Armed with the same mind as Christ

Seeking for the help of the Lord, I direct your prayerful attention to 1 Peter chapter 4. I read for our text the first six verses. For as much then as Christ hath suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves likewise with the same mind. For he that hath suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin. that he no longer should live the rest of his time in the flesh to the lusts of men, but to the will of God. For the time past of our life may suffice us to have wrought the will of the Gentiles when we walked in lasciviousness, lusts, excess of wine, revelings, banquetings, and abominable idolatries, wherein they think it strange that ye run not with them to the same excess of riot, speaking evil of you. who shall give account to him that is ready to judge the quick and the dead. For for this cause was the gospel preached also to them that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the Spirit.

1 Peter chapter 4 verses 1 through to 6. We continue in our series in the Epistles of Peter, this is the 17th one, 17th address, and last time we spoke of Christ, Noah, and baptism. And the believer's response to Christ's sufferings was obedience and being baptized as our Lord had commanded and of which Noah was a type of one that was saved by water. And we are to follow in that same way as Christ has joined together, believing and to be baptized. Not that baptism is required for salvation, but it is a fruit. It is not a requirement, but it's inseparably joined by our Lord to believing.

Well, this evening, in these six verses, Peter follows this with Christ, his sufferings, suffering in the flesh, so that we are exhorted to be armed with the same mind as Christ. Peter is seeking to strengthen the brethren in this way, to have the same mind as Christ. So no doubt that Peter could remember when he had a distinctly different mind to the Lord.

When our Lord was telling of his future and coming sufferings, and Peter said, that shall not be unto thee, Lord. That shall not be unto thee. And the Lord says that, depart from me, Satan. Now save us not the things that are of God, but the things that are of men. It's very obvious Peter was thinking very differently than the Lord.

And so with these epistles and with this section here, he is seeking to arm or be ready for a fight, to fight the good fight of faith, that we might have the same mind as Christ, the same mindset. In a way, Peter is mirrored by Paul. Paul, when he writes to the Philippians in the third chapter of his epistle to them, he speaks of being minded, and he says, I press, in verse 14, toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God. in Christ Jesus.

He said, Let us therefore as many as be perfect be thus minded, and if in anything ye be otherwise minded, God shall reveal even this unto you. Nevertheless, whereto we have already attained Let us walk by the same rule, let us mind the same thing. And this is the same import is directing us to be thinking along the same lines, having the same mind, instructed not by our own flesh, not by our own wisdom, but by the word of God. Now there are four areas in these six verses where we are to have the same mind as Christ, that we be armed in this way. Arm yourselves likewise with the same mind.

I'll briefly name the four areas and then we'll go back and look more particularly at them. The first is resign to suffering. Christ has suffered for us in the flesh. And then secondly, regarding sin. Verses one, three, and four set before us Christ's mind and what our mind should be regarding sin. And then thirdly, as to the will of God, verse two, also covered in verse four, that we have the same mind as our Lord to the will of God. And then lastly, in verses five and six, in readiness for the judgment, having the same mind as Christ in that way. Well firstly, the resignation to suffering. For as much then as Christ hath suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves likewise with the same mind.

Our Lord, when he was going up to Jerusalem to be crucified, his face was set to go up to Jerusalem. And when he came to those in Samaria, the Samaritans would not receive him. The disciples, they said to the Lord, shall we command fire to come down from heaven and consume them as Elias did? Well, our Lord said, ye know not what spirit ye are of. They did not have the same mind of Christ in that matter, but Christ there, he had his thoughts, his mind, and it was very evident from his whole demeanor that he was set to go up to Jerusalem.

And we can notice people, our friends, our loved ones, if they've got their minds set on something, we might try and dissuade them, We might try and introduce other things that we want them to do or take notice of, but it's very evident their mind is set on one thing and they're doing one thing.

And of course, in the providence of God, it would not have been good for our Lord to be turned aside and to spend time with the Samaritans on this occasion. It's a similar occasion when The Shunammite's son was dead, suffering from sunstroke. And she goes and she rides to Elisha, who had said that she should have that son. And when Elisha then sent first his servant Gehazi, he charged him that if any saluted him, he should not salute in return. that he wasn't to be turned aside, he was to have his mind set on going to that child, laying his rod on the child.

And in the way with suffering here is to have this in mind, that our Lord Jesus Christ suffered for us while he was here below, in the flesh, in his own body, on the tree, and not only that, But right through his life, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I bear with you?

Now, if we had to go up into some of the worst areas in London and we were told to stay there a day or a week and to hear their language and to see their deeds and to be amongst them, we wouldn't cause that a pleasant thing. we call it a path of suffering.

And our Lord, we are told, endured the contradiction of sinners against himself. A sinless, spotless, pure, holy man of God, God himself, and yet in the midst of sinners, beholding their works, if it was said of Lot that he vexed his righteous soul, day by day with their unrighteous deeds, unlawful deeds, how much more with Christ when he was upon earth. And if we have the mind of Christ in that way, then we also, in seeing and hearing those things that are round about us, that will be a cause of suffering For us, instead of being along with them and having the same mind with them, it will be a cause of suffering. We think of the offense of the cross and the suffering that that entails. The natural flesh likes to have a path that is at ease, that has no sufferings, has no trials, whether it be spiritually, whether it be for our faith, whether it be in afflictions, sicknesses, whether it be in providential circumstances, whatever it is, we like to have a smooth path. We're not mindful that here below We are in this wilderness, there's pilgrims, and it is under the curse.

Thorns also, thistles, it shall bring forth unto you. And if we have been given the word of God, the Lord said, I have given them thy word, and the world hath hated them. If we already are in the mindset and mindful that suffering is part of the past, Then we'll be so grateful if it is less than what we anticipated. We will not be tossed to and fro when those things come. We wonder how it was with dear Joan. Everything going well, blessed with riches, with health, with strength. And then suddenly, he has suffering. Suddenly, he loses all of those things in Providence. Suddenly he loses his loved ones, he loses his health, he loses the support of his friends, he loses the support of his wife.

Then at first the Lord gave and the Lord hath taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord. Satan thought and accused him that God had put a hedge round about him. If God was to touch those things you would turn and curse him to his face. But I believe Job had the mind of Christ, he had that realisation that he was to be resigned to suffering and certainly in the start he very much was resigned to it. And so Christ is set before us. Hymn writer says, shall Christ my Lord suffer and shall I repine? Shall he suffer for our sins and we not know anything at all about sufferings?

Not have any fellowship with him in his sufferings, not ever needing to know what his mindset was in them, being faced with them in prospect Right from the very coming into this world, he says to Pilate, to this end was I born. For this cause came I into this world. He had that suffering, that death, set before him right through his life. We do not know what is before us. I mean, many of us, we shall not have the suffering that our Lord had, but our Lord knew beforehand, and He walked through it, in the anticipation of it, and then in the actual sufferings.

And so Peter, and no doubt thinking of his own mindset before, says, yourselves likewise with the same mind. As if we were to say, once I did not have that mind. I did not think as Christ did. I would even turn Him aside from it. And there's another aspect here as well, isn't there? It's not even only having the same mind as Christ, but it's how we would encourage and strengthen one another in it as well. Did Job's friends, Job's friends, their interpretation of his sufferings? Wasn't that this was the mind of God that should be resigned to it?

But there must be something wrong with Job. There must be a cause, a reason for it to come. It must be chastisement. It must be because he'd done some terrible thing. May our Lord himself was spotless, innocent, he is suffering for our sins. But they said of the man that was born blind, who hath sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind. But the idea that he must, through much tribulation, enter the kingdom, or much deep trouble and trial, that the natural mind rejects. But our Lord and the Word of God says, no, this needs to be your mindset.

In me shall have peace in the world, ye shall have tribulation. The apostles, they passed that on. They said to the brethren, exhorting the brethren, that they must, through much tribulation, end the kingdom. And that was a word of comfort, a word of help for them. Those that were having to walk that path, they realized it was a foretold path, and they were ready in mind to walk in that path.

And so this is the first exhortation or mindset that Peter would set before his hearers here and sat before the Church of God to be resigned to the suffering. But then secondly, regarding sin. Our Lord suffered for the sins of his people and We read in verse one, he that has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin. And we have the past life that is set before us here, and each one of God's children, they have a past life, a life that God in mercy has turned them away from, brought them to repent of, And yet they still have that old nature that will bend back to those very things. Peter here has a list of the time past of our life. If we were to go back to Paul writing to the Ephesians, he also brings them and reminds them of their past in chapter two of Ephesians. wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience, among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others. a past life and as the Apostle Paul when the Lord began with him and he brought him to the law and afterwards Paul says the law is a schoolmaster unto Christ.

He says I was alive without the law once but when the commandment came sin revived and I died and that which was ordained unto life I found to be unto death. And immediately the subject was sin. He is brought to know what sin was, brought to be convicted of sin, brought to realize how evil it is. Sin is a transgression of the law of God. It is something that when we are dead in trespasses and sins, we are not mindful of what sin really is. And sin itself has a hardening effect. And I believe this is one of the reasons why Peter here is strengthening the brethren, because as time goes on, then we get more and more hardened to sin. We backslide, we see it all around us, we indulge it, we trifle with it, then gradually we become more and more desensitized to it. and we haven't a tender conscience towards sin.

And so Peter would in effect say, you think of what Christ thinks about sin. Does he think small of it? No, he suffered to put it away. He suffered the wrath of God because of sin. And the life that he, when he first quickened us, brought us away from, was a sinful life, a wicked life.

And we are to have that mind that Christ has regarding sin. Now there's another aspect regarding this. It says here, verse 1, for he that hath suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin. What does it mean? Well, we read in James and in other parts that it is no sin to be tempted.

We can be tempted with sin, we can be tempted of evil, and while we resist it, while we don't walk in it, while we walk in as set before us in Hebrews 12, ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin, and remember What is here, arm yourselves, this is a fight, this is a battle with sin.

Paul says, the good that I would, I do not. The evil that I would not, that I do. A wretched man that I am. Who shall deliver me from this body of death? And it's a constant conflict with sin, a suffering because of sin. When we were Without the law, we just went along the way of sin. We didn't suffer because of it. We weren't troubled because of it. We didn't have sleepless nights because of it. We didn't have wrestlings because of it. We weren't chastened because of it.

But when called, then sin is something we're mindful with, and it has a real part of our suffering. One of the brethren said recently, one of our fraternals, that one of the fathers had said that we can't stop birds flying over our head, but we can stop them from building nests in our hair. And what they meant, we cannot stop sinful thoughts coming into our mind. We cannot stop those things that we see, we hear, and that our mind suddenly has in our minds. But if we have the mind of Christ regarding sin, then we are to resist it, to fight it, to mourn over it, to cry unto the Lord, to resist the devil, and that is a part of suffering a way that the world does not know. They never walk in that way.

And so if we have the same mind of Christ regarding sin, that will in itself bring sufferings, but also it brings us to cease from sin. Not from being mindful of it in our bodies, not from being mindful of our corrupt nature, but we don't enter into that sin and so take that as being our sin and our transgression.

Our Lord Jesus Christ came into this world to save sinners. His name shall be called Jesus. for he shall save his people from their sins. Rather than let those sins rule their lives, condemn them eternally, and damn them to hell, he came into this world to endure the wrath of God for them and to give them grace and help and strength that they might resist those sins that they might hate those sins. The hymn writer says, I hate the sins that made thee mourn and drove thee from my breast. It's one thing I feel to need very much, especially, and to be renewed into it day by day, to have Christ's mind regarding sin, identifying sin, and thinking as he thought concerning sin.

The third point is that concerning the will of God. We have in verse 2 that he no longer should live the rest of his time in the flesh to the lusts of men but to the will of God. In verse 3, It says, the time past of our life may suffice us to have wrought the will of the Gentiles. But now it is walking according not to the will of the Gentiles or to the will of our own wicked heart, but to the will of God. Because this featured very strongly with our Lord in Gethsemane, When he prayed, Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but thy will be done. A submission to the will of God.

And of course, this aspect goes into all of our lives. Everything that comes upon us in Providence, all of the Lord's ordering of the whole world, of those in authority over us, the laws that are made that really affect us, that make the difference, whether perhaps we can afford to buy a house or not buy a house, to pay a house off or not, or to change a house, the taxes, or to move country, the exchange rates, how profound effect The rulings of men have.

Why did our Lord come while in his mother's womb to Bethlehem and was born in Bethlehem? Because man decreed that there should be a census, a taxing. And they were the house and lineage of David, so they went there. and overruling for good, bringing about the purposes of God, fulfilling the scriptures. And it comes about because of decisions of men in government.

And it still happens, it still will in our lives. You think of our current government and regarding farmers and saying, well, If a farmer dies and he passes on his farm to his children, then he's got to pay so much inheritance tax, and the end result will be that it'd be impossible to pass on, because all the money is paid up in the land, so they'd have to sell the farm to pay the inheritance tax, and they wouldn't have a farm anymore. making of laws in our government is going to have a profound effect on the lives of farmers and everything in this land. And you see these things, these are under the Lord's control. It's easy to rise up against man and sometimes it is right to make supplication as William Gadsby used to do. When the Corn Laws came in, and so affected his hearers.

But we make supplication and we make supplication to the Lord and intercession to man and we're looking at the Lord overall in these things. Just because that we would be submissive to the Lord doesn't mean to say that we do not ever take steps to order our lives or to remedy things, we are given wisdom and help to order our lives according to the laws of the land, not lawless, but subject to those in authority over us, using what means that we have.

And it's a great blessing to have not only freedom of worship, but freedom of expression and freedom even to challenge or to write to those in authority over us. That is given us by the will of God. In some countries, you could not do that. Even just a hint of rising up against those or thinking differently to those in authority would bring even the sentence of death.

But we are to look beyond man and beyond the things that man brings and to see the will of God. We think of Solomon. was such a wise man, God gave him such wisdom, but he fell through women, through worshipping their idols, and God then chastened him by raising up men, Jeroboam amongst them, that were a thorn in his side, and he fought against them.

He tried to take them, not realising, looking at his own life and thinking the reason why these troubles, why these adversaries are here is because of my sin. That's why God is sending it and scriptures clearly say it was sent for that cause. And this applies to many things. They are the sword, the hand is thine.

And it's then to be have with same mind of Christ to the will of God and right through our lives what we do, how that we suffer, the consequences of our actions of serving the Lord, whether we stand against the rules of men and then suffer for it. we look over it all to the will of God. Our Lord said, when Peter took out his sword, put up thy sword within its sheath, the cup which my father hath given me to drink, shall I not drink it? Thinkest thou not that I could pray my father, he'd presently give me twelve legion of angels, seventy-two thousand But how then shall the scriptures be fulfilled?

And so when we discern the will of God, there's that time to be submissive to it and to walk in that way. Providence unfolds the book and makes his counsels shine. It may be we come to nine, and there's some of you struggling with things, whether it is the will of God, why the Lord has permitted this. Perhaps you might think, well, the Lord has two wills. He has his perfect will that he really wants to happen, but then he has a permissive will that he just allows men to do things and to get away with things. God doesn't have two wills. He has one will, one perfect will, one decree.

He has those things which are secret, which are hidden from us, but those things that are revealed, and we are to walk in the revealed will of God. But when we look at the overall results of what things have happened, the will of the Lord has been done. Yes, overruled. The fall, the fall was not man's in control. God appointed it. The crucifixion, God appointed it. Doesn't take away the sinfulness of man, doesn't take away man's responsibility, his accountability, but it puts God on the throne.

You know, if we were to have a house down the road that was condemned to be demolished. And we saw lads going down the road wrecking things. We said to them, look, come here. You can get away with it. You wrecked that house. And they did so thinking they were doing injury to people, but in actual fact, They're doing exactly what we wanted and doing our will. And Satan does that.

We mentioned of Job. He thought that he was going to prove Job to be, as it were, a fraud. But instead, the Lord used the latter end of Job better than the beginning. And Satan was proved a liar, even in the crucifixion, the very first promise. Thou shalt bruise, the Lord shall bruise his head, thou shalt bruise his heel. That which was Satan's hour, the hour of darkness, all the redemption of the people of God was accomplished in that hour, not by Satan, but by God and by his will.

And we need to be very clear, who is he that said, And it cometh to pass when the Lord not permits it, but commandeth it not. The Lord commands all things. This is the great mystery that when we act, we must act according to the revealed will of God. But when things go then so contrary to our will, or we think everything is messed up, then we know that it isn't. The Lord has done His will anyway. He's never frustrated, and He is to be then submissive to that will of God. But to the will of God. May we have the same mind as our Lord Jesus Christ in this matter, in every aspect of our lives.

I want to look fourthly at the readiness for the judgment. These verses are difficult verses, but I want to open them up really with the help of scriptures as we should do comparing scripture with scripture. Verse five and six, who shall give account to him that is ready to judge the quick and the dead, that is the living, literally living, and the dead, those that are literally dead. For for this cause was the gospel preached also to them that are dead, literally are dead now, that they might be judged according to man in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit. Now I want to turn to a couple of portions.

Firstly, Romans 8. Romans 8 verses 8 and 9, we read, So then, they that are in the flesh cannot please God. But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, He is none of his." So bearing that in mind and going back to our text, our text speaks, in verse 6, of those that are men in the flesh but live according to God in the spirit. Romans it is, that ye are not in the flesh but in the spirit If so, be the Spirit of God well in you. So in verse six, there are those that are going to be judged by those who are living in this world in the flesh, but they are walking after the Spirit. They're walking in the Spirit. They are spiritually minded. That's who is being spoken of here.

Then if we go to Paul's epistle to the Corinthians, 1st epistle and in chapter 6, the apostle in the beginning of this chapter is reproving the Corinthians because they were going to the law of the land against one another. Before the ungodly they were going before and bringing each other for small matters.

And he says in verse 2, do ye not know that the saints shall judge the world? And if the world shall be judged by you, are ye unworthy to judge the smallest matters? Know you not that we shall judge angels? How much more things that pertain to this life? And he goes on, if then you have judgments of things pertaining to this life, set them to judge who are least esteemed in the church, or those that are spiritually minded. It's hard for us to understand that there is to be a judgment and that we shall be with the Lord on His throne and to be judging angels and to judge those that are not His.

But Christ shall be on that throne, His people shall be of the same mind with Him as to those that are condemned, but the picture is here put as a readiness for judgment. Christ, he is ready to sit on his throne. He ascended up into heaven at the right hand of the throne of God in the judgment seat of Christ. But are we ready to come before that throne?

If we are sinners, if we are still under condemnation, we are not ready. But if we are the Lord's people, those that Peter is writing to hear, then we are to have this mind of Christ. We have been given discernment And those that are in the Spirit with the same mind of Christ are those that are ready and able to discern between those that serve God and those that serve Him not. This is what is set before us at the end of the Old Testament in Malachi chapter 3. and those that fear the Lord speak often one to another, and it is those that are said in verse 18, then shall ye return and discern between the righteous and the wicked, between him that serveth God and him that serveth him not. If we are to be of any use in the Church of God, in any discernment, if we are to be like in Jude, to contend earnestly for the faith once delivered unto the saints, if we are to be like the churches in the Revelation that had to discern that they'd got those of the Nicolaitans in them, those who were teaching like Jezebel in the midst of them, churches that had those that were able to judge and discern between him that was serving God and him that was serving him not.

And so this is the mind that Peter is setting before them here. When Peter came to where Philip had been preaching, and Philip had baptized Simon the sorcerer, And when Simon saw that Peter laid hands and could impart the gift of the Holy Spirit by the laying on of hands, he asked for that power and gave money that he might receive it. And Peter had the discernment. He was able to judge. Thou hast no part or lot in this matter. Thy heart is not right before God. And we need to be ourselves spiritually minded, ready to judge and to discern, even while we are here below. And this, I believe, is the true picture here of being ready unto judgment.

For this cause was the gospel also preached to them that are dead. Those who have died and they have the gospel, preach to them, and one day they shall come before the judgment seat of Christ, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh. Those who have also lived, heard the gospel, heard the word of God, been given discernment, and be able to clearly discern between those that are serving God. and those who are not serving Him.

No, the natural mind would rise up against God's judgment. They would say, well, that's unfair, that's not right. But if we have the same mind of Christ in His judgment upon sin and looking upon men, then we'll be able to rightly discern those that truly are serving and fearing the Lord. There are many warnings in the scripture of those that creep in the churches unawares, evil men, men that need to be identified by the Church of God. And for the strengthening of the Church of God, Peter is saying here, you need the mind of Christ. This is for the peace and strength of the Church of God. to discern this, to recognize this before they do damage, before they ruin the Church of God, before they hurt the little ones of God. So may we have, be armed with the same mind of Christ, resigned to suffering, and the same mind regarding sin, same mind as to the will of God in the same mind as in readiness for the judgment. The Lord add his blessing. Amen.

Armed with the same mind as Christ

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Armed with the same mind as Christ

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