But I'll start the sermon again.
Okay, so turn your attention back today to 1st Peter and chapter
2. And the text is in verse 21,
an example to follow, but really we're looking at verses 11 down
to 25 of 1st Peter chapter 2. And we've been thinking about
the amazing status of believers who Peter calls scattered strangers. They're scattered strangers,
but they're a chosen generation. In verse 9 you see a chosen generation. This is speaking of what he says
in verse 2 of chapter 1. Elect according to the foreknowledge
of God the Father. Do you know what makes the huge
difference? The only difference, ultimately, between one person
and another is the election of God. And you say, well, that
doesn't sound very fair. Well, you can think what you
like, but that's the way God works. That's how God works. His word is the truth. And the
truth of God is this, that he is the one who sovereignly chooses
whom he will save. Out of this world, which is in
rebellion against the living God, he chooses his people. And
he says, those that have been chosen, you know that you've
been chosen because you believe the gospel of his grace. And
he calls us a chosen generation. He calls us a royal priesthood.
Don't we need a priest when we go to church? No, we have one.
So Lord Jesus Christ is the great high priest, and every believer
according to God. Who are you going to believe?
Who are you going to believe? Some fallen man dressed up in
a robe. Are you going to believe what he says, or are you going
to believe what God's word says? He says every believer is a priest
of God. in his temple, you're living
stones in the temple. It's not a cathedral, it isn't
a huge great building, the building of God is his church, Zion. And
the stones are living stones, people, cut from the quarry of
nature, and fitted together, and founded, built on the foundation
stone. Who's the foundation stone? Our
Lord Jesus Christ. I lay in Zion a chief cornerstone. were peculiar people. Oh yeah,
I think most people would agree with that. People who believe
the stuff that you believe, what peculiar people? Well, don't
worry, I'm happy to take that accusation. Verse 9 says you're
a peculiar people. You peculiar folk, to believe
all this sort of stuff. No, you show forth the praises
of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous
light. Into His marvelous light. And
So then, we go on and we see that we're people who have obtained
mercy. We're people who have obtained
mercy. It's okay, sorry, just leave it, it's alright, it's
fine, don't worry about it. Sorry, messages are cropping up on the
screen, I'm sorry, it must be so distracting for you. I made
a mistake at the start, so we've got past that now, okay. Right then, so then. Peter goes
on to beseech them. Now look at verse 11. Dearly
beloved. The people he's writing to. This is the Apostle Peter
who's writing. Dearly beloved. Not the Pope
in Rome, as the Catholics claim. He's not the Pope. He wasn't
the first Pope. Not at all. He's the Apostle
Peter, who was the man who denied the Lord Jesus Christ. He is
the man who went back to his fishing when Christ had died
and risen from the dead and he didn't know what to do and he
went back to his fishing. No, he's not the first Pope, he's
the Apostle. the apostle that God sent to
bring his message, and here he is, as an elder, as one who feels
that he's no better than anybody else, he's just another person
saved by the grace of God, and he writes to them, dearly beloved,
I beseech you, I plead with you, I encourage you, as strangers
and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the soul. This is what he's beseeching,
I beseech you, abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the soul."
Understand, first of all, the dichotomy that you are. Do you
know what a dichotomy is? It's a complete contradiction
in the one situation. It's in the one situation, it's
this and it's that, and the two are completely opposite to one
another, yet they coexist in the one situation. Understand,
if you're a believer, the dichotomy that you are, because you live
in a body of flesh and blood and bones, and the flesh and
the conscience and the human nature is lusting to sin. Abstain from fleshly lusts. Because
if you're a believer, there's a new man of the Spirit of God.
You must be born again, said Jesus to Nicodemus. That birth
is from on high. It's a spiritual birth by the
Spirit of the living God. And a new man is born within
that person that was born physically. A new man is born of the Spirit
of God. And that's the soul that is from heaven. And that soul,
which is from the life of God, that soul is renewed with life
and holiness of God. And the two exist together in
the one person, the believer. And it says they war against
one another. The flesh wars against the Spirit,
and we read that in other places in the Scripture. The Spirit
and the flesh are contrary to one another. The one wants to
do the things of the Spirit of God, the one wants to do the
righteousness of God and refrain from the evil that is in the
flesh, and the flesh wants to carry on doing what it does.
It never gets any better until the day that we leave this life,
until the day that we breathe our last breath. The Scriptures
calls it, in Song of Solomon chapter 6, it is as if we were
a camp of two armies. There's the one camp, but within
it there are two opposing armies, the flesh and the spirit. But
as those that are in Christ, believers in Christ, are in Christ. We're in union with Christ, we're
united with Him. In the reckoning of God, everything
He is, those who are in Him are counted the same. Those in Christ
who are citizens of Zion are destined for sinless glory, as
Stephen mentioned in his prayer. That heavenly state on which
we're destined. And we're told elsewhere in the
epistles to put off the old man, you know when you came in some
of you had coats on and you took off, you put off your coat and
hung it up you're wearing indoor clothes now, you put off your
outdoor clothes well in the same way the epistles encourage believers
to put off the old man of the flesh with his desires and put
on increasingly the new man of the spirit of God And what does
it mean to do that? Well, look with me down from
verse 12 to verse 20. This is what he calls, this is
what he beseeches, this is the sort of behavior and attitudes
he beseeches, he encourages from people who are believers. He
says, have your conversation honest among the Gentiles. Don't tell lies. Deal honestly. That whereas they speak against
you, those who don't believe, speak against you as evildoers,
they may see your good works which will include your honesty
and integrity and they shall behold them and glorify God in
the day of visitation He says, don't be like rebels, verse 13.
Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake, whether
it be to the king, a supreme, or to governors, or to them that
are sent by him for the punishment of evildoers, magistrates, judges,
police, et cetera. He says, be a good citizen. Don't
be a rebel, for so is the will of God, verse 15, that with well-doing
you may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men. as free. Free in what sense? Free in Christ. Free from the law of God. Free, really, free. Not but. Not using your liberty as a cloak
of maliciousness. Don't say, because Christ has
saved me from the curse of the law by being made that curse
on the cross of Calvary for me, that then I am free to live exactly
as I want and do what I want. No, no, don't use it as a cloak
for maliciousness but as the servants of God. Honour all men. Have respect for everybody. Love the brotherhood. Love your
fellow believers. Fear God. Honour the king, or
whatever governing authorities there are. Servants, if you're
in that situation, and we might say in these days, employees,
employees, be subject to your masters, to your employers, with
all fear, with respect. Not only to the good and gentle,
but also to the froward, the ones that are not very nice.
There are all sorts of bosses and masters in this world, and
some are very nice and sympathetic, and others are not so. But be
subject to them, whatever they're like, for this is thankworthy. If a man, for conscience toward
God, endure grief, suffering wrongfully, What glory is it,
he says, when you do wrong, you're buffeted for your faults. You
do wrong and you bear the punishment of it, you shall take it patiently.
You deserved it. But when you do well and you
didn't deserve it, and suffer for it, you take it patiently.
Even then, when you've done nothing wrong but you're suffering for
it, that's acceptable to God. For even hereunto were ye called,
because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example
that ye should follow in his steps. There is the example. What are we going to do? It's
New Year's Day tomorrow, it's the last day of the year today.
And a lot of people do things that are called making New Year's
resolutions. Oh, now, starting on the New
Year, I'm going to give up smoking. Well, it's not such a problem
in our society, because not many people do it, relatively speaking
now. Or I'm going to give up alcohol. Or I'm going to start
doing this, or start doing that. Or I'm going to start being nice
to people who I've been unpleasant to. New Year's resolutions. But where do we get the ability
to suppress the flesh? Because the flesh, the nature
in which we inhabit, is a fallen human nature. Fallen human nature. We all have that sinful trait
of our first parents in the creation, when they fell from that state
of perfection with God. We've got that weakness in the
flesh. What's going to constrain the flesh? What's going to cause
the flesh to live as we've just read? Will the threats and the
promises of the law do it? Will God's law saying, do this
and live, fail to do this and you shall die? You shall surely
die in the day that you sin, you shall surely die, says the
word of God. It's quite clear. The soul that
sins, it shall die. That's it, that's it, that's
what the law of God says, that's what this book says. Will the
threats of law do it? Make us behave that way? Not
if Paul's experience, the Apostle Paul in Romans chapter 7 is typical. Let me read you just one verse,
Romans 7, 19. He says this, For the good that
I would, I do not. In other words, the good things
that I really want to do, I find I don't do them, I keep failing.
But the evil, which I don't want to do, That I do. Is that your
experience? It's certainly my experience.
Whenever we try to reform in the power of restrained flesh,
we fail. So, what does verse 21 say? It says to us, follow his example. Follow the example of Christ.
Verse 21, Christ suffered for us, leaving us an example that
ye should follow in his steps. So, try to follow Christ's example. So, refrain from sinning, as
he did. So, tell Satan to get behind
you with his temptations, as he did. Jesus said, get thee
behind me, Satan. Get thee behind me. Do you know
what will happen if you do? He'll push you flat on your face
in the dirt. In your flesh, you have neither
the will nor the power neither the will nor the power to restrain
sin in the power of your flesh. You just don't. yet you are in
Christ if you're a believer with all the privileges of the sheep
of Christ's flock concerning eternity. So what is it to follow
his steps? Well firstly, it's to realize
what we are by fleshly nature. In verse 25, look at verse 25,
right at the end of 1 Peter chapter 2, for ye were as sheep going
astray. Sheep going astray. This is what
you're like in your flesh. You're a sheep going astray. Isaiah 53 verse 6, written 800
years, seven 800 years before Christ came, all we like sheep
have gone astray. We have turned everyone to his
own way and the Lord has laid on him, on Christ, the iniquity
of us all, all his believing people. God's description of
us, God's description of us in our fleshly nature. The us is
his believing people, even after they've believed the gospel of
grace and a trust in Christ. His description of us in our
fleshly nature is like sheep that have gone astray. In what
way are we like sheep that have gone astray? You and me, in our
flesh, in what way are we like sheep that have gone astray in
the economy of God, in the reckoning of God, in the way that God works?
Firstly, We have foolish stupidity like sheep. You know, sheep are
noted for plain silliness at times. If you've ever had anything
to do with sheep, and I know I've told you once or twice,
but when I was a kid growing up, sort of age 11, 12, 13, 14,
that sort of age, I spent an awful lot of time on the local farms in South Cumbria,
up near the Lake District, and there are a lot of sheep up there.
And I had an awful lot to do. I mean, the things now, when
I think of it, that I did, I used to help with the lambing. I used
to help sheep that were struggling to give birth to a lamb, to get
the lamb out. and to get it breathing and to
put it to its mother's teats so that it could feed. I used
to do all that sort of thing. I even used to do the not very
nice thing of when a lamb had died, I'd carry the dead body
of the lamb and throw it on the farm midden. All that sort of
thing was what I did, age 12, 13, 14. used to go and try and
round up the sheep, and work with the sheep dogs. Do you know
something? I can tell you. Sheep are not
known for making intelligent choices regarding their welfare. God says of us, we're like sheep
going astray. We, in our flesh, concerning
the things of eternity, and of eternal life, and of the righteousness
of God, and the knowledge of God, that we must have, if it's
to be right with us in eternity, We are like foolish sheep going
astray. We always naturally will go the
easy way. We'll choose the broad way that
leads to destruction. Like a sheep will almost sleepwalk,
as it were, into danger. In Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress,
Pilgrim, at times he sleepwalks into danger. And where does he
end up? He ends up in the dungeon of
giant despair. Allegory, I know, but you know,
it's got real meaning as that. We are like sheep in the sense
that we're a bit foolish, we're stupid, we're plain silly at
times in our flesh. And then secondly, we're a bit
like sheep because, do you know, sheep always want fresh pasture. You know, there they are, munching
away on nice green grass up on those Southern Lake District
slopes, and it's lovely, wholesome grass, it will do them no harm
whatsoever, and in the winter when the grass isn't so good,
the farmer, you go out with a tractor with a load of hay on it, and
you put hay down in the feeders, and they love it, and it's all
good for them. But you know, if they get an
opportunity, They'll turn their back on that, on the wholesome
hay and on the grass, and they'll look for that which is in another
pasture that might be ever so green. but it could contain poisonous
herbs. I remember once, there's a vegetable,
I don't know if it's in the south of England, but in the north
of England, it's a bit like a turnip or a swede, and it's called a
mangle. And they grow them in fields
and they make for cattle feed and stuff like that. Well, if
the sheep can get in amongst the mangles, they will gorge
themselves on the mangles. And I remember once when a whole
load of sheep got into a field of mangles, and we found them,
and they'd gorged themselves. If you've ever read Thomas Hardy's
Far From the Madding Crowd, there's a scene in it which is exactly
this, so I'm not spinning yarns, it is true. And these sheep had
gorged themselves on the mangles which had fermented, and so they
had terrible stomach gas that in their digestive system and
they were lying on their side and these sheep were groaning
and you know what you have to get a vet or a farmer that knows
what he's doing to punch a hole in the digestive tract otherwise
the sheep dies this search for new pasture whatever it is it
can lead to such harm and God says you are like sheep in your
foolishness in our flesh we act in accordance with our silly
nature and we end up in peril when it's too late to back out.
We also, do you know what sheep have got a tendency to do? Have
you ever heard anybody say to kids at school, oh look at you,
there you go, or you don't think, you just follow like sheep. Because
sheep just follow one another, whether it's a sensible place
to go. The story's told, I read it, of a flock of sheep a couple
of hundred years ago, down in the River Severn valley, where
the River Severn was quite wide and there was a rickety bridge
across the river, and That bridge supported a cart and a horse
pulling the cart across it. But down by the side of it, a
step down, was a little parapet, a little walkway. And one of
the sheep started to go, and so the others thought, oh, sheep's
going over there. What do we do? Oh, I know, we're
sheep, we follow, don't we? So off they go, following that
sheep. And the first one jumps down onto the little parapet.
So they think, oh, that's a good idea. The first sheep's jumped
down, I'll jump down. And off they go, they all jump
down and the end of the story, the parapet runs out and they
end up, all the sheep fall into the river and the entire flock
gets lost in the River Severn. Because they follow one another
without thinking. Isn't that like us? In our flesh?
In the society in which we operate? How we fear being different from
the cool crowd. The crowd and what it wants to
do and what it regards as the cool thing to do. How we fear
being ostracised, cut off, cut out, because we're different
and we don't follow the crowd. As I said earlier, it's the broad
way, Jesus called it this, the broad way that leads to destruction,
not the narrow way that leads to life. And if they do wander
off, the sheep that has wandered off, they never ever come back
by themselves. In Luke chapter 15, Jesus told
a parable. Luke 15 verse 3. And he spake
this parable unto them, saying, What man of you, having an hundred
sheep, if he lose one of them, doth not leave the ninety and
nine in the wilderness, and go after that which is lost, until
he find it? And when he hath found it, he
layeth it on his shoulders, rejoicing. And when he cometh home, he calleth
together his friends and neighbours, saying unto them, Rejoice with
me, for I have found my sheep which was lost. If they wander
off, they need a shepherd. they need a shepherd to go and
find them and bring them back. How much as foolish sheep in
our natural state regarding the things of God we need a shepherd. We need a shepherd. We read it
in Ezekiel 34, those verses concerning how God was angry with the false
shepherds of the people of God, Israel, how he was angry with
them for giving falsehood in place of the truth of the gospel
of grace. And how he said, for his true people he would set
up one shepherd over them. One shepherd. That shepherd,
he says, my servant David. Of course he doesn't mean literal
David who died years earlier. He means the one who was David's
greatest son. Great David's greatest son. The
Lord Jesus Christ. He was pointing to Messiah who
would come. There will be one shepherd, and
we need a shepherd. As foolish sheep, we need a shepherd. Jesus himself said, in John's
Gospel, chapter 10, verse 11, he said, I am the good shepherd. What does the good shepherd do?
The good shepherd gives his life for the sheep. The good shepherd
does not leave the sheep to themselves. The good shepherd gives his life
for the sheep. Now, can we follow and seek to
imitate his example, not in the power of the flesh. We can't
do what he did for his sheep, can we? We cannot go to the cross
of Calvary and pay the penalty for the sins of his sheep, no.
But we can look. We can look, he says, look unto
me, all ye ends of the earth, Isaiah 45, 21 or 22. Look unto
me, all ye ends of the earth, and be ye safe, for I am God,
and there is no other. We can't follow in the power
of the flesh, but we can look. We can obey the exhortation to
keep looking unto Jesus. Hebrews chapter 12, verses 1
and 2. Run the race with patience that is set before you. In what
strength? looking unto Jesus the author
and finisher of our faith and the key the key thing the key
foundational aspect which we ought to look at is in verse
24 now look in 1 Peter chapter 2 verse 24 with me who his own
self bear our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being
dead to sins, should live unto righteousness, by whose stripes
you were healed. For we were a sheep going astray,
but are now returned unto the shepherd and bishop of your souls. You see, if we try in the power
of flesh, we only confirm our inability. Those in the name
of religion, and even evangelical religion, who make a big thing
about keeping the law of God, do you know something? That approach
either leads to despair when people are honest with themselves
as to how weak they really are in the flesh, or it leads to
hypocrisy of those that claim that they're walking around floating
several feet above the ground and far much better than we are.
You know, don't stand next to me, I am holier than thou, is
what Isaiah says that they're like. It just leads to that sort
of thing. We only succeed in confirming
God's indictment. What is God's indictment of us? What is God's indictment of us
all as we are? He says it in Jeremiah chapter
2. Let me just read you this just
now. Verse 12. He says, Be astonished,
O ye heavens, at this, and be horribly afraid. Be ye very desolate,
saith the Lord, for my people have committed two evils. They
have, number one, Forsaken me, the fountain of living waters.
Is that not true? Mankind, humanity in general,
we have forsaken God, who is alone the fountain of living
waters. And what have we done in place
of that? We've hewed out, we've carved out, we've chiseled out
of stone, cisterns, and they end up broken. Have you ever
tried to make something, carve something out of pottery or something
like that, and you get to the crucial moment. I remember once
trying to make a lampshade out of a fancy wine bottle, a lampstand,
and I remember I drilled that hole for days and days on end. It was ever such a slow process
to put the wire through the bottom so that it didn't have a wire
dangling from its neck. And I was so pleased with how
I was getting on and I got to the very, very last turn of the
drill and ping, the whole bottle is shattered in a load of pieces. cisterns, broken cisterns, that
can hold no water. I tried the broken cisterns,
Lord, says that hymn, but ah, the waters failed, and even as
I stooped to drink, they mocked me as I wailed. You see, we're
always trying the broken cisterns of this life and finding that
they failed. But verse 19 says this, Thine
own wickedness shall correct thee, and thy backsliding shall
reprove thee. Know therefore and see that it
is an evil thing and bitter that thou hast forsaken the Lord thy
God, and that my fear is not in thee, saith the Lord God of
hosts. People don't like to think of fear. We were thinking of
it the other week. that the fear of the Lord is the beginning
of knowledge. That the secret of the Lord, if you would know
the secret of God, who is the author of all things in this
universe, the secret of the Lord is with those who are cocky in
themselves. No, it's not. It's with those that fear him,
is what the word of God says. The secret of the Lord is with
them. We're incapable of cleansing ourselves from our sin. Job says
this, Job, the oldest book in the Bible, Job 9 verse 30 and
31, attained to that holiness without
which no man shall see God. If divine justice concerning
sin is to be satisfied in its demands, only full payment of
the sin debt that is due will suffice. Only that will suffice. And what is it? What does the
law of God demand? What does the divine justice
of God demand? It demands death. It demands
that blood be shed. Oh, that sounds gory, doesn't
it? Yes, it does, but it's what God's Word says. Without the
shedding of blood, there is no remission of sin. For the life
is in the blood, and when Christ poured out His lifeblood, His
infinite, perfect, precious lifeblood on the cross of Calvary, He satisfied
the law of God, the justice of God, in the place of the people
the Father had given to Him before the beginning of time. If you
die Without Christ, you die bearing
your own sin into judgment yourself, and you will stand before that
judgment seat of Christ and give an account, and you will be found
wanting. But for his sheep, we read here,
his own self bear our sins in his own body on the tree. Which
tree? The cross of Calvary. That's
the tree. The cursed tree. Cursed is every
one that hangeth on a tree, it says in the Word of God, who
his own self, Christ, bear the sins of his people in his own
body on that tree. He, the infinite, sinless God-man,
has borne all his people's sins, committed throughout all time,
I don't understand it, I don't understand the mechanics of it,
but I believe the truth of it. His human body was broken. That's
what we do when we share communion. We have bread and wine to remember
the body that was broken, the human body that was broken, the
blood that was shed to pay the price of sin to the law of God.
His precious blood was shed. That's why our God became a man. Just as the children, it says,
in Hebrews 2.14, have partaken of flesh and blood, so he, the
older brother, our Lord Jesus Christ, has partaken of the same,
that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death,
that is the devil. Think of the personal guilt and
debt of one person's sin. I think of mine. If I could ever
get my head around the gravity of it when viewed from the perspective
of the holy God who has made all things. What an offence to
the holiness and righteousness and the character of God that
is. Then think of the sin of the multitude which the Father
gave to Christ before time began, for whom He paid their penalty
on the cross of Calvary. His own self bear our sins, ours,
the sins of all those people that the Father gave to the Son
before the beginning of time. He bore it all at Calvary. The Lord, we read that verse
earlier, the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all. The
margin reads, if you've got a Bible with a margin, it reads this,
the Lord hath made the iniquity of us all to meet on him. He's made it to meet on him.
When he made him sin, when he sweat as it were drops of blood
in the garden of Gethsemane before he went to Calvary the next morning.
And there they nailed him to that cross, they beat him with
stripes, they whipped him and cut his back with canes or whatever
it was that they used. That was part of the crucifixion
ritual. was to wound them with stripes. And it pleased the Lord, we read
in Isaiah, looking forward 800 years to when Christ would die.
It pleased the Lord, God, to bruise him. God, the Son of God. The Son of God, the second person
of the Trinity. And in so doing, he satisfied
offended justice. We read of Christ, who knew no
sin, who lived sinlessly, being made sin for us. that we might
be made the righteousness of God in him. What sin was he made? He was made the sin of all his
people, though he never ever committed sin. Which of you convinces
me of sin? Who of you convicts me of sin?
He said, and not one of them could bring any accusation against
him. Not one of them. He never committed
any sin. yet God made him to be the sin
of his people. And the Psalms in various places
show clearly that when he was on Calvary, dying for the sins
of his people, those sins were his. They were his. He talks
about the Psalmist, speaking prophetically the words of Christ.
He talks about my foolishness, my sins are ever before you.
Whose sins? Christ's sins, for he was made
the sins of his people. He never committed one, but he
was made sin. He was judged guilty, and he
was judged worthy of the law's retribution. And God, who is
of purer eyes than to behold iniquity, and cannot look upon
sin, the Father turned his face away. And so Psalm 22 verse 1,
the very words that Christ himself spoke on the cross, My God, my
God, why have you forsaken me? Why? Because he was bearing the
sin of his people. He was made sin. And God, the
Father, who lives in unapproachable light, cannot look upon sin.
And there he bare those sins and paid for them. and cancelled
their debt. So the law is satisfied. Is there
any sin outstanding on the people that he has chosen in Christ
before the beginning of time? Answer, no. You can read it three
or four times. Jeremiah 50, verse 20, I think
it is. The sins were looked for in the
day of judgment on the people of God, and not one was found. Why? I'm a sinner, I know I am.
Why is not one sin going to be found? For he has paid for it
all at Calvary. And in the reckoning of God,
that's good enough. It's done. It's cancelled. He's
taken them away, not as far as the North is from the South,
because if you go from the North Pole to the South Pole and keep
going, you end up back at the North Pole. No, as far as the
East is from the West, because it doesn't matter how much East
you travel, you always continue to travel East. You never get
to the East, you're always going round. See, that's how far he's
removed the sins of his people from them. Now, We can't imitate
successfully, but we can look there. Look unto me, all ye ends
of the earth, and be ye saved. Look unto me. Look there. We
can do that. Not to an idolatrous crucifix. No, we don't have those. We don't
have those, no. We don't have crosses up in here
as symbols of worship. Not at all. Do you know why?
People would make idols out of them. People would start worshiping
a piece of wood. If we found a piece of the very
wood on which Christ died you know all sorts of people would
want to make a huge money-making pilgrim place for it. Do you
know what I'd do with it? I'd set fire to it to stop people
making an idol out of it because that's all it is. Now, not an
idolatrous crucifix, but we look. How do we look? You need the
sight of the spiritual soul. You need the sight of the soul.
You need the senses of the soul. The taste, the touch, the feel
of the Spirit of God. By faith, which is sight of the
soul. We look to the Lamb slain, as
it says in Revelation 13 verse 8, the Lamb slain from the foundation
of the world. And we look to Him. praying that
God, by his Spirit, will apply redemption's power to your soul.
What do I mean by that? That the price he paid might
be the price that was paid for my sin, that I might know it
and believe it by faith. that I see the stripes. With
his stripes you were healed, it says in verse 24. With his
stripes, part of that crucifixion, the beating with rods, that those
stripes with which he was wounded would accomplish your healing.
Why would they do that? Because the law demands retribution
for sin. For the character of God, the
true God, cannot look upon sin without demanding a penalty and
a payment. And he himself, in grace and
mercy, came to accomplish that. We cannot imitate his example,
but we can look, and by looking we can feel the power of his
saving grace, and the reality and the comfort of his mercy
applied. You didn't receive mercy, he
says, but now, believers, Peter says, you have received mercy,
and you receive power from on high, which enables, which constrains,
which motivates to follow insofar as we can in the flesh. Nevertheless,
it motivates, and we return last phrase of verse 25, to the shepherd
and bishop of our souls. Look at Christ who has paid sin's
penalty for all of us who believe. See him with all the indictment
of God's law nailed to his cross and cancelled by his death. See
the power of sin conquered the power of sin in us, in the flesh.
See the power of sin in us, even in our flesh, conquered in a
way that law, however good that law might be, can never do. You
see, look, when fleshly lusts arise, look to Him by faith,
discharging the law's penalty for that contemplated sin, and
feel the power of its restraint. You're about to commit a theft
and you look and you see Christ dying on the cross for that sin
of theft, and all the others, and can you still go ahead and
steal? No, the love of Christ constrains
us. Flesh never improves, but the new man of the Spirit of
God grows in appreciation of what we saw in verse 3 of chapter
2 a few weeks ago, the taste of God's grace. If you've tasted
that the Lord is gracious, And the love which drove Christ to
the cross melts the stubborn hard heart and constrains fleshly
lusts. Oh, do we still sin? Of course
we do. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the
truth is not in us. But if we confess our sins, He is faithful
and just to forgive us and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
If we sin, or rather when we sin, because we sin every day
all of the time, in thought, word and deed, when we sin, we
who believe we have an advocate with the Father, a lawyer, a
heavenly lawyer, a divine lawyer in heaven, pleading our case
before the bar of divine justice. And thus, the new man of God,
the believer, is enabled to emulate Christ, to follow his steps,
leaving us an example that we should follow his steps. He is
the good shepherd and the bishop, or the overseer, And that's a
kind phrase, that's a caring phrase. The shepherd cares for
his sheep, the bishop oversees his people's souls. Would you
want to be under any other jurisdiction than his? The scripture says
this, seek him while he may be found. You may not know him,
but seek him while he may be found. Call upon him while he
is near. He never turned anyone away who
came seeking mercy. Amen.