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Oct 21, 2012

You've Got Mail! (Introduction)

Passage: 1 Peter 1:1-5:14

Preacher: Tim Badal

Series:Strangers in a Strange Land

Detail:

We believe that over the next 22 sermons we are going to glean great truths from this letter Peter has sent.  We’ve spent a lot of time in the last couple of years looking at Peter’s life.  We learned some things through the Gospel of Mark in which Peter is a main character.  We also did a series not too long ago called “Empty: This Changes Everything” and two of those four messages keyed in on Peter.  As an elder and preaching team, we thought it would be good to hear a little bit more from this great Apostle Peter  from whom we can glean a great deal.

We’re going to begin with an introduction to the letter.  Introductions are not the easiest sermons to preach because you run one of two extremes:

    1. You don’t say anything at all about the book or the writer because you want to keep it for the weeks to come, or
    2. You spend this sermon giving everything you were going to give in the next 22 sermons and then just close in prayer. 

So I want to balance that out as much as possible and kind of set the table so we can enjoy—sermon after sermon—what God would have for us in this great letter.

I would encourage you to read the entire letter in one reading on your own time—there’s nothing greater.  It’s five chapters long—105 verses—and it would be a wonderful time.  It would be great for each of us to sit down and read it from start to finish, to see it and read it as it was written.

For now, I want to start by looking at what is called the salutation—the first two verses.  This will set the stage for what is to come.  First Peter 1:1-2 says:

1 Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, To those who are elect exiles of the dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, 2 according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in the sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience to Jesus Christ and for sprinkling with his blood:

May grace and peace be multiplied to you.

Let’s go to the Lord in prayer. 

Father God, we need Your grace and peace in abundance.  As we read these words from a man Your Son walked with and discipled personally, a man who had all kinds of issues and struggles—like all of us—we recognize that You changed him.  You made him to be like Your Son.  In doing so, we see the fruit of that ministry in the writing of this letter.  Father, we need that grace, mercy and love that come only from Jesus Christ.  I pray that You would shower it upon us in abundance.  We need it because we are strangers in a strange land.  We are a people who walk, work and live in this world which does not know You.  We recognize this world does not live according to Your ways.  We recognize this world does not worship or glorify You as God.

So there is a great divide in our lives because we know what Your Word has said and what You’ve called us to, yet we walk, talk and work with people who see the world in such a different way.  How ought we to live, Lord?  Thank You for 1 Peter which tells us exactly how.  How can we live in a world of sin, debauchery, trials, temptation and even tribulation?  How can we do so and seek holiness every step of the way?  Lord, thank You for 1 Peter because it answers those questions.  I thank You for what You’re going to teach us.  I pray that our hearts and minds would be open to hear what You have to say.  I pray that we would be ready to obey You because of the work You’ve done and the salvation You’ve given.  Lord, be with us and strengthen us through Your Word.  In Christ’s name we pray, Amen.

I want to look at this introduction under the heading “You’ve Got Mail.”  As young men, my brothers and I used to ask our parents—usually in the car—what it was like not to have certain things.  For example, “How did you live without a VCR?  How could you live without color television?”  I mean, that just seems so crazy.  But it wasn’t too long ago that my nine-year-old son said, “Hey Dad, what was it like to not have cell phones?”  You start feeling old when people start asking you those questions.  “How could you live without a cell phone?  How did you go on with your day without having one of the basic essentials of life?  I mean, everybody has to have a cell phone, Dad.  By the way, I’d really like one for Christmas.”

As we grow older—because of the advent of so much technology—we know that we’ve lived without these things.  As a teenager, one of the biggest inventions of my generation was the advent of the internet.  I remember as a teenager the advent of the computer—especially the personal computer—and then I remember people starting to talk about how you could talk via your computer and that this “internet” connected computer to computer.  I didn’t know how it all worked.  I remember my senior year my parents got a new computer and we hooked up to the “super-highway.”  We started to have conversations with people.  Chat rooms were big then.  You could have all these conversations with people all over the world and it was amazing.

I remember the first time we got mail and how excited we were.  “We’ve got mail!”  It’s not just everyday mail; you don’t even have to go to the mailbox for this mail.  All you have to do is go to your computer and that voice came on the computer and said, “You’ve got mail.”  We were all giddy, “This is awesome!  This is so wonderful!  I’ve never seen anything like this before.”  But now—years later—I look to my Google mailbox and I have over 25,000 of those emails.  I can tell you I don’t usually get very giddy when emails come now.  That’s what happens—familiarity breeds contempt.  When something becomes rote to us or we become all too acquainted with something, we begin to push back and say, “There’s nothing all that exciting about it.”  What was exciting to me back in my senior year is no longer exciting to me now.

I saw that a couple weeks ago when one of our Sunday School teachers sent one of my boys a card.  I didn’t think much of it, but I said, “Joshua, you got a card from your Sunday School teacher.”  He bolted to the kitchen, “Give it to me; don’t open it!  I want to open it.  It’s my mail.  It’s for me.  Do you see?  My name is on it!”  He was excited because he was the recipient of a letter.  You and I don’t do that—just like with email.  It’s every day we go out to the mailbox.  Usually it’s just bills or a bunch of junk mail.  Rarely are we all that excited.  Here’s the thing—just like with the mail and email messages we get—because of our familiarity with them, they don’t change who we are.  They don’t create a sense of great desire to read them.

A letter was written to us—it’s called God’s Word.  As we open up 1 Peter, we can have the ideal response like my son or my senior year as I opened that email, “What is it?  What is it going to be all about?  Who is it from?  I want to examine it.  I’ve never been a part of something like this before and I look forward to what is going to come.”  Or we can say, “We’ve been there, done that.  Every Sunday we open up that same Book and hear it being taught.  So what’s it going to do?” 

Brothers and sisters, we should be so excited as Christians that God wrote a love letter to us.  Part of this love letter was written by the hands of Peter and through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.  We’re going to open this Book up and examine it.  I will tell you though, if your familiarity with and accessibility to the Bible thwarts your ability because you’ve been there and done that, then you’ll receive nothing over these next 22 sermons.  So what I would encourage you to do is take a look at this letter with a new set of eyes and an open heart, saying, “Lord, maybe I’ve studied this book before.  What do You have for me to learn today?  What do You have to speak to me where I’m at right now?”

So here’s 1 Peter.  I want you to think about those exiled Christians who were in Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia.  That’s Asia Minor or modern-day Turkey.  These were real Christians in a real place.  Being written around 63-65 A.D. with all kinds of persecution taking place, a letter came to the house churches in those areas.  It’s not just from anybody.  As the people asked, “Who is it from?” they heard the words, “It is from Peter, an Apostle of Jesus Christ.”  Peter’s name must have struck them with a great amount of excitement.

Peter was a man who walked with Jesus.  Most of the readers who would read this letter had never seen Jesus before.  Many of the people who worshipped Jesus in these churches had never heard Jesus’ voice or touched Him in any way.  So here is a letter from a man who not only saw Jesus and heard Him speak, but also walked and talked with Him for three and a half years.  This was a man who saw Jesus do miracles.  This was a man who saw Jesus stand before the Pharisees and repeatedly speak truth to a group of men who were obstinate.  Peter saw Jesus arrested, put on a cross and raised from the grave three days later.  You had better believe these people were excited.  They were totally and utterly amazed at every word that came from this letter.  It would be good for us to follow in their pattern: to be excited and engaged.  We have the words of an eyewitness of the account of Jesus Christ.  Not only that, brothers and sisters, but we also have God sharing His words with us through the work of the Holy Spirit in Peter’s writing.  So as we look at 1 Peter, we need to look with a new set of eyes.  What are we to gain from this letter?  I want to chart a road map for us.  There are three things we need to remember about this book as we look at it in every sermon:

    1. We need to understand the personality of Peter.  We talk about the dual-authorship of Scripture, a tenet in which every Bible-believing evangelical must believe.  It’s the idea that Peter wrote this with his own hands and thoughts, but superintended in that process was God Who was using Peter with his own thoughts, experiences and personality to write the very words of God.  Within that, we see the personality of Peter come out continually.  We’ll talk some more about that later.  To understand 1 Peter, we must understand the writer Peter.  We have to get him down.  If we don’t understand him then we’ll have difficulty understanding the book.
    2. We need to understand the preeminence of Christ.  Over and over again, Peter will raise Jesus high.  He will lift Jesus above all other things and if we don’t see or recognize that, we’re going to have a world that has no hope because this world is troublesome.  It’s difficult.  The trials and tribulations we face at times are more than we can bear—until we cast our eyes on Jesus and see Him high and lifted up.  Peter will say repeatedly, “I know this world is hard, but look at Jesus!  I know you’re suffering trials of many kinds, but look at Jesus!  I know there are difficulties and it seems like nothing is ever going to happen.  I know it seems like God’s promises are failing—but let me tell you about Jesus.”
    3. We need to understand the persecution by Nero.  One of the things I love about 1 Peter is it comes right out of our history books.  Peter was in Rome and writing to a group of people just outside the area of Rome over in Turkey—not very far away.  Of course, we think those things were far away but they really weren’t far at all.  In fact, Rome had an empire which all of these areas were under.  We know from history this letter takes place around the same time Nero—who was a crazy Roman emperor—burned down Rome.  We’re not sure why he did it.  There’s a lot of speculation by both secular and Christian historians as to why he did it.  His whole empire was at risk and people were sitting there saying, “Nero’s this crazy man.  Why is he leading us?  Why would he do such a thing?”  So he found a scapegoat and said, “Christians are the ones who started the fire.”  As a result of that, Christians became the most wanted of the Roman Empire.  If you forget that, then you forget the context of what’s going on.  When Peter says, “Suffer well,” he is saying, “Suffer well because people are going to persecute you” (1 Peter 3:8-22).  You’re going to see later on that he says, “Honor the emperor” (1 Peter 2:17).  My goodness, we have difficulty sometimes honoring our presidents and senators but Peter said, “Honor Nero.  Pray for him—the one who burned down Rome, killed people and blamed it on us even though we didn’t do it, and the one who even now is driving us into the Colosseum and sending us to our deaths with the lions and fierce animals.  You need to honor him.”

If we remember these three things, we will see the amazing letter that is before us.

The Leader

Now with our message today, I want to look at three headings.  We are going to be all over the place and I don’t want to camp in one place too long because I don’t want to take away from what we’re going to talk about in the days to come.

The first thing we must do if we want to understand 1 Peter is understand the leader.  The letter begins with the writer.  We usually just put our name at the end of the letter.  The way they did it in the first century was saying right off the bat, “I want you to know who I am.”  We do this now of course with our postal address so people know ahead of time who the letter is coming from and who has sent us the information we’re about to read.  We see right off the bat that the author was Peter.  Of course, Peter was  an apostle of Jesus Christ.  The reason he wrote this is because there were probably a lot of Peters back in that day.  So Peter said, “I’m not just any ordinary Peter who lives in this area during this time.  I am the same Peter who walked with Jesus.”

What do we need to know about Peter?  I want to look at two different headings:

  • Peter the man
  • Peter the apostle of Jesus Christ

Peter the Man

I want you to notice first of all, we see two things that are very important for understanding who Peter was.  First, he was driven by his fervor.  At first, I had said he was driven by his flaws.  As I began to think it through, I didn’t like that wording.  For one, I know Peter is probably watching us right now and the last thing I want to do is badmouth the guy and have him say, “Badal, what are you doing?  You know, it would be nice and really convenient for me to preach a sermon about you.  I could totally do that—it would be a great sermon.  Man, we could really bring out your issues.”  So I thought, “No.  We’re all driven by our flaws.”  But more importantly as I thought about it, what made Peter Peter was that he was driven by his fervor.  The idea of fervor is being passionate and intense, so the idea here is Peter was a man who was intense and passionate about all things.

There are two kinds of people in this world.  If you want to see, go to your local swimming pool.  Think about it for a moment.  The first person comes up—exhibit A—and walks out to the pool.  All so gently and methodically, they just kind of dip their toe—not too fast—into the water.  That’s not good enough.  Once they kind of test things, little by little and inch by inch they get into the pool.  “Okay, that’s alright.  Okay, I’m still alive.” 

That was not Peter.  That’s some of you.  God bless you; we need some of you in this world.  Peter was the guy who backs up as far as he can, runs as fast as he can, balls up and yells, “Cannonball!”  Some of you are like that.  Peter was that cannonball kind of guy who drives everybody else crazy.  We cannonball people look for “Exhibit A” type people in the pool and jump right next to them!  Then we have the audacity to say, “We love you.  Isn’t it good to be in the pool?”

Peter was a guy who was all-in.  This would have been seen not only in his life as a fisherman but in his family life.  Peter was a married man.  We know this not because we were given Peter’s wife’s name but because one of Jesus’ first miracles was the healing of Peter’s mother-in-law.  If you want to know the compassion of Jesus, He is a Savior Who heals mothers-in-law—God bless Him!  Peter saw this miracle.  No doubt he was an all-in kind of guy with family and as a fisherman but also as a follower of Jesus Christ.  We’ll see that repeatedly.

Before I move on, I want to take a moment to point out something.  Bible teaching isn’t just teaching the Bible.  It is looking at the characters of Scripture and gleaning truths from them.  I want to glean a truth from this—one of the things Peter needed to do and we need to do is something we don’t see in the Bible yet I think is so important to the Christian faith.  It is so important to our lives and service as Christians.  Peter needed to know who he was and what he was all about.  I think far too many of us don’t know that.  Who are we?  What is our personality?  We need to know these things because we need to know how God made us.  One of the things I think we’ll see in the progress of Peter is that he recognized who he was and then put it under the authority of Jesus Christ.

God uses the quiet ones who go step-by-step into the pool.  God needs you.  He wants to use you.  He has created you for a purpose.  He didn’t say, “We can’t make everybody the great cannonball people because they’re awesome, so we’re going to make you something different.  Adam, you’re going to be one of those slow, methodical ones who is quiet and more introverted.”  God made you for a purpose.  I want you to learn what that purpose and plan is for your life.  Don’t just say, “Well, God’s ministry and the work of the gospel will only happen through cannonball-type people—through the Peters of this world.”  No, brothers and sisters, God uses even the quiet ones.  He uses the ones who are more methodical and think before they speak—God bless you.

I struggled with this idea of knowing who I was and what I was all about because I was a Peter type of guy.  I got in trouble.  Every time I thought I was on the right track as a kid, I would find myself failing.  I really struggled with that.  My self-image as a young man was incredibly low.  It wasn’t because I didn’t like the way I looked or anything like that.  It wasn’t cosmetic.  It was because I couldn’t get a break.  Every time I thought I was making some progress, I would fail—just like Peter.  I would sit there and say, “God, why did You make me this way?  Why is it that every time I come into a room I can tell people are sitting there saying, ‘Wow, what’s this guy going to do now?  Let’s take a step back because we don’t know what Tim’s going to say or do.’”  I felt many times like I was a ticking time-bomb, watching people just waiting for me to explode.  I carried that over and over again.  As a young man I would say, “God, why do I have to talk before I think?  Why is it I have to be the center of the universe?  Why?  This is terrible.  How could You have made me this way?”  I want you to know what God has taught me in the years after that: God made me exactly that way for a purpose.

Here’s the thing—that’s not an excuse just to allow both your strengths and weaknesses to shine.  I had to learn quickly that just because God made me a certain way doesn’t give me an excuse to live outside of His authority.  You might be a Peter or maybe one of the other far quieter disciples whom we don’t hear anything about.  Maybe you’re a Thaddeus.  You don’t hear anything about Thaddeus.  But God made you that way.  You need to recognize what the strengths and weaknesses are for the personality you have and ask God, “What needs to be fixed?  What areas need to be accentuated?”  When you do that, God is going to use you in marvelous ways.

Within the life of Peter, we see his personality.  He was a guy who was full of fervor.  The second thing we see is that he showed great potential but in the end he was faithless.  There are three scenes in Peter’s life we see and hear taught about repeatedly.  By far, Peter is the most taught-about disciple and it’s mostly because we see more of Peter in the Bible than any of the other disciples.  There are three episodes in Peter’s life where we see that Peter started out good but ended by failing miserably.

Turn in your Bibles for a moment to Matthew 14.  I don’t want to teach sermons on these things so we won’t spend much time here, but you can note these and look at them more closely later.  Matthew 14:22-29 says:

Immediately he [Jesus] made the disciples get into the boat and go before him to the other side, while he dismissed the crowds.  And after he had dismissed the crowds, he went up on the mountain by himself to pray.  When evening came, he was there alone, but the boat by this time was a long way from the land, beaten by the waves, for the wind was against them.  And in the fourth watch of the night he came to them, walking on the sea [walking on the water].  But when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were terrified, and said, "It is a ghost!" and they cried out in fear.  But immediately Jesus spoke to them, saying, "Take heart; it is I.  Do not be afraid."

And Peter answered him, "Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water."  He said, "Come."  So Peter got out of the boat and walked on the water and came to Jesus.

Let’s stop there for a moment.  Think about this.  Here you have a bunch of fishermen.  They were out in the boat.  The waves were crashing.  It was night; it was dark.  Then they saw this figure walking on the water.  They were afraid it was a ghost—but not Peter.  Peter saw that it was the Lord and he was excited.  He said, “Not only is it Jesus, but I want to be with Jesus.”  He was an all-in kind of guy.  He said, “Jesus, I want to walk out there with You.  I want to do what You’re doing.”  That is commendable.  Here was a disciple who wanted to do what Jesus was doing.  “Let me do that.  Just tell me and I’ll walk out on the water.”  He did.

We might think, “Oh Peter, you’re a pretty cool guy,” until we read the rest of the story.  Notice what it says as it goes on in verses 30-31, “But when he saw the wind, he was afraid, and beginning to sink he cried out, ‘Lord, save me.’  Jesus immediately reached out his hand and took hold of him, saying to him, ‘O you of little faith, why did you doubt?’”  Peter started out great and then found himself—because of a lack of faith—failing.

Now let’s go to another passage.  Turn a couple of pages over to Matthew 16:13-23 where we see this theme again.  Verses 13-16 say:

Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, "Who do people say that the Son of Man is?"  And they said, "Some say John the Baptist, others say Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets."  He said to them [he’s talking to the disciples], "But who do you say that I am?"  Simon Peter [there’s our guy] replied, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God."

I know Jesus didn’t do this, but I can just see Him having fun with Peter, “Ding, ding, ding!  You got it!  What do we have for him, Bob?  You got the right answer; you nailed it.  I am the Christ.  I am the Son of the Living God.”  Peter must have thought, “Yeah!  I know I failed in walking on the water and I’ve been getting ribbed by the rest of the guys for that, but now I’ve done it.  It was an important question and I nailed it!” 

Alright Peter, well done.  But here’s the problem—we haven’t read the rest of the story.

In verse 18, Jesus says, “And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.”  Notice though verse 21, “From that time Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised.”  Here comes Peter.  He couldn’t stick with his victory.  Verse 22 tells us, “And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him…”

Think about that for a moment.  “Hey Jesus, I know You’re the Creator of all good things, of Heaven and earth and You’re worshipped day and night by angels.  But let me tell You, You got this thing wrong.”  It says in other parts of the Scriptures that he was rebuking Jesus harshly, “Come on, Jesus!  You’ve got to be kidding me!  You’re not going to the cross; no way!”  Notice what Jesus did in verse 23, “But he turned and said to Peter, ‘Get behind me, Satan!  You are a hindrance to me.  For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man.’”  I wonder if Peter had a lump in his throat, “Oops!  I took it a little too far.”  He started out well but failed in the end.

Let’s look at one final example.  Turn one Gospel over to Mark 14:26-31.  Mark says this:

And when they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives [this was the night Jesus was going to be arrested].  And Jesus said to them, “You will all fall away, for it is written, ‘I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered.’  But after I am raised up, I will go before you to Galilee.”  Peter [here’s our guy] said to him, “Even though they all fall away, I will not.”  And Jesus said to him, “Truly, I tell you, this very night, before the rooster crows twice, you will deny me three times.”  But he said emphatically [here he is again saying, “You don’t know me Jesus.  I know myself.”], “If I must die with you, I will not deny you.”  And they all said the same.

I love that all the other disciples said, “Yeah Jesus, whatever he said, we say.”  What happens?  Is Jesus right?  Of course He is.  Peter starts out well and fails.

We have to be careful because it is easy for us on a Sunday morning in our Sunday best to say, “What a loser you are, Peter!”  But I want to tell you something—you could totally take out that name Peter and put Tim in there.  He starts out well but in the end, fails.  We come into this building and start out the week well.  “What a great time of worship.  My heart has been moved and I’ve been changed.  This week is going to be totally different than it was last week.  I’m not going to look at the things or say the things I did last week because I’m a new person.”  We leave this place and it doesn’t take long for us to be back in the same garbage we were in before.  It doesn’t take long for the preacher so I’m going to assume it doesn’t take long for you.  We start out well but in the end we are found faithless.  I don’t bring all of this up to knock Peter down.  I do this to show you Peter is just like one of us.  He’s like every one of us.

Peter the Apostle

I want you to notice something happens; something changes.  We see that not only is Peter a man, he is an apostle.  We see that 50 days after the resurrection, something changed in Peter.  Peter denied Jesus.  Jesus restored him on the Sea of Tiberius.  Jesus told Peter to be a shepherd to his flock (John 21:15-19).  We see that Peter didn’t struggle with finding his potential anymore; he started living it out.  One of the reasons  is because he became focused on his calling and his Savior.  Something rattled Peter so that he was no longer this guy who went back and forth between belief and doubt.  He had now become rock solid on his following of Jesus Christ.  What happened?  These things are great evidence of the power of the resurrection in Peter’s life.  Peter was changed.  He was not just a man who had walked with a Rabbi.  He was now a man who was changed because he saw the power of God in the resurrection.

For some of you right now, you feel like you are a Peter.  I tell you, I felt like a Peter and I still do at times.  My life changed when I gave my life to Jesus in more than a salvation way and told Him, “Lord, You need to live, work and do Your will through me.  I will become the one who allows You to empower me to do that.”  In the same way, Peter’s life was changed.  Your life can be changed.  Peter became focused.

Notice what his focus became as you listen to these words in 1 Peter 1:13-16:

Therefore, preparing your minds for action, and being sober-minded [or “self-controlled,” Peter knows what it means to be self-controlled], set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.  As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, since it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.”

He became focused and headed in the right direction.  Peter would prove his love for Christ through faithfulness.  He had gone from being faithless to being faithful.  I want you to notice that one of the ways Peter proved his love was seen in John 21:15-19.  Jesus was talking with Peter on the Sea of Tiberius and he said, “Do you love Me?”  He asked Peter three times.  Peter said, “You know I love You.”  Jesus said, “Okay, that’s great that you say it with your words.  Now do something about it.”  Three times, Jesus came back and said, “Feed my sheep; tend my lambs.”  I want you to notice something—one of the ways we live out our lives as Christians isn’t just telling Jesus we love Him.  It is living differently.  So 1 Peter is Peter’s magnum opus of saying, “This is how you live in such a way to show Jesus you love Him.  I know what it is like to look Jesus in the eye and tell Him three times, ‘I love You Jesus,’ and have Him answer three times, ‘Then do something about it.  Show Me that love.’”

Some of us are able to say clearly with our mouths, “I’m a follower of Jesus Christ.  I love Jesus,” but our lives aren’t an example of that.  Peter didn’t come up short.  He hit it.  Notice his faithfulness wasn’t just seen while Jesus was on earth or while Peter was a young man.  It was seen even to the point that tradition tells us Peter was hung upside-down on the cross as a martyr for the faith.  He would go to his grave as a faithful follower of Christ.  If Peter can do it then we can do it.

One of the problems I have with our friends in the Catholic church is they’ve elevated Peter to something he’s not.  When we look at Peter we say, “We could never do that.”  Let me tell you, Peter’s just like you and me.  We can do it.  It’s not that we can do it because we’re like Peter.  We can do it because we have a Savior named Jesus.

The Letter

Let’s look at the letter now.  In our second point, we see we need to explore what he writes.  Go to 1 Peter 5.  What is the purpose for the letter?  Now we know this man was an important man to whom we can listen.  There’s so much we can glean from his life and ministry with Jesus.  So why did he write us?  In 1 Peter 5:12, he said, “By Silvanus, a faithful brother as I regard him, I have written briefly to you, exhorting and declaring that this is the true grace of God.  Stand firm in it.”  There’s the purpose statement.  Usually your thesis statement goes at the beginning.  Peter put it at the end, “Here’s the reason why I wrote this letter to you.”

There are three reasons Peter wrote this letter:

To encourage the believer. 

Peter uses the Greek word parakaleō.  The idea here is to call someone alongside, to give them strength and aid or to encourage someone in an earnest way.  So Peter said, “I have written to you and wanted to write you so that I may help you and be of some aid to you.  I wrote to encourage you, give you strength and give you the courage needed to go throughout the day.”  This word was used in a medical way, talking about those who would comfort others who were hurting.  Peter is telling us, “Village Bible Church, the reason why this letter was written was so that when Tim gets up to preach, he would encourage you with my words.”  This is what he was trying to encourage.  He gathered these people together.

Peter’s heart in writing this letter was this, “I know life is hard.”  Pastor Keith just got up here and told us that some of our own are fighting for their lives.  Life is not easy.  We’ve got all kinds of financial issues, political upheaval, wars and rumors of wars going on.  Life isn’t easy and Peter said, “I get it.  I know it.  I want to encourage you.”  One of the goals I have every week is you would walk out of this place encouraged.  There are probably times I fail you miserably in that, but that is my goal.  We have a Savior and a God Who loves us.  What Peter did is what Paul did in Romans 8:37 where we learn that we’re more than conquerors.  No matter what man does to us or what this world throws our way, we can be encouraged because one of the themes of 1 Peter is hope.  You have been “born again to a living hope…” (1 Peter 1:3).  So who cares what happens on Election Day?  We’ve got hope!  Who cares if America stands for another 150 or 300 years?  Let’s say it blows up tomorrow—we have hope.  We have hope when the medical doctor comes and says, “You’ve only got a couple of days.”  We have hope when our kids are running amuck.  We have hope when there’s no money in the bank account.  We have hope.  So when we open up 1 Peter, he reminds us, “Be encouraged, God’s people, because we have Christ Jesus as our Lord.”

To explain to the believer. 

He said, “I have written briefly to you, exhorting and declaring that this is the true grace of God” (1 Peter 5:12).  The word “testify” (epimartyreō) is a legal term that means “to bear witness.”  Not simply an eyewitness but one who, with the help of supporting evidence, makes something more certain.  So Peter was saying, “I’m not just telling you, ‘Have hope.’”  Don’t just get in a circle and sing Kumbaya and say, “Well, I hope something happens.”  Peter said, “I have hope.  The reason we can all have hope is because when it was at its darkest and seemed like all hope was gone, Jesus hung on a cross.  We ran for our lives thinking the world was done and our lives as we knew them were over.  But on that third and glorious day, Jesus rose from the grave and I’m an eyewitness to it.  I have seen it and touched Him.  Because of that, brothers, we don’t have an empty hope.  We have a true and real hope found in the grace of Jesus Christ.  I’m a witness.  Let me share with you.”

Peter will repeatedly share with us the evidence that proves our hope is real.  We have an inheritance that is stored in Heaven (1:4).  So what are these light, momentary trials?  Peter has been there and tells us those trials are nothing compared to what God is going to do in our lives (1:6-7). 

To exhort the believer. 

So then he exhorts the believers.  Here’s the gist of Peter’s message, “I know what you’re going through is tough.  I know life isn’t easy.  I know some of you want to give in, but let me tell you, when things look tough for us, they’re very easy for God.” 

So what is our job?  Our job is to stand firm.  That word “stand firm” is one Greek word—histēmi.  It means to hold your ground.  In the original Greek, it would have literally read, “In it, stand firm.”  What “in it” means is in your life, where you’re at, stand firm.  This phrase is one of the most explosive phrases Peter utters in his whole letter.  This word is shared in the aorist tense.  It’s an active word.  He’s fired up about this.  He says, “I know things are difficult and there’s persecution.  I know every time there’s a knock at your door you’re afraid this is the end.  But be encouraged; Christ is with us.  That same Jesus Who was with me, walked with me and talked with me is with you.  Now your job is to stand firm.”

Brothers and sisters, in that one verse there is a sermon.  We want to encourage the believer and explain how we can be encouraged.  Then our job as listeners is to listen, hear that Word spoken and then do what it says.  You’ve heard, “Be encouraged.”  You’ve heard what the Word of God says about why we should be encouraged.  Now your job—your assignment if you choose to accept it—is to stand firm this week in the truth of God’s Word.

This is what Peter does in his letter.  Over and over again, you’re going to see him encourage, explain and exhort.  We’re going to study that together.

The Lifestyle

The final thing I want you to see is the lifestyle.  Peter wasn’t just writing to share some nice words.  This is not a Hallmark card.  His hope and prayer was that the life of those who called themselves Christians would be different.  Why should it be different?

Because of our situation. 

In this text, Peter tells us a couple of times that we—the listeners—are aliens and strangers.  That was true physically at the time of the letter.  The listeners were from Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia.  They were from all these different places and had been dispersed because they could no longer live where they wanted.  Think about that for a moment—the Badals are told, “You can’t live in Hinckley anymore.”  Or you are told, “You can’t live in Sugar Grove anymore because if we find you, we know you’re Christians and we’re going to come after you.”  So we leave our homes and go to another place which is foreign to us.  That place doesn’t have the same language or culture.  Peter was saying, “Wherever you are, you are to live like Christ even though you may be the only person who does it.”

Brothers and sisters, we can apply that to our own lives.  We can say I am probably in the minority of how I live in the Prairie View subdivision of Hinckley.  I’m different.  In spite of the culture around me, I’m not pursuing life and purpose according to my friends’ and neighbors’ definitions but according to the plans and purposes of God.  I recognize that I’m an alien and stranger.  Peter says repeatedly that we need to live differently.  Look at 1 Peter 2:11, “Beloved [Village Bible Church], I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul.”  Where are those passions coming from?  One of the places is the world.  Our neighbors and friends are doing it and the TV shows are telling us to do it.  Peter says, “You don’t live that way.  This is not your world so don’t live like that.”  So he tells us to abstain from those things.  He says, “Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation” (1 Peter 2:12).

Peter is saying, “It’s not your world.  You can’t live like everybody else, but live in such a way that even though you don’t live like them, they can say, ‘You know those Badals?  That Village Bible Church?  They’re good people—weird, but good people.’”  I watch my neighbors—God bless them, they’re wonderful people—and I imagine they think we’re part of a cult because no one leaves for church at 8:00 A.M. and doesn’t get home until 1:00 or 1:30 in the afternoon.  They have to be like, “What in the world?  What are these guys doing?  You know, those cars need to be washed.  Less time at church Tim and more time washing the cars.” 

Your neighbors are asking the same thing if you’re living the life of Christ.  You’re different.  Our job isn’t to try to prove to them we’re the same.  Our job is to prove to them we are different—but different is good.  Different is a blessing to them because I want my neighbors to be able to say, “He’s weird.  They spend all day at church and then they go to night church—I don’t even know what they’re doing there.  I mean, what’s that all about?  But you know what?  Tim and Amanda care for us.  They’re there when we need them.  I don’t have to worry what the kids may find when they go to the Badals’ house.  I don’t have to wonder if Tim is going to use bad language in front of my kids.  I don’t have to wonder if Tim’s going to cheat me.  I still don’t know what he’s doing with his life, but he’s trustworthy.”  This is what Peter’s trying to get across.  It is totally applicable for us.

Because suffering will come. 

This isn’t our world so suffering is going to come.  Peter talks about suffering repeatedly.  He addresses this issue of suffering in 1 Peter 4:12-17:

Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you.  But rejoice insofar as you share Christ's sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed.  If you are insulted for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you.  But let none of you suffer as a murderer or a thief or an evildoer or as a meddler.  Yet if anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in that name.  For it is time for judgment to begin at the household of God; and if it begins with us, what will be the outcome for those who do not obey the gospel of God?

He goes on and articulates that outcome.  We need to understand that as Christians, this is what God promises—we’re going to suffer.  That’s why the garbage of the prosperity gospel—that we’ll be healthy and wealthy—is from the pit of Hell.  The Bible says repeatedly that we’re going to suffer as Christians.  My job is not only to encourage in those times of suffering and explain why that suffering is taking place, but to encourage you to suffer well.  You’re going to suffer, so do it well.

Because it involves our salvation. 

I’m going to let Peter’s words resonate.  This is what we’re going to close with.  Peter says the following in 1 Peter 1:3-9:

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ!  According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead [what a great place for an “Amen!”] to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God's power [How do we know we can make it through trials?  We know because we are shielded by God’s power.]are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.

In this [Village Bible Church] you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.  Though you have not seen him, you love him.  Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls.

What a letter!  God has not only saved us but He’s given us a hope for tomorrow.  As we go through this letter, we will see repeatedly that our God is utterly faithful to see us through to the end.

Let’s pray. 

Father God, we come before You and as we’ve examined this incredible letter, we see there is much to glean from it.  I pray that we as a people would see the example of Peter and it would bring hope to some of us who—just like Peter and just like me—have failed miserably.  Lord, give those individuals hope.  Give them the encouragement that You’re not done with them.  You’re just beginning the process of making Your children like Jesus.  Lord, I pray this letter will be a letter that encourages.  This world seems to be falling apart at all ends, so we need that encouragement.  But we need to understand why we can be encouraged.

Lord, I pray that because of what we read and learn in this letter, we will stand firm in it.  I pray that because of our time in this letter, our lifestyles will change.  We are aliens and strangers, there’s no doubt about that.  Some of us have a great disdain for that truth because we want to be like the world.  Lord, allow us to abandon that way of ignorance and foolishness.  The way we are to live is a life that is following You and not the ways of this world.  Change us and remind us that when we live that way there will be suffering.  But in our darkest times of trials and tribulations, remind us we have an inheritance in Heaven which You’re keeping for us, and if we prove ourselves faithful, one day we will be able to stand before You and receive that inheritance which is far greater than anything in this world.  Lord, commend upon us the teaching and reading of 1 Peter so we will be changed.  We give You the glory for it.  In Christ’s name we pray.  Amen.