Grace that Marks the People of God

Introduction: Peter's Concern for Honorable Behavior

0:03 The following sermon was delivered on Sunday morning, June 20th, 1999, at the Trinity Baptist Church in Montville, New Jersey.

0:15 Now may I encourage you to turn in your Bibles with me to the book of 1 Peter, and I shall read in your hearing 1 Peter 2, verses 11 and 12, and then chapter 3, verses 8 through 12. 1 Peter 2 and verse 11. Beloved, I beseech you as sojourners and pilgrims to abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the soul, having your behavior honorable among the Gentiles, that wherein they speak against you as evildoers, they may by your good works which they behold glorify God in the day of visitation. Chapter 3 and verse 8. Finally, be ye all like-minded, compassionate, loving as brethren, tender-hearted, humble-minded, not rendering evil for evil or reviling for reviling, but contrary-wise blessing. For hereunto were you called that you should inherit a blessing.

1:33 For he that would love life and see good days, let him refrain his tongue, from evil and his lips, that they speak no guile. And let him turn away from evil and seek good. Let him seek peace and pursue it. For the eyes of the Lord are upon the righteous, and his ears unto their supplication.

1:59 But the face of the Lord is upon them that do evil. Now let us pray and ask God's help and blessing as we come to the end of this sermon. Let us come to the study of his word together. Let us pray.

2:16 Our Father, we thank you that again we are privileged to draw near to you, and that we may do so in the confidence that you are not weary of our coming. For as best we know our hearts, we do not come as a matter of empty, repetitious mouthing of words, but out of the matrix of our felt sense of need for present grace. O Lord, at the throne of grace, we ask for grace to help in this our time of need, and we seek in expectation to obtain it from you. Amen.

3:04 In writing to the Christians at Rome, the Apostle Paul said in words familiar to many of us, Let not your good be evil spoken of. In giving this directive, it's clear that the Apostle Paul said, Let not your good be evil spoken of. In giving this directive, It's clear that the Apostle Paul said, was deeply concerned that the people of God raise no unnecessary prejudice at the Christian community by the way in which they conducted themselves, even in matters of moral indifference. Now this concern is clearly shared by the Apostle Peter as he writes from Rome to the people of God scattered in the churches of Asia Minor, those whom he addressed, in the opening words of this epistle. As Peter begins his second series of pastoral exhortations, verses 11 and 12 of chapter 2, he makes this concern abundantly clear when he writes in verse 12, having your behavior honorable among the Gentiles. He is conscious that the people of God are not living in a cocoon. They are living under the scrutinized, scrutinizing eye of the Gentiles.

4:24 Those who are not believers. Those who in many cases, with respect to these believers, were hostile to the people of God. And he is passionately concerned that they so walk before God and man that they validate the power of the gospel and give no legitimate occasion of prejudice against the gospel. Having then focused upon how these believers are to commend the gospel with respect to the whole issue of human authority, and that begins in verse 13 and goes all the way down to verse 7 of chapter 3, the Apostle is now concerned to give some general directives to all of the people of God. In giving those specific directives, with relationship to the various structures of human authority, he addressed very specifically servants in verse 18 of chapter 2, wives in verse 1 of chapter 3, husbands in verse 7 of chapter 3. But when we come to verse 8, we note immediately the words, finally, be all like-minded, compassionate, etc.

The Structure of 1 Peter 3:8-12

5:50 What he is doing here in this section is to turn from specific directives to specific segments of the church and giving a generic directive to all of the members of the church. And basically what we have in verses 8 through 12, I trust was even initially clear to you in the reading of the passage. In verse 8, Peter highlights this, the graces that are to mark the believers primarily in their relationships one to another. And then in verse 9, he lays out the manner in which believers are to respond to the ill treatment received primarily at the hands of unbelievers. And then in verses 10 to 12, he gives a biblical reinforcement of these directives based upon an excerpt from Psalm 34. So that's the basic overall structure of this section of the Word of God. Now this morning we're going to focus our attention upon verse 8.

7:03 And as we take up the text, we should understand that Peter was guided by the Spirit of God to identify the graces which should make the way in which we relate one to another a matter of constant validation of the gospel which we claim to believe. After that call to a radically different Christian lifestyle, a call that gets specific by the constant use of participles, these verbal forms used in differing ways. Now when Peter comes to these descriptions of the graces that are to mark the people of God, he does a strange thing. And those of you who have any acquaintance with your Greek text will know this when you look at the passage. For no longer do we find participles, these verbal constructions, but we find Peter stringing together five adjectives. There is no verb in verse 8.

8:11 That's why if you have an older translation, the words, D, are in, or the word D is in italics. Literally, he says, finally. At this point, now as a concluding word in this present series of exhortations, not finally with respect to the letter, not finally with respect to the full gamut of his pastoral concerns, but finally with reference to this series of exhortations beginning in verse 11, going down through verse 10 and verse 12, he then simply says, all, finally, all, no longer servants, specifically, no longer wives, specifically, no longer husbands, specifically, but finally, all, and then there's no verb. He just hangs together five adjectives, one after another, without any comment. Finally, all. And it's as though by this very method of writing, the Spirit of God is guiding Peter to impress upon these believers that if people from the outside look in upon you, they ought to stand back and exclaim with these five adjectives that this is what characterizes your life together.

9:37 Like-minded, compassionate, loving his brethren, tender-hearted, humble-minded, that's become the very essence of what you are in your life together. Looking upon the community of God's people, rather than be stumbled with respect to a contradiction in their corporate lifestyle and the ethos of their relationship together, they should see them as a people who are same-minded, sympathetic, brotherly-loving, tender-hearted, humble-minded people. Now, when we come to expound these five adjectives, it's not an easy task, because, again, Peter is considered the ignorant fisherman, but when you start taking seriously the Greek in which he wrote, you realize he wasn't so ignorant. Four of these five adjectives are found only once in the New Testament, and they're here in this verse. One of them is found twice. The other four are found nowhere else in the New Testament.

Pearl 1: Like-minded (Same-minded)

10:46 Thankfully, most of them are found in a noun or verbal form, the same stem of the word, and we can compare Scripture with Scripture, and we are not left to simply dig out of secular literature some sense of the meaning of the word, or be thrown back merely upon etymology. So we come this morning to consider these five graces that are to mark the relationship of the people of God primarily viewed as a community interacting one with another. And as I wrestled with how to lay them out in some kind of orderly manner with some kind of homiletical structure, the only thing I could come up with is to think of these as five pearls in the beautiful necklace of grace, and we're going to take them up one pearl at a time. All right? Pearl number one, like-minded or same-minded. Now this quality that is to mark the people of God is again and again brought forward by the Apostle Paul in his letters using a verbal construction, but the stuff of the basic words is such that it is evident that the Spirit of God is pointing precisely to the same thing.

12:11 What is seen to characterize the people of God, namely this like-minded or same-mindedness receives constant emphasis in the letters of the Apostle Paul. Note with me quickly an overview of those emphases or of that emphasis and of those texts in Romans chapter 12. As the Apostle is stringing together various pastoral directives to the Roman Christians, he writes in verse 15 and 16 of Romans 12, Rejoice with them that rejoice, weep with them that weep, be of the same mind one toward another. Be of the same mind one toward another. Chapter 15 in verse 5, Now the God of patience and comfort grant you to be of the same mind one with another. One with another according to Christ Jesus.

13:15 1 Corinthians 1 and verse 10, Now I beseech you, brethren, through the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, that you all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be perfected together in the same mind and in the same judgment. 2 Corinthians 13 and verse 11, 2 Corinthians 13 and verse 11, Finally, brethren, farewell, be perfected, be comforted, be of the same mind. As Paul is thinking of the things that he wants to linger in their ears and in their consciousness as he brings his letter to a close, same-mindedness is brought forward along with comfort and living in peace. And then in Philippians 2 and verse 2, Philippians 2 and verse 2, Make full my joy that you be of the same mind, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind. So though Peter, under the guidance of the Spirit, uses an adjective found only here in the New Testament, he is pointing to something with which all of the churches eventually in the Greco-Roman world would have known was a central concern

14:43 of apostolic directive impeaching all things that Christ had commanded. And so Peter envisions the people of God in their life together so living as to validate the power of the Gospel as people see them like-minded or same-minded. Now that brings us to a very simple and necessary question. What lies at the heart of this like-mindedness, this same-mindedness?

15:16 Well as I wrestled with that and read much and pondered and cogitated, I found most helpful to me was the little phrase that Paul brings into play when he addresses the subject in Romans chapter 15 in verse 5. The God of patience and comfort grant you to be of the same mind one with another according to Christ Jesus. He is urging a same-mindedness that takes its point of reference from Christ Jesus. And that brings us immediately to what we have emphasized again and again in the exposition of this epistle that these Christians have in common the great and glorious salvation in Christ already described in this letter. So that when Peter says finally all of you like-minded he is not shooting that adjective into a vacuum. He has already described the things that they possess in Christ Jesus that become the standard and the reference point for their like-mindedness. He began in chapter 1 in describing their identity as elect sojourners

16:45 as those who were foreknown chosen by God washed in the blood of Christ renewed by the Spirit participants in that great salvation rooted in the redemptive work of Christ climaxing in His resurrection from the dead. They are bound together in their common inheritance that is reserved in heaven for them. They are redeemed by the same blood. They are born of the same Spirit.

17:13 They have been quickened from the state of being dead stones to living stones brought in to that living temple of which Christ Himself is cornerstone and by the Spirit the very life of that temple. And now he says to such people who are living in that living temple of which Christ Himself is cornerstone and by the Spirit the very life of that temple and now he says to such people who have a common salvation with a common hope with a common commitment to a common standard of holiness in pursuit of a common calling he says to them all of you like-minded. And it is these gospel realities presently believed and nurturing the soul and filling the mind that lie at the very basis of any true like-mindedness or same-mindedness among any congregation of God's people. And so when Peter says to them this is to mark your life together like-mindedness same-mindedness he knows that the foundation and the basis and the life for that like-mindedness is there in the provisions of the gospel in the person and work of the Lord Jesus. The apostle says be of one mind

18:39 according to Christ Jesus. And as I was thinking of a way to illustrate this I could not help but think of a documentary that I saw a few weeks ago. It caught my eye in the TV guide that I think the title of it was B-24 Bomber Crew something or other caught my eye it was taking me back to the Second World War. And it was a fascinating documentary.

19:08 They gathered together the living members of the crew of a B-24 Liberator bomber. And this was one of the bombers that was greatly useful in the Second World War a lumbering four-engine bomber precursor to the B-17 and other larger bombers. And all they did basically interspersed with a few clips of various actual flights of these bombers was to interview the living members of that crew. Where are you from?

19:39 How did you happen to come onto the crew? What was your place? I was a gunner. I was the navigator, etc.

19:46 And each of these men was given the opportunity to give a little mini biography of himself his background his education where he came from. And it soon became evident as they interviewed one after another I think all told they interviewed seven or eight I don't remember the exact number that they came from a tremendous diversity of background. There was one Jewish young man there was a Swedish man there were a couple of Hispanics someone was from a rural place in the Midwest some from large cities some southerners some northerners some midwesterners. And then the interviewer asked the captain this question.

20:22 He said, now it's evident from what we've heard that you came from a tremendous diversity of background religious ethnic social cultural big city little city some southerners Did these differences ever get in the way? And you know what his answer was? To my knowledge never. Because we were all taken up in a cause that was bigger than our differences.

20:54 They were of one mind. Why? Not because someone sat them down and gave them lectures on the evils of the self-consciousness of ethnicity in the midst of a war. It's not because they all were captured with a cause bigger than their differences.

21:16 You get the point of my illustration? When Peter says, finally, in this series of exhortations, as I now seek to move your attention away from the subject of what it means to be a validation of the gospel in the way you relate as citizens to the state, slaves to their masters, wives to their husbands, husbands to their wives, as I now think of you as communities there in Asia Minor, living together before the scrutinizing eye of the Gentiles, finally, all of you like-minded, same-minded. Peter understands that the stuff for the same-mindedness has been laid in all of their hearts by the power and grace of God. In Jesus Christ. And that all they must do is to continue to feed their minds and hearts upon those things which originally constituted them as one people. And is it not true that to the extent that any community of God's people cling closely to Christ and to the realities of what they are and possess in virtue of the same God?

22:37 In the salvation of Christ, they find themselves of one mind. Of one mind.

22:45 It's when they move from that greater concern to matters of lesser concern that they find a fragmentation of mind, a loss of unity of aim and commitment, as well as affection and the consciousness of being one body in Jesus Christ. So we need. Constantly. Constantly to remember that it is the will of God as revealed through his servant Peter that we, as his people, seeking so to live before the Gentiles, that we glorify God and give no unnecessary occasion of prejudice to the gospel, that we are to be described as a like-minded, a same-minded people. Not a pseudo-unity based upon an agreement, or believe nothing, but a true unity bound together by truth, the center of which is Christ himself.

Pearl 2: Sympathetic

23:52 But then he moves on to the second pearl, and that is sympathetic. Now again, a little word study.

24:01 The word, etymologically, and in its common usage, means to share the same feelings. We get our English word sympathetic by transliterating the Greek word. Sympathetic means to share the same feelings. Now, generally, we use it when we share a feeling of grief with another.

24:25 We say of a given person, he's a very sympathetic person. Generally, what we mean is when someone's going through trouble and expressing grief, hardship, and sorrow, this person has an unusual ability to draw near and enter in with them and sympathize. But there's nothing in the Greek word sympathetic, nothing in the word itself, nor in its usage, that demands that we limit sympathy to sharing only the feelings of grief, and of pain, and of sorrow. Just as sharing in the painful emotions of another shows that we are liberated from self-centeredness and hardness of heart, so entering into the joys of another shows that we are free from the wretched sins of envy and jealousy. And there are some who seem to be apparently free enough to sympathize with others' grief, but they find it very difficult to sympathize with another's joys, because the very thing that makes that brother or sister joyful is the thing concerning which you have an un-mortified, covetous spirit. You see the pattern of the word of God, and here we have two other texts that help throw light on this adjective sympathetic. What does that mean in specific things?

25:47 We go back to Romans 12 and verse 15. Romans 12 and verse 15. Rejoice with them that rejoice. Weep with them that weep.

26:00 What's it mean to be characterized as a sympathetic people? It means simply this. Most of us live our lives on the plateau of the ordinary. Is that where you live most of your life?

26:15 How many of you had something so extraordinary you were tempted to call a staff reporter in the Star-Ledger of the New York Times and report it as a news item this week? Were any of you tempted to call in to Channel 2 or Channel 9 and say, hey, something amazing? No, most of us live this past week on the plateau of the very ordinary. You don't even know what sock you put on first every morning, but you put the same sock, not the same one, I hope, morning after morning, but whatever socks you pull out, you put it on the same foot.

26:47 You don't even know where you put on your left or right foot. Start checking yourself. Pull on the same way. When you guys start to shave, you always start to shave exactly in the same place.

26:56 You try to start shaving on the other side, it unhinges you. Our lives are lived out in the plateau of the ordinary, the routine. That's the way most of us live. That's the way life is.

27:08 But there are those mountain peaks when in the providence of God, God so showers certain gifts and graces upon us that we are raised above the plateau measure of our joy in the Holy Ghost. The fruit of the Spirit is joy. And anyone full of the Spirit and walking in the Spirit will have this plateau measure of joy. But when the Scripture says the disciples were filled with joy under the Holy Ghost, there was an unusual effusion of divine joy upon them.

27:43 Now the text says, when our brethren are brought to that place, we are to be sympathetic. We are to enter into their joy. So that when they are on that mountain peak of joy, they've got companions to share their joy. Because if they're Christians, they know that that which has brought them joy has come from the hand of their God.

28:07 And they want to share the beneficent heart of God as manifested in what He's done for them. Peter says, all of you sympathetic, rejoice with those who rejoice. But then the text says, weep with those who weep. Not only are we ordinarily on the plateau of the ordinary, but there are times we go down into the valley of the extraordinary.

28:35 That which brings us to weeping, to brokenness of heart and of spirit. When for whatever reason, the thing providence has brought into our lives crushes us. And we may have to say with the psalmist, our tears have been our meat day and night. The scripture says, weeping may endure for the night.

28:59 There is a night of weeping for the child of God. And we are commanded as the people of God to weep with those who weep. To be sympathetic so that while we live out most of our lives on the plateau of the ordinary, we're never alone on the mountain peak of joy or alone in the valley of joy. We are crushing grief.

29:26 And people looking in upon us are astounded. Why? What's the attitude of the world? It's a world filled with selfishness and indifference.

29:36 A world that doesn't care what breaks the heart of another or what brings delight and joy and exhilaration to another. And when the world sees the people expressing not feigned sympathy as a means to get something, from someone, but genuine, unfeigned sympathy, rejoicing with another in things that I would rejoice in had God given them to me. But in his wisdom he's withheld them from me. The world sees genuine rejoicing and it can't figure this out.

30:13 Why aren't you green with envy? Why aren't you gritting your teeth with cynicism? Because I'm not what I once was. There was a time when I would have been green with envy.

30:29 I would have found something to say to cut off the keen edge of another's joy in what he had received. But now there is genuine, what the old writers would call, disinterested joy. That is, joy for the sheer joy of rejoicing with another. Not seeking anything in return.

30:48 Disinterested grief in sharing with the pain and the grief of another. Now that assumes, does it not, that as Peter sits down and ponders what he's going to write and the Spirit of God guides him to write this adjective, sympathetic, he views those saints out there in those five provinces of Asia Minor as the people who have growing personal intimacy with one another. You can't be sympathetic with another's mountain peaks and valleys if you're so far removed in the geography of interpersonal relationships that you don't know when they're on the mountain or in the valley. Peter's assuming that the people of God have growing personal intimacy, that they have growing comfortableness in being open and honest with one another. How in the world can I be sympathetic if sympathetic means to share the same feelings of another if the one whose feelings I'm seeking to share is one who wears the plastic face and never lets his heart get out to where I can enter it? How can we?

32:08 We're not God. We can't read into the heart of a man and see that there in his heart he's groveling in the valley or he's dancing on the mountain. It means we've got to get over this cynicism about opening our hearts at a deep level one to another. I know it's not popular and I know the world looks upon it with suspicion and well they might, but dear people of God, we have this one-mindedness, this same-mindedness in the dynamics and in the power of the Gospel and cannot those dynamics keep us from profaning the sacred trust of an open heart from a brother or sister?

32:52 Peter assumes that there is growing personal intimacy, growing openness with each other, growing honesty in our dealings one with another. How can we be characterized as a people who are sympathetic unless there is this growing openness of heart and of mind? Ah, you say, but Pastor Martin, that's just your personality. It has nothing to do with my personality.

33:18 It has to do with the Word of God. And if you have things in your personality that tend to make you carnally reserved, take them to a place called Calvary and see the mail to that cross. And if you have a tendency to be too open and too effusive, take your lack of self-control to that cross. But it works both ways.

33:41 This is not a matter of personality emphasis, dear brethren. It's a matter of biblical norms. What is it to have our behavior becoming among the Gentiles? It's to be a community of one-minded followers of Christ bound together, in the truths and realities of the Gospel.

34:06 It's to be a sympathetic people. It's to be like our Lord Jesus. The verb form of this word is used of Him in Hebrews 4.15.

34:18 We have not a high priest who cannot be, here's our word, touched with the feeling of our infirmities. We have not an unsympathetic high priest. We have one who feels with us. He that saith he abideth in Him ought to walk even as He walked.

Pearl 3: Loving as Brothers (Brotherly Affectionate)

34:39 Now we come quickly to our third pearl. In this string of the pearl of graces that is to be hung about the neck of God's people as it is worked into their hearts by the Spirit of God, loving as brothers. And here again we face the problem of language. How do you take a Greek word that is an adjective and bring it over into an English word which we just don't have an English word?

35:07 The Greek word philadelphoi, the best we can do is come up with a hyphenated English two words. It would be brotherly affectionate. Brotherly affectionate. That is maintain and manifest that special love that exists among you because you are members of the same spiritual family.

35:34 Now Peter already addressed this in chapter 1 and verse 22. He wrote, seeing you've purified your souls in your obedience to the truth unto unfeigned love of the brethren. He says you've purified your soul in the end result of that initial purification in God's initial impartation of grace that is it puts you in a posture where you can now genuinely love your brethren. Therefore in chapter 2 and verse 17, he gives a mandate.

36:07 Honor all men. Love the brotherhood. The same root word is used here. Brotherhood.

36:15 Now he comes along and says this is what is to characterize you as the people of God since you have purified your souls and in the dynamics of the impartation of grace are in a place where you can love with unfeigned love and since I've commanded you to love the brotherhood you ought as God to have as one of your dominant characteristics when anyone looks upon you this adjective you are brotherly affectionate. Now Peter is not saying love as brothers love but the use of this word points in another direction. Rather you love because you are brothers. It's what you have been made as Christ's family of which he is the elder brother and according to Hebrews 3, according to Hebrews 2, 11 and 12 unashamedly calls us his brethren. Think of it. Brought by Christ. Incorporated into the family of Christ.

37:19 Called the brotherhood of Christ. That's what grace has done. Now Peter says let an onlooking world see you to be what God in grace has made you. Brotherly affectionate.

37:34 Now again this is not an isolated issue. You know your Bibles well enough. Many of you. By this Jesus said shall all men know that you are my disciples if you have love one to another.

37:45 Obviously it is not a love that simply courses through our hearts. How can the world know if they are not seeing the manifestation of that love? That's a fair question isn't it? By this shall all men know that you are my disciples if you have love one to another.

38:03 The assumption is that love will not be a dormant feeling in the heart but an act of love. But an active principle regulating the life. So that when Peter says let your lifestyle be one that validates the gospel. Let it be honorable so that though they speak against you as evil doers they may in beholding your good works glorify God in the day of visitation.

38:28 Here is one of the characteristics that will fit that directive. Loving as brethren. By this we know we have passed from death on earth. We have passed from death unto life because we love the brethren.

38:41 He that loves not abides in death. The whole book of 1 John filled with such constant reiteration. Here again dear people with all the diversity of background that was there among these to whom Peter was writing. Different temperaments.

39:01 Different tastes. Different stages of growth and development. Differences in matters of indifference. Something fostered by the apostolic writings.

39:13 There is nothing in the apostolic writings that moves toward an artificial wooden sameness of personality type. Of taste and interest in matters indifferent. The constant emphasis is let each man be fully persuaded in his own mind. Do nothing that impedes your spiritual progress.

39:33 Do nothing that will hinder the progress of another or the progress of the gospel. But there is no legislation on a broad spectrum of matters where we have individual liberty before God. Yet in the midst of all of that it is to be evident that we are marked as those who are brotherly. That we are able to rise above the recognition of differences on matters indifferent.

40:01 And to express in the most concrete and evident ways that we relate to one another. In the consciousness we are part of a blood-bought brotherhood of which Christ is the elder brother. Then very quickly pearl number four. Tender-hearted.

Pearl 4: Tender-hearted

40:25 This is the one word of the five found elsewhere in the New Testament. It is found in Ephesians 4 and verse 32. Be kind one to another. Here is our word tender-hearted.

40:38 Forgiving one another even as God for Christ's sake has forgiven you. And the root of this word comes from the word you would use if you were going to describe your viscera. Your internal organs. And it has deep tap roots in the Hebrew concept carried over into the New Testament.

40:58 When it is used in its verbal form Jesus was moved with compassion. Matthew 9.36 When you saw the multitudes. Mark 8 in verse 2.

41:08 He is moved with compassion when he sees the crowd that has been following him. I have compassion upon the multitude. They have gone three days and they have eaten nothing. It is what the father felt when he saw the son returning from the hard pens in the far country.

41:23 Luke 15.20 says he was moved with compassion. His bowels, his viscera. We say in our day I feel it at the gut level.

41:33 That is the closest English contemporary approximate to the Greek concept. Now Peter says you are to be compassionately moved with compassion. You are to be compassionately tender. That is to mark you in your relationship one to another.

41:49 Tender hearted. It is very interesting that the same root word is used when John says in 1 John 3 and verse 17. If you see your brother have need and shut up your compassion. The old authorized says your bowels of compassion from him.

42:08 How dwelleth the love of God in you? You see it is an inward thing. But John assumes if it is there inward it is outward into your hand. You see your brother have need.

42:18 You shut up. You stop up. You put a blockage to your compassion. How does John assume that blockage would be manifested?

42:29 You don't stretch out your hand to meet the need of your brother when it is in the power of your hand to do it. He that sees his brother in need and shuts up his compassion from him. How dwelleth the love of God in him? Let us not love inward only but in deed and truth.

42:46 You see the assumption is that bound up in this compassionate tenderness is not only the inward ability to be moved in the presence of perceived need in another. But to be moved to the point that I am prepared to do something to relieve that need. And Peter says it is that which will cause an onlooking world to see in you the validation of the gospel. Because that is a reflection of the very God who in Christ has redeemed you.

43:20 He is a tender hearted compassionate God who not only was moved in the face of human need but he so loved as to give his only begotten son. You see the world is a world of crass self-centeredness. Its motto is you made your bed lie in it. It is no skin off my feet.

43:49 You made the mistake live with it. You made your choice that is your problem not mine. It is a world described in Titus 3.3 as marked by living in malice and envy.

44:06 Hateful and hating one another. What a validation of the gospel to see a compassionately tender people formed into such a people by the saving power of a compassionately tender Savior. Then very quickly humble minded. Those of you who have the old authorized in the New King James you have the word courteous.

Pearl 5: Humble-minded

44:35 Why? Well it is a matter of a certain class of manuscripts have a word that could be translated courteous but a better manuscript collection points to the word that is translated humble minded. And the word again is used only here in the New Testament but the noun form is found in several other places. Paul says in Acts 20 and verse 19 you know how from the first day I came among you I served the Lord literally serving the Lord with all lowliness of mind.

45:15 And Ephesians 4 and verse 2 after Paul exhorts the believers to strive to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace he emphasizes this particular grace with all lowliness and meekness. The same in Philippians 2 and verse 3 Colossians in 3.12 and then again in this very epistle in chapter 5 and verse 5 Likewise you younger be subject to the elder all of you gird yourselves here is our word with humility with lowliness of mind. Now this was a word despised in the Greek world.

45:55 To be lowly minded was to be something less than a noble Greek. But it's one of those words sanctified by the grace and power of God in the Christian community. It's the opposite of being haughty or high minded or proud. Turn to Proverbs 29.23 where this is made very very clear. Proverbs 29 and verse 23 Notice the contrast. A man's pride shall bring him low but he that is of a lowly spirit shall obtain honor. And in that Greek translation of the Hebrew scriptures that's the word that is chosen by the translators.

46:35 Our word humble minded it's the opposite of pride. It is averse to bragging and pushing oneself forward jostling and jockeying for position. According to Ephesians 4.2 and Philippians 2.3 it is a characteristic crucial in the life of a church committed to the maintenance of peace and unity. Solomon said in Proverbs 13.10 by pride comes only contention. What lies at the root of contention?

47:11 It's pride. My wish my desire my perspective my opinion everyone make way for it. And if I must fracture unity in the course of making way for it too bad. My perspective my wish my desire my feelings are supreme.

47:32 Well who made you God? No humble mindedness is that which is to mark the community of God's people. It is one of the adjectives that constitutes pearl number five in that string of pearls that is to grace the life of God's people. And surely as those who claim to be saved by the Christ of the towel and the basin it ought to mark us.

48:03 You know what I mean by the towel and the basin? The very night before he is betrayed Jesus takes the place of the servant girds himself with a towel takes a basin and scoops to wash the feet of the very disciples for whom he would die. The next day the Christ of Gabbatha shamefully spat upon and falsely accused and struck with blows and dressed in mock royal honor the Christ of Golgotha immolated naked shamed beaten bruised mocked taunted plunged into the abyss of how in the world can anybody strut who said Jesus washes who knows something of Jesus wrestling unto great drops of blood in Gethsemane. If I have taken my place not only as a preacher whose very breath is given by God but as a sinner whose only hope of averting the judgment of God is found in the self humbling of the incarnate second person of the Godhead how in the world can there be strut of the incarnate second person of the Godhead be

49:30 strut. Now here's a community many of them scattered throughout Asia Minor they claim to be the community of those redeemed by the blood of Christ chapter 1 verses 18 and following what a horrible anomaly for there to be strut and arrogance and pushing and shoving for one's rights and one's way and one's opinion making one's feelings the arbiter of all that's right and wrong Peter says no humble mindedness is to be that pearl that in a very real sense is the central pearl and the other two flanking each side of it you see pride leads to the self seeking that leads people to seek novel opinions and destroys one mindedness among God's people at the root of all heresy is pride that's why the translators of our New Testament find trouble rendering one or two words shall it be called divisive or heretical well the very concept of heresy is that there is a fracturing from that body of truth in which we are united someone gets so proud that he's living under the shadow of truth he's got to come out into the light and so he creates a spotlight of his own error on which to shine upon himself and likewise with sympathy

50:59 and too important to make the world a better place for us I'm too important to make my brother's joys my joy I'm too important to make his grief my grief you see how humble mindedness in a very real sense feeds same mindedness and feeds true sympathy and flanked on the other side it will also feed and nourish and help to develop true brotherly affection because I do regard my brother as better than him and myself Philippians chapter 2 each regarding not the things of his own but the things of another only a humble minded man will do that and such a one will be tender in heart knowing that that which I perceive in the need of another is worthy of my concern and of my involvement one commentator has written in very helpfully Christians are not to think of themselves highly if they are Christians they must believe their insignificance as creatures and their demerit as sinners they must believe they are in their natural state thoroughly depraved deeply inexcusably guilty righteously condemned hopelessly

52:27 wretched and that if their state is altered if their characters are transformed if their prospects are improved it's all owing to the sovereign divine kindness operating through the mediation of Christ and the influence of the Holy Spirit the native tendency of such views is to make a man humble and lowly in spirit to make him feel that pride was not made for him this should be the habitual temper of the Christian and should give a decided character to his habitual demeanor and behavior he should be clothed with humility in lowliness of mind esteeming others better than himself he should certainly and carefully avoid all kinds of pride as absurd and criminal that's strong language isn't it but as I've so often said if we've taken our place in Eden chapters one and two of Genesis if we've stood our ground in Eden chapter three of Genesis and if we've stood our ground at God aware in the name of all rationality is there room for pride all man has esteem glory as created is given by God what he becomes as fallen is shameful before God

Summary and Application: Acquiring, Growing, and Manifesting These Graces

53:54 what his sin demanded of God is horrific God immolated God forsaken by God where in the world is there room for a community of God's people in Asia Minor who say this is the stuff of their life their faith is it wrong then to expect that this would be that adjective that describes your life as you interact one with another humble minded well I've attempted to at least point in the direction of the significance of these five adjectives we come around full circle to where we began after addressing servants wives husbands now all the people of God the dominant character of their life together is to be like minded sympathetic brother loving tender hearted lowly minded let me say these brief words in summary and in application I want to state it as plainly as I know how I sat at my desk no considerable length of time saying Lord I want to state it so plainly none will miss it I don't want to insult

55:24 anyone's intelligence please don't be insulted but I want to be faithful to yourself and to your soul if we learn anything from this study this morning surely we ought to learn this to acquire these graces you must be in Christ to acquire these graces you must be in Christ I've tried to show you in opening up each one of them that each of them has its cap roots in the realities of Christ and His Gospel and in the dynamics of the work of grace in the heart of a sinner this was ready in this world angels and saints in the whole human world starring in heinous подiphy which is beheld by this all lords and ayuda of every man all believers who stand before us whether they are tired or very distraught one days is My dear friend, you can't know these graces unless you're in Christ. You must be in Christ. You've got to make the tree good. That is what you are as a man, woman, boy or girl must be made good.

56:48 Good in the gospel way. The way of repentance and faith and fleeing to and clinging and casting your soul upon Christ. You will have a welcome in Christ. And by the enabling grace of the Spirit of Christ, then you can begin to know what it is to be like-minded, sympathetic, brotherly, affectionate.

57:13 You can begin to know what it is to be empathetic, tender-hearted and humble-minded. To acquire these graces, you must be in Christ. Secondly, to grow in these graces, you must abide in Christ. John 15.

57:29 Without me, you can do nothing.

57:33 You cannot of yourself produce these graces, but you've been united to Christ. He is divine. You are branches. Abide in Him.

57:43 Feed upon Him in the ways of His appointment. By a living faith. By feeding upon His word. By calling upon His name.

57:52 To be able to say with Paul, the life that I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me. And gave Himself for me. And my final word of application, is to say, to manifest these graces in our lives together. Each one of us must take upon ourselves the responsibility before God to cultivate them individually.

58:18 We'll not be like minded as a people unless you are like minded as one of the members of this body. And ask yourself every time you've got an itch to take the minority opinion. Isso é opora. gefmć Browning emos, menos menas.

58:32 minority way and the minority judgment. Ask yourself, is it obsession with Christ and the great issues of the gospel that gives me this itch to be always the one in the minority opinion? Or do I find the closer I am to Jesus, the more I find myself of one mind with my brethren? That's a good little litmus test. How long has it been since you've been on a mountain dancing with someone who's dancing? How long since you've been in a valley with your arm around a weeping brother? Ask yourself, do you open yourself up so that others can dance with you and weep with you? You see, dear people, it will not do to sit and say, oh, that was helpful, that was helpful. You've got to leave this place this morning determined

59:29 to say, if it all rested upon me, that string of pearls would be manifested in this particular place. Member of this assembly by the grace of God. May God make it so for his glory. Let's pray.

59:49 Our Father, how we thank you for your word. How we praise you that it is a lamp to our feet and a light to our pathway. We pray that you would take this portion of your word and write it upon our hearts. Have deep and lasting dealings with every one of us. Oh, Lord, we beg of you that we as a people may be marked by your love for us. By these five gracious pearls that your spirit alone can manufacture and sustain and cause to grow. Oh, we pray, seal your word to our prophet and have mercy upon those who have had to face the fact that they don't have the stuff to manifest these graces. May that not discourage them, but may it drive them to Christ. That in him they may be able to

60:43 be furnished with all that is needful for life and godliness. Hear us, we plead in his name. Amen.