We're going to read from 1 Peter
4, if you have your Bibles, 1 Peter 4. And just as you're turning to
that, let me make a couple of comments by way of introduction.
We're going to be reading this morning about a fiery trial,
a fiery trial that Peter was concerned about as far as these
pilgrims, these scattered strangers that had been put out, chased
away perhaps from Jerusalem into cities beyond and this general
epistle went addressed not to a particular church but to those
that were the Lord's people scattered around and about and he was writing
to them of a fiery trial which seems to be above and beyond
the other difficulties that they were facing. And I want us to
just note that this fiery trial is the particular thing that
is to the fore in Peter's writing in this passage. So he says in
verse 12, 1 Peter chapter four and verse 12, beloved, Think
it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you,
as though some strange thing happened unto you. But rejoice, inasmuch as ye are
partakers of Christ's sufferings, that when his glory shall be
revealed, ye may be glad also with exceeding joy. If ye be
reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye, for the spirit
of glory and of God resteth upon you. On their part he is evil
spoken of, but on your part he is glorified. But let none of
you suffer as a murderer or as a thief or as an evildoer or
as a busybody in other men's matters. If any man suffer as
a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God on this
behalf. For the time has come that judgment
must begin at the house of God. And if it first begin at us,
what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God? And if the righteous scarcely
be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear? Wherefore,
let them that suffer according to the will of God commit the
keeping of their souls to him in well-doing as unto a faithful
creator. Amen, and may God bless to us
this reading from his word. Just before we begin what I want
to say about that fiery trial, let me make mention of something
else here. Considering the number of people
today who self-identify as Christians, it is interesting to note how
infrequently that word is used in scripture. Lots and lots of people call
themselves Christians. We have a Christian here. I told
him to listen out for his name. So there you are. You hope you
got it. But people call themselves Christians.
Everybody. I doubt that you could go out
into the street and stop the first person that you came to
and said, what religion are you? I'm a Christian. And they all
Many, many of them self-identify as Christians and yet it's not
a word that the Bible uses about us pretty much at all. Luke tells us that it was a nickname,
it was a term of disparagement that was applied first to the
Lord's people in Antioch. That was in Turkey, or modern
day Turkey. Antioch of Syria, they called
it. And they were called Christians because it was a term of abuse. Oh, you are those Christians. And it was leveled at the followers
of Jesus. probably as a term of contempt. In Acts 11, verse 26, we're told
the disciples were called Christians first in Antioch. And it seems
to have been a term of mockery because the next time we hear
about the word Christian, It's a King who is speaking to the
Apostle Paul and the Apostle Paul has just laid out the message
of the Gospel. He has just spoken of the way
in which the Lord Jesus Christ met him and saved him and converted
him and brought him into a knowledge of Jesus Christ as his Saviour. And it's possible that we could
construe Agrippa's words in another way, but I have the sense that
there was a degree of contempt. There was an element of sneering
in the way in which he spoke to Paul. He realized how earnest
Paul was. He realized the sincerity in
this man. He realized that here was Paul
who was absolutely sold out to this Lord Jesus Christ. And he
says to Paul, Paul, You almost persuade me to be a Christian. Even if it was true that he was
almost persuaded, that wasn't good enough. That wasn't enough. It's not enough to be almost
persuaded to be a Christian. But I detect in Agrippa's statement
that he was speaking disparagingly about these Christians. And here is the only time that
an apostle uses the word Christian in these verses before us today. And I think that as he speaks
of it in verse 16, he is again implying that it was used by
outsiders as a term of scorn because it was they who accused
them of being Christians. And it's as though he's saying,
I don't want you to be ashamed to bear reproach for the name
of Christ, because that's what they were doing. They were reproaching
these people. They were reproaching them by
calling them Christians. It was a term of abuse that the
world laid upon the true people of God. And I guess gradually
that term of abuse came to be accepted as the name of Jesus'
followers. And then somewhere along the
line, they accepted it for themselves. And so we now self-identify as
being Christians, followers of the Lord Jesus Christ. But it
was not always so. What we discover in the Gospels
and in the Acts and in the Epistles is that the people of God, the
followers of the Lord Jesus Christ, they addressed one another, they
used terms about one another that were rather titles such
as the brethren, the faithful, the elect, the saints, Believers,
those are good words. I like those words. Maybe I like
those words better than Christian because it speaks of what it
was that they did. What characterized them was not
some notion, not some list of doctrines or affirmations that
they gave some sort of mental assent to. Oh yeah, I'm a Christian
because I was born in a Christian country. No. Oh, I'm a Christian
because I was brought up in the Christian church. No. I'm a Christian. I'm a follower
of Christ because I'm an elect child of God. Because I've been
sanctified by God the Holy Spirit. I've been set apart by God in
the eternal covenant to receive the benefits and blessings of
grace. Because I have been brought to
faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Because I believe in Him. And
because I have been brought into the family of God by adoption,
and you are my sister, and you are my brother, and together
we are children in the family of God. Those are better names. And I like them better. But I'm
not going to make a suggestion this morning that we overthrow
the name Christian, because it's too far gone for that. But that
was what the apostles called themselves. Whatever name we
go by, those who are truly the Lord's people are the beloved
of God. And this is how the apostle starts
this section in verse 12. He calls them beloved. And they
were beloved not just because Peter loved them. Peter did love
them. Peter was writing to them out
of a heart of sympathy and empathy and affection and care that he
had towards these people. And he wrote to them to help
and encourage and comfort them in their times of trouble. He
had a love for them. He had an affection which was
a God-given affection for them and to them. And it wasn't just the other
disciples also who loved them. But this is speaking about the
love of God. It was God who loved these people. And here's another
reason why it's important to stress this. Because once again,
the Christian world will tell us that God loves everyone. Well,
we read this morning from Psalm 7, that God is angry with the
wicked every day. The testimony of Scripture is,
Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated. Now you get round
that, you show me the way to get round such an explicit statement
that isn't said once, it is said multiple times in the Old and
in the New Testament. The apostolic testimony attests
to the fact that God says he hated Esau. What is that? God is saying that in Christ
there is a love. outside of Christ. There is no
love of God. There is no love of God. There
is a fearful looking forward to of judgment. And don't let
anyone think that they can go and face God in a day to come
at the judgment and say, well, you're right. I got to hold my
hands up. You're right. I've not been the
man that I should have been, but I knew that you were a God
of love and I knew that you would forgive me in the end. Because
it won't happen. It won't happen. Now these were the beloved of
God. And the love of God is a rare and a precious gift. It is not
given to everyone. The electing love of God is what
is before us. The love that chose a people
in eternity for himself. that He chose to be betrothed
to, that He chose to be wedded to, to be joined with and united
to for all eternity, is God's choice, God's electing choice,
based and founded upon His love for that particular people. The
justifying love of God is the love that made a way of acceptance,
reconciliation, peace by justifying us, not because of our own works,
because we are sinners and the very best that we can do in this
world will be a stench in the nostrils of a holy God, the very
best. Our righteousness, as the Word
of God, is like a filthy rag. The very best that we can come
up with is a filthy rag before the holiness of Almighty God. But He has justified us, He has
made us right. Why? Because we were special,
because we were good, because we were better than anyone else?
No. The Word of God tells us, because
I've loved you, because I've loved you, that is the particular
discriminating, particular love of God. And it's a redeeming
love because it sent the Lord Jesus Christ to the cross to
die for us. It sent the Lord Jesus Christ
to the cross knowing that that death would be a substitutionary
death, would be a death whereby He took the sins of that beloved
people. on his own shoulders and would
pay the price by his life's blood for their redemption. What prompted
that? What provoked that? What initiated
that? But the love of God. The love
of God towards us. And so when Peter writes beloved
he is speaking to a particular people. And he's speaking to
a people who have tasted something of the effectual, powerful workings
of God in the plan of salvation for the redemption of their souls. Chosen by love, the love of the
Father, the same love, hear this, the same love granted to these
blessed individuals in this world, the same love, with which the
Father, God, loves the Son of God. We are loved as His people
through that adoptive work of gathering us to Himself. We are
loved with the self-same love of the Father to the Son. Now
I can't explain that, that's too much for me, but I'm simply
gonna state it. And if you would like to mull
that over and meditate upon it as the week unfolds, then I think
it'll do you so good. But we are loved with such a
love that is beyond our comprehension. Thou hast loved them, says the
Lord Jesus Christ in John 17. Thou hast loved them as thou
hast loved me. The Lord Jesus Christ himself
said so. And Peter reminds these scattered
pilgrims of that love of God for them because he knows that
they are about to face a particular fiery trial. This is the reality
of the situation. This is what they are about to
undergo, a fiery trial. It's about to overtake them.
Now, we're not actually told what this fiery trial is. A fiery trial can be intense, like a volcano exploding. And
I know some of you have had explosions like that in your life. I know
that some of you have had a moment when your life just crashed around
about you because a fiery trial came on you. And it can be like a wildfire
that just sweeps right through you. You can't outrun a wildfire. You can't outdrive a wildfire. not when it really gets going
with the wind behind it. And such a fiery trial can come
into the lives of men and women, and it just sweeps all before
them. And a fiery trial can be a slow
burn. We have, I'm sure you have them
here as well, we have patches of peat. You have peat here,
don't you? You know what peat is? No? Okay. Peat is like a moss which has
become compacted. It's full of roots and decaying
vegetation. And it can dry out and then it
goes on fire. But it burns slow and it burns
deep. And you can get all the fire
tenders that you like to come and spray as much water on that
as possible and it'll be out. It'll be cold to the touch. It'll
be out. There'll be no smoke. And then
in three months or six months or a year's time, back it comes
again. And it's just a slow burn. And
some of these peak fires have been burning for decades. Fiery trial. A fiery trial in
the life of an individual, in the life of a people, in the
life of a family that just goes on and on and on and on. And nobody else understands it.
Nobody really understands. So whether it's a wildfire or
a slow burn, a fiery trial can be many things to different people. And it may seem extinguished
only to flare up again. And here the Apostle doesn't
specify what that fiery trial is. It has been suggested that
maybe it was the imminent destruction of Jerusalem. That's possible. It was going to happen. This
would have been written at a time which was just before that, in
which case these people living far off wouldn't actually have
felt the burn themselves, as it were, except that they would
know that their friends and families and their homes had come to such
an end at the hand of the Roman legions. Or perhaps it was something
that was going to affect and afflict them personally in their
own cities and in their own place. A time of persecution that was
coming which would go through the whole of the empire. Peter
doesn't specify it and I'm glad he doesn't because it means that
you and I can own this too. Regardless of what happened in
Jerusalem or in another city at a particular time, we all
know something of the fiery trials that afflict us. And if you don't
know it now, I've said this before, you will soon because that's
just the way of life and we are a people that will face and endure
these fiery trials. That's why it's in the word of
God. That's why it has been given to us. And so Peter tells his readers,
and he's telling us, that we're not to think that it's a strange
and unusual thing, intense as it might be. Don't think it's
strange. Others have experienced this
before you, and others will experience it yet in time to come. But it
doesn't mean that the love of God towards us has changed. It doesn't mean that God is not
in control. It doesn't mean that his purpose
has been thwarted. It means that God is accomplishing
his purpose and he is using even fiery trials to succeed and to
secure his will in the lives of his church and people. So
here's what I have for you this morning. Here are positive reasons,
five positive, they're quick, so don't worry. Five positive
reasons why we should stand in the face of that fiery trial,
whatever it might be. We are to understand these things
in order to be comforted. guided in that trial so as to
rejoice in it. How opposite is that? To rejoice
in it and to endure whatever the trial might be. Here's the
first reason, and I'm just basically working down through the verses
that we have in this passage. Verse 13 gives us the first reason. You are partaking of the Lord's
sufferings. By this fiery trial, you are
actually partaking of the Lord's sufferings. Now that doesn't
mean you're partaking of his sufferings on the cross. But
it does draw us again to remember that the Lord Jesus Christ is
united with his people and that we are one body. Christ is the
head and we are the body. The church is the body of the
Lord Jesus Christ. And so, That union, that joining
together that Christ has with us means that Christ owns our
suffering. And in fact, it's the head that
is suffering. Excuse me, as the body suffers,
so the head suffers. You can't get a pain anywhere
in your body from the sole of your foot to the tips of your
fingers that doesn't affect your head. Because that's where you
feel it. And so the Lord Jesus Christ
takes upon himself our sufferings and we are joined together in
our suffering with the sufferings that he knows also as his mystical
body suffers, as the church suffers. And therein we endure hardship
for his sake. Here's the second thing that
Peter says, also in verse 13. He says, you are being prepared
by this suffering to see his excellent glory. You are being
prepared in this world by this suffering, by these hardships
that you are enduring, by the trial and the trouble that you're
feeling, by the loss that's in your heart. You are being prepared
to see his glory. And that glory is being set before
you as it were to encourage you with eagerness to look towards
those things which are yet to be revealed. And we will see
that glory. We will see it in time and we
will see it in eternity. We will see the glory of Christ
preserving his people through those fiery trials. Do you remember
who Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego were? They knew a fiery trial. They were cast by the King Nebuchadnezzar
into a burning fiery furnace. And they walked in the midst
of that furnace with a fourth person who looked like unto the
Son of God. In the midst of the fiery trial,
God preserves his people. And you will see the glory of
the Lord Jesus Christ manifested in the preservation of his people
through these trials. We will be overcomers. And if
the Lord takes us into his presence, we will see his eternal glory,
and we will worship him in eternity. So we are being prepared to see
His glory. The third reason why we should
face these fiery trials is found in verse 14. Because you, as
the church of the Lord Jesus Christ, are possessors of the
Holy Spirit. The Holy Ghost is upon you. He rests on you. And you will
discover in the midst of that fiery trial that you are not
facing it alone. You will have a spiritual witness
within that the Lord is with you. You will find unexpected
resources. You will find peace beyond understanding. You will find a joy unspeakable. And despite the natural trepidation
which we all face when we have to enter into these fiery trials,
we will discover that the Lord Jesus Christ is faithful to his
word and he will never leave us and he will never forsake
us. Verse 17 gives us the fourth
reason. We are privileged to be counted
worthy of that fiery hardship. I was reading recently about
an incident in 1863 when a man called Colonel Robert
Shaw died in the Battle of Fort Wagner in the American Civil
War. As a Britisher, I always have
to say the American Civil War because as far as we were concerned,
there have been a few different ones. Robert Shaw, Colonel, died when
he was leading the 54th Massachusetts Infantry Regiment against the
ramparts of Fort Wagner. But he had gone to his superior
officers and he had pleaded for the honor of leading the charge
against Fort Wagner. He wanted to lead his regiment
against that heavily fortified fort. Why? Because he counted
it an honour to do so. And we are to count the fiery
trials that come upon us as an honour. They are an honour that
we should serve our God so, that he should count us worthy to
place us in the front line of the battle, that we might serve
him and that we might go forward under his banner and under his
encouragement. The Lord's people are soldiers
in a spiritual battle. and it is our glory to serve
our King. The time has come, Peter says,
the time has come. It had been anticipated and now
it was commenced. that we are to reckon our service
as evidence of God's judgment upon this world. The judgment
of God is coming quickly upon this world. This sin, this stench
of wickedness and evil that arises from the face of this globe is
not going to be put up with for very much longer. and God is
going to come in judgment upon this world. And as people are
at the forefront of the battle against wickedness in this world,
and judgment is begun, and if there are casualties, and if
we are those casualties in this judgment, then is that not an
honor to be so blessed, to be so honored by our God to have
been placed in such a position as this? Satan comes against us and he
is ready to rip us up and he is ready to scar us and he is
ready to grind us down. He's ready to take that life
and vitality that once characterized our characters and to turn it
to dust, both individually and as a church. My I'm not a great worker with
my hands, I never have been. My son-in-law is a practising
carpenter and he likes to take pieces of wood and to make something
of them and maybe there are some here today. You take a piece
of wood and you take that wood and you sand it and you file
it And of that piece of wood, you make something that is smooth,
something that is polished, something that is prized, something that
is useful. But what do you do with the sandpaper
after you're finished with it? You screw it up and you throw
it in the bin. And the sandpaper, it was the
hard, edge and it thought it was going to rub away and grind
away this piece of wood until there was nothing left. But the
reality of the fact was that what was left was smooth and
beautiful and what was discarded was the sandpaper that did all
the grinding. And that's what the Lord is doing
with his church and his people. Yes, there is an opposition in
this world. Yes, this world with all its
hardness and with all its brutality and with all its scarring power,
it comes against the church and it endeavours to grind it to
dust and to destroy it. But what is the outcome? It is
discarded and what is produced is beautiful. The fifth thing that we have
before us is that this fiery trial is the will of God. And actually, for all the previous
four, that's enough. If it's God's will that you go
through this fiery trial, so be it. Shall not the judge of
all the earth do right? If the Lord gives us this trial,
and it's his will that it be so, then let us be prepared and
quiet to accept it. Peter says in verse 19, he speaks
of them that suffer according to the will of God. Note this
please, there is nothing random or accidental about this suffering. They are suffering, we are suffering.
These fiery trials come into our lives at the direct instigation
of God. He did it. It is His will. And people will say, well, yes,
it's His permissive will. No, no, no, we'll not let that
stand. This is the decretive will of
God. God ordained it so to be. And
don't imagine that he somehow lost control for a moment and
he just lets it happen because, well, if he lets it happen, he
can gather up the ends again pretty soon and he'll get it
back on track. This is the purpose of God, to
accomplish his glory and his honour. And all these arguments,
these five arguments, in all of them, we are to count it a
joy A privilege to suffer in the
name and cause of our King Jesus and to endure the reproach of
men for his sake. We're to withstand temptation.
We are to struggle against evil. We have to expect the pains of
this flesh to enter into our very souls, our heart. And whatever
that fiery trial might be, our union with Christ is assured. And His coming glory is assured. And that Holy Spirit promise
of comfort is assured. And our high calling and the
privilege and honor of being His people is assured. And the knowledge that God knows
best is our portion in this world. And he will strengthen and he
will encourage us to stand strong in the face of our trials. Just
want to mention a couple of things in closing and then we're done.
Says the end of the passage there, if the righteous scarcely be
saved, where shall the sinner appear? I grew up in a little
church being taught that there would be disobedient Christians,
second-class Christians, that would be saved, as it were, by
the skin of their teeth. They wouldn't have any real works,
they wouldn't have any real righteousness, but they would be saved by the
skin of their teeth on the merits of the death of the Lord Jesus
Christ, and they would only just make it into heaven. Now maybe I misunderstood what
I was being taught. As if there was a people who
would be scarcely saved, only just. Now that's nonsense and
that is wrong. The salvation which we have in
the Lord Jesus Christ is by his blood alone and nothing to do
with our works. The salvation that we have is
full and plenteous. The man from Balaleesha brought
his first fruit offering and there was plenty to eat and there
was stuff left over. The blood of the Lord Jesus Christ,
the merits in the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ is sufficient
for all our needs. Every need that I have is sufficiently
catered for by the precious blood of Jesus Christ and there's plenty
of merit left over. The Lord Jesus Christ is not
stinting. God is not stinting in the salvation
that he gives. That's not the meaning of scarcely
saved. Those who are righteous before
God are not righteous in their own merits. They're righteous
in the merits of the Lord Jesus Christ. They are righteous in
Christ, who is the Lord, our righteousness. But here's what the meaning of
that little phrase is. Scarce are the ways of salvation. Indeed, there is but one. But what a salvation that one
is. What a great salvation we have,
and what a great saviour is ours. That was a hard-won salvation. That was a hard one because what
it cost the Lord Jesus Christ to secure the salvation and deliverance
of his people is beyond our appreciation and knowledge. Indeed, I suspect
we will be getting to know what it cost the Lord Jesus for eternity. Under our praise of God and glory
for ages to come, will be constantly being re-evaluated and reassessed
as it dawns upon us the sheer magnitude of the work of salvation
which God has freely granted to us. How shall we escape if we neglect
so great salvation? Brothers and sisters, As Peter
wrote to the beloved, so I say to you this morning, this suffering
that we have to face is according to the will of God. Let us commit
to him the keeping of our souls in well-doing. Christ will keep
our precious souls. He will guard, he will protect,
and he will secure, and that's a promise. But hear what Peter
says. Let us commit to Christ the keeping
of our souls in well-doing. You see, that puts an onus upon
us. The way that we live is important. How we stand in this world is
important. Those values that we have, the
kindnesses that we show, the generosities that we exhibit,
the way that we live, these things are important. And so we are
to be a people who are characterised by well-doing. That's what the
apostle here says. How does that work? not by having
our feet held to the law, but by looking to the Lord Jesus
Christ of whom it was said, surely he hath done all things well. That's the source of our well-doing.
following, emulating, patterning ourselves after the life of Christ. Following him, hearing his word,
observing his goodness, his kindness, his gentleness to his fellow
man, and seeking to follow that pattern. There is a last section which
speaks about the faithful creator. I'm going to leave that to another
day because I've been thinking throughout the last week as I've
been anticipating this service that the title of my sermon would
be faithful creator. And by the time I got to faithful
creator, I had already used up all my time. So it's going to
be a sermon for another day. But I trust we will see something
that will comfort our hearts and souls out of this passage
that Peter has written. For the benefit of a scattered
pilgrim band thousands of years ago, but a benefit that endures
to this day for the Church of Jesus Christ. And may we be blessed
as we reflect upon the fact that the Lord Jesus Christ, in accomplishing
our salvation, has provided for us all the resources that we
need to face the trials of our day, the fieriness of these trials,
and to come through them, praising our Saviour for all that he has
done for us. Amen.