called the righteous, but sinners
to repentance. And anyone who is not willing
to own the name sinner can never or never has any authority by
which to claim the name child of God. All right, going back
to the scripture we read earlier, 1 Peter chapter four, beginning
at verse 12. Now the theme or the purpose
of this book, he returns to it. He's already addressed it some
in the first chapter when he talks about the fiery trials
that they were enduring. And here he says, once again,
don't be surprised at the painful trial. You are suffering as though
something strange were happening to you. Now, we can take a scripture
like this and we could remove it from its context and apply
it to every kind of trial, every sort of trial, every cause of
trial that God's people may undergo. And we would not be doing violence
to this scripture if we did that. But there is a particular kind
of trial and suffering that Peter has in mind here. For he says that if we suffer, verse 16,
as a Christian, if we suffer as a Christian, if we suffer
because we're Christians, because of the one whom we worship and
because of the word concerning him, if we suffer for that. So
that's the kind of suffering or the cause of suffering that
he's addressing here. Remember that Peter is the apostle
or was the apostle to the Gentiles primarily. And he had sent this
letter to Jewish believers who had fled from Jerusalem and Judea fled to the
uttermost parts of the world, all over the Gentile world, in
various places they settled. He said, scattered throughout
the provinces of, and he names several places. And he says,
he addresses it to them and he addresses it to them as Jews
who had been persecuted by their kinsmen. and were also beginning
to experience persecution from the Gentiles. In other words,
it was becoming very difficult to be a believer, and in particular,
a Jewish believer, because then you were hated on two accounts. And so, that's the painful trial
that they were suffering. And they might be surprised by
it, for they might have said in their hearts and minds, I
can understand suffering if I, like my other kinsmen according
to flesh, had rejected the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, had
turned away from Christ. I can understand suffering from
those who do not believe from among our nation. And that's
why we had to leave. But having already suffered persecution
for the name of Christ, why is it that now, when I live among
those who should not be particularly offended by this message, how
come I'm suffering from them as well? This seems strange. And you know,
even for us, we are not Jews according to the flesh, but we
might still hold a little of that attitude in us, particularly
as we hold forth the distinctiveness of what we believe. And while judgment of others
is not our primary message or anything. We do claim this is
the truth, and that which is contrary to what we preach is
not the truth. Consequently, we are on the fringe, out there
on the edge. And some of you, and I'll admit,
I don't know that I've ever suffered any real persecution for this,
but some of you have suffered some things on account of your
identification with this church and with the message, the distinctive
message that it teaches and declares. And you might think, well, wait,
I left what was wrong and submitted to what is right, how come I'm
suffering? Because we still have within
our hearts and minds that knowledge that doing the right thing will
produce blessedness in this life. And in truth, the opposite is
more often the case. After all, who suffered more
than anyone else in this world. Not the one who simply submitted
to the truth, but the one who is the truth. And so the more closely we attach ourselves to the truth,
the more fiercely we hold on to it, the more boldly we declare
this is the truth and nothing else is, the more we are going
to be at odds with this world, whether it be the irreligious
world or the religious world. The more at odds we will find
ourselves with them and the more we will suffer. Our Lord said
to his disciples, in this world you will have trouble. That's one of those, you know,
when people, there was a popular song when I was a kid, that is
in our church, it was a popular song. All the promises in the
book are mine. Well, there's one. Our Lord promised
that in this world we would have trouble. But he's addressing this and
we wanna put it in its context first and then see how it can
apply to us. He's talking to Jews. Jews who
have professed Christ, who suffered for their profession of Jesus
as the Christ while they were among their brethren, but now
that they've been scattered, they're beginning to suffer at
the hands of pagans, Gentiles, those who don't even worship
the God of the Jews, much less his son, the Lord Jesus Christ.
They're being insulted for it. They are having lands and valuables
taken from them. Sometimes they go to one place
and they're able to live there in peace for a little while till
someone catches on who they are and what they believe, then it's
trouble there and they got to move on. So the things that Peter
is writing here to these Jews are designed to comfort them
And first, its design, its comfort comes in this. Don't be surprised
as though this is something strange. Don't be surprised as though
it's something that should surprise you. Don't be surprised as though
what you're suffering has come, for one thing, because you've
been bad. Now, being raised in the free will
fundamentalism that was the religion of my childhood, I was trained
that I always had to be looking over my shoulder, because if
I did something wrong, God's out to get me. God was going
to do something that was going to be horribly painful one way
or another, because I'd stepped out of line. And nobody, at least I don't
remember, and I'll admit, within a few months of getting out of
college, I had left that church because I could no longer tolerate
his doctrine. And I began listening to a different
message, the message I preached to you and have preached to you
for many years. But no one told me that just living in this world
has its problems. Everybody suffers trouble. And
living in this world as a believer, even as a faithful, what we might
call a faithful, obedient child of God, brings with it trouble. It's inescapable. And it is not
God saying, you've done something wrong. It's not God saying, or
it's not God operating contrary to the nature that we've learned
to trust, his gracious and merciful nature. It's not like suddenly
he's changed and has turned a frowning face toward us. No, it's nothing
strange. It's nothing that we shouldn't
expect. It's nothing they should have
not expected. Why? The Lord said, the servant is not greater than
his master. They hated me, they will hate
you. And the world will do what it
can to make you suffer, because you bear my name." That's what
the Lord said. So if we do, we should not be
surprised by it as though something strange and unexpected has happened. Actually, we should be somewhat
surprised and very thankful that we live in a culture that has
been so affected. by broad Christianity, that even
if they do in their hearts reject us, they will withhold themselves
from the worst forms of persecution just because their conscience
won't allow them to do it. So you and I, we don't suffer. Certainly not compared to how
some of our brothers and sisters in other parts of the world do.
But these Jewish believers should not be surprised and instead
of being caught off guard and confused, verse 13, rejoice that
you participate in the sufferings of Christ so that you may be
overjoyed when His glory is revealed. When it says we participate in
the sufferings of Christ, it does not mean that we are participating
in those sufferings that God inflicted upon his soul in payment
for the sins that he bore. We're not bearing that suffering. The suffering that he is speaking
of here, the suffering of Christ, is all that suffering our Lord
bore as he began his ministry, as he was rejected, as he was
despised. And then as he was falsely accused
of blasphemy, falsely accused of insurrection, In fact, everything they accused
him of was false. And then he was murdered. In one place, the scriptures
call him a servant of the truth in behalf of the Jews. Now, I've
sometimes said, our Lord did not die as a martyr. He died
as a substitute. And within the context, I normally
make that statement. That's true. But he also died
as a martyr. Now the reason God put him to
death was because he was our substitute. But what motivated
men to put him to death was his testimony regarding his father. It enraged them. It brought out
their natural hatred of God and they aimed it at him. And if we Well, speaking to the
Jews, again, I said, first, let's put this in its context. I'm
always jumping to our context. But in the context of them, these
were Jews who were declaring the same message that the Lord
Jesus did. And he says, don't be surprised
that you get the same treatment the Lord Jesus did. Rejoice that
you're suffering the same way and for the same cause. that
he did. When the apostles went out preaching,
and they were immediately met with resistance and severe resistance,
and they were told stoutly, with all the authority of the high
priest and the other chief priests and all, and the Pharisees and
all them, don't you preach in that name anymore. And then they
let them go. What'd they do? They went right
out and preached in that name some more. And so what did they
do? They rounded them up and then
they beat them. Remember how our Lord was beaten?
They beat the apostles. And believe me, when you got
a beaten like that, it was no small thing. And it says, they went out rejoicing
that they had been counted worthy to suffer for the name. And the one who wrote this book
is one of the ones who was beaten and went out rejoicing that he
was counted worthy to suffer for the name. those who suffer for the name, it simply increases their joy
when they see Christ vindicated. when he comes in his glory and
he is revealed to this world as he is, not as they thought
he was. He came among them and it is
written, there was no majesty in him that we would desire him. And they didn't, they didn't
see anything in Christ glorious. And therefore they did not glorify
him, but despised him and rejected him. And if we preach His message,
they aren't going to see any majesty in what we say, and they'll
despise us. But here's the thing. The time
is coming when that One in whom they saw no majesty, they will
see Him come in majesty. They will see Him. in the fullness
of His glory, His glory as God Himself, His glory as the Son
of God, His glory as the successful mediator between God and men. They'll see His glory as the
one to whom God said, sit here at my right hand till I make
all your enemies a footstool for your feet. They're going
to see it eventually. And when they see it, we're gonna
see it. But a wonderful thing will happen
when we see it. John, one of the others who went
out rejoicing because he was counted worthy to suffer for
the name. John said, it does not yet appear
what we will be. People try to figure out what's
heaven's gonna be like. You may as well just don't even
try, because it's not been revealed. It's not been made known what
we will be like when we are in his presence. Then John goes on to say this,
but we know this. When he shall appear, and that word doesn't
simply mean show up. It means when he is manifested. When He is revealed as He really
is, when He shall appear, we shall
be like Him. for we shall see him as he is. Now, when the world sees him
as he is, it will result in them becoming less than what they
were because they will be given over entirely to the wretchedness
of their own nature. People think about hell and they
think about the flame and say, oh, it'd be an awful place to
go. That's not the worst part of hell. The worst part of hell
is to have God's restraining hand utterly removed from you
so that you become the entirely sinful creature that you've been
all along, but he just wouldn't allow you to act like it. It's to be given over to spiritual
insanity. It's to become like those demons
who entered that demoniac. There's lots of them. And the
wretchedness of his life was a picture or simply the outworking
of the wretched existence of those demons who were in him. And therefore you can look at
that demoniac living among the tombs, cutting himself. You couldn't
even chain him, running around naked. That's what happens when the
unbelieving, it's what'll happen to them when they see Christ
as he is. All divine restraint will be
removed and they will become as wretched and awful as a human
being can become. But when we see him, the reverse
will happen. We will become what he is. We will be glorified in our humanity
as he is glorified in his humanity. I don't think that we're stretching
the scriptures too far. If we were to say this, on the
day in which our Lord returns and we stand with him, were there not someone pointing
out or some way to point out who the Lord Jesus was, no one
would know. Because we're all going to be
like him. Now that may almost sound blasphemous. Well, won't it always be that
the glory of Christ exceeds ours? According to John, not in his
humanity. I realize he has a glory that
belongs to his divinity that we'll never have. But so far
as being a human being, we will be made as glorious as he is. If you are, verse 14, if you're
insulted because of the name of Christ, you are blessed. For
the spirit of glory and of God rests on you. Now, what he means here is, if
you're being insulted because of the name of Christ, that is
evidence that that spirit of God who was sent to take the
things of Christ and reveal them to us, it must be that he's on
you. Now, especially now that Christianity
is a very broad term, has spread to all parts of the world, you
can say the name of Christ and the spirit of glory and of God
not be upon you. Because there's lots of people
taking that name. I hear people say, I'm proud
to be a Christian. And I feel like saying, well,
then you don't know what it is to be a Christian if you're proud of
it. We're not ashamed of it, but we're not proud. It's not
a thing to be proud of. But people take pride in their
Christianity. But if you take upon the name,
take upon you, the name of the Christ who despised and rejected
of men, and you suffer on account of that, what's that reveal? It reveals that the Spirit of
God is upon you because you wouldn't own that name. You wouldn't own
it that way if the Spirit of God did not work in you to claim
that name, to set forth that name. And it means that the Spirit
of Glory is upon you. Now John says we're going to
be made like Christ. Who do you think is going to
do that? The Spirit of God. Who is it that already made us
like Christ with regard to Spirit? Who already caused us to be made
alive? We were dead in trespasses and
sins, but now we've been forgiven, and the Spirit of God has given
us the new birth. We've been made alive and already
on the inner man. We are like our Lord Jesus Christ,
and the Spirit of God is the one that's gonna take this outer
man and also make him like the Lord Jesus Christ. I tell you,
that's something I look forward to. I get tired of the outer
man fighting with the inner man. Don't you? I get tired of the old way of
thinking trying to dominate my whole way of thinking. I weary
of the warfare between flesh and spirit and I long for the
day when this body which God made will be made perfect so
that it walks in lockstep with that newborn spirit he has created
within me. In verse 15, he says, if you
suffer, it should not be as a murderer or a thief or any other kind
of criminal or even as a meddler. And certainly, you know, you
can't glory in your suffering if you're suffering because you're
a criminal. I had one guy that had been, well,
nevermind that story. Don't have time to tell it. But
if you're a criminal, and that's what people call you, what do
you expect? If you're a criminal, and you
get put in jail, what do you expect? You can't say, look how
virtuously I am bearing up under my suffering. And I kind of like this, that
last one. He mentions some awful things. Murderer, thief, other
kind of criminal, or a meddler. You say, meddling? I looked up the word, because
I just love to. And interestingly enough, it's
made up of the word that's normally translated bishop, means an overseer, and then the word that means
other. And it means that kind of person
who tries to come in and take over other people's business,
who thinks that when you're doing something, they ought to come
in and tell you how to do it. And you ought to listen, meddlers. And they're particularly meddlesome
when they're in the church, when they believe that it is within
their power and authority to come and tell you how to live
your life and say to you, you know, you oughtn't to do that.
Now, there may be some things that that'd be legitimate. I
mean, if you're cheating and lying and all that, yeah, it's
all right for somebody to tell you not to do that. But I was brought up in a religion,
had a lot of meddlesome folk in it, that they were quite willing to come and tell you how you
should live, even in the details of your life. So if you suffer
for that, well, can't take any credit for that. You shouldn't
have been meddling in other people's business. However, verse 16, if you suffer
as a Christian, do not be ashamed, but praise God that you bear
the name, what name? Christ, Christian. Christians did not invent the
name Christian. Unbelievers did. It was first
used in the city of Antioch. And though eventually it became
a term of derision, it was originally just a term that the unbelievers
in Antioch came up with to describe the people of this new religion
who'd showed up in their town. And like a nickname, they named
this new religion according to what was most prominent about
it. And while they did not intend
to heap any honor upon these disciples of the Lord Jesus,
they did honor them by calling them Christians. Why? Because
what these unbelievers were testifying about this new group of people,
this new religion, was that they're all together taken up with somebody
they call the Christ. Oh, I do hope that if we were
the only believers in Christ in this city, and we were surrounded
by idolaters, who didn't know anything about the Lord Jesus
Christ. And they saw us and listened
to what we talked about when we talked about spiritual things,
heard some of our preaching, heard how we talked to one another
and the things we talked. And they said, all right, they
must be Christians. That's all they ever talk about,
Christ. I'd say, well, thank you very
much. a lady who did not particularly
care for Brother Scott Richardson's preaching. I believe I've got the story
right. You hear these stories and you forget who they're about,
but I'm pretty sure it's about Scott. Told him, said, I've been here a lot of times,
and I've never heard you preach about anything but Christ. He
said, well, thank you. I appreciate that. She meant
it as an insult. He took it as a compliment. Another
person told him, you make an idol out of Jesus Christ. Yes,
we do. When it says he is the image
of the invisible God, it's the word idos, from which we get
the word idol. He is our idol. He is our image
of God. And before him, we fall down
in worship. Don't be ashamed to bear that
name. Give thanks to God, if you can
rightly claim it. For it is time for judgment to
begin with the family of God. Now, strictly speaking, it is
written, the word is not family, it's house. And our translators
probably in trying to You know, in all translation, there's some
interpretation. And they were looking at this
epistle in a more general sense. But if we keep this within what
I believe its context to be, he's speaking to Jews about the
suffering, believing Jews, about the suffering they're enduring,
and he's also told them back in verse 7, the end of all things
is near, that, you know, God is about to wipe Judaism out. Therefore, if we read, for it's
time for judgment to begin with the house of God. What did the psalmist say? I
was glad when they said unto me, let us go into the house
of the Lord. What was he talking about? Going
to the temple. Going to that place where believers
of that day would meet to worship according to the form that had
been given to them. Not only that, the Jewish nation
was considered in some sense to be the house of God. And so Peter says to them, for
it's time for judgment to begin with the house of God. He's acting
here like a prophet. And he said, if it begins with
us, which us? Us Jews. What will the outcome be for
those who do not obey the gospel of God? Here's what he's saying. I believe what he's saying. And
I understand this can be open to some interpretation, but to
me, this is the only way it keeps within the context. He's saying,
brother Jews, Brother believing Jews, it's high time that God
bring judgment on our nation. And it's going to get tough. And if it begins with us and
we experience some loss on account of it, after all, remember, their
homes were going to be destroyed. God was going to bring the Roman
army in there and just wipe the place out. Everything that they
had known from their childhood was about to be destroyed. If it begins with us, he said,
what will the outcome be for those who did not obey the gospel
of God? He said, now you're suffering.
And he said, I'm not going to make small of your suffering,
but know this. It's nothing compared to what's
going to happen to those who rejected Jesus as the Christ. Verse 18, if it is hard for the
righteous to be saved, what will become of the ungodly and the
sinner? Now, he does not mean by that
that, you know, we have to work hard for salvation. He's talking
about the difficulty of the way it is written. We must go through
many troubles to enter the kingdom of God. It's not as though by
going through those troubles, we earn our place in the kingdom
of God. It's simply that the way there
is troublesome in this world. Consequently, what Peter is saying,
if you think it's hard for you who, like Paul, you're pressing
on to lay hold of that for which you were laid hold of. If you
think it's hard for you, what do you think it's gonna be like
for the rebel when God comes in judgment? So then, those who suffer according to
God's will. He says, when all of this blows
up in your suffering, That suffering's according to
the will of God. It's not really judgment on you, but if God sends
a famine somewhere, everybody in that area feels it. If God
brings economic disaster in an area, everybody in that area
feels it, believer and unbeliever. That's the way it is. So if you
suffer according to God's will, commit yourself to your faithful
creator. and continue to do good. Now
what's he calling on us to do here? Exactly what the Lord Jesus
Christ did. So far as we know, the very last
words of our Lord Jesus Christ on the cross were, Father, into
your hands I commit my spirit. So we commit ourselves into the
hand of God, body and soul, and continue doing good. Continue
trusting Christ, pursuing Him. Now, two or three minutes of
applying this to us. A phrase that Brother Scott Richardson
used from time to time that I really like. He said, does this scripture
have no voice for us? It does. For right now, broad
Christianity is much like Judaism in our Lord's day. It is, for the most part, not
in submission to God. Most of the two billion people
of this earth who claim to be Christians do not know Christ. And from time to time, God brings
judgment on that house. And when he does, it can become
very difficult, even for those who are faithful. Here in our country, and I'm
not gonna pretend to be a prophet, I'm not. I don't know how long
God's gonna let this nonsense go on. I don't know how much
farther downhill he'll let our nation go. I don't know if within our lifetimes
we will see our freedoms horribly diminished, and in particular,
the freedom to worship God according to the truth in peace. I don't
know. But I know that within the past
few years we've seen some shocking changes within our nation, haven't
we? And right now we see some examples
of lawlessness. And those who are supposed to
handle that won't. And we see a rising tide of anti-Christian
sentiment. And I'll say this, if I were
a worldling and what I saw of Christianity is what you see
on TV about Christianity, I'd be against them too. I would. And they have now for as far
back as I can remember, people have taken up the name of Christ
and have made merchandise out of men's souls. and have traded
on the name of Christ. They've dragged his name through
the mud. They brought his name into politics. They have used
his name as though it's a tool to advance their own cause. Do
you think God's gonna sit still for that forever? One of two things has to happen.
God sends a revival to the nation, or God sends judgment on it.
God will. vindicate his name. And when
he does, and he vindicates himself against
all those who falsely claim his name, we who by the grace of
God sincerely set forth his name and trust
in it, we're going to suffer right along with him. We will. When they try to stamp out religious
tyrants and shut the doors on their religion, they'll try to
shut our doors too. And as one brother wisely said,
when we do suffer for the name of Christ, he said, our suffering
will not be noble. It will not be written down that
we suffered for a noble cause. It'd be written down that we
suffered because we were bigots. It will be written down that
we suffered because we were not broad-minded enough. It'll be written down that we
suffered as child abusers because we insisted on teaching our children
what the scriptures say. I hope that that day doesn't
come, but if it does, think about this, brethren. When God brings
judgment on what in the book of Revelation was called the
beast that rises out of the earth, false religion, when he brings judgment on them
and we feel it, remember Whatever judgment or whatever
suffering you experience is nothing compared to the glory that will
be revealed in you. And also remember this, if you
think it's tough on you, imagine what it's going to be like when
the rebels against God who have taken his name in vain by using
it for their own advancement What will it be like for them? Troubles may come. I hope not. The Lord taught us to pray, lead
us not into trouble. But he also promised some would
come. And if and when it does, God give us grace to remember
the grace that's been given to us. the grace that will be revealed
in us, and to understand that nothing, not even the most agonizing
forms of torture which some of our brothers and sisters in the
past have endured, nothing can be compared to the glories and
the blessings that await us. when we go to him or he comes
to us, however it may be. And if you're without Christ
this morning, if you're just religious, take this as a warning. Seriously. Actually, all of us
should. I mean, we ought always to make
sure that we're not just playing games. But a time is coming when the
game players are going to suffer beyond comprehension. Don't play games with God. He
always wins. But blessed be His name. The
most wretched, hypocritical, religious phony finds full forgiveness
and mercy the moment he asks for it from the Lord. Well, the
Lord added.