Alright, let's turn to 1 Peter
chapter 3. Last week I spent the whole of
my time on verse 15. And today, if I can, I'd like
to finish out chapter 3. But for reading purposes, let's
go back and read verse 15 and 16 together. But sanctify the Lord God in
your hearts, And be ready always to give an answer to every man
that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness
and fear, having a good conscience that whereas they speak evil
of you as of evildoers, they may be ashamed that falsely accuse
your good conversation in Christ. Now, I find it of particular
interest here when he tells us to be ready to give an answer
to every man, that he immediately follows that with a verse that
tells us that we're going to be accused of being evildoers. Have you ever noticed that when
you read that? If you and I profess before men
that we're sons of God, as according to His good pleasure, and if
we lay claim to a divine calling and an interest in the promises
of God in Christ, let's be sure that we do so with a clear conscience. Let's be sure that we do that
with a good conscience toward God in all sincerity of mind
and heart being persuaded that these things are so. This is
where salvation's in Christ. I'm persuaded of that by the
scripture, by the preaching of the gospel, and the Holy Spirit
of God. I believe he's confirmed those
things in my heart. He's persuaded me that he's able
to keep that which I've committed unto him against that time. And
that's what Peter's telling us. If we're going to do these things,
we're going to be challenged for them. So be sure if you're
going to do these things that you do these things with a good
conscience, that you do these things being persuaded of them
because you're going to be challenged. for what you profess to believe.
And I believe the difference between a true Christian and
one who just makes a profession of faith is in the heart. That's
where the difference is. It's what takes place in the
heart. Anybody, don't be fooled because a man's a Calvinist.
He's a good Calvinist. I've heard his testimony. He's
a good Calvinist. Don't you be fooled by that.
Anybody can be a good Calvinist. That don't necessarily mean you
know God or that you have an interest in the kingdom of God
just because you've learned Calvinism. You can buy a book and learn
Calvinism. But the scripture said, with the heart, man believeth
unto righteousness. And then, with the mouth, confession
is made unto salvation. And then again, that's Romans
10.10. But again, Paul makes that same statement over here
in Romans 6 and verse 17. He said, But God bethanked you
were the servants of sin, but you have obeyed from the heart
that form of doctrine which was delivered to you. Man looks on
the outward countenance. God looks on the heart. You know,
I see a man or a woman troubled. I see a man or a woman in tears,
and they're talking to me about their troubles. And I've got
no reason to doubt their sincerity. And those people make a profession
of faith. They submit themselves to baptism. They identify themselves with
the Church of Christ. I can't see your heart. I don't
know what's on your heart. And that's why when I baptize
somebody, I baptize them upon their profession of faith, not
on my confidence, on their confidence. I can't see your heart, but God
can. God can. And that's what Peter's
talking about here. Ungodly men and women are going
to ridicule you. They're going to lambast you.
They're going to accuse you of being evildoers. And what you
profess and dare to tell others is contrary to what they believe
and how they worship, and you're going to be challenged for it.
The Apostle Paul was falsely accused. I don't think if you
search the scriptures that you could find a more godly man than
the Apostle Paul. He gave himself completely, body
and soul, he gave it to the gospel of Christ and to the ministry.
And he was falsely accused. They called him a pestilent fellow. That's what they said. They got
up before the king, and the king says, OK, here's Paul. He's in
bonds. And here's this bunch of self-righteous
religionists over here. And they come up before the king,
and the king says, what's the problem? He said, he's the problem.
He's a pestilent fellow. You know what pestilent means?
Do you know what pestilence is, when God sent pestilence into
Egypt? Plagues, a curse, all these things? When you call somebody a pestilent
fellow, you're saying that he has the capability and potential
to cause a plague. He's infectious. This man, don't
you let this man in your midst. He carries with him the germ
of Calvinism. He carries with him the germ
of the gospel. You'll be infected. He can cause
a plague. Isn't that basically what they
said about the disciples over in the book of Acts? They said
these few men have turned the world upside down, preaching one Jesus. They called
him a pestilent feather. Troublesome man, causing destruction
and corruption. And then they called him a man
guilty of sedition. His whole ministry is about sedition,
they said. A mover of sedition among the
Jews, a riotous man. He stirs up a revolt everywhere
he goes. And he's a ringleader, they said.
He's a ringleader of the sect. called the Nazarene. You know
that's what people say about us. That sect over there, that
cult, that group. And he's the ringleader. That's
what they say about Paul. He's the ringleader. And then
they accused him of going about to profane the temple. Now here's
how Paul answered these accusations. He said, after the way which
they call heresy, That's how I worship God. That's how I worship
the God of our fathers. The gospel in the eyes of the
world is utter heresy. It's utter heresy. And the only
thing worse in their eyes and in God's eyes than these men
who despise this gospel and call it heresy is for a man to know
the truth and not embrace it in his heart. And then Peter
makes this statement, verse 17, for it is better if the will
of God be so that you suffer for well-doing than for evil-doing. God will vindicate his people
and bring those who falsely accuse them into judgment. He will in
his time. If he don't do it in this world,
he'll do it in the world to come. But most of the time, he does
it in this world as well as in the world to come. But the lesson
here, I believe, is a precautionary word, a warning to those who
would profess true faith on a whim. You know, they went to the meeting,
and there was a very charismatic preacher, and he preached, and
he stirred up the people, and they got stirred up that night
and made a profession of faith and wanted to be baptized, and
they did all this stuff on a whim. They weren't persuaded from the
scriptures. They weren't persuaded by the
Holy Ghost or the preaching of the gospel. They just got caught
up in what was going on, like those 3,000 souls that was all
born on that one day. Things like that happen, and
it's catching. The spirit of it is catching.
You get caught up in it. Because there's suffering involved
in believing and identifying ourselves with Christ. Now, there
will always be suffering. There will always be suffering.
Everybody suffers to one extent or another, but this suffering
that Peter's talking about is for the glory of God in the gospel
of Christ. And this suffering is a heart-wrenching
suffering. I don't really know how to explain
this except just to say it and just leave it up to the Holy
Spirit to press it home to your heart. This suffering can come
from a mother. It can come from a father. It
can come from a husband or a wife or a child. It can come from
those of your own household. He said that's where your enemies
are going to come from, from your own household. It can come
from a wife or a husband, from a lifelong friend, or from a
whole religious community. And it will never cease to come
so long as we bear faithful testimony of Christ. But this godly suffering
is a whole lot better than suffering for evil. Godly suffering will
be vindicated. You can't pay the debt on evil
working. You can't pay that debt. And
people who suffer for evil doing, people outside the grace of God
that suffer for evil doing, you can't pay that bill. Hell is everlasting. Damnation. It's everlasting torment. That's
how the scriptures describe it. It's everlasting because you
can't pay the bill. And I'll tell you this, when
God takes aim at a sinner, none can deliver out of his hand.
He says that in the Old Testament scriptures time and again. If
he sets his face on you to destroy you, none can deliver out of
his hand. Pharaoh was doomed from the get-go,
wasn't he? He was doomed. God set his face
against that man, and that man, time after time after time, he
ignored God. He hardened his heart against
God. No one could deliver out of his
hand. Scripture said it's a fearful
thing to fall into the hands of a just and righteous God,
of the living God. Now watch this, 1 Peter 3, verse
18. Here's an example right here.
Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust,
that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh,
but quickened in the spirit. He just named two types of suffering
here. He talked about a suffering for
evil doing and a suffering which was a godly suffering, which
come about because of your testimony, because of that which you're
here to do. You're to testify to this world, to warn this world. And with all reverence, due to
his holy name, I believe that Christ here examples both kinds
of suffering. Both kinds of suffering. I know
that Christ was not a sinner. I know that He did nothing contrary
to perfect righteousness and the holiness of God. But as our
substitute, He bore our sins in His own body on the tree,
did He not? His suffering on the cross was
the suffering due to evildoers. If you want to know what kind
of suffering an evildoer is going to reap of God, all you have
to do is look at your cross. I Corinthians 5.21 says, For
He, that is God, hath made Him, that is Christ, to be sin for
us who knew no sin. that we might be made the righteousness
of God in him. And all the sins of all God's
elect were called into account on the cross in our substitute. He alone, he alone, John said,
treadeth the winepress of the fierceness of the wrath of God.
And in the Savior, every chosen sinner reaped what he sowed. reaped what he sowed in the Savior
because of our union with him. His sins were justly charged
to him. They were justly punished in
him and punished to the full satisfaction of the justice of
God. And at the same time, the suffering
of Christ was the just for the unjust that he might bring us
to God. You see that? His sufferings
and death was not to redeem himself, but to redeem his people. Paul
said, in whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness
of sins according to the riches of his grace. And Peter puts
it this way. He said, he was put to death
in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit. The one mediator
between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, died. on the cross. In Matthew 27.50,
it says, Jesus, when he had cried again with a loud voice, yielded
up the ghost. In the other three gospel accounts,
it said he gave up the ghost. He died. And then Paul tells
us plainly he was delivered for our offenses and raised again.
for our justification and that Christ died for our sins. That's
the scripture I was hunting for, 1 Corinthians 15. Christ died
for our sins according to the scriptures. He died on that cross. And he was raised for our justification. All right. Verse 19, 1 Peter
chapter 3. by which also he went and preached
unto the spirits in prison, which sometime were disobedient when
once the long-suffering of God waited in the days of Noah while
the ark was a-preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls, were
saved by water." Now, I read all the writers on
this. I was curious to see what they
had to say. And whether this is talking about
the spirit of Christ or the Holy Spirit, I'll let you decide.
You can decide that. But what difference would it
make? Do you suppose the spirit of Christ is any different than
the Holy Spirit? In fact, the scripture sometimes
calls the Holy Spirit the spirit of Christ. Over in 1 Peter 1, verse 11,
speaking of that revelation of Christ given to the prophets,
he talked about that spirit of Christ which was in them did
prophesy. And then that same prophecy was
revealed to us by them who preached the gospel by the Holy Spirit. I personally believe he's talking
about the eternal spirit of Christ, which spirit is God and was with
God and by which he made all things and was in the garden
and by which he was in the world in the days of Noah and in the
world in the days of Moses and all the prophets by which he
rose from the dead, that same spirit. Christ in his eternal
spirit and by way of the ministry of Noah and the building of that
typical ark preached to the fallen sons of Adam and they ignored
his message. Caleb, could you turn that air
up a little bit? They ignored his warning and
were disobedient when the long suffering of God waited while
the ark was being prepared. But eight souls, the world disobeyed. The world, they were prisoners. They were fallen. They were in
bondage to sin. And the world ignored Noah, ignored
that message, ignored the spirit of Christ that was in Noah. But eight souls entered into
that ark and were spared the wrath of God in that great flood.
We have a tendency, when we think about the gospel, to think about
the gospel in modern terms. We think about the gospel from
the days of the birth of Christ. My friend, the gospel is as old
as God. It's His eternal gospel. It's the gospel of God, and the
ministry of that gospel It's as old as man. And the suffering
incurred by that ministry is as old as the fall of man. And
wherever the gospel is preached, being sin of God, the spirit
of Christ is present. Isn't that what he said? Where
two or three are gathered together in my name, he said, I'll be
in the midst. How's he going to be in the midst? By his spirit. By his spirit. And 3,000 souls may bow to Christ
as they did on the day of Pentecost, and all of them be baptized,
or as few as eight souls enter into an ark. But anybody who does anything
in the name of Christ is going to do it by the Spirit of Christ,
whether it's the Holy Spirit or whether it's the actual Spirit
of Christ. And when they do, it'll be with
this knowledge, the same knowledge that those folks had when they
entered into that ark, the same knowledge that we have, knowing
that Christ was put to death in the flesh and raised again
in the spirit. And so Peter tells us here in
verse 21, the like figure whereunto even baptism doth also now save
us, Not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer
of a good conscience toward God by the resurrection of Jesus
Christ. Now listen to me. Eight souls who entered into
that ark all made professions of faith. Every last one of them. Every last one of them with a
good conscience entered into that ark. All eight souls. They all believed what Noah preached,
and they all publicly identified themselves with God's people
when they walked into that ark. God's wrath was about to fall
on this ungodly world, and they believed that this vessel of
God's design and purpose would deliver them from the wrath to
come. They believed that. They believed
God. They believed God's messenger.
And with a clear conscience and a good conscience, they walked
on that ark expecting to be preserved in this vessel that God provided. And when God's wrath had buried
a world of sinners, God's ark rose to the top. Did he not? That's that resurrection he's
talking about there. We're buried with Christ in baptism. We're raised with him to walk
in newness of life. And even so, these people who
got on that ark, they saw this ark as a picture of the coming
Redeemer and entered in with a good conscience. Now listen
to what the Scripture says here, by the resurrection of Jesus
Christ. But this world had never believed
God's gospel. They didn't believe it in declaration.
They don't believe it when they see it in the type. And they
don't believe it in the very manifestation of it in Christ.
This world thinks the gospel is something you do. You just
ask somebody sometime when they're, you know they're not saved men.
You know they don't believe the gospel. Just ask them sometime,
well, what is the gospel? Ask them what it is. They believe
it's something you do. They believe it's something you
accept. They believe it's something you decide on. They think the
gospel is a plan, an outline, a road map. But it's not. The gospel is a
person. It's a person, the Lord Jesus
Christ. And to be saved is to be in Christ. Christ was that ark. He's our
ark. And the gospel, and to be saved
with that understanding, to be saved is to be in Christ. And
to be saved is to lay hold of Christ. To be saved is to submit
to Christ. And to be saved is to know Christ. Listen to this. This is talking
about the overall record of the Word of God. John says over in
1 John 5, verse 11, this is the record that God has given to
us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He that hath the
Son hath life, and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life. And this one of whom the ark
was typical rose from the dead. He ascended into heaven, I Peter
3.22, and is on the right hand of God, angels and authorities
and powers being made subject unto him. I'm going to tell you
something, you're never going to have assurance in an old experience. Just quit
looking to it. I've had experiences, good experiences,
godly experiences, but I can't go back and get any assurance
out of that experience. My assurance is in Christ. And as we're persuaded of Christ
and come to know Christ and grow in grace and knowledge of the
Lord Jesus Christ, our faith increases and so does our assurance. Our assurance is in Him, being
persuaded of Him, His capability, His victory, His strength, His
power, His spirit. You see what I'm saying? Salvation's in a living Savior,
whom God has crowned Lord of lords and King of kings. There's no ifs, ands, or buts
about the salvation that he's accomplished. He accomplished
it. He justified. When God raised him from the
dead, he justified all his elect. They're justified. And those
whom are justified will never be unjustified. They're justified. When were they justified? Well,
if you want to know the truth, when God chose him and put him
in Christ, he justified him because he provided for him a way. He provided for him a person,
a savior, a mediator, a surety. And then they're justified when
God raised him from the dead. And he justifies the individual
as he calls him to faith in Christ, purges our conscience. Christ is the way. He's the way. No man cometh unto the Father,
he said, but by me. And Christ is the truth. He said,
this is eternal life, that they might know thee, the only true
God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou sent. He's the truth. And Christ
is the life. Paul said, for me to live is
Christ. My conscience is purged from
guilt by the death of Christ, and I'm made willing to enter
the vessel of his design, though I be ridiculed by this unbelieving
world. I can just almost imagine from
the experiences that I've had with this world, I just see a
multitude of people out there, and I see them laughing and cutting
up and ridiculing these men as they walked up into that ark,
poking fun at them, Punching their kids, look at
that fool. Look at him. Look at him. They followed that
crazy old man and now they're up there in that ark. And then
they sat there and this big door, it says that door was first,
second, and third story on that ark. It must have been a humongous
door. God shut the door. That big door
raised up, went shut. sealed inside that vessel ate
souls, ate souls. That's what Peter's talking about. The hymn writer said, my hope
is built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness. I dare not, now listen, he said,
I dare not trust the sweetest frame. I've had some sweet friends.
I have. I have. And every now and then, I want
to go back and try to incorporate that old friend. He said, we
dare not trust the sweetest friend, but wholly lean on Jesus' name. On Christ, the solid rock I stand,
all other ground is sinking sand. That's what Peter's teaching
here in this chapter. This is the Christ in whom we believe
and whom we serve. And those who know that, they
know if they're sincere or not. They know if this is the foundation
of their faith or not. They know these things. And the
more they know about them, the more they serve and the better
they serve.