to know what is right and wrong. We know about his plan for the future, and so we have a clear view of where human history is headed and how we can be prepared for what’s to come.

We are not lost in some fog of uncertainty or ignorance. God has given us a clear model for how we should live, and that’s what Peter goes on to emphasize in verses 14 to 16.

2. Live by the pattern laid out by God, not your own passions (vv. 14-16)

            In verses 14 through 16, Peter points out that just as it is normal and appropriate for children to imitate their parents, we too, as children of God, should imitate our heavenly father [READ vv. 14-16].

            The word “conformed” in verse 14 gives us an interesting word picture, in my opinion. The Greek term is the root word for our English word “schematic.” A schematic is like a diagram or a blueprint; diagrams of electrical circuits in particular are often called “schematics.”

            I think that connection can offer us a helpful paraphrase of this statement: “Don’t follow the diagram or the blueprint drawn up by the passions of your former ignorance.” As we are building our lives we need to follow a different blueprint, a different pattern – and that pattern is God’s own holiness.

            The fundamental idea of holiness is the idea of uniqueness; something that is separated out by itself because it has a unique and special quality to it. God has a unique and special quality to him no matter how you think about him. He is unique in his power, his knowledge, his eternality, and his wisdom. He is certainly also unique in the way that he interacts with others, because he always treats others in ways that are right and proper.

            We can’t really imitate God in terms of his power, for example, because we simply don’t have the capacity to be Almighty. But we certainly can imitate him in the way that we treat others, and that idea is really what the Bible is getting at when it calls us to be holy. Compared to the way that unbelievers treat other people, we should treat other people in a way that is unique and different, with a higher and more noble and beautiful quality to it.

            We should treat other people the right way, but perhaps what truly makes us unique and different is that we can treat other people the right way for the right reasons and with the right kind of goals in mind. As Christians, we certainly don’t have a corner on the market when it comes to treating people the right way. Followers of other religions and even people who are irreligious can and do treat other people with kindness and fairness.

            But what sets us apart as Christians is that we can treat people the right way for the right kind of reasons and with the right kind of goals in mind. We can treat people the right way not just out of habit or to conform to tradition as Midwesterners or something like that, but as a true expression of the character that the Holy Spirit is carving out within us. We can treat other people the right way not from a motivation of what we might get from them, but simply because they’re people made in the image of God and because it’s honoring to God to act that way.

            We can treat other people the right way without trying to satisfy any misguided notion that doing so will earn us favor in the eyes of God. Above all, I would say that our worldview and spiritual resources as Christians empower us to be able to treat all kinds of people the right way in all kinds of circumstances. Do we always do that? Of course not, but we are empowered to do so by the Holy Spirit who lives within us.

            Finally, please notice how Peter supports his call for us to imitate the holiness of God. First, he appeals to us as obedient children, which reminds us that it is simply normal and appropriate for us to imitate our father. But the real bottom line is seen in verse 16 – we have an express, written commandment from God to be holy because he is holy.

            Let us never forget that as Christians, the word of God is to be our final word for all matters of faith and practice – what we believe and how we conduct ourselves. The Bible is true and it is in fact a message from God to mankind, and though we can call God our father and Christ our brother without stretching the truth even a little bit, we must never forget that God is also our master. When we learn of his commands, we have one obligation – obey! We are not free to disobey his commands without the risk of facing his displeasure and discipline.

            And since his commands are recorded for us right here in the Bible, we also have no excuse for not knowing about them. As in our own courtrooms here in the United States, being ignorant of the law is no excuse for breaking the law. In the next section of 1 Peter, we will learn that it is in fact a fearful thing to live with the knowledge that even though we have God as our father, that fact does not exempt us from an evaluation of our lives when we meet him someday.

            It is so important for us, then, to learn God’s commands for us in the Bible so that we can obey. It is imperative for us to exalt the Bible in our own opinions so that we don’t treat its teachings as just one option among many for how we could live, but as the final word for how we should conduct ourselves in this world.