Chapter 5, we'll be looking at
one verse. Verse 10. I've entitled the message
this morning, The God of All Grace to Suffering Saints. The God of All Grace to Suffering
Saints. The Apostle Peter writes, but
the God of all grace, who hath called us unto his eternal glory
by Christ Jesus, after that you have suffered a while, make you
perfect, Now, the writer of this epistle,
the Apostle Peter, was no stranger to suffering. If you remember, when He first
came to our Lord Jesus Christ, He was a very bold man, wasn't
He? He was most likely the spokesman
of all of the other disciples. He was a man so bold that at
the night of Christ's passion, of the night that Christ suffered
so greatly in that garden, that when they came to take our Lord,
He drew His sword. and smote off the ear of the
high priest's servant. He was so bold as to say to the
Lord, the Lord told them, one of you shall deny me. And Peter
said, I will not deny you. No, I will die with you. Yet you remember what happened.
And the same night, he made that bold statement. The Lord removed
his hand of restraint and the Apostle Peter denied his Lord
three times. And you remember when the Lord
looked at him and the cock crewed, he went out and You remember what he said after
the crucifixion. He said, I go fishing. I'm leaving
this religion behind. He went back to where he was
before, figuring he was no better than
Judas who had betrayed the Lord himself. Went back. And you remember
the Lord came to him in such grace on the shore and They caught
those fish and he brought them in and he said, come and dine.
And as they sat there eating together and the Lord looked
at Peter and he said, Simon, love of Simon is more than these. Can you not imagine the suffering
of this man who had denied his Lord? And yet now there his Lord stands.
Remember what he said to his disciples? He said when he rose
again, he said, you go tell my disciples and what? And Peter. He knew something of suffering
concerning his sin, concerning his betrayal of the Lord Jesus
Christ. But he also knew this. He knew
something of grace. He knew something of grace. And
in this epistle, the Apostle Peter here tells us, that calls
out to the elect of God. He says to the elect, according
to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification
of the Spirit, the sprinkling of the blood of Christ. And he
said that we are kept by the power of God, but he also says
this, Wherein you greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need
be, through heaviness and manifold temptations, that the trial of
your faith be much more precious than gold. Peter was writing
from experience. He was writing concerning the
believer's necessity to suffer and yet our necessity to maintain
our Christian character. Virtue. Add to your faith virtue. Virtue temperance. See, Peter
knew that we should maintain and we should act as becometh
the gospel of Christ. Peter, who had himself been in
the furnace of affliction, having failed in faith and fidelity
to his Lord, having felt the pains and sorrows of sin, implores
us at all costs to cast off sin. And He closes this epistle. Now
He comes, this is where we've come, is the end of this epistle.
After He has exhorted us to maintain our Christian character and cast
off all sin, knowing the pain of sin, knowing the suffering
of sin, His own experience concerning. He says, put it off! Put it off,
you who are the elect and called. But notice this, He does not
leave the strength or the ability to do these things in the hand
of the believer, but rather offers up this prayer. He says, but,
having said all that I have said before, but, here's our comforter,
the God of all grace, the God of all grace who hath called
us to His eternal glory by Jesus Christ, after that you have suffered
a while, make you perfect, establish, strengthen, and settle you. So
the first thing, I'm going to take this scripture in order.
I want us just to go through this one scripture, taking each
portion in its order. First of all, the God of all
grace. The Apostle having set forth
this truth of doctrines of grace, and that we should never abuse
the grace of God. He has said that we should give
all diligence to live as becometh the saints of God, yet in the
end he leaves nothing to the ability of the creature to perform
or maintain this standing, but rather leads us to the source
of all mercy and strength. Here it is, the source of your
mercy, the source of your strength is this, the God of all grace. The God of all grace. And notice, he does not just
say the God of grace. He is the God of grace. But this word is vitally important,
the God of all grace, all grace. Therefore, the only cause of
our salvation. The only reason we have experienced
the regeneration of the Holy Spirit and been enlightened to
our sin and fled to Christ, the only thing that separates us
from the rest of fallen humanity is this, the grace of God. For by grace you are saved. If you are not saved by grace,
you are not saved. Period. If you are supposing
grace to be some mixture of God's work and your own, you are not
saved. You are lost. You are in your
sin. and under the condemnation of
God. But we who are saved understand
this truth. We are saved by the free, sovereign
grace of God. Only by the grace of God. And
not only by just grace, as though grace were separate from God.
We are saved by the God of all grace. The God of all grace. Has God ever exposed your sin?
Now listen, man has a veil on his
heart. Right now, he sees himself as not really good. He's not
saying he's good. But he's not really bad either.
Anybody thinks that about themselves, they have a veil on their heart
and they don't know themselves. The heart is deceitful. Listen. Above all things now,
there's nothing more deceitful. There's some liars out there
There's some deceivers, but there's one deceiver. That's more deceptive
than anyone else. It's your own heart Is deceitful Deceptive and Desperately
wicked who can know it? I'll tell you this anybody's
who's experienced the grace of God knows something of it We
know something. God removes this veil upon our
hearts and we see our sin. And then, in an act of grace,
He opens our eyes to see the glory and perfection of Christ. I like that. He creates in us
a need. Now listen, there was a time
that I didn't have a need. I had need of the things of the
world, the pleasures of the flesh. I had the needs of the natural
man, but I had no need for Christ. I had no love for Christ. I had
no desire for Christ until God opened my eyes to see my need. And so great a need, it moved
me to flee to Christ. I could not do anything else
but flee to Christ. He showed me the perfection of
Christ. He showed me my imperfection
and showed me Christ's perfection. I looked at my imperfection and
His perfection and I said, I'll have His perfection. That's something
that God of all grace does for His people. Over in 2 Corinthians chapter
4, the Apostle said, We preach not ourselves. I want you to bear me record
that I have not preached myself. Have I ever preached myself to
you? Why would I do that? If I preach myself, it's this,
I'm a sinner and nothing at all. We preach not ourselves, but
Jesus Christ the Lord and ourselves your servants. And I'll tell
you what, I'm thankful that God sent me a preacher. He sent you
a preacher. If you've believed, He sent you
a preacher to preach this Gospel for God who commanded the light
to shine out of darkness has shined in our hearts to give
us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face
of Jesus Christ. This is the work of the God of all grace.
To shine the light in the heart of darkness. To shine the light
of Jesus Christ into our hearts so that we must have Him. We must believe and trust in
Him. And the God of grace then receives
all the glory for our salvation, all the glory. But notice His
grace, which we heard and believed, we also still need. Do you not need the God of all
grace? Do you not often feel the corrupt
and constant and numerous assaults of sin upon your soul? Yes, I do. So that my soul cries, my sin,
my sin! It causes me so much grief. Does
sin cause you grief? It does if the God of all grace
has saved you. I know this, sin is not the pleasure
it once was. We're not saying that sin is
not pleasurable. But I tell you this, it is not
the pleasure that it once was. It is a bane. It is a spot of filth that I long
to be rid of. It is as the body of death wrapped
around a corpse, wrapped around the neck of the living. That's
what sin is to the believer. Therefore, we not only need the
God of grace, but we need the God of all grace. The God of continual grace. The God of constant grace. The God of perpetual grace. We need constantly to be pardoned. We need constantly our sins to
be cleansed in our conscience. We're just saying this, prone
to wonder. Lord, I feel it. Prone to leave
the God I love. Behold, it is the God of all
grace who constantly, daily, hourly forgives us, cleanses
us, and keeps us by His loving kindness. You know that? He is
right now cleansing us. Right now, constantly forgiving
us, even of our worship. Is your worship perfect this
morning? Would you stand on it? Would you put any trust in it?
No. As I'm preaching hymn to you,
I know sin is mixed with all I do. I need to be cleansed of
my preaching. And yet, this is what the God
of all grace does, constantly. Surely, if God did not possess
all grace, we would perish. See this truth, that He is the
God of all grace. What does that imply? It implies
this, that His grace is endless. Endless grace. Endless grace. Suppose a man would put aside
money for himself. rich man he's got millions and
millions of dollars and he puts it away for his son and he gives
it to a bank or an honest man and so then at that time appointed
that son should receive everything his father decreed to give him
how much all of it all of it but yet When we say that, God
has set aside grace for us. But that analogy just don't work.
Why? Because that's a limited supply. Though it's millions, though
it's billions, it's still limited. And when the sun is spinning,
there's no more to be spent. Not so with the God of all grace. If God had done this, we would
surely have already spent it all. Isn't that right? We're
like that prodigal who went and what? Spent it all. We would have already spent it. But see, God's grace is not limited. It is the God of all grace. Therefore,
His grace is linked to all His attributes. His grace is holy. His grace is righteous. His grace
is powerful. His grace is infinite. The God of all grace. He possesses all grace. Infinite supply of grace. Even
all the grace. If it were limited, we might
have drained, but it is infinite. So then this morning, as I would
encourage every one of us to be children of virtue, children
to put off sin, yet you know and I know we have not done what
we should. We have not done what we would,
but the God of all grace. The God of all grace, who cleanseth
us from all our sin, cleanseth, perpetually cleansing our sins. You see, God's grace is not like
a lake or a pond. God likens His grace to a fountain. Why? Because a fountain is a
perpetual source of water. And so then the grace of God
is an ever-flowing stream of living water that cleanses and
refreshes His saints constantly. Therefore, His saints who are
His chosen, His redeemed, those who have quickened by His grace,
we may rejoice and give thanks for His never-ceasing grace. We sang this earlier, fountain
of never-ceasing grace. Thy saints exhaustless thee. object of immortal praise, essentially
supreme, the God of all grace. Now then look at the second thing.
He says, Who hath called called us the God of all grace, this
is the first stream of the fountain of never-ceasing grace, is effectual
calling." You want to know if the God of all grace is your
God of all grace? Then this is the first stream
by which we may know Him. Is this calling. Calling. This is always the first work
of God upon the hearts of His people. Now, the term calling,
obviously, has to do with someone speaking. You know, when we were
younger, we didn't have cell phones. Mom would call us to
dinner. She would literally call you. She would literally yell
out your name and tell you to get into the house. She was calling
you. She was using her voice. And
you heard her voice, and you came, or there was trouble. Yes. So there was a calling. And so
this calling implies to be spoken to. Now, as the Lord Jesus Christ
stood at the grave of Lazarus, this is an example of effectual
calling. Lazarus was dead. He had been
dead for four days. His body began to be corrupt. His sister said, don't open that
tomb, it stinks. It stinks. And Jesus said, remove
it. I'm going to do something. I'm
going to call him. That would sound foolish to those
people, to call Lazarus. Now it would be if we stood at
the tomb and tried to call somebody foolish, wouldn't it? But this
wasn't foolish, because when he called Lazarus by name, there
was power with his call. He called him Lazarus. Come forth. And Lazarus came forth. even as He had commanded. Even
so it is the God of all grace, having chose us, saved us, then
He calls us. He calls us by Jesus Christ at
the appointed time of love. I like that picture of the infant
that has been cast out, polluted in his own blood. It's a picture
of us, polluted in our own blood, left to die in our sins. And
yet God says, at the appointed time of love, the time of love,
I said unto thee, I called thee, I said unto thee, I said, when you were polluted
in your own blood. He didn't wait for you to get
better. Isn't that great? That's good. That's the God of
all grace. He doesn't wait for men to get better. He comes to
them. He speaks to them. And they come
forth from the grave. And they believe on Him. By the
power of His own Word, He calls them. And they come. And listen, they come as they
are. They don't come any other way.
They come realizing they can't fix themselves up. They can't
make themselves better. They can't fix their minds, their
hearts, their will. They can't do anything. They
come as they are only at His calling them. The only reason
I came to Him is He called me. He called me. I had no right
to come, yet the God of all grace called me. This was the first stream of
grace that flowed into my heart was His calling. He exposed my
guilt and His holiness. And what is
the result of this calling? First of all, repentance. Repentance. That's our Lord's first message.
You know what? Repent and believe the gospel. When He calls you,
He calls you to repentance. What is the repentance? It is
to turn around. We were just talking about the
military this morning. About face. You'll get that. About face. They say it different
in the Marine Corps, but it's the same thing. About face. Turn
around. You turn from one thing and you
turn around toward another. It is repentance. And God has
called us to repent of the world from sin, from self. We turn from self. Why? There's nothing in self. There's
no good in self. There's no help in self. There's
no help in the world. I find this. There's no help
in my family. There's no help with my friends.
There's no help. They can't help themselves and
they can't help me. There's no help in the preacher.
Don't turn to me. I can't help you. Repentance is turning from yourself,
from the world, from your sin. It is turning also from your
religion. Oh, this is something that's
unusual when men talk about repentance. Surely you don't mean turn from
my good works? Yes. Turn from all my religion? Yes. You must repent of your religion. I've had some of your children
confess to me many times that this is their church, and yet they have no interest
in the things of Christ. They have no evidence, they've
never repented, they've never turned, and yet they still say
this is their church, and I'm their pastor. No! No, you need
to repent of that. You need to repent of that. Just
because your family belongs here doesn't mean you belong here.
That gives you no standing before God. Turn from that. Repent from
that. And turn to Christ. Now, I'll tell you, a lot of
people in this day and age are turning from one religion to
another. Some people out there preaching
Calvinism, and they're trying to get Armenians to turn from
Arminianism to Calvinism. To trade one theology for another. No, that's not repentance. We
don't repent to a theology, we repent to a person. You turn
from your sin and self and religion and you turn to a person. And
it is from that person you get your doctrine. It's from Christ we get our doctrine.
It is by our understanding and knowledge of Christ through the
Word of God we get our doctrine in practice. And so we don't turn from a religion
to when we turn to Christ. This is the stream of grace as
He calls us to repentance. And not only repentance, but
what? Faith in Christ. Faith in Christ. Trusting in
Christ alone. I'll tell you there is no other
place I would rather be than in Christ. There is no other
place that I would rather be found than in Him. I want Him. I want all of Him. I want only Him. I believe only in His perfect
Word. And I'll tell you, some who have
repented, they stuck around their old religion for a little while,
but that don't last, does it? No, we repent, we leave everything
for Him. Family, friends, and we turn
by faith to Christ. We embrace this truth about Him. The Scripture says, but this
man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sin forever, sat
down on the right hand of God. This is my hope. When this repentance
and calling come, this is the only place you'll go, is the
perfect work of Christ. You have no place else to go.
You don't have any work. You don't have anything to stand
on. So what do we do? We turn to Him who is the solid
rock and foundation of our salvation, Christ. And this act of faith
in coming to Him is not a mere act of will, but divine calling. Go to Ephesians 1. Look over
to Ephesians 1, verse 18. Now Paul describes this calling. He describes this in great detail
as to the effect of this calling. He says in verse 18, "...the
eyes of your understanding being enlightened, that you may know what is the
hope..." And that doesn't mean wish. Friends, that means rock-solid
confidence. The confidence of His calling. And what is the riches of the
glory of His inheritance in the saints? And what is the exceeding
greatness of His power toward, to usward, who believe according
to the working of His mighty power? So is faith now a mere
decision? Or is it according to the working
of His mighty power? Which is it? Is faith something
man can do? Or is it something that God must
do? If your eyes have been enlightened, you know it is something God
must do. That God has done. And friends,
if we have faith in Christ, I know who's keeping it. Not me. The God of all grace is keeping
us in the faith. That's how you know if your faith
is real, isn't it? if it continues if your faith continues to the
end you know this my face of God my faith is given to me of
God for by grace you are saved through faith and that not of
yourself it faith is a gift of God the gift of the God of all
grace and see the result then. What
is the result of this calling? Go back to your text. Look at
the result of this calling. He called us unto what? Eternal
glory. Eternal glory. Believer, this life is short. I know to you young, it is a
long process right now. But, I have not yet experienced
what some of you older people have, to realize that time is
moving rapidly toward an end. This life is short. And when
time shall be no more and God who has called us and saved us
and quickened us and keeps us, soon we shall experience the
full measure of the gift. What is that? Eternal glory.
Eternal life. Heaven. Heaven. The promise of God to us is that
we shall never perish but have everlasting life. I like this
song, the sands of time are sinking, the dawn of heaven breaks, the
summer morn I've sighed for, the fair sweet morn awakes, dark,
dark hath been the midnight, but day spring is at hand, and
glory, glory dwelleth in Emmanuel's land. That's what we're promised,
Emmanuel's land. But now that I should have you
not be ignorant of this, the path to glory is paved with suffering. The same God of all grace who
chose you, redeemed you, called you, quickened you, caused you
to repent and believe on His Son, and will give you eternal
glory, is the same God who has ordained your path in this life. And the God of all grace has
determined that His people should suffer in this world. He has called us to it, called
us not only to glory, but to suffer. Listen to what Paul says
in Philippians 1 and verse 29. For it is given unto you in the
behalf of Christ, not only to believe on Him, but also to what? Suffering. For His name's sake. Suffering. He calls us to suffer. The Scriptures testify that our
Savior suffered. I don't quite fully understand
this, but you may begin to as we suffer. The Scripture says
that He being the Son of God, perfect in wisdom and knowledge,
yet he learned obedience by the things he suffered." Now, if our master, the perfect
son of God, must learn obedience by the things
he suffered, how much more us? Anybody not need any more learning? We need to learn. And I'm telling
you, as God says, the greatest teacher is suffering. He uses
suffering as a teacher. Now, we all suffer, but we all
do not suffer the same. Isn't that right? I remember
reading of some of the martyrs that they took this one woman
and buried her in the sand up to her neck. And a younger believer
down the way from her. And as the tide rolled in, that
poor woman had to hear the screams of that younger believer as she
was drowning. And yet she would not repent.
She would not turn from Christ. And she died. Now that's suffering. Others have been led to the stake
and burned for their faith in Christ. Others have been cast
to the lions. Others have been crucified. Others
have starved to death for the cause of Christ. They have suffered. As of yet, we have not experienced
that. But we have suffered. Which among us has not suffered
the pains of sin? in this mortal body? How many times have we not suffered
as Peter, thinking God has left us to ourselves? Suffering saints, how many times
have we been so deeply depressed because of our disobedience? But this maxim is true We may
not all suffer the same, but we all suffer. As the song says, the way of
the cross leads home. Leads home. The apostle said this, that the way to heaven is paved with suffering. It is. But friends, God does not call
us to suffer without giving us strength to endure it. Matter
of fact, listen to what He says in your text. Go back to your
text here and look at the results of this suffering. God calls
us to suffer. Oh, notice this. Notice that our suffering is
only for a while. That's good news, isn't it? It's
only for a while. Often God leads us to the Mara,
waters of Mara, which are bitter. But after that, He leads them
to Elam. place of peace. How many times
have you experienced that? How many times have you suffered
only to be delivered? Only to suffer. Only to be delivered. What is this doing? It's teaching
you that God is the God of all grace. That God's grace doesn't
end. It doesn't leave us. And look
at the consequences of this. First of all, to make you perfect. Now listen, that's not talking
about your sinless perfection. Christ did that. This word means
mature. It means to make you mature. To grow in the grace. Who prays for growth? Who says, Lord, increase my faith? Lord, increase my love. Lord, help me to be temperate,
meek, kind. What are you praying for? Suffering. Remember Newton, when
he wrote that hymn, he said, I prayed for grace and faith,
and the fires of hell assaulted my soul on every part. I asked
the Lord, why? And he said, the Lord answered,
this is how I answer prayer for grace and faith. Did he not say, buy of me gold
tried by fire? Suffering brings maturity. But
not only maturity, what does it also do? It establishes us.
We're not tossed about. Once we've been through the fire
and we've found that Christ is sufficient, we're not willing
to go anywhere else. And the more we've experienced
that, the more we cling to Him, the more we are established that
this is the truth. Look, I am sure this is the truth.
Now, how did I know that? Through much tribulation have
I experienced this. This is the Word of God. And
let God be true and ever man a liar. It establishes us. What else? It strengthens us.
Strengthens us. If you make it through one trial,
it's because God strengthened you to do it. You've not made
it through one on your own strength. Matter of fact, usually we're
in trouble because we relied on our own strength. So what
do we need to learn? God kicks out every crutch that
we lean on so that we only fall on Him. Suffering has a purpose and it
also settles you. Peace. The God of all grace gives
us peace. Even in the midst of our trouble. What did he say? He hath made
peace. Jesus said, I came not in the
world to bring peace, but a sword. Now in the world you shall have
tribulation, but be of good cheer. I have overcome the world. Who? The God of all sufficient grace,
all supplying, never ceasing grace, flowing, constant. He called us. He called us to
faith and to suffering. Therefore, let us give all the
glory I pray that God would reveal
himself to you as the God of grace. Do you need
grace? Do you need mercy? Then go to the God of all grace.
I pray that he'd call you to his glory by Jesus Christ and
that when you suffer you may have comfort. And He's doing
this not to hurt you, not to destroy you, but to strengthen
you, establish you, settle you in the faith. May God do this
for His own glory. Let's stand and be dismissed
in prayer.