Response Required Encouragement Given

Introduction: The Shepherd's Warning and Peter's Image

0:02 The following sermon was delivered on Sunday morning, May 7, 2000, at the Trinity Baptist Church in Montville, New Jersey. Now let us turn this morning to 1 Peter and chapter 5 as we return to our consecutive expositions through this epistle, coming down to the last few of those expositions. And I shall read in your hearing 1 Peter 5b through verse 11. Having given directions to elders and then to church members in general, Peter now writes to all of the people of God, elders, the membership,

0:46 all ages, all experience, all stages of knowledge. Yes, all of you, gird yourselves with humility to serve one another, for God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble. Humble yourselves, therefore. Under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time, casting all your anxieties upon him, because he cares for you.

1:16 Be sober, be watchful. Your adversary, the devil, as a roaring lion, walks about seeking whom he may devour, whom withstands steadfast in your faith, knowing that the same sufferings are accomplished, in your brethren who are in the world. And the God of all grace, who called you unto his eternal glory in Christ, after that you have suffered a little while, shall himself perfect, establish, strengthen, settle you.

1:56 To him be the dominion forever and ever. Amen. Now, if you were a shepherd of a real, flock of sheep, and you had a most unusual flock of sheep, in that this flock of sheep were endowed with a capacity to hear and to receive verbal communication like they were human beings. So you've got a flock of sheep, but they have this capacity to be able to understand the vocables that come out of your own mouth.

2:33 And if you knew that where the flock of sheep were presently, grazing, there was somewhere in the thicket in the woods, a hungry, prowling lion, what would you say? There are the sheep, defenseless, vulnerable, grazing lazily on a hillside. A vicious, ravenous, and hungry lion, with only one thing on his mind, is prowling through the thicket and the nearby forest. Well, that's precisely, the image that is before the Apostle's mind.

3:13 He views the scattered believers in Asia Minor and the various churches to whom this letter would come and amongst whom it would be circulated. He views each of those congregations as one of Christ's flock. And he sees the flock as vulnerable and defenseless in themselves. And they have an adversary whom he identifies as the devil, who, as a roaring lion, a lion that roars when he seizes its prey, is constantly prowling about, voracious, ravenously hungry, seeking to gobble down, to swallow down,

3:58 any sheep whom he may bring within the influence of his paws and of his teeth. And recognizing that the people of God are in that position, in particular, in the light of the suffering they are undergoing. And you must not read any section of 1 Peter divorced from that constant background that Peter is conscious he's writing to a people suffering for the sake of Christ, suffering for righteousness' sake. And their dangers and their opportunities are conditioned by that peculiar pressure of opposition and persecution for the sake of Christ.

4:40 Well, as Peter views them in that position, he charges the elders, who are the under-shepherds of Christ, to care for the flock, to be deeply concerned to shepherd them, to provide all of the things that shepherds are responsible to provide for sheep, not the least of which is protecting them in the face of danger. Having addressed the shepherds, and then having addressed the elders, and then having addressed the people telling them that the place of safety is in submission to those under-shepherds whom God has given to them, he calls upon the entire community

The Devil's Deceptive Nature: Not Always a Roaring Lion

5:23 to a life of humility in relationship to one another and humility in relationship to God. And then he begins in verse 8 to deal very specifically with what they are to be and to do in the light of the presence of that lurking lion. And so he commands them, in what we considered in our last exposition, what I called their duties succinctly declared, two imperatives back to back with no filler in between, be sober, be watchful.

6:01 Keep yourself utterly free from anything that would cause spiritual and mental drunkenness, a dulling of the mind with spiritual drowsiness. He says be sober and in your wakefulness be watchful. While awake and sober be alert and on your guard like watchmen on a military assignment. And he does so because of that which I called in our last exposition our danger graphically described.

6:35 Having laid out the duty in these two curse imperatives, be sober, be watchful, he now states their danger. And their danger is this. They have an adversary. And that adversary is the devil.

6:51 And that adversary is like a hungry, ravenous beast on the prowl with one intention only, finding any creature whom he may seize and gulp down. Now something I did not mention in our last exposition that I want to mention. Just as we transition out of this brief review into our study this morning, is that while the devil is always in his nature and intention exactly as he is described here, ravenous, prowling, with one intention devouring his prey,

7:30 he does not appear in the guise or in the form of a lion that roars, or a lion that prowls. The scriptures tell us that he can transform himself into an angel of light. Second Corinthians 11 and verse 14. And how did he come to Eve?

7:54 The first time the devil appears in the pages of Holy Scripture. How does he appear? Does he come roaring into the Garden of Eden with his fangs bared and threatening and menacing Eve? No.

8:09 He comes like crazy and thrown her arms around Adam and said, Protect me, honey. No. She is somewhere separated from Adam. And he comes in the guise of what?

8:20 A friend and a benefactor. That's how he comes. As God said. Oh yes, he said that.

8:27 But you see, I've got the inside track. I know something that will help you. He comes not in the form of a devouring lion, but he comes as friend and benefactor. He's got information.

8:39 He's got the power. He's got the power. He's got the power. He's got the power.

8:40 He's got the power. He's got the power. He's got the power. He's got the power.

8:40 He's got the power. He's got the power. He will set an example for him, which will point him to the path of truth than anything, whether the devil or the devil himself. And he's not to some extent in the horrible fashion that Satan calls piersite.

8:56 He'll toast over the devil for the cânt communautas. God metre-na. God metre-na. God metre-na.

9:02 Edna. He'll strangle him, and put him in the chalice. Andau will bless him. If God's love promises an end, he will have love, It's fanged, bared, roaring, all tense and ready to pounce.

9:16 Oh no, the devil knows better than that. If we saw him in that form, we'd be running continually to Christ, saying, Lord Jesus, protect me from the lion.

9:28 But he doesn't come in the form of what he is. He can come as an angel, a messenger of light, with new insights to the Scripture, with new ways to view the moral standards of the Scripture, whispering that that's just an old puritanic standard that really has nothing to do with what the law and the word of God says. That's how he comes, my dear Christian brothers and sisters. And Peter knows that.

9:57 Peter knows it well. He knows it by bitter experience. The devil did not come when Peter was charged with the other two to watch and pray in the garden lest they fall into temptation. The devil didn't come and go, and I'll get you to Christ.

10:16 I curse and swear you don't even know Jesus. No. The devil came saying, God knows it's been a long day, hasn't it, Peter? Oh yeah, it has been.

10:25 And he knows our frame, that we are dust. He quoted Scripture to Jesus, not beneath him to quote Scripture to Peter. Peter, the Lord knows your frame. He remembers that we are dust.

10:37 God's not a slave driver, is he? Hasn't your Lord been the one who's been tender and compassionate? Surely, Peter, a little sleep won't hurt. Behind that proposition of God's beneficent character and Peter's own good, there was a lion seeking to devour him.

10:57 Is that my imagination? No. It's the word of Jesus. Satan has desired to sift you as wheat.

11:06 Peter! But I have prayed for you that your faith fail not. You see, when Peter writes, you have an adversary. And that adversary is the devil.

11:18 And he is always... He is always true to himself in his nature and character as a ravenous lion.

11:24 But he rarely, rarely puts on the form of a ravenous lion. Just as he's always a liar and a murderer, John 8, 44. But he doesn't come in the guise of a liar and a murderer.

11:40 That's what he was with Eve. Out to kill her soul and to do it by the dagger of a lie. But he came as a friend and a benefactor. You saw no knife protruding from his belt.

11:54 You saw no sign emblazoned on his brow, I'm a liar. No, he came as a friend. And dear people of God, we need to be able to say with the apostle, we're not ignorant of his devices. But because I'm expounding 1 Peter and not giving a series on the devil, I can only sow that seed for you.

The Response Required: Withstand Steadfast in the Faith

12:12 But I felt I had to do it before we moved on this morning. Peter having described the adversary. In this very...

12:21 In this very graphic way, then goes on in the next verses to give us what I'm calling the response required. Look at the text. The response required, whom withstands dead fast in your faith. Secondly, the encouragement given, knowing that the same sufferings are accomplished in your brethren who are in the world.

12:44 And then the promise issued and the God of all grace who called you to his eternal glory in Christ Jesus. After you have suffered a little while, shall himself perfect, establish, strengthen. And I do believe the fourth word should be in there, settle you. To him be the dominion forever and ever.

13:04 Amen. So we have the response required, the encouragement given, and the promise issued. This morning, we take up just the first two. The response required and the encouragement given.

13:17 The response required. Peter is just finished. Reminding the suffering saints in Asia Minor that they have an adversary that is vicious, aggressive, and ravenously hungry to gulp down his prey. Having done this, he now informs these saints concerning the response they must give to the attempts of this adversary to pounce upon them and devour them.

13:43 And as we look at this response required, consider with me two aspects of it. The essence of it and the means. Or the climate or the context in which we carry out that response. What's the essence of the response?

13:59 Well, it's bound up in this third imperative in this section of his epistle. Whom withstand steadfast in your faith. The essence of that response is to be resistance or withstanding. Now, the word used here means to stand.

14:21 Stand up against someone or something. Let's look at a couple of examples of its usage to get a feel of the strength of this verb. In Acts chapter 6, the record of Stephen and his life and ministry. We read in verse 10, regarding Stephen as he spoke to these men of the synagogue.

14:44 They were not able, here's our verb, to withstand the wisdom. And the spirit by which he spoke. They could not stand up against the wisdom and the spirit in which Stephen spoke. In other words, both the content, the logic, the scriptural substance and the demeanor and the manner clothed with the spirit in which he spoke.

15:12 They could not stand against it. They could not withstand it. It overcame that. That's its sense of its use.

15:20 Romans 9 in verse 9. In that section where Paul is dealing with that mysterious, awesome doctrine of God's absolute sovereignty over men. Good and evil. And he's mouthing the language of an objector to this.

15:40 And listen to the language in verse 19 of Romans 9. Will you then say unto me, why does he still find fault? If God is utterly sovereign over all men in their actions, good and evil. How can he find fault?

15:53 For who withstands his will? Who can stand up and against the will of such a God? It's a rhetorical question and the answer is obviously none can. And then this objector wants to go on to say, well if everything then is attributed to God's will, then how can God hold us responsible for what we do?

16:13 A common objection, but it's in that setting. They said, who has withstood? Who stands up against? And can raise an effective barrier?

16:21 A barrier to God accomplishing his will. And then we had this verb in our last reading in Galatians, several weeks ago, Galatians 2.11. Where Paul says, I withstood Peter to his face.

16:34 I got in his face on this issue and I wouldn't back down. I withstood Peter in this matter where he was justly culpable. I withstood him. Now, that's the sense of the verb.

16:48 When it comes to how we are to deal with our adversary, the devil, it is this spiritual activity of resistance that is brought to the fore. The parallel passage to 1 Peter 5.9 is James 4 in verse 8. No doubt some of you have already thought of this passage.

17:07 In a totally different setting, here the subject is worldliness, but behind that worldliness is a devil who is the God of this world and who is seeking to devour these professing Christians by inciting them to sin. By inciting them to sin. By inciting them to sin. By inciting them to sin.

17:23 By ensnaring them in compromising spiritually adulterous relationships with the world. And in that context, James writes in verse 7, Be subject therefore unto God, but resist the devil and he will flee from you. What are we to do with the devil who in this context is working not by means of suffering and the peculiar vulnerability that brings to the devil's life? Lion-like paw and jaws seeking to devour us.

17:57 Here it is worldliness, but no matter what the manifestation of the devil's activity may be, we are called upon to resist the devil. Again, in Ephesians chapter 6, where Paul says that our wrestling as the people of God, our striving, our true theater of conflict is not with flesh and blood, but against the principalities, Ephesians 6.12, against the powers, against the world rulers of this darkness, against the spiritual host of wickedness in the heavenly places. Wherefore, take up the whole armor of God.

18:35 Why? Here's our verb. That you may be able to, here it is, withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to continue to stand. A different word.

18:48 And this is the compound word, the more intensive word. The whole end in you intakes. Taking the armor of God against the backdrop of the realization that our warfare as the people of God is not with the things that seem to be the points of conflict, but that insidious, demonic, evil power and powers that work behind them and through them. And in the face of this opposition of the devil and the host of hell and all the minions of our adversary, we are to withstand.

19:24 So here we have in these three critical passages in the New Testament where the child of God is envisioned in some kind of direct encounter with the devil, either personally or in terms of the host of his servants, his lackeys, his minions, the host of those fallen angels that constitute the powers of darkness. And in all three settings, 1 Peter, James 4, Ephesians 6, we are called to one activity. To withstand. To withstand, to stand up against.

19:58 Now this is set in direct contrast to the fact that the New Testament makes it plain that there are certain sins that we are to run from them. We are to flee them. 1 Corinthians 6, 18, flee fornication. 1 Corinthians 10, in verse 14, flee idolatry.

20:16 1 Timothy 6, 11, Paul says, But thou, O man of God, flee these things. And in the context of these things are covetousness, and grasping after wealth. 2 Timothy 2, and verse 22, he says, Flee also youthful lusts. There are certain sins we are to flee.

20:34 But nowhere in the word of God are we told to flee the devil. We are told to withstand him. In fact, James says, if we do withstand him, he will flee from us. When there is an encounter between the devil and the child of God, the only one who is to flee is the devil, the child of God.

20:54 The child of God is to withstand. Whom withstand? That's the very essence of the response required. But now notice, the means, or the context, or the sphere, I'm not satisfied with any of those words, within which that resistance is to be offered.

The Means of Resistance: Steadfast in 'The Faith'

21:14 Look at our text. Whom withstand, steadfast, better rendered, not your faith. There's no, you're in the original text. It is literally, whom withstand steadfast in the faith.

21:34 Whom withstand steadfast. Now this word steadfast means strong, or firm, or rock-like. 2 Timothy 2, and verse 19, Paul says, The foundation of God stands firm. Better rendered, the firm foundation of God stands.

21:55 Yes. God's foundation is what? It is rock-like. It is firm.

22:00 That's our word in the original. It speaks of that which is firm and rock-like. Acts 16.5, the verbal form.

22:08 The apostle and his companions went through the churches, strengthening the believers in the faith. Strengthening. Making them firm. More established, and steadfast, and stable.

22:25 In the Old Testament, in translation from Hebrew into Greek, the Septuagint. There are several instances where this word is used as a word to translate a Hebrew word for rock, or even for flint. Isaiah 50, and verse 7, and Isaiah 51, in verse 1. So you get the feeling of the word.

22:44 When Peter wrote, As you think of your adversary, you are to withstand him. You're to get in his face. You're not to yield ground to him. Ephesians 4, and verse 27, Neither give place to the devil.

23:00 You are to stand. But how are we to stand? By what means do we stand? He says, You stand, withstand against him, steadfast, rock-like, established in the faith.

23:16 Now, there are a number of commentators who say, Well, what that means is that we are to exercise faith in the great truths of the gospel, and the way we withstand the devil is to make sure that we continue in the path of vigorous, constant trust in God. Now, that's a truth taught in the scriptures. There is no grace more central to your spiritual health than the grace of faith, just as there is no grace more indicative of your spiritual reality than love. He that loves not knows not God.

23:53 But without faith it is impossible. And so they will then bring into their exposition of this passage such passages as 1 John 5, 4, this is the victory that overcomes the world, even our faith, Galatians 2, 20, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me, gave himself for me, 2 Corinthians 5, 8, we walk by faith and not by sight, and in so teaching they teach no error. There's nothing they teach that is erroneous. So it's not an error that needs to be attacked, and exposed.

24:27 However, I don't believe that's what Peter is saying.

24:32 I do not believe that Peter is saying, whom resist rock-like in your faith, the subjective exercise of faith, but rather rock-like, steadfast in the faith. In the faith. And when you have the article with that word faith, many times it is referring not to our subjective exercise of the grace of faith, but to the grace of God. but the objective body of God's revealed truth in the gospel.

25:04 A Christian is one who has embraced the faith, that is, the body of revealed truth concerning Christ and His salvation. It's used that way, for example, in James 2 and verse 1. James is addressing this matter of partiality in their assemblies, and he says, My brethren, do not hold the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, with respected persons. Don't be found as one who is adhering to the body of truth revealed concerning Jesus Christ and His salvation, while at the same time showing a carnal, horribly distorted view

25:45 of what the gospel produces in horizontal relationships. The gospel knocks down the middle wall of partition between Jew and Gentile, rich and poor, educated and uneducated. Don't! Don't hold such a faith in the context of contradicting it by showing respected persons.

26:03 You see how he uses it. Similarly, in Galatians 1.23, we read that several weeks ago, Paul says that the people at Jerusalem, they heard that I was now preaching the faith which I was once persecuting. What was Paul persecuting?

26:19 He was not persecuting subjective faith. He was seeking to oppose the body of truth that God revealed concerning Jesus Christ and His salvation. And in Acts 6.7, Luke writes of a great company of the priests who were obedient to the faith.

26:39 What's that mean? They came to the place where they embraced the body of revealed truth concerning Jesus Christ and His salvation. All right? Now we can produce many other passages, but now let's come back to 1 Peter.

The Devil's Strategy and the Believer's Defense

26:52 And this is so crucial, brethren, it's going to mean over the next ten minutes, you've got to put yourself... You've got to put your thinking cap on.

26:59 I've labored to make it as plain and simple as I know how, and this is Sunday morning, and I've got to give you what I've got. All right? So hang in there with me. Peter writes, Here's the response demanded in the face of the reality of your adversary.

27:14 You are suffering Christians. You are experiencing these devilish, demonic attacks upon you, seeking to wrench you loose from Christ. Dear people of God, resist this, this adversary, rock-like in your faith. That is rock-like and unshakable in clinging to the body of truth revealed concerning Jesus Christ and His salvation.

27:46 Now, why did He do that? Well, think it through with me. These Christians had heard the gospel, attended by the power of the Holy Spirit, and they were brought then to...

27:57 Embrace the faith. Go back to chapter 1. This is what He says about all these people that He's talking to in chapter 5.

28:06 Chapter 1, He speaks of the prophets in verse 10, searching what they wrote concerning the sufferings of Christ and the glories to follow. Verse 12, To whom it was revealed that not unto them but unto you did they minister these things. Now notice. Which now have been announced unto you through them that preach the gospel, the gospel unto you by the Holy Spirit sent forth from heaven, which the angels desire to look into.

28:35 He said all of these marvelous gospel mysteries were hid for ages. The prophets wrote about Christ's coming, Christ's suffering, Christ's glory. They couldn't fit it together. All they knew is this awaits fulfillment down the line.

28:50 Down the line it's going to be fulfilled. And He said now you're in the age of fulfillment. And these very things of which they wrote concerning Christ, His sufferings and His glory, this has been announced unto you in the gospel. And the Holy Spirit has attended the preaching of that gospel with power.

29:06 So much so that what happened to these to whom He writes. Verse 22 of the same chapter. Seeing you've purified your souls, now notice, in your obedience to the truth unto one faint love of the brethren. He says your souls have been purified.

29:22 Why? Because they have been brought unto obedience to the truth. What truth? The truth of the gospel.

29:29 What gospel? The gospel that has its tap roots in the writings of the Old Testament prophets focusing upon Christ's sufferings and Christ's glory to follow. So they embraced the Lord Jesus. They were begotten again.

29:44 Verse 23. They were born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible by the word of God that lives and abides. Verse 25. And this is the word of good tidings that was preached unto you.

29:58 So when? When the gospel was being preached with the attendant power of the Spirit, God secretly and powerfully worked His work of regenerating grace. And they embraced the truth and their souls are purified by the truth. And they are committed now to this Christ in terms of what?

30:19 In terms of the faith. That is the revealed truth about Christ and His salvation. Now what happened when they did that? Well, they got all the blessings Peter describes from chapter 1 verse 3 all the way through to chapter 2 and verse 10.

30:36 They were begotten again unto a living hope by the resurrection of Christ to an inheritance incorruptible, undefiled. You just go back and read chapter 1 verse 3 to chapter 2 verse 10. That's all that they received. The moment they were brought into union with Christ, the moment they were born of the Spirit and having known the Spirit's regenerating work, they rendered.

30:59 A response of obedience to the call to repent and to believe the gospel. And they were brought by the gospel, that is by the faith, into the possession of all these marvelous gospel privileges. But something else happened.

31:18 They were brought into a love relationship to the person of Jesus Christ who was preached in that faith. And chapter 1 in verse 8 and 9 make this abundantly clear. These same people, verse 8, whom having not seen the whom is Jesus Christ, on whom though you see him not yet believing, you rejoice with joy unspeakable. When they were obedient to the truth, when they were begotten again, when they experienced redemption through his blood, when they were made living stones and incorporated into the living temple, that's all the wonderful gospel privileges of 1.3 to 2.10.

31:59 They were also, they were brought into a relationship to Jesus Christ in which they began to love him supremely. Not perfectly, but supremely. More than mother, father, brother, sister, and their own lives. For unless we love him that way, he says you can't be my disciple.

32:18 Very simple. So if these are true disciples, true believers, the same Holy Spirit that in the proclamation of the faith set forth Christ in his sufferings and resurrection, that same Holy Spirit in bringing them to faith brought them to an attachment to the person of Christ in love. And how does love to Christ express itself? By praising him? Yes.

32:46 By devotional expressions? Yes. But supremely, how does love to Christ express itself? If you love me, you will what?

32:54 Keep my commandments. He that loves me keeps my commandments. He that loves me keeps not my commandments. So what happens?

33:01 These people, the majority of whom were wretched pagans. You read about how they lived in chapter 4. Wretched pagans. Now, every part of life.

33:12 Who, with whom do I associate for my social interactions? What do I do for recreation? How do I spend my money? How do I treat my husband?

33:22 How do I treat my wife? How do I treat my master? How does master treat his servant? How am I going to relate to the state?

33:30 And in all of these areas, only one thing mattered to them. What does Jesus want me to do? That's it. What does Jesus want me to do?

33:39 And whatever Jesus wants, I want! And whatever Jesus says, cuts mustard with me. And when they began to live that way, you know what happened? You know what happened?

33:53 They began to get it. From whom? From all those around them. I'll give you a quick review of that.

34:00 Look at chapter 2 and verse 12. Having your behavior seemingly good, honorable among the Gentiles, that wherein they speak against you as evildoers. No new leading of the sun, is it? They begin to live an upright, moral, chaste life.

34:21 And people say, huh, that's evil. That's restrictive. You're an evildoer! Because you're now honest.

34:27 You won't listen to the latest dirty joke. And you won't try to join in some seditious band against the government of Caesar and his governors sent to govern us in his name. And you're concerned to treat your wife with dignity and honor and dwell with her according to knowledge. That's evil.

34:44 You're never going to cut it unless you keep your wife under your thumb. And some were saying to their wives, what in the world are you doing being subject to him? Don't you know? We're equal to men.

34:53 This nonsense of man having hierarchy is a lot of baloney. It's evil. You just go back through the epistle and see all the things that Peter has said by the Spirit are to regulate life from dawn to dusk, from sunup to sundown. And these people are saying, that's the way I'm going to live by the grace of God.

35:10 And what happens? People begin to speak against them as evil doers. Chapter 3 and verse 14. But even if you should suffer for righteousness sake, their righteous lives begin to expose the unrighteousness around them.

35:24 And Jesus said, this is the condemnation that light has come into the world. And men love what? Darkness rather than the light. Neither will they come to the light lest their deeds be reproved.

35:34 And here Christ places a light right there. Next to them. And that light exposes their darkness. What do they do?

35:41 They try to push it away. So what do they do? He says in verse 14, they begin to afflict the righteous ones. Verse 16, having a good conscience that wherein you are spoken against, they may be put to shame who revile your good manner of life in Christ.

35:59 The worldlings can't be neutral to them. They revile their good manner of life. They charge them even against the good that is the Lord. Hope that comes from their spirit.

36:10 So in verse 15. Evil doers. Chapter 4 in verse 14. If you are reproached for the name of Christ.

36:15 They can't stand it. You bring in your Jesus stuff all the time. You can't talk about anything. But when you got to talk about your Lord.

36:21 I'm sick and tired of this stuff. That's what they were experiencing. They were suffering for the sake of Christ. For, and verse 19, let them that suffer according to the will of God.

36:36 happen. We haven't lost our track. If you're staying with me now, we're coming up on about minute seven. I said, hang with me for ten minutes on this. The faith

36:45 was preached to them. The Holy Spirit worked in power. They were regenerated. And in that life imparted by God, its first expression was repentance and faith. But in

36:57 the complex of their conversion, their hearts are wedded to Christ. He has the place of supreme affection. They begin to frame all of life by the word and will of Christ in the power of the Spirit of Christ. And what's the reaction? The reaction

37:11 is they speak evil of them. They oppose them. They revile them. And it's all for Christ's sake and righteousness' sake.

The Devil's Motivation: Reclaiming Lost Subjects

37:22 Now, where's the devil in all of this? How's he get into all of this? I think you begin to see the picture, don't you? When the faith was preached and when the Holy Spirit attended the preaching with power and when they were born again and purified their souls in obedience to the truth, what happened to the devil?

37:46 He lost a willing servant and subject.

37:52 And he's spitting mad. For every time someone becomes obedient to the faith, whether consciously or not, they have repudiated their sonship and servitude to their natural spiritual father, the devil. No one is truly converted. Who does not repudiate the devil in experience if not in a cognitive repudiation. When Paul was

38:21 commissioned by his Lord, Acts 26, verse 18, I send you out, he says, to open their eyes, to turn them from darkness to light and from the power of Satan unto God that they may receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those sanctified by faith in me. No one ever got forgiveness of sins but what the devil lost a subject and a servant. Every single time. Now, how do you think he takes that? Here in Asia Minor,

38:55 we had all kinds of subjects and servants in their pagan ignorance, idolatry and immorality and rivalry and every form of perversion. Read Romans 1, 18 and following where paganism reigns. This is the lifestyle and Peter describes that in chapter 4 of the early verses. Well, the devil didn't like this.

39:17 People who were his slaves and when he had them in his grip and when they were his willing servants all he needed to do was stir up their lust by what they saw or what they heard and as Paul says in Romans 6 they presented their members instruments of unrighteousness unto sin and in so doing they made the devil sit back and say, good subject, good servant, I like what you do. But when he loses a subject and a servant though he knows he can't never get them back, he does all he can in his fiendish, hellish perverted will to get them back under

40:00 his government. And one of the ways, and here we come to where the last stroke in the picture comes together, one of the most effective ways, follow carefully, is to let loose persecution and slander and opposition and even martyrdom upon the people of God knowing that when these things come to us, we're tempted to say look, I thought in coming to Christ, I was coming out from under the wrath and disfavor of God and into the favor and smile of God well if God now smiles, why has he allowed me to lose my job for righteousness sake? Why has he allowed

40:45 my name to become mud in my community for righteousness sake? And the devil is there to say, yea, hath God said? I am come that you might have life and have it more abundantly ha ha ha, look what he's given to you. And the slanderer is there whispering into the ear of the child of God, God's not so good a master as he made out he was if you had known this when you embraced Christ, would you have embraced him? It's not

41:17 too late to repudiate him and go back to the good life that's what the devil's doing why? Because he wants to get his subjects back that's the imagery, seeking whom he may what? Swallow down until you become a part of him, he wants you again in his grasp, and he uses opposition and persecution and suffering and even martyrdom as an attempt to get his subjects back within his domain now then what is Peter's prescription in that whole scenario? Whom resist rock-like in what?

42:01 The faith in other words when the devil's whisperings to take us out of the service of Christ and out of the way of Christ are echoing in the ears and chambers of our hearts at that point we are to be rock-like not in our courage but in our grasp upon the contents of the faith what was proclaimed to me in my initial encounter with the faith what was proclaimed to me was that I had a never-dying soul I would spend eternity with that soul united to a resurrected body unless I repented and fled to Christ

42:44 and that Christ came all the way from heaven in his infinite inexhaustible love was willing to become one of us taking to himself a true human soul a true fallen body living under the very law that He gave on Sinai and then going to Golgotha and there bearing the wrath of God against sin then he might give us a just pardon and righteous forgiveness and this God who so loved the world as to give Him and this Christ who gave Himself in love they welcome us and promise pardon and acceptance and wonder of wonders!

43:25 wonders, an eternal home in His presence in the new heavens and the new earth.

43:34 But in the deal is a short span where you've got to carry a cross and through many tribulations enter the kingdom of God. That's what was proposed in the faith. That's what's so wicked about most modern evangelism. It's dishonest with people.

43:54 It tells about the glory to come and about the joys of the now. No, but it omits the reality to be identified with Christ is to take up a cross. If the world has hated me, he said, hate you, it hated me before you. You are not of the world, therefore the world hates you.

44:15 No other alternative. And Peter recognizing this says, look, distressed Christians, your persecution and your opposition, the devil's trying to use it as the very means to get you back into his...

44:30 service to repudiate your attachment to Christ, to repudiate your posture as a pilgrim, the very way he described them, elect sojourners, to begin to think in terms of what am I getting now? I'm getting flack and opposition and misunderstanding, hardship, difficulty. Ah, Peter says, go back and be rock-like in the faith. When you came to repentance and faith, having embraced the faith that was preached to you, did you not declare that from here on in you were going to live as an alien in foreign country?

45:06 That you had a new home and a new citizenship, where your Lord had gone before you and is preparing a place for you. And whatever his lot for you would be in this life, you knew you had a what? An inheritance incorruptible and undefiled that fades not away, reserved in heaven for you. He said, now you go back to those basic things and you be rock-like in the faith.

45:30 You see? Our subjective faith is bound up in that verb, to be steadfast, to be rock-like. That's the emphasis upon faith, but it is the object of that faith, which is the faith, the revealed truth about Christ and his salvation. So Peter gives them this very simple, straightforward description of the response required.

The Importance of Doctrinally Dense Preaching and Hymns

45:57 Whom resist steadfast in the faith. You see, the temptation for these people was not the temptation to covetousness and lying, as in the case of Ananias and Sapphira. Why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit? Nor was it the temptation to go into false doctrine that Paul speaks about in 1 Timothy 4.1.

46:26 People will give heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of demons. Peter, with keen perception, saw that these believers, scattered throughout the world, throughout Asia Minor, were being peculiarly tempted by the pressure of their suffering for righteousness' sake, to repudiate their attachment to Christ, because things weren't as rosy as they once had been, and as some of them perhaps hoped they would be. And he said, the answer is to stand up against the devil, who would whisper his accusing words about the character of God, the love of God, the goodness of God, the wisdom of God. Who would whisper accusations about Christ.

47:10 He said, his yoke is easy, and his burden is light. Is this easy? Is this light? A wretched, ungodly, unrighteous master, and I've got to be subject to him?

47:20 And even when he wits me, when I've done good, I'm not to curse him, I'm not to revile back? That's an easy yoke? The enemy will come and say, is that an easy yoke? Repudiate such a Christ, who treats his disciples in such a way.

47:34 Peter says, look, resist him. Resist him! Talk to him, rock light in the faith, and say, devil, the heart of my God has not changed. The heart of my Christ has not changed.

47:49 My inheritance has not changed. The glory that awaits me has not changed. I'll cling to Christ with a death grip. Resist steadfast in the faith.

48:01 And it underscores something else, dear people. That's why we need doctorally dense preaching and teaching, so we might know the faith. The body of revealed truth. And hear me out now, some of you aren't going to like this, but I've got to say it.

48:17 We need doctrinally dense hymns, not only in our church, but when we're in our car and listening to CDs and tapes. Some of the gospel bideism won't stand up to one whisper of the devil. It's theological much, so much of it. We need hymns like the ones we sang this morning, that take us to the cap roots of the great truths.

The Encouragement Given: Sufferings are Common, Apportioned, and Limited

48:45 About Christ, what he's done, who he is, that form the very vertebrae of the faith of the child of God. Well then, very quickly, the second head, and it is much briefer. The encouragement given. The encouragement given.

49:06 Look at the text. Whom withstand, that's the essence of our response. The context, steadfast in the faith. Now here's the answer.

49:17 The encouragement given, knowing, knowing that the same sufferings are accomplished in your brethren who are in the world. We are to resist our adversary, being steadfast in the faith while knowing something. In the form of the verb, it's a present perfect. It's a knowledge to be acquired and to be retained to the end that we may continually reflect upon it.

49:42 And what is it that we are to know? What is it that we are to acquire? What kind of knowledge? Knowledge of what?

49:50 What are we to retain with a view to constant reflection? Well three things, very simply. Number one, Peter wants them to be encouraged to resist the devil by knowing and remembering that their sufferings are the lot of all their brethren. He wants them to be encouraged to resist the devil by remembering that their sufferings are the lot of all the brethren.

50:16 Look at the text. Knowing that the same sufferings are accomplished in your brethren. And here I'm just going to do a little bit of linguistic study with you because I think it will be helpful. Peter, first of all, does not say brethren.

50:31 You have a marginal reading, the old ASV, brotherhood. It's a collective singular noun only used twice in the New Testament, both here in 1 Peter. 1 Peter 2.17, he said, love the brotherhood.

50:46 And here he says, you're to know something with respect. And here he says, you're to know something with respect. And here he says, you're to know something with respect. And here he says, you're to know something with respect.

50:50 With respect to the brotherhood, singular. That is all believers in all places. And this is what he says, you're to know about the brotherhood the same sufferings, literally the same things of the sufferings. Poor English, but it gives the sense of the original.

51:09 The same things of the sufferings are accomplished in the brotherhood. What you're going through is not strange to the whole world. But it is the same thing you've been through. The same thing of that brotherhood.

51:19 whole brotherhood of the people of God wherever they are found. You are part of a brotherhood and you need to know that though the enemy may whisper and say, ah, your condition is unique. No, he says, resist, steadfast in your faith, knowing the world is full of people assailed by the same whisperings of the adversary seeking to devour them. And they are standing, young and old, men and women, boys and girls. I'm not somebody unique in my sufferings.

51:54 The same things of the sufferings are there in the brotherhood. No temptation taken you but such as is common to man. But God is faithful. You see, we're particularly vulnerable when the devil persuades us our case is the exception. How many times in the past couple of years

52:17 have people who know something of what we've gone through as a church and what the Martin householder face with two bouts with cancer and the rest. How in the world do you go through it? I'm thankful. I know enough of church history and Christian boggers to say, I'm way down on the scale of accumulated trials.

52:37 I don't live with headaches and multiple diseases as Calvin did and what that man accomplished. You read of Spurgeon's gout and his fits of depression and all of those. You say, what in the world have I born? What have I born? No.

52:53 We need to remember that the same things of the sufferings are present in our brethren. John Brown said very perceptively sufferers are very apt to think their case is quite singular. Others have been tried but none tried as we are. And the Apostle Paul shows his knowledge of human nature when he says to the Corinthians no temptation taken you but such is common to man. Your sufferings

53:18 are not peculiar. It's unreasonable to complain of what is so common a lot. And a lot of the old writers like to use this word. It were pusillanimous.

53:28 That's an old word. It sounds just like it is. Sissy. Cowardly.

53:34 It were cowardly to sink under what so many are suffering and have sustained. But the consolation given here is of a higher kind than this. These sufferings are characteristic of the brotherhood to which you belong. Every member of the brotherhood is a partaker of them. He who is the firstborn

53:51 among many brethren, even Jesus, experienced the temptations of the devil and the persecutions of wicked men. And in their sufferings all the younger branches of the holy family have fellowship with him. You could not belong to the brotherhood if you were entire strangers to their afflictions. That's part of the badge of being in the brotherhood.

54:16 That's the first thing Peter wants them to know as an encouragement. You're in this as part of the brotherhood. Secondly, Peter wants them to be encouraged to resist the devil by knowing and remembering that their suffering is a divinely apportioned reality. Look again at the text.

54:37 Knowing that the same sufferings are accomplished. Now this verb, accomplished. The linguist and the commentators debate its precise significance here. It's a word that means to complete, to perform, to lay something upon someone. It's used

54:56 by the Apostle Paul in 2 Corinthians 8.6 concerning the completing of that offering. It's used in a similar way in Romans 15.28 and then this morning Galatians 3. Are you Galatians so foolish

55:08 having begun in the spirit? You are now perfected. There's our verb. Are you bringing to completion your salvation by fleshy involvement in things that have nothing to do with your salvation?

55:21 And I believe John Brown is right on the money when he takes the position that we should think of the verb in that sense. Peter's saying this. Look, my suffering saints, in calling you to resist this one who like a ravenous beast would swallow you up, do so in the context of being rock-like in the faith and constantly remember not only is there a brotherhood who share in similar sufferings, but those sufferings are being accomplished. They are not sent willy-nilly.

55:53 They do not come or go by external forces. There is behind them the wisdom and the will of Almighty God who has said He would not permit us to be tried above that we are able to bear it. The one who knows our frame, the one who cares for us, Matthew chapter 6, far more than He cares for sparrows that fall to the ground and flowers that wither and die in a day. We are of much more value than we are of value.

56:24 And this is to be a consolation, an encouragement to the people of God as they seek by the grace of God to withstand the devil steadfast in faith, constantly remembering the brotherhood experience similar sufferings. And the brotherhood and I and we with them experience sufferings that are being accomplished. They are being brought to a completion and as soon as God sees they have accomplished their purpose in our individual lives God will relieve us of them not a moment before not a moment after. And then thirdly Peter wants them to be encouraged to resist the devil by knowing and remembering that these sufferings

57:08 are limited to this sphere. Look at the phrase knowing that the same sufferings are accomplished in your brethren or in the brotherhood, your brotherhood literally, who are in the world. Some of the brotherhood ain't no longer here. They're no longer in the world. They've gone home.

57:28 Suffering is no longer their lot. The prancing and perambulating lion is no longer out to get them. They're beyond his reach and he knows it. But it's in this world, but in this world only that you have to contend with these realities.

57:48 Some of them are the answer to Jesus prayer in John 17. Father I desire that those who you have given me be with me where I am that they may be behold my glory and the wish and the will of Christ for them is accomplished. So Peter says look know this. Constantly bring to mind this reality that the same sufferings that leave you vulnerable to satanic attacks to wrench you loose from Christ and from his truth.

58:14 Remember there's a brotherhood experiencing them. Remember they are being accomplished. There is wisdom and design and a sovereign hand controlling all of them and they only have reference to this world. But as long as you're in this world that's going to be part and parcel. In the world

58:33 Jesus said you what shall have tribulation. All that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution. Isn't it an encouragement to know a few more breaths, a few more ticks of this old heart and it's all over. Then we go to the inheritance incorruptible, undefiled and it fades not away. And the Christ

Conclusion: Aligning with Christ Against the World and Devil

58:57 we've loved so feebly and thickly at times and so poorly we'll see him face to face and we'll love him with the capacity of a perfected and purified spirit. Think what that will mean to have no contrary influence upon our affections when we see him as he is. So we're still in the world. And when the devil whispers is this what you bargained for? Say well no

59:24 I really didn't know this was going to be it but I know Christ said this would be part of it so what's the big deal? But he's going to take me to himself. He said if he were not going to do that he would have told me. And he does not lie. He is the way and the

59:37 truth as well as the life. Well in conclusion brethren we've seen the response required. Whom resist steadfast in the faith. The encouragement given knowing that the same things of sufferings are accomplished in the brotherhood who are in the world.

59:59 This passage sets before us the basic truth of all true and saving Christian experience and it is this to be savingly aligned with Christ is to be aligned against the world and the devil. To be savingly aligned with Christ is to be aligned against this world. And to be aligned against the world is to be aligned against the prince of the power of the air. The one who is called the God of this world.

60:29 And he is determined to devour you. I.E. he wants you to apostatize from Christ.

60:35 He wants to swallow you down. He doesn't like it that you're no longer his slave and his servant. He doesn't like it that you're no longer his spiritual child. Ever since God broke up the alignments in Genesis 3.15

60:51 when God came to the man and to the woman who had aligned themselves with the devil and the whole human race would have been aligned with him forever. God said I will put enmity. I'm going to inject influences that readjust the alignments and some will be aligned with the woman and her seed and some with the devil and his seed. And that's what you and I experience. That ongoing

61:15 conflict that will go until the heavens open and our Lord returns. Child of God in the midst of suffering when assaults come upon you with blasphemous thoughts. Hard thoughts of God. Resist the devil. Rock like in the

61:32 cave. Always remembering what you know. Others have been where you are. Others are where you are. And they

61:40 have overcome. All the facets of my trials are divinely ordered and they only pertain to this world. My unconverted friend let me speak to you frankly and winsomely. Almighty God commands you to repent and to believe.

61:59 The living Christ sincerely invites you to come to him. And what does he promise? Forgiveness, pardon, and eternal inheritance. But he also promises this.

62:10 Opposition, hardship, suffering. You've got a choice to make.

62:17 Will I avoid a little suffering now in order to plunge myself into eternal suffering where the worm dies not and the fire is never quenched? Every one of us must suffer. We must. And to avoid the suffering of rejection and identification with the Christ, to spare your own feelings or your own skin is to keep your alignments with the devil and suffer with him forever.

62:50 Suffer you must. Isn't it just reasonable to say I'd rather have a little suffering for a few more ticks of my heart here and have eternal glory than willfully, knowingly consign myself to a place of eternal suffering? That's the issue. As long as the Bible is taught and preached in this place, you will never be told, coming to Christ, is the end of all your troubles.

63:16 Coming to Christ is the beginning of a whole new set of troubles.

63:21 But bless God, they're only for this time. I can't believe that the Lord spares me in less than two years. I will have been fifty years in a state of grace.

63:35 And while I mourn my sins, my lack of love to Christ, my lack of zeal for his kingdom, I have no questions that his yoke has been easy and his burden has been light.

63:51 That old man said who was being forced to recant lest he be slain for Christ. He had served Christ for close to eighty years. And he said, should I repudiate so gracious a master? Oh, my unconverted friend, I plead with you this morning. Go to Christ

64:09 as he's presented in the faith, in the gospel. Embrace him. Tell him what you are. He knows it.

64:20 Ask him to cleanse you in his blood and bind you to his heart in faith and love. And begin to live with the brotherhood out of love to Christ, in the will of Christ, by the power of Christ, to the glory of Christ. And then someday go to be with Christ. Let's pray.

Prayer

64:42 Our Father, how we thank you for this portion of your word. We thank you for your spirit who moved through the apostle to write these words. And we pray that the same spirit who moved the apostle to write them would write them upon our hearts by his own present ministry that we may, by your grace, who are your children, ever hear you saying to us whom resist, rock-like, steadfast in the faith, constantly remembering these realities that are calculated to encourage us and spur us on.

65:27 Father, have mercy upon those who are yet the devil's slave, slaves, servants, subjects, sons and daughters. Oh, that they would repudiate that allegiance and be aligned with Christ in his grace and mercy and in his easy yoke. Seal then your word to the prophet of each one, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen.