Now may I encourage you to turn
with me in your own Bibles to 1 Peter in chapter 4, 1 Peter
chapter 4. I shall read verses 12 through
19, 1 Peter chapter 4, 12. Beloved, do not think it strange
concerning the fiery trial among you which comes upon you to prove
you as though a strange thing happened unto you, but insomuch
as you are partakers of Christ's sufferings, rejoice, that at
the revelation of His glory also you may rejoice with exceeding
joy. If you are reproached for the
name of Christ, blessed are you, because the Spirit of glory and
the Spirit of God rests upon you. For let none of you suffer
as a murderer or a thief or an evildoer or as a meddler in other
men's matters. But if a man suffer as a Christian,
let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in this name. The time has come for judgment
to begin at the house of God, and if it begin first at us,
what shall be the end of them that obey not the gospel of God? And if the righteous is scarcely
or with difficulty saved, where shall the ungodly and sinner
appear? Wherefore, Let them also that
suffer according to the will of God commit their souls in
well-doing unto a faithful Creator. Now let us again seek God's help
and blessing in the ministry of His Word. Let us pray. Our Father, we have just sung
a hymn that oozes with sobering realities. And as we have sought
to bring near in our mind's eye that awesome day, when we shall
look upon our Lord Jesus in glorified humanity, when we shall hear
His voice saying, Come, you blessed, or depart, you cursed. O God,
help us. that we will not think upon these
things with careless, unfeeling hearts, that I may not be permitted
to speak of them in a clinical manner. Oh God, help preacher
and listener alike that together we may taste the powers of the
age to come as we listen to your words. Hear us for the good of
our souls and for the glory of Christ we pray. Amen. One of the burning questions
which is forced upon the minds and hearts of the observing and
sensitive souls in every generation is this. Why is it that so often
the righteous suffer and are afflicted while the wicked are
at ease and prosper? It is this burning question that
form both the basis and the primary concerns of Psalm 73. The psalmist
looks out and sees this reality before his eyes. The righteous
suffering, the wicked prospering, and his soul is vexed, his thinking
is so skewed as he looks at those realities that later on in the
psalm he says, I was as a beast before you. In other words, to
contemplate that disparity, that apparent inequity, while the
righteous suffer and the wicked prosper, to think of it in any
other way than God's way is to put ourselves in the character
of a beast. And it is no doubt this very
question that was in the mind of many of the believers there
in Asia Minor when the Apostle Peter wrote to them in that portion
of the Word of God that we call First Peter. For as we have seen,
and as I have sought to affirm again and again, the central
issue of this letter is Peter's passionate pastoral concern to
enlighten, to encourage, and to instruct the suffering saints
there in Asia Minor. And he's seeking to do this in
order to promote their stability in their Christian experience
and to enhance and augment their usefulness as a witness to the
power of the gospel. And from chapter 3 and verse
13 onward to chapter 5 and verse 11, this very pastoral passion
is the primary focus of the letter. Here in the paragraph read in
your hearing again today, Peter describes their suffering as
a fiery trial. in its present expressions and
in its future manifestations, he says that what they are experiencing
is a fiery trial or a burning which has been permitted to try
them, to test them. And with reference to this trial,
this burning, this fiery trial, he says, don't think it a strange
thing, but rejoice. And then he tells them what are
the grounds for that rejoicing. He says, rejoice. because your
sufferings for Christ are in reality a suffering with Christ. You are fellowshipping in the
sufferings of Christ. Further, he says, as you are
unable to rejoice in your present sufferings, that rejoicing is
a pledge and an earnest of an even greater rejoicing that will
be yours at the coming of Christ. In addition to this, Peter writes,
You are in the category of the blessed ones, the ones who stand
under God's covenant, favor and blessing, if you are being reproached
for the name of Christ. That puts you in the category
of the blessed ones, and one of the primary aspects of that
blessedness is that the Spirit of glory and of God is resting
upon you. It is because of God's gracious
gift of the Holy Spirit that you, in your present level of
conformity to Christ, are the object of those who hate your
Savior. And as you fellowship in His
sufferings, Remind yourself all this has come to pass because
the Spirit of God has graciously and powerfully intruded upon
my life and rests upon me even as it rested upon my living head,
the Lord Jesus. However, Peter says, make sure
that you do nothing worthy of punishment or blame that would
constitute suffering. Rather, when suffering is the
result of consistency in your life as a Christian, don't be
ashamed, but glorify God in the realm of your attachment to the
name of Christ. That's a bit of a paraphrase
and review of verses 12 through 16. But now in verse 17, He begins
to place the sufferings of the people of God in a broader, and
we might say even a deeper, biblical and theological context. Notice
verse 17 begins with the word for. There is still a logical
connection. What he has said in the previous
verses is going to flower out in what he then writes in what
is in our Bibles, verses 17 through 19. In verses 17 and 18, he's
going to give a further, a deeper, expanded explanation of the nature
and the purpose of their sufferings. And then in verse 19, he's going
to give a very helpful conclusion to this entire paragraph, beginning
with the words, Wherefore, here's the sum of it all. If you've
understood what I've written, this should be the settled disposition
and response of your heart. Now, this morning, we're going
to focus our attention upon verses 17 and 18. And I struggled and
prayed for a popular title to the sermon. But for the life
of me, I couldn't come up with a popular title that was accurate.
So I'm going to tell you, we're going to study the verses under
the title, An Expanded Theology of Suffering for the Sake of
Christ. Because that's exactly what Peter
does for these saints, is to take them into the deeper theology
of suffering. with deep embedded tap roots
in Old Testament perspectives. And so though I don't have a
popular title, I hope I will preach by God's help simply and
plainly. As we look at verses 17 and 18,
we will do so under three headings. First of all, we will look at
verse 17a as a significant assertion For the time is come for judgment
to begin at the house of God. There's the simple assertion.
Then we find the sobering questions. And if it begin first at us,
what shall be the end of them that obey not the gospel of God?
Question one. And if the righteous is scarcely
saved, where shall the ungodly and sinner appear? Question number
two. So having looked at the significant
assertion, the sobering questions, I will then seek to make one
pointed concluding application. First of all, then, the significant
assertion. To assert is to state a fact
with certainty. And this is exactly what Peter
does. as he is taking them deeper into the theology of suffering
for the sake of Christ, suffering as a Christian, suffering for
the name of Christ, he says in this very straightforward assertion,
for the time is come for judgment to begin at the house of God. You saints in Asia Minor, You
who I'm seeking to minister to in pastoral wisdom and tenderness. I've told you so many things
about your sufferings. Now I'm going to tell you if
you understand this fact, you will cope with your sufferings
in a more thoroughly Christian way. Before the time has come,
you are living in a time frame appointed by God in which judgment
is to begin at, or as we shall see more literally and more accurately,
from the house of God. Would you understand your sufferings?
Then understand this. The time is upon us. The reference
that God has given to us is this truth. The time has come for
judgment to begin at the house of God. Now it's obvious that
the key words in this assertion are the words judgment and house
of God. So we're going to have to wrestle
with what do the words mean in this setting. And as Wayne Gruden
is very helpfully indicated, and this is not a direct quote,
but I owe so much to him that I must give acknowledgment. Peter
begins this assertion by calling the fiery trial of verse 12. Remember, he's still in this
subject matter. Think it not strange concerning
the fiery trial among you. Verse 17 begins with a four. There's still a logical connection.
He's still thinking about the burning among them, the fiery
trial. They're being reproached for
the name of Christ, and he says this fiery trial, in some way
or another, is a judgment. For the time has come for judgment. The fiery trial is, in some way
or another, a judgment of God. Now, the word Peter uses, prima,
not kata, prima, is a word that often means an assessment leading
to condemnation. If you were to take an Englishman's
Greek concordance or a concordance, Strong's or Young's, and look
up the word crema, judgment, you'd see many times the word
crema. It does refer to that divine assessment leading to
condemnation. But it does not necessarily mean
that. It is a broader term that can
refer to a judgment that results in good or bad evaluations, a
judgment that may issue in approval or discipline, as well as in
condemnation. James says, Be not many of you
teachers, knowing you shall receive the heavier judgment. Now, if the word necessarily
meant the condemnation that sends us to hell, I'd quit today. Be
not many of you teachers, knowing you shall receive the heavier
condemnation to hell. I'd shut my Bible, sit down,
and just be an ordinary Christian. No, you shall receive the heavier
evaluation. hopefully unto approbation, approval. You see, the word there does
not mean judgment in the sense that we ordinarily think of that
word. And there is a passage where
it is very, very clear that this is the way in which the Spirit
of God uses this word. We read it last week, 1 Corinthians
11, 1 Corinthians chapter 11, in dealing with the irregularities
there in Corinth. One of them was that in conjunction
with the Lord's Supper they had what they called their love feasts,
and some were coming drunk, some were coming stuffed and burping,
and others were coming with their stomachs growling, and Paul had
to sort this mess out, and in the midst of it he says this,
verse 29, They were profaning the significance of the Lord's
Supper, for he who eats and drinks eats and drinks judgment unto
himself, if he discern not the body. There's our word, he drinks
judgment, and you have it in both the noun and verbal forms
found in the New Testament. For this cause, Many are weak
and sickly, and not a few sleep. But if we discerned ourselves,
we should not be judged. But when we are judged, we are
chastened of the Lord that we may not be condemned with the
world." That's kata krino. You have for judgment krima. Kata krima is the judgment unto
condemnation. That's what Paul writes in Romans
8.1. There is therefore now no kata krima, no condemnation,
no judgment unto damnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
But there is a present judgment unto God's disciplinary action,
and that's exactly what Paul is talking about in this passage. When we are judged, we are chastened
that we might not be condemned with the world. So here you have
a clear use of this word where God is bringing judgment that
is in the form of disciplinary action upon his people, not condemning
them and consigning them to hell, cutting them off from the grace
that they previously had. So there's the significance of
the word judgment. Back in our passage, Peter says,
would you understand and relate as Christian men and women, boys
and girls to your present suffering, to your present fiery trial? Then understand this. The time
has come for judgment to begin from the house of God. We are
in the time when God is sitting as judge, not judge assessing
and consigning men to their eternal destiny in condemnation in hell. but as judge in his house, assessing,
evaluating his people and exercising, where necessary, a disciplinary
providence in order to advance the purposes of his grace in
their lives. That leads us very naturally
then to the next key words, house of God. Peter writes, the time
has come for judgment to begin literally from The Greek preposition
at pole never means at, it means from. from this point to another,
a pole. I will come and paint your entire
house beginning from the front porch. And then I move from the
front porch into the living room and the dining room and the bedrooms.
This is what Peter writes. The time has come for judgment
to begin from the house of God. Now, what is the house of God?
If you have a translation that says family or household, it's
a poor translation. It should read House of God. That's the very term Peter used
in Chapter 2. Turn back to it for a moment.
Peter, using Old Testament imagery to describe the New Testament
church, He says that coming to Christ, verse 4, as a living
stone, rejected indeed of men, but with God elect and precious,
you also as living stones are built up a spiritual house. It's the image, you see, of a
living temple, and within that temple we are the priesthood
who offer up spiritual sacrifices. So Peter uses the term house
of God as a synonym for church. You will not find the Greek word
ekklesia in Peter's writings. He doesn't use the word church.
But twice in this epistle he refers to the church as the house
of God. Some of you perhaps have already
thought of the other very clear reference, 1 Timothy 3 in verse
15. When Paul is giving directions
to Timothy as to the ministry he should employ there in Ephesus,
he writes in chapter 3 in verses 14 and 15, these things I write
to you hoping to come unto you shortly. But if I tarry long,
that you may know how men ought to behave themselves," here's
our phrase again, "...in the house of God, which is the church
of the living God." The house of God is the church. The church
is the house of God. So now, in this significant assertion,
and I know this has made you strain your brain, but I don't
know any other way to be a faithful servant of the Word, I remind
you of the quote from Albert Barnes that I give you about
once every five years, he who would expound the word as a faithful
servant of Christ must do so not under the impress of a vivid
imagination, but by the discipline of being able to give an accurate
explanation of the words of scripture to those to whom he preaches.
And that's what I'm attempting to do. You say, well, that's
hard. Well, imagine how hard it was
for me to try to get it down to where it's easy as it can
be for you. All right. So we're going to work together
because this may have far more relevance than any of us realize.
When the fire may get so intense that we may say, oh, God, have
mercy on me, that you gave me the stuff to prepare me. And
I sat there half asleep or mentally lazy. God help us that that will
not be so. In this assertion, key words,
judgment, which we have seen, does not necessarily mean God's
assessment leading to condemnation, but it can be God's assessment
leading to disciplinary action that has as its goal our ongoing
sanctification. And that judgment goes on in
the house of God. Now, in trying to think of an
illustration that would at least point in the direction of this,
and then I'll pick up the threads of it later on, it may be helpful,
I want you to think with me of a man who is a noble, honest,
upright man. He has paid his dues to gain
a very thorough acquaintance with law, and with justice, and
he has eventually made his way into a very prestigious sphere
of legal responsibility. He is the duly appointed judge
in a specific courtroom. Day after day, at an appointed
hour, he goes into his chambers, he puts on his robe, he enters
the courtroom, and the court, whoever he is in the uniform
that says, will all rise, and he is announced, and he sits
in his judgment seat. He sits at his bench. And there,
day after day, he sits as an administrator of the law of that
particular county or state, wherever he may be carrying on his work. When he is there and the accused
appears before him, he is marshalling all of his powers to make sure
that in his courtroom there is a fair and honest exposure of
the evidence, that there is every opportunity for him, as much
as a fallible human being can do it, to express true justice
in his dealings. So he's making assessments, he
is making judgments, he is then pronouncing the, or giving the
jury, if it's a jury case, he is the official manipulator,
orchestrator of the whole system that then makes a pronouncement,
guilty or not guilty, and then a sentence is imposed. Now think
of that man, whose whole life is taken up with the courtroom,
he is the judge. He appears in his robe, he speaks
in his legal language, and before him appear day after day those
who are charged with some felony, with some breach of the law. At the end of each day, he takes
off his robes. He makes his way back to his
home in the suburbs, and there he puts on his slippers, and
he takes off his shirt and tie and puts on a bathrobe or a lounging
robe and he sits down and kicks his feet up and seeks to enjoy
his family, has four children. This particular night he's all
done his work as a judge and he goes home and he just has
had enough time to relax and look at the headlines of his
paper And lo and behold, he hears something going on somewhere
else in the house that sounds like two of the kids are having
a real old-fashioned donnybrook. So he says, uh-oh, gotta go sort
this out. So he goes into the room. He
says, now what in the world is going on with you two? Well,
she did this, and she did that, and he said... Now, wait a minute,
wait a minute. Let's get the facts. So he sits
down in the bed and he puts the boy under his right arm and the
girl under the other. He says, now, son, she's going
to speak first. Keep your mouth shut. All right,
dear, you give me your account of what's happened. Well, daddy.
He said, no, no, no, no. You be quiet. Let sister talk.
So sister gets it all out. All right, now, sister, you be
quiet. Let your brother speak. So the brother and she starts.
No, no, you don't butt in. He let's it all out. OK, now,
then we have two different accounts of the thing now. You've heard
her, you've heard him, now, and so he lets them cross-examine
one another. He's trying to exercise a righteous judgment in this
family spat. And after examining and cross-examining
and hearing the things, he doesn't take the shortcut that my mother
did. All she had to do was discern we were having a fight, she came
in and said, if you had a fight, it takes two to fight, you both
get your bottoms, end of discussion. But he's a judge and he knows
he just feels even more comfortable this way. So after he gets it
all sorted out, he makes a judgment. And he said, now, son, in this
particular situation, you bear the primary responsibility. You
provoked your sister. You're the older. You did this.
You did this. You bear the culpability. And
then he administers some paternal discipline upon his son. Now,
let me ask this simple question. The man who sat in court that
day and the man who was in the bedroom sorting out a family
feud, was he the same man? Yes. Right? Was he acting as
a judge in both circumstances? Yes. Was he pronouncing sentence? Yes. But was there identity in
what he did in the courtroom and what he did in the bedroom
with his two kids? I hope you're saying, no way. In the one he
sits as the administrator of pure justice in a system of legality. In his home he sits as a father
to his children. And when he makes a judgment
in the one case, it's the sheer brunt of naked law that comes
down upon the criminal. In the other, it's the loving
passion of a father to see noble character fashioned in his son. Do you see that? Now, we already
learned from Peter in chapter 1. We are going somewhere. Just hang in there with me. Go
back to chapter 1. And I've heard some of you in
your prayers give back this language to God, so you will remember
it, I'm sure. Chapter 1 in verse 17, And if
you call on him as father, who without respect of persons judges
according to each man's work, past the time of your sojourning
in fear. The father is your judge, but
the judge is your father. And in that courtroom, someone
who was pleading for clemency or for leniency could not say,
Oh, judge, you are my daddy. Does your daddy's heart not move? No, no. In that courtroom, it's
law, pure law, justice, only justice. But in that bedroom,
where there's a filial relationship between the son and the daughter
and their daddy, he's the judge, yes, but he's the father. and
the whole intentions of his judgment and any punishment that is administered
has an entirely different end in view. One is disciplinary,
one is formative, one is sanctifying, the other is pure vengeance upon
a broken law. It is the administration of naked
judgment. Come back to our text. In this
significant assertion, Peter says, Would you have some deeper,
richer understanding of why it is that a fiery trial has come
upon you? Then understand this. The time
is come. You notice in your Bibles, if
you have a good translation, is come is in italics. There is no such verb in the
Greek. Literally, it's very rough English,
for the time for judgment to begin at the house of God. It's
a very terse statement. You people are living in the
time. You are living in the kairos,
that point or time, or that period fixed in time, but Almighty God
in which God has ordained that judgment shall begin, not at,
but literally, from the house of God. Well, if it begins from
the house of God, where does it go and where does it end? Well, he's going to come to that,
because he goes on to say, and if it begins first, again, the
same Greek preposition, not at, but opposed. If it begins from
us, what the end of them that obey not the gospel of God? Now, we've wrestled in this significant
assertion with the key words, the time has come for judgment,
God's disciplinary assessments and actions to begin from his
house. And we are living in that time.
Now, the next major question is, This seems very, very strange
language to me. The time has come for judgment,
not in terms of condemnation resulting in eternal damnation,
but assessment and decision leading to fatherly discipline and chastisement
that has the development of Christian character as its end, What in
the world does this mean? That judgment is in the time
frame beginning from the house of God. Well, there are many
reasons why I still love the old American Standard Version
of the Bible, not the least of which, I love its accuracy. But
I love its center column reference. It is often so helpful to let
scripture interpret scripture. And if you ever use those, you
would find that in the letter attached to this verse, to this
phrase, judgment beginning from the house of God, the old American
standard refers us to three Old Testament passages. And there
is a motif in the Old Testament prophets of this very concept.
And remember, Peter's writing is one whose mind was not only
steeped in the Old Testament scriptures, but he had the Lord
Jesus as his personal Bible instructor for 40 days after the resurrection,
During which time, according to Luke 24, the Lord Jesus was
expounding passage after passage in the Old Testament, showing
its fulfillment in Christ and in the age of Christ's ascension,
the descent of the Spirit, and the gospel age, which is the
end times until Jesus returns. What Peter referred to in verse
7, that the end of all things is at hand. And then Peter had
the promise of the Holy Spirit coming and in a unique way, giving
insight and understanding to him as an apostle. And I want
you to look with me very quickly at a couple of passages in which
this emphasis of God coming in judgment, starting with his own
people, starting in his own house and then moving out to the nations. Jeremiah, chapter 25. Jeremiah,
chapter 25. Notice in verse 15, for thus
saith the Lord the God of Israel, take this cup of wine of my wrath
at my hand, now notice, and cause all the nations to whom I send
thee to drink it. God says, Jeremiah, I'm going
to come forth in wrath. Take this cup of the wine of
my wrath and make all the nations to drink of it. Verse 17. Then
took I the cup at the Lord's hand and made all the nations
to drink unto whom the Lord had sent me, that is, Jerusalem,
and the cities of Judah, and the kings thereof, and the princes
thereof, to make them a desolation, an astonishment, a hissing, and
a curse, as it is this day, Pharaoh, king of Egypt, all the way down
to verse 29. For lo, I begin to work at the
city which is called by my name. And should you be utterly unpunished,
God says, if I start with my people, those called by my name,
shall those who have a greater distance in relationship to me
be unpunished? And the answer to that rhetorical
question is given, for I will call for a sword upon all the
inhabitants of the earth, saith the Lord of hosts. If I will
judge those to whom I have a peculiar covenantal relationship, will
you who are outside that relationship escape? And the answer is obvious. Turn to Ezekiel chapter 9. This
is one of the passages that is in the center column reference.
Not inspired, but very perceptive. You remember this graphic imagery
in which the Lord speaks to Jeremiah? Chapter 9, verse 1, Then he cried
in my ears with a loud voice, saying, Cause them that have
charge over the city to draw near, every man with his destroying
weapon in his hand. And, behold, six men came from
the way of the upper gate, And he describes these who come,
one man in the midst clothed in linen with a writer's incorn,
and the glory of God is again manifested. Verse four, And the
Lord said to him, Go through the midst of the city, through
the midst of Jerusalem, set a mark upon the foreheads of the men
that sigh and cry over all the abominations that are done in
the midst thereof. And to the others, he said in
my hearing, go through the city after him in smite. Let not your
eyes spare, neither have pity. Slay utterly old man, young man,
virgin, little children, women, but come not near any man upon
whom is the mark and begin at my sanctuary. Then they began
at the elders, the old men, the older ones that were before the
house. And then you see the judgment
of God going out in ever widening circles. There's the directive
to begin at my sanctuary. And then is what is probably
the passage that was at least working in the mind of Peter
as he penned these words, the book of Malachi. that last book
of Old Testament revelation. And you have this vivid language
in chapter 3. Malachi, last book of the Old
Testament, verse 1. Behold, I send my messenger. He shall prepare the way before
me, and the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple. And the messenger of the covenant
whom you desire, behold, he comes, says the Lord of hosts. We know
this refers to Jesus, for we have the infallible New Testament
interpretation that the messenger was John the Baptist. He's the
messenger, prepares the way, and then the messenger of the
covenant himself comes, the Lord Jesus, verse 2. But who can abide
the day of his coming? Who can stand when he appears?
For he's like a refiner's fire, and like fuller soap, and he
will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and will purify, notice,
the sons of Levi, and refine them as gold and silver, and
they shall offer unto the Lord offerings in righteousness. The messenger of the covenant
comes, and his first work is to purify the sons of Levi, that
they may offer acceptable sacrifices." Does that sound like some of
Peter's language in chapter 2? We are made this spiritual house
to offer up spiritual sacrifices. The Lord is determined that the
sacrifices in his house will be offered by these new covenant
Levites who are increasingly purified and made more and more
into his likeness. Peter had written in chapter
one that their trials were like fire that purified metal and
it was being used to purify their faith. He again picks up the
theme of fire here in chapter four. And as you read on in the
book of Malachi, it's not until chapter four that the day comes
that burns as a furnace and the proud and those who work wickedness
shall be a stubble that the day comes that shall burn them up.
Judgment begins from the house of God. and will ultimately move
out until the messenger of the covenant shall come in all the
glory and power of his second coming. And then the wicked,
who in this period have been let loose to oppress the people
of God, to mock the people of God, to taunt the people of God,
to throw into their faces everything they can do to dissuade them
from their attachment to Christ. while all the while the loving
Father is judging His own, all in anticipation of the day when
He comes in glory and power, and His work of judging and purifying
His own is completed. For we shall be like Him when
we see Him as He is. Then He sits on His throne, not
as a father in the bedroom with His arm around a son and daughter,
but as the judge to deal with you pure justice. And if you think you're going
to get by, just look at God's people. Does God take sin seriously? Look what He does to His people
whom He loves. Throws them into the fire, lets
them be burnt and scorched, brings His disciplinary rod upon them. Why? Because though He is their
Father, And He loves them with a passion that finds its expression
in the giving of His only begotten Son. He hates the sin that is
yet in them. And he's determined to make them
more and more into the likeness of his son. And so he uses afflictive
dispensations, as the old Puritans would call it, and he uses the
taunting and the abuse and the opposition of the wicked, all
to one end, to make his people more like him. Judgment upon
human sin is beginning at the house or from the house of God. That's what God is doing. And
His great concern, you see, for us as His people, is not our
present happiness. It is not our present comfort. It is our ongoing conformity
to the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. So as Peter is instructing
the people of God as to how to view and react to their suffering
for the name of Christ, now he asserts, You are living in the
period between the first and the second coming. The time is
for judgment to begin from the house of God. The messenger of
the covenant has come. He's lived and died and rose
again and sent the Spirit. You've embraced him as he's offered
in the gospel. As a result of your allegiance
to him, you are suffering for his name. And Peter says, I've
called you to rejoice. Rejoice, because your sufferings
for Christ are a fellowship in the sufferings of Christ. Rejoice,
for your present joy is a pledge of even greater joy. Rejoice,
because you are blessed. Even now, the Spirit of glory
and the Spirit of God rest upon you. Therefore, you don't need
to be ashamed, but glorify God in the midst of your suffering.
And if you need further and even deeper understanding of your
sufferings, that you may respond as you ought, Peter says, here
it is. Your sufferings for Christ are perfectly suited for and
consistent with the time frame in which you live. This is the
time frame of judgment beginning from the house of God. And the only pointed application
I shall make is, dear people, if there were no other passage
to utterly explode the health, wealth, and prosperity gospel,
it's this. That's trying to bring into this
time what awaits us in another time. This is the time of God's
judging. not unto condemnation and damnation,
but unto every fatherly discipline essential to purify our faith,
to prune our graces. This is God's appointed time
for the fire and the file, for the hammer and the hard knocks,
for the pinch and the pruning hook, and we shall have endless
ages. in order to bask in the glory
of unmixed joy and peace and overflowing glory. That's Peter's
assertion. Has it made any sense? I've done
my best to try to explain it, to illustrate it. Peter says
that's the deeper theology of your sufferings. You're in this
time. After that assertion, we then
have, and we can move much more quickly, the sobering questions. Peter follows this assertion
with two sobering questions. Let's look at them. Question
number one. And if, not an if of uncertainty, but just a conditional
statement, this is reality, if since it begin first at us, And
then you'll notice the word shall be are in italics, no shall be
in the Greek, in the original, terse language again, and if
first at us, what the end of those that obey not the gospel
of God. That's Peter's first question.
If the God who is the moral governor and judge of all men takes sin
so seriously, that he brings a fiery trial among his people,
a disciplinary judgment in his house, what will the envy of
those who are not his children, who are not justified, who have
not embraced his son? You see, if the judge is a righteous
father, let's go back to my illustration. If all you saw, first of all,
was that judge in his home, you were a fly on the wall. And you
heard the spat, and you watched him get off his easy chair and
go into the bedroom and take his son and daughter under his
big arms and sort the thing out. If you were flying the wall and
said, man, this guy deals thoroughly. He deals righteously. He's not
going to let any kind of nonsense go on in his house. He's neither
moved by the whines of his daughter, nor is he moved by the booming
voice of his son. He gets down to facts, and he
deals with issues where they need to be dealt with. Now, if
after you were to fly on the wall and saw him dealing with
such fair and inflexible paternal judgment in his home, and you
say, oh, by the way, where's this guy work? Oh, he's a judge.
You say, boy, I bet you things are really sorted out in his
court. Wouldn't you have every reason
to believe if he dealt that way when he was a father? All the
more would you expect it when he was dealing with pure law
and justice in the courtroom. That's Peter's argument here.
The time has come for judgment to begin at the house of God,
and if first, at us! Who's the us? It's Peter and
all these believers. Elect sojourners, that's how
he addressed them in chapter one. Sanctified in Christ. brought unto obedience. They
have this marvelous inheritance reserved in heaven. They're redeemed
by blood. They're born of the Spirit. All
the stuff we've preached for months in those early chapters.
He says, but God nonetheless, He deals with us with the fiery
trial that is a form of His judgment beginning from His house. If
it begins first from us, what the end of those that obey not
the gospel of God. They are described as those that,
notice, obey not the gospel. This word apitho is not a simple
word for, if I may ever use the term, simple unbelief. It's not
the word for simple unbelief. It's unbelief, to use current
terminology, it's unbelief with an attitude. It is perverse,
willful unbelief. It's a construct of the alpha
privative, ah, someone's moral, someone who's not moral is amoral
or amoral. This is ah, Pytho. Not to be
persuaded, intransigent, stubbornly refusing the claims of the gospel. Peter says, now look, Here's
someone who, by the enablement of the Spirit, has embraced the
privileges and claims of the gospel. Peter describes them
in chapter 1. The gospel was preached unto
them with those who preached with the Holy Spirit sent down
from heaven. Further on in chapter 1, he says,
you purified your souls in your obedience to the truth, having
been begotten again. Here is a community. The gospel
has conquered them. They love the Christ of the gospel,
whom, having not seen, you love. They want to obey Him. They're
pursuing universal holiness when they hear the words in chapter
1, As he that is called you is holy, so be ye holy. And they
say, Lord, that's what I want to be. I want to be as holy as
you are and as you are revealed in your Son. Now, you see what
Peter's saying? If, if, if, God deals so with
us, who have complied with the gospel, who are living within
the dynamics and the power of the gospel, as we considered
last Sunday night. If to us judgment begins, what
the end of those who not merely turn away from the gospel in
ignorance, are never exposed to it, but they hear it. And
they not only hear it, it comes with persuasive energy. reasoning,
warning, entreating by tenderness, by love, by thunders, seeking
to persuade them to come within the orbit of gospel privileges
and gospel commands to obey and to believe in the Lord Jesus,
to believe and obey. Peter doesn't answer his question,
does he? Look at the text. It leaves it hanging. It leaves
it hanging. If it begin first in us, what
the end of them that obey not the gospel of God? Not the gospel
of Trinity Church, not the gospel of this church, that church,
this preacher, but of the living God who is their judge. And they
will not be persuaded. There's the question. What the
end? What the end? And remember, this was said Not
because Peter said, look, take this part of the epistle and
send it out as an evangelistic tract. He's wanting Christians
to think in these terms. Because when you think in these
terms and realize that my end, as one who has been persuaded
by the gospel, is to know in my experience everything described
there in the book of the Revelation, there shall be no more sickness,
no crying, no tears, no pain, no death. And in the midst of
the fiery trial, I see that the God who loved me in Christ is
committed to make me like Christ and shall at last bring me home
to Christ. How can I envy the wicked who
have it easy now? but have nothing but a wretched
eternity of outer darkness of weeping and wailing and gnashing
of teeth. He wants you and me as Christians to think that way.
Think that way. If, if, if his judgment begin
from us, what the end of those that obey not the gospel? I can,
in a sense, relax on my bed of thorns. I can, in a sense, hug
the pinch and the pressure and the file and the pruning hook. What the end? What the end? What
the end? What the end? Christian, ask
yourself that again and again and again. Because you're not
one who disobeys the gospel. Your end is glorious. Look at
question number two. He follows on. And built upon
the same foundation of that assertion If the righteous, most of our
Bibles say scarcely saved, again, it's a poor translation. If the
righteous is with difficulty saved, where shall the ungodly
and sinner appear? Just to give you a flavor of
how this word is used, turn to Acts 27. It's crucial that I
persuade your judgment from the Bible that I've not arbitrarily
put that meaning on the word. In Acts 27, we have three uses
of it in a short compass. Acts 27, verse 7. Speaking of
one of the seafaring voyages of Paul and his companions, we
read, And when we had sailed, slowly many days, and were come
with difficulty over against Cnidus, the wind not further
suffering us, we sailed under the lee of Crete over against
Salmoni. And with, here's our word again,
with difficulty coasting along it, we came to a certain place
called Fairhens. Here is a sea voyage and the
winds are not favorable. And Luke writes, we entered these
particular circumstances and pass through them with difficulty. And then in verse 16, you have
it again. And running, running out of the lee of a small island
called Cauda, we were able, here's our word again, with difficulty
to secure the boat. So, when I say the word should
be translated here, not scarcely, it gives the idea of the saved
just barely make it. No, they're all going to make
it, but it is with difficulty. Now, what is Peter saying? And
if the righteous is with difficulty saved, what does he mean? Well,
that's all he's been writing about. Here are the righteous
ones. Here are God's righteous ones. And they are saved with
difficulty in the language of Acts 14 22 through many tribulations. They are entering the kingdom
of God, the difficulty of opposition, the difficulty of strange providences,
the difficulties that combined constitute the fiery trial, the
burning. This is how the righteous are
being saved. This refers to the whole process
of salvation, not the initial saving act of God declaring us
righteous. That's a part of it. But salvation
takes in, in this context, the whole of God's saving work, and
it's pictured as a process going on. If a righteous one, quoting
from the Greek version of Proverbs 11.31, word for word, quote,
just omits one little Greek particle, Peter either quotes or it's influencing
his thinking, and it all turns to singulars now, singular nouns
and verbs. If a righteous one, With difficulty,
is continually being saved? That's his question, and that's
reality. Now he asks, where, where, where shall the ungodly
and sinner? And for you Greek students, with
an article in front of the one noun, ungodly, and not the other,
it's to be conceived as one person. Where shall the ungodly and sinner? And the two words are found in
couplets several times in the New Testament. Ungodly is what
they are primarily with reference to God. They are not like God. They are impious. They do not
occupy themselves with God and give him the place he deserves
in their life as his image bearers. Sinners refers to what they are
with reference to God's law. Harmarcalos. It is sinners. Sinners in terms of their stepping
over the boundaries of God's law, missing the mark of His
law. Where shall those indifferent to God and His law, and look
at the next word, appear. Appear. He doesn't say where
shall they end up, but where shall they appear. And every
use of that word in the New Testament, it refers to something that is
seen. His appearance, what was seen, what was manifest, what
was visible. And so Peter brings these two
questions to bear upon the people of God up there in Asia Minor.
He said, in the light of this reality, that you're living in
the time when judgment begins from the house of God. Now I
ask the first question, what the end of them that obey not
the gospel? What is their end? Now he asks,
what will be their appearance? Where will they appear? Where
are they going? Where will they appear? The answer
is obvious from other portions of the word of God. Peter does
not answer it here, but it is answered. The Lord Jesus shall
come in flaming fire, taking vengeance on them that obey not
the gospel. Second Thessalonians, one who
shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence
of his glory. And Peter says, I want you saints
to think upon this. This is the period of God's judgment
beginning from his house. And if it begins from us, what
the end of those that obey not the gospel? Think of it. And
if you as a righteous one with difficulty are being saved, where
shall the ungodly and sinner appear? Where will he be seen
in his eternal state? Think upon it, Christian. And
when you do, you won't envy what he has now, because what he is
and has now is taking him to where he shall appear. There's
nothing to envy. Nothing to envy. And isn't that
exactly where Psalm 73 turns? Isn't that exactly where it turns?
Look at it. If it's not coming to mind, look
at it with me. Psalm 73. The psalmist is battled by this
prosperity of the wicked and the difficulty of the righteous.
And he can't sort it all out until Psalm 73, verse 16. When I sought to know, when I
thought how I might know this, it was too painful for me. And what he's been talking about
is this problem of prospering wicked men and suffering righteous
men right down to their graves. And he says, when I tried to
sort it out, it was too painful for me until I went into the
sanctuary of God and did what? Considered their latter end. That's what it says. Consider
their latter end. He said, when I did that, then
I saw I was thinking like an animal. He said, surely you've
set them in slippery places. You cast them down to destruction.
They have become a desolation in the moment. They are consumed
with terrors as a dream when one wakes. So, Lord, when you
awake, you will despise their image. My soul was grieved. I was pricked in my heart. So
brutish was I and ignorant. I was as a beast before you.
Nevertheless, I'm continually with you. You have held my right
hand. You will guide me with your counsel
and afterward receive me to glory. Whom have I in heaven but you
and none that I desire upon earth beside you. It all got sorted
out when he did exactly what Peter says. That's what Peter
says to do in the midst of the fiery trial. Ask yourself the
question. If judgment begins from God's
house, and I'm part of that house, and He's so determined to deal
with my sins, and so determined to fashion Christ-like graces
in me, that He'll stop with nothing, everything in His universe, from
the cells in my body that mutate and cause a tumor, to the disposition
of my neighbors, to the judgment of my boss about whether I should
be fired or let go or laid off. Everything is in his hands, to
be instruments of his loving paternal judgment, working in
his house, to bring it more and more into conformity to his Son,
that these new covenant Levites, when they gather on the Lord's
Day, will be purified sons of Levi, who can offer up spiritual
sacrifices acceptable through the Lord Jesus. If indeed he
deals so with us, what the end of those who obey not the gospel? Bless God, I'll not know their
end. And if I, as a righteous man
or woman, with difficulty am being saved, and God surely has
a lot of difficulty with me, He has to use extra long teeth
in the file when He's working on me, and He's got to use an
awfully wide paddle when He's going to work on me, where shall
the ungodly and sinner be seen? Child of God, that's for you,
that's for me. And that's how God wants us to
think, as we try by His grace to respond to our fiery trials
in a way that will enable us to bring in glory. Well, I sought
to open up the text under those two headings, the significant
assertion, the sobering questions. I said I want to make one final
pointed application. I've tried to open up the passage
in terms of Peter's primary concern. I've sought to open up the passage
as a word to believers, but I want to ask you all a question as
we close this morning, and I want you to think on this question.
Do you believe you could sit at my desk and know over the
past days that you were going to preach on this text? Do you
think, do you think, do you really think that believing what I say
I believe about the Bible being God's word, There is a heaven,
there is a hell. And in less than a hundred years,
all of us, our faith will be fixed for one place or another.
Do you believe I could live with words like this? What shall be
the end of those that obey not the gospel? If the righteous
with difficulty shall be saved, where shall the ungodly and sinner
appear? What shall be the end? Where
shall they appear? Do you really believe I could
conclude the message without looking you in the eye and begging
you to think about your end and where you will appear? Do you
really think I could? Maybe you sat there saying, well,
sooner or later I know he's going to... Yes, that's right. You
know why. Because you know that in some
very faint and imperfect way The heart of the God who is your
judge is reflected in his word and poorly mirrored through the
heart and voice and pleadings of his servants. And I want you
to think, that's the problem. There's a sense in which the
only way the devil can keep you as his servant is to keep you
from thinking about your end and where you're going to appear.
You think for five minutes on this issue, what is my end? Not what do I have right now
at the endings of my nerves? What pleasures can I enjoy? What
relationships can I sustain that give me some sense of delight
and fulfillment? Think beyond all pleasures and
relationships and ask yourself, what shall be my end if I go
on disobeying the gospel of God? What shall be my end? Think on
it. I challenge you to take this
day and for five minutes sit in quietness in your room, no
images in front of your face, no sound in your ears, and think,
what shall be my end? And then think of the next question,
where shall I appear? Before the assembled multitudes
of all the nations, angels and glorified saints, where shall
I appear? In their company or in the company
of the devil and his angels? Shall I appear in the pit described
as outer darkness and the fire that never shall be quenched?
About every five years I tell what was passed on to me in a
book as a true story and I close with this The old man, wise Christian
man, welcomed into his presence a starry-eyed, brilliant, ambitious,
effervescent young man. He began to talk to him about
his future. He said, young man, what are
you planning to do? Oh, he said, I'm going to pursue a medical
career. I'm going to go to the most prestigious
universities to get my undergraduate training, my med school training
and then go on and I'm going to do my internship at this prestigious
hospital and he said, yes, and then? He said, well after that
I plan to establish a practice in such and such a well-known
city and there I want to earn the reputation of being the finest
physician in that field. The old man listened and then
said, and then? He said, well, when I've established
my credentials and my reputation is well known, I should begin
to receive invitations from some of the most prestigious hospital
teaching centers. And I want to further establish
my name as one who can instruct others the top of my field. And
the old man listened and then said, and then. And he said,
well, after doing that, I then will hope to retire and name
the place where he thought was the ideal retirement village
or place in his country. The old man listened and then
again, just for two words, and then the young man paused and
said, I guess I'll then grow old and die. The old man looked
at him and asked the same two-word question, and then, and then,
and then, And I ask it to you this morning.
Assuming you're going to live 80, 90 years, ask the question,
and then what the end? Where shall you appear? You can't escape it. This is
not preacher scare tactic, folks. The trite little saying, only
two things that are certain in life are death and taxes. Only
one of them is absolutely true. And then? And then? What then? I don't want to think
about it. Well, you see, that's not going
to change the reality. The reality is there, inescapable. May God have mercy upon you. Often the first step in a sinner
getting right with God is thinking on those two questions. What's
the end? Where shall I appear? May God
grant that you'll join the ranks of those who found their first
steps to heaven were serious reflecting on what their end
will be and where they will appear if they go on in the category
of the ungodly and sinner and those who obey not the gospel
of our God. Let's pray. Our Father, we marvel at your
goodness and mercy to us, your people, giving us your word through
the mind and pen of your servants, Peter and Paul and John and Mark
and Luke. We thank you for this portion
of your word and we pray that the Holy Spirit will write it
upon our hearts And that you would also, O God, use that word,
as we were reminded in the previous hour, it is your ordinary means
to bring people to repentance and faith. And, O blessed, that
means that some would mark this day as the day when they stopped
disobeying the gospel and believed on the Lord Jesus. O God, will
you not give to your son the reward of his sufferings, from
among those who sit in this place today. Help your people. Oh, God, help us to treasure
up these biblical perspectives for whatever fiery trials we
presently face and whatever crucibles of trial into which we shall
yet be brought. Oh, Lord, enable us by your grace
to think as we ought to think. We ask in Jesus name. Amen.