Fearing the Lord In Every Manner of Life

Transcript

GR1927
09/22/2015
Fearing the Lord in Every Manner of Life
I Peter 1:17-21
Gil Rugh

We are going to I Peter chapter 1 in your Bibles. You know one of the ways the devil works even in the church is he tries to take the simple, clear things of God’s Word and complicate them. The Word of God is not complicated in the sense that God was trying to hide things from us. He has spoken. He has spoken clearly and it is clear as believers that He expects us to understand it. You would expect that the God who created us, who created languages that we can communicate with, would be able to communicate with us in an understandable way. Now because of sin, our ability to understand God’s truth is distorted and corrupted but in Christ we are made new. As believers we have the Holy Spirit. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t take study and effort and work but the Word is clear if we accept it as God has given it.

People are always drawn to other things. That simplicity and beauty and clarity of the Word we are looking for something else, something more so we are drawn to forms. It has become somewhat popular to revert back to the mystics and the monks of earlier centuries to try to create atmospheres using candles and all that goes with it. It is the appeal of Roman Catholicism. It has the externals. It has a man who is supposedly God’s representative on earth and supposedly he can mediate the body of Christ to you and it’s tangible, it’s physical and the ceremonies and all that go with it impresses people. We see that with the pope coming to this country and the millions of people anticipating it.

One of the morning papers has a couple of pages all about the pope and what he has said about various subjects from the environment to immigration to – who cares but for people who are looking for the physical, the religious, that whole realm it matters.

We have what God has said but somehow what a man says and even as evangelicals that pressure and that desire begins to corrupt the church.

I was reading the testimony while I was gone of a man who had some years ago been a leader in evangelicalism and converted to Catholicism. He liked the authority of the magisterium of the church that could have final say and something of the majesty of the worship and those kinds of things. I said, well what is wrong with the simplicity and beauty of the Word. You note we are talking in Peter and he has opened up by talking about the wonder of God’s sovereignty in providing our salvation, a salvation that has given us an inheritance and a hope for the future and the enabling power to live in the present. You don’t find the Scripture saying we need certain forms, certain rituals. We have to learn that from man. We have to go back to the monks and the mystics. We have to go to Catholicism. I use Catholicism because it has an appeal that draws people because it has the visible form, majestic cathedrals, all of that which goes with it.

Peter is writing the simplicity of the faith and the trials and the suffering and the hardship, he said that is part of the life. We rejoice he said in verse 6 “In the salvation He has provided even now for a little while if necessary you have been distressed by various trials.” This is and we were talking about this earlier today is a proof of your faith. It is a testing of your faith. It is a refining process of your faith. Just like gold put through the fire and the refining process to burn off the impurities, to bring out the purity of the gold. So that is what God is doing with us. It is a process of growth, maturing, becoming more like the Savior.

Verse 8, “You have not seen Him, you love Him, you don’t see Him now, you believe in Him, you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory.” And the outcome of our faith is the salvation of our souls. This is what was prophesied in the Old Testament and prophecy goes on to say. He starts out his second letter and says that “God by His divine power has granted to us everything necessary for life and godliness.” As soon as we depart from that simplicity, clarity and beauty of God’s Word we begin to complicate matters. We begin to focus on externals and lose the focus on God’s work and what God is doing.

Having overviewed in these opening verses of God’s provision of such a wonderful salvation that is sufficient for us now and for the future, he talks about our conduct now and in light of this salvation. It is true we have our attention focused on a future hope. So the first thing he says, he gives a command. He gave two commands in verse 13 to 16. We have already moved through these verses. The first, if you have it marked in your Bible in verse 13: “Fix your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.” We think well we spend too much time focused on future things, too much time talking about what is going to come. We need to be focused on what is here but again that is a subtle way of what, taking our attention away from what God says ought to be our focus. Man says we ought to be focused on dealing with problems now, on improving our world now, on doing this now. Climate change is of huge importance. God says “fix your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.”

We are reminded that the things of this world are transitory. We are dealing with matters of eternal importance but this impacts us now because we have our hope fixed on what God has promised that shapes the way we live. So the command in verse 15, the second command in these verses is “Be holy. Fix your hope, be holy.” You don’t live like you used to live. We have experienced the power of God that changes us within. We have been made new within. We have to keep this in view.

He is going to talk about our conduct here, the conduct for believers. We ought not to be living like we used to live. “Don’t be conformed to your former lusts which were yours when you were ignorant of God and His salvation,” the point of verse 14 but “Like the holy One who called you. You must be holy in all your conduct, all your behavior.” You know we have become partakers of the divine nature as he talks about in the opening part of his second letter, Peter’s second letter. We belong to God. He is our Father. We are His spiritual children. We are to manifest His character.

We keep going back to John 8. Jesus told the religious people of His day, the Jewish leaders, what? “You are of your father the devil and you conduct yourself like him. He was a liar, you are liars. He was a murderer, you are murderers.” But now we have become children of the living God and His character is holiness, holy, holy, holy the cry of the seraphim in the presence of God in Isaiah 6 and how amazing, “like the holy One who called you, you must be holy yourselves.” What a standard. It doesn’t say be more holy than this person or be as holy as that person. You be holy like the One who called you. That’s that process of growth that we are talking about. It involves suffering and difficulty and trials of various kinds. That is what he talked about back in verses 6 and 7. This is a refining process not to destroy us but to mature us which brings us more into conformity with the character of God and His holiness.

This has always been His intention for His people. He quotes from the Old Testament from the book of Leviticus where God had instructed Israel, His people in the Old Testament, “You shall be holy for I am holy.”

Verse 17-21 where we are going to focus our attention. Peter focuses attention and continues this development of holy living. How we are to live. We don’t live this way to become acceptable and holy to God, clean up your life and then God will be pleased with you. No, you must be born again. When you are born again you are born anew. You are born from above. You become the child of God. Now you live a holy life.

In verses 17 to 21 there is one command. The command is in verse 17: “Conduct yourselves.” Everything in verse 17-21 is built around that command. So he starts out: “If you address as Father the One who impartially judges according to each one’s work conduct yourselves this way and knowing that you weren’t redeemed with perishable things.” But in verse 19: “You were redeemed with precious blood, the blood of Christ” and this has been God’s plan from the foundation of the world when He ordained Christ to come and be the Savior and we become believers through Him. All of this theology around the what, here’s how you must behave yourselves, conduct yourselves. It is the same word basically as we had in verse 15, “Be holy yourselves in all your behavior.” It is the same basic word. Now we have it in the command, in the verb, “Conduct yourselves.” How do we live?

Verse 17 begins: “If you address as Father” as he is not doubting that. This form of condition would indicate that he is confident they are believers. “If you address as Father (and you do,) the One who impartially judges according to each man’s work.” In other words He is your Father now. That is the spiritual relationship, right, when you are born again. It is an act of God. That is how he started out in the first two verses talking about God’s sovereign work in salvation. He’s the One who brings about that salvation. “For by grace you have been saved through faith and that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God, not as a result of works.” So now we have a new relationship. God is our Father. “You address as Father the One who impartially judges according to each one’s work. You must conduct yourselves in fear during the time of your stay.” And they have added on “earth” in English Bible and that would be the point we will see as we move along here.

“Conduct yourselves in fear” because He is the One who impartially judges. God is our Father. Now we have to have a proper perspective on Him. He impartially judges, a present tense here. It is an ongoing activity. He is the One evaluating our conduct, our behavior. We ought not to think that now we have become God’s children sin is something less serious. You know, He understands, He knows. None of us is perfect and we maybe have a light view of sin.

When you see the seriousness of people lost without Christ but now that we are God’s children, He’s our heavenly Father but don’t get the idea that He is a heavenly Father that is tolerant, indifferent to how we live. The serious of that is stated in verse 15 and 16 when He said, “You must be holy” and the reason is, “I am holy.”

I not only expect, I require you now as My child to produce My character. So we recognize our heavenly Father. We call Him Father. “He is the One who impartially judges.” He is evaluating us and the analogy of course is true in a human, physical family. You have children, their conduct, their behavior is being evaluated by the parents. The father is responsible. He is seeing what they do. It is not in a mean way, waiting to come down in a destructive way on them. It is for their good, their benefit. How often does a father say, “This is what is expected and required of you.” And when the child deviates in that behavior there are consequences.

So we are to conduct ourselves in an understanding that God is doing the evaluation. He is our heavenly Father and He is impartially judging according to each one’s work. So it is not a matter of being compared to someone else. He is evaluating me. He is evaluating you.

We have to be careful because we tend to compare ourselves with one another. Well, I may not be perfect but I am doing better than they are. Well, that is not how He is evaluating. Just like when you have several children. One of them may try to excuse their conduct by saying “But they do this, my brother does this, my sister does this.” And you say, “I am talking to you about your conduct. I am dealing with you.” That’s how God is evaluating us. That is encouraging. He’s my Father. He is evaluating my conduct, my work.

So I am to “conduct myself in fear,” in fear. Now we talked a little bit earlier today you have to have a balanced view of Scripture. If you just take one passage of Scripture and don’t consider it carefully in light of the broader picture you can get a misunderstanding. God is judging but He is judging as a Father so this is not a judgment to condemn me. In other words my father would have been judging me when I was a young boy but I never had the fear, boy, if he is not happy I am out of the family. He’s going to throw me out on the street. That was never the issue. The fear I had of him was displeasing him because I loved him and fear of the consequences for not conducting myself properly but not that fear that I would no longer belong to him. So that is the balance we have in talking about the judging of God of His children here.

There is a fear and the emphasis is on fear here. The command is “conduct yourself” but the order here indicates He is emphasizing, “In fear conduct yourself.” This is in light of the fact He judges impartially. Just because He is my Father doesn’t mean He overlooks my failures, that I am not accountable like other people are. I am accountable to Him.

Fear comes out of two things really. I love Him so I want to please Him. I have a fear of displeasing Him and I do have a healthy fear of the consequences of when I displease Him. You know fear is a sign of a healthy believer, the fear of God. It is the sign of a healthy church. It is good. It was good that I feared my father. That was the motivation for the proper kind of behavior.

Again, we have two aspects. Because we love our fathers we don’t want to displease them. I remember talking to a man with an oriental background talking about when he was a young person. Their family relationships may be their own twists. He said I got a grade a little lower than I should have. When I brought it home and my father saw it he cried. He said, “I was ashamed why I displeased my father.” There is that aspect. When you love someone you want to please him, right? You want to do what will please them. We love God because He first loved us. We want to please Him but then there is the other side. I fear Him because there are serious consequences for disobedience.

Come back to the book of Acts chapter 5, Acts chapter 5. This is the account of Ananias and Saphira in the early history of the church. They lied to the Holy Spirit. You know how they lied to the Holy Spirit? They lied to the congregation. They lied to Peter providing leadership here.

So in verse 3 Peter said to Ananias, “Why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit?” At the end of verse 4: “You have not lied to men but to God. When he heard these words Ananias fell down and breathed his last (and note) and great fear came over all who heard of it.” This was God’s intention. Such a severe discipline here produces fear that God intended. He is a God to be feared.

Down in verse 11: “Great fear came over the whole church.” You want the church to live in fear? Yes. We should fear displeasing God, disobeying Him, fear that our disobedience will bring His discipline into our lives. Fear is connected with growing, maturing.

We were in 2 Corinthians today. Come to 2 Corinthians chapter 7, verse 1, the chapter we were in in our earlier study. “Therefore having these promises, beloved” and previous, the instructions to come out from among them, be separate, live a life faithfully devoted to God. “Having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit.” Note this – “Perfecting holiness in the fear of God.” There is to be that healthy, holy fear and that helps what? To bring holiness to further maturity because it keeps us from sin. This lower view of God, He is tolerant and He is understanding. It’s alright if I don’t do everything that He wants me to or I do somethings He wouldn’t. It’s not alright and it’s not for our good. I mean He is perfecting holiness in us and that is in the context of the fear of God.

Come over to Philippians chapter 2. We won’t look at all the verses but Philippians chapter 2. Verse 12: “So then my beloved just as you have always obeyed not in My presence only but now much more in My absence work out your salvation with fear and trembling,” because it is God who is at work in you both “to will and to work for His good pleasure.” We are about pleasing Him. So there is a healthy fear to the point of trembling even as His child.

When I was young my dad did the disciplining. I prefered my mother to do it but she usually passed it on to my dad and usually what she would say if there was something, “You go to your room and wait till your dad comes home.” Ah, well Mom, why don’t you just do what needs to be done. No, your dad will do it. But mom, I, “Go to your room.” So I go to my room and then I would hear dad come in the door and I would hear plump, plump, and then dad would come to the room. You know I feared that. I trembled because I knew what was going on. In our room on the way up I knew the pattern. He was taking off his belt, not because he was going to change his pants. That’s where we were going. It was a healthy fear. I had disobeyed. It is good. You know this day what happens – children raised without any discipline they become adults that are still living like children out of control and we have all kinds of excuses. God is not going to have His children function like that so you work out your salvation with fear and trembling. Know it is God at work in you and He is doing it for His good pleasure and that it what we are about right, to be pleasing to Him.

Alright, we need to look at another verse to put this in proper context. Come over to I John, I John chapter 4 and talks about the love we have, the context in John, for one another because God is love and He loved us and because He first loved us we love Him and now we love other believers. So He is talking about this in and verse 10 of I John 4: “In this is love. Not that we loved God but He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.” The satisfaction for our sins, He bore the wrath of God paying the penalty for our sins. “Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought to love one another.” That comes out of it. You are family now, spiritual family.

So come down to verse 17: “By this love is perfected with us so that we may have confidence in the day of judgment because as He is so are we in this world. There is no fear in love.” This is the same basic word, phobos, fear. “A perfect love casts out fear because fear involves punishment and the one who fears is not protected in love.” I just thought we were told that we were to be fearing God. Now we are told that if you fear your love is not as complete as it should be. This is another one of those passages we talked of today. We have to be careful that we deal with Scripture in the perspective it gives. There is a certain kind of fear we need not have. As I mentioned earlier I never feared that my dad would put me out. Sometimes I wished he would but he wouldn’t. He loved me, he disciplined me for my good

Come back to Romans chapter 8. This is after talking about the salvation we have in Christ and if God gave His Son for us what would He hold back from us? He is working all His purposes for our good in that well known verse, 28. Verse 33: “Who will bring a charge against God’s elect? God is the One who justifies. Who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is He would died, rather Who was raised, Who was at the right hand of God, Who also intercedes for us. Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will tribulation, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, peril or sword ?” There are believers who go through this and he quotes from the Old Testmanet.

Verse 37: “But in all these things we overwhelming conquer through Him who loved us. I am convinced that neither death nor life nor angels nor principalities nor things present nor things to come, nor powers nor heights nor depths nor any other created things will be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” So I understand the two facets of fear he is talking about. I belong to God for time and eternity so I have no fear that He will cast me out of the family. That is one of the tragic doctrines of what we call Arminianism. You can lose your salvation. Early in my Christian life we were part of a group that taught that. Every night I went to bed saying, “Oh, Lord, forgive me one more time. I will never sin again. I will never be disobedient like that. I will never talk like that. I knew I sinned and I thought I lost it. You know, God take me back one more time. No, I will never be put out of the family. So I don’t have that kind of fear. Anybody who has that kind of a fear if they are a believer, they are an immature believer. They haven’t understood the greatness of God’s love, the greatness of His salvation that it is His sovereign power that guarantees our security that salvation has provided for that eternal security.

So you are not perfected in love if you are thinking because you’ve sinned God would throw you out of the family. Well then, therefore, it doesn’t matter as long as I am going to heaven what else matters. Well I never thought that growing up. Dad’s not going to throw me out of the family so it doesn’t matter. It mattered. It hurt. To displease God is unpleasant for us. So there are both sides of the fear. So I want to be careful. I read I John 4 and think that it doesn’t matter whether I sin – it does matter and John is clear on that but reading those particular verses, “Perfect love casts our fear,” yes, there will be no eternal condemnation. I am in the family. You are in the family. You were born into that family and when you are through faith in Christ, you’re there. Does your sin matter? Yes, it matters greatly and you ought to fear displeasing Him because He is evaluating what you do. We think well, we got by. We don’t get by because the eyes of the Lord roam to and fro on the face of the earth beholding the evil and the good. There is no darkness for Him. What we hide from others, we don’t hide from Him. We ought to fear. You know what it is like if you have been a believer for a while. You sin, you almost hold your breath and you think I’ve got a pain. Maybe God is disciplining me for my sin. There is a healthy fear. He is gracious, His forgiveness goes on but there are consequences.

Alright, come back to Peter. “We conduct ourselves in fear during the time of our stay.” This emphasizes the fact that this is a transitory time for us. It is of great importance. This is the time that I have to live pleasing to God in obedience to Him, to have His perfecting work go on in me, to store up rewards not earning my salvation but the rewards that come for faithfulness.

This word, “during your stay,” come down to chapter 2, verse 11. “I urge you as aliens and strangers.” That ‘strangers,’ same word translated basically ‘stay’ during your time as a stranger on this earth. We are outsiders. The whole world lies in the evil one. This whole world system is opposed to God. We see it. It is like oozing out through all the cracks. It becomes more evident. This world is not our home, the song says, we are just passing through. We are on our way to glory and when we return to this earth it will be transformed by the power of the One who would rule over a redeemed creation.

Back up to Philippians chapter 3, Philippians chapter 3, verse 20: “For our citizenship is in heaven from which also we eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ who will transform the body of our humble state into conformity with the body of His glory and the power that He has to subject all things to Himself.” You see our citizenship is in heaven ultimately what we anticipate.

So we are strangers and sojourners here. Hebrews 11 talks about the Old Testament saints; that same attitude and view of things. So we conduct ourselves here, realizing this is not home for us. So we don’t want to become entangled in the things of this life like Paul wrote to Timothy. “You are a soldier, no soldier entangles himself.” The affairs of this life, I mean we live here, we have to eat and work and do that but this is not the focus of our life. This is not what life is about. We are here as slaves of the One who loved us, died for us, and is working His purposes in our lives. We are here to bring the message of the eternal God and His salvation to a world that is lost and without hope.

It is the work of the devil to turn the church into we have to reform the world. The church ought to be involved in all the things of trying to make the world better. I am not against planting flowers and making things look nice but don’t lose sight of what we are about.

Peter will go in his letter. We know all these things are going to be burned up as he writes at the end of his second letter. That ought to motivate you to live a holy, godly life. You want to pour your life into that which what? What won’t last. That is what we are talking about here. Here is how we conduct ourselves during the time of our pilgrimage. We are here for a purpose. We want to fulfill that purpose.

“Knowing that you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold from your futile (empty, worthless) way of life inherited from your forefathers,” redemption, (lutroo, the Greek word some of you studied) to redeem, set free by paying the price. “You were not redeemed with perishable things.” The world calls them valuable but they are perishable, silver, gold. “From your futile way of life,” out your futile, worthless, empty life that you “inherited from your forefathers.”

He is writing, remember, to Jewish believers and we won’t take time to go and look at a lot of passages but just go to one, Mark chapter 7 because as you are aware in the New Testament, believers are constantly under pressure to return to Judaism. We see the Roman Catholic’s invitation. I saw it on the TV this week to “return home,” calling Catholics to come back to Catholicism and for them, even Protestants.

My Roman Catholic boss in New Jersey talked about the Gospel and I would witness to him and his priest would come in. He managed the business and other Roman Catholic friends and he would always say, “Come over here, he would call me and even to his friends there, I want to introduce you to my dirty, fallen away Roman Catholic friend that was me. He says, “You are just a fallen away Catholic. You need to get back.” I don’t know that he ever trusted the Lord. He’s passed away long since but that is how they view us.

The Jews, you’ve got to get back to Judaism. You don’t have to abandon Christ but you do have to come back to Judaism. Look what Jesus said to the Jews in Mark chapter 7, look at verse 8. In verse 6 he quotes Isaiah, “Rightly did Isaiah prophesy of you, you hypocrites. This people honors Me with their lips, their heart is far from Me. In vain do they worship Me teaching as doctrines the precepts of men, neglecting the commandment of God, you hold to the tradition of men, you are experts at setting aside the commandment of God in order to keep your tradition.” He gives an example, verse 13: “You are invalidating the Word of God by your tradition that you have handed down. You do many such things as this.” That empty worthless traditions that became so important that the Jews would die for them. They would kill for them but they were worthless. That couldn’t redeem you. They never could, Jeremiah chapter 2, verse 5, “They went far from Me and walked after emptiness and became empty.” That was God’s evaluation through Jeremiah of the Jews of his day. They went far from Me, walked after emptiness and became empty.

So back in Peter. We were not redeemed with perishable things. And the things you inherited from your forefathers. You know people are devoted. You know the devil does his work well from the beginning. Get them baptized as children, babies and raised in their parents’ religion, their traditions. You raise your children in that and everybody thinks it is wonderful. It is a disaster. It’s a road to hell. He is reminding them, how are you redeemed? No one was ever redeemed through trying to keep these external things and systems including baptism, sacraments, men’s creations. “You were redeemed with the precious blood as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ.” That’s what it took, the death of Christ on the cross. All this other stuff that has been added and piled on, the work of the devil. It is just like Paul had to tell the Galatians. You add these things to the message of Christ, you are anathema, cursed to hell.

You have to be careful. Evangelicals in mass have moved away from the clarity of the Word of God on this. Well as long as they believe in Christ we can call them brothers. That is a lie from hell. You say you believe in Christ and you add anything to that you are on your way to hell. We want to be clear. It is not enough to say you believe in Christ. You are believing in Christ and the sacraments; you are believing in Christ and your baptism; you are believing in Christ and circumcision; you are believing in Christ and keeping the ten commandments, you are lost! It is a trap of the devil!

Why do you think these New Testament churches kept getting in trouble? Well you come and say, “You have to believe in Christ. He is the Messiah. He died on the cross. You must believe in Him.” The Acts 15 conference but that is not enough. You were redeemed with precious blood, not with anything from your empty way of life that your parents passed on to you. They probably passed on the Gospel to you, the message of the Gospel, thank God but we are talking about the empty, worthless traditions. You got baptized into this church, confirmed in this church, my parents were; they helped build this church. What does that have to do with anything? It is just a way of keeping people entangled, bound to the empty hopelessness like the Jews were. We have the law. They have the commandments, we have our traditions. You have nothing, empty worthlessness. You were redeemed with precious blood and this has been God’s plan from the beginning. No one was ever saved by their works, by keeping the law, by keeping the Ten Commandments or by offering an animal sacrifice which could never take away sin. Christ was foreknown before the foundation of the world. God established and ordained this as the plan of redemption before Genesis 1:1, “In the beginning God created.”

It has now been made known, it has appeared, Christ has appeared in these last times for the sake of you who through Him are believers in God who raised Him from the dead, gave Him glory so that your faith and hope are in God. We lose the beauty of the clarity of this salvation. And the church, oh yeah, you know, I feel much more like I am worshipping.

The man that I mentioned who was a leader in an evangelical organization who left to convert to Catholicism said, “my life is so much richer now that I can go to Mother Mary.” Where do you get that in the Scripture here? Peter telling people that you need Christ and Mother Mary. Christ was the ordained One before the foundation. He was foreknown. This is the same word that we saw back in verse 2 of chapter 1 that “we were elect according to the foreknowledge of God.” We had a discussion of foreknowledge. It means more than just to know ahead of time. You think God just looked into the future and saw that Christ would be crucified so He included that in His plan?

One person who is well known who not too long ago passed away wrote a book on attacking some Calvinistics’ doctrines and you know who he is. He talks about foreknowledge and it just means God knows ahead of time. I may have missed it but I have been through the book. I was through the manuscript before the book was printed. I have been through the index. There is one verse on foreknowledge that he leaves out and you know which one it is? I Peter chapter 1, verse 20 because that is a real problem. Did God plan salvation by the provision of His Son or did He just look ahead and see what was going to happen and since that was what was going to happen He would make it a part of His plan. That’s why you have to be careful in defining the words. Foreknowledge means more than just to know ahead. When God knows ahead He has ordained it ahead. This was God’s plan before the creation but now He has appeared and we benefit from it who are believers in God. He doesn’t just say “in Christ” because if you don’t have the Son you don’t have the Father and if you reject Christ you reject the One who sent Christ. Believers in God who raised Him from the dead gave Him glory. Your faith and your hope are in God. You are believers in God Who raised Him from the dead. That is our faith. That is our hope. The simplicity of it. The beauty of it. That is what we need for our Christian life. We don’t need another book on the secret of the Christian life, spiritual formation which is learning certain patterns to follow, certain ways to meditate, certain ways to become closer to God, basically drawn from monks. Who is going to the monks to find out how to have a spiritual life? Why don’t we just go to the Word of God? We are the people who profess to believe this is God’s inspired Word. But you really ought to go to the monks. Everything here He has given us in Christ, everything necessary for life and godliness.

You know I sometimes read changes that have come about in men that I have respected. The seminary that I attended. What in the world has happened to it? Where has it gone? Would I want anybody to go there? How did they get off track? You know it comes in subtlety.

So Peter is encouraging these believers – you’ve got trails, you’ve got pressures, you’ve got difficulties? That shouldn’t make you think something is wrong. These are part of God’s plan to refine you, to purify you, to impress you of the importance of fearing the Father who loves you and because He loves you He requires the behavior that is not only best for you but honoring to Him. And He has made every provision for us to live that life.

He keeps reminding us of the basics. What? We are redeemed by the precious blood of Christ. This was God’s plan ordained by Him before the foundation of the world. You were chosen in Him before the foundation of the world as we have seen in passages like Ephesians chapter 1. So this is God’s plan. There is no other plan. There never has been. There never will be. That is the beauty of it. In Christ we have been given everything necessary for life and godliness. Now walk in holiness, fearing God, your Father who loves you, is monitoring your behavior, is providing for you everything you need.

Let’s pray together. Thank You Lord for Your Word. Thank You Lord for the simplicity of your Word. We don’t get off track because Your Word is confusing. We get off track because we allow the doctrines of men to confuse us. Thank You for Your work in Christ planned before the foundation of the world, ordained for our benefit who would become believers in Him. Lord thank You for the provision You make for us to walk in a manner pleasing to You. You have saved us by grace. You have ordained the walk for us, individually as in a church we want to be a testimony of Your grace, of the holiness of the God that we love and serve. We pray that would be true of us as we serve you in the days of the week before us we pray in Christ’s name, amen.