Alright, let's turn to 1 Peter
2. The lesson this morning is about Christ, our example. We've been looking at the believers'
walk as they struggle in this life to be faithful to Christ
and honor Him in all that they say and do. And I say struggle,
not because they're unwilling. Believers are willing to serve
Christ. They're willing to live for Him.
They're willing to suffer for Him. But I say that they struggle
because of the strong opposition that they encounter everywhere. Opposition within, opposition
without. Everything in and about this
world seems to be designed to drive a wedge between the believer
and his Lord. Everything in it, even things
that we enjoy to do and things that we have to do, everything
seems to have a design behind it to drive a wedge between the
believer and his Lord. To walk with Christ and be faithful
to him requires some things. It requires love. Love. It requires commitment. It requires
wisdom. And it requires a willingness
to suffer for him and his gospel sake. A willingness to suffer. You're going to suffer. You're
going to suffer. People we know. I wanted to use
the term in a general expression, but when I use a term in a general
expression, sometimes we misapply it. It's like it's way off from
us somewhere, like men and women do judgment. It's way off somewhere,
so we're not going to worry about it. But when the fact is that
judgment's present and active in men. So I'll put it this way. People we know. people we grew
up with, people we went to school with, people we share our name
with, mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, people we work with,
who teach in our schools, who work in the stores, are utterly
destitute. Now listen to what I'm telling
you. Utterly destitute and altogether lacking of spiritual life. As far as people go, they're
good people. They're good people. They're
smart people. They do community service. Some work for the power
company and the phone company, and they actually, with what
they're doing, they do a public service, and they go sometimes
above and beyond the call to get out and get things done.
I know after storms, power companies go out and they risk their life
out in that weather to get your power back on, things like that. As far as people go, they're
a pretty good lot. but they're utterly destitute
and lacking of spiritual light. So empty of light and life are
the unconverted that they actually prefer darkness to light. Christ said that ye are the light
of the world, talking about you and I, those who believe. We're
the light of the world. And you have that light. You
have that light of revelation. You have that light of Christ.
And you take that light and you go and you are going to give
this light to people that you know walk in darkness. And you
take this light to them. They prefer darkness over your
light. So depraved is man that he believes
himself to be a servant of God while doing the will of his father,
the devil. The Pharisees, these are the
religious men that we read about in the scripture who are unbelievers. The Pharisees, the Sadducees,
the doctors of the law, they were all convinced that God was
their father and that they were his children. And as Paul put
it, a guide to the blind, an instructor of the foolish, and
a teacher of babes. They were fully convinced that
they were God's messengers to this world. But Christ said to them, if God
were your father, you'd love me. That's the first thing. You'd love me. You'd love me
exactly as I am. You'd love me exactly as I've
been set forth by the prophets. You'd love me exactly as I'm
manifesting myself to this world. If God were your father, you'd
love me. This world walks according to
the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now worketh
in the children of disobedience. And they walk, the scripture
says, in the vanity of their minds. They walk by carnal reasoning
and carnal motives and carnal affections. Paul said the law
is spiritual, talking about the word of God as well as the law
of Moses. And he said the law is spiritual,
but we are carnal, sold unto sin. Believers are spiritual. They're spiritual people. They
live in carnal bodies and in a carnal world. And as believers
in this kind of situation, he finds opposition all around him
and within him. Opposition, opposition. Paul
said in Romans chapter 7, that which I would do, that which
I know in my mind and heart to do, that which I would do, I
don't do. And that which I know in my mind
and heart not to do, that's what I do. That's what I do. We find opposition
inside and we find it outside, all around, all around. Satan's work in men is threefold. He works, first of all, to draw
men and women into rank and open sin. First thing you little children
are going to be tempted with is to steal. To steal. Take that which is not yours.
Take that which you're forbidden to have. You're going to take
it. You're going to take it. To steal, to cheat, to commit
adultery, drunkenness, perversion, and uncleanness. Satan draws
men to this. This is how he works in men.
He draws them to rank sin and uncleanness. And secondly, it
tempts men and women and draws them into a false sense of security
by causing them to chase the carrot of a better life. Husbands, wives, young adults, hundreds
of thousands of men and women believe that by hard work, good
education, and frugal spending habits that they can say to themselves,
Take thine ease. Isn't that what that man said,
our Lord? He was frugal. He saved his money. That's what
that word, he was careful how he spent his money. And he watched
the bottom line. And he listened as he was taught. And he got an education. And
he went out and applied that with hard work. And he accumulated
things. And he said, now, now, I've got
all of this. I know what I'm going to do now.
I'm going to tear these little barns down and build big barns.
And I'm going to fill them up. And then I'm going to say, soul,
take thine ease. Remember what the Lord told him?
Thou fool, thou fool, this day shalt thy soul be required of
thee. Now, don't misunderstand me.
I want you to work hard at your job. I want you to get a good
education. And I want you to put some money
aside for your later years. You're going to need it. But
don't find satisfaction and security in it, because there's none in
it. There's none in it. And then thirdly, and this is
the deepest pit of all, Satan draws men and women into false
religion. He gives them a zeal for God
without knowledge. You ever watch people out here
that are doing what they believe is a service to God. They're
not a more zealous people on the face of the earth than those
people. They go house to house, knocking on doors, passing out
tracts, having bake sales, and grog sales, and raising money
for the church, and doing all of these things. They have a
zeal, but they don't have any knowledge. He causes them to go about ignorantly
trying to establish their own righteousness. He causes them
to resist and to persecute and oppose the gospel of Christ and
his true church and think that they're doing God a service.
He gives to them a form of godliness but denying the power thereof.
And Paul said, if our gospel be hid, it's hid to the lost
in whom the God of this world hath blinded the minds of them
that believe not. lest the light of the glorious
gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto
them. Now, this is the state and condition
of all men and the state in which God found us and called us to
himself. Paul said, we were living out
our days in the lust of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the
flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath,
even as others. This world despises light because
their deeds are evil. We talk to men who are religious
but don't know God. They despise what we say because
their deeds are evil. And the same thing goes for the
drunk and the adulterer and so on. He says this over in John chapter
3 about this light. They won't approach this light.
They won't come to this light. Because when they come, their
deeds are reproved. So as believers... We're strangers
and pilgrims in this world. We're totally, we're strangers.
Our customs are strange to the people of this country. Oh, Abraham,
he come from the land of Chaldees, and they brought him over here
into this other land. And Abraham knew God and walked
with God, and he did sacrifices to God, and he worshiped God
in a different manner than they did. He didn't worship the same
God they did. He was a stranger and a pilgrim
in that land. Everything he did was strange
to him. And that's what Peter tells us.
Because of these things, we're strangers and pilgrims in this
world. What we say and do seems foreign
and different and not acceptable to natural men. Simply putting
it, it's this way. It's the depraved nature of man
that causes believers to suffer. But now think about something.
Is it not sinners that we're called to minister to? Watch this over here, 1 Peter
2, verse 21. This is the beginning of our
lesson. 1 Peter 2, verse 21. For even
here unto were ye called, because Christ also suffered for us,
leaving us an example that we should follow His steps. To live in this world and minister
to sinners and be faithful to God is our calling. This is what
we're called to do. What did you first expect it
to be? Or maybe I should ask, what do
you expect it to be right now? What did you expect? Did you
expect honor and praise and immediate acceptance from the world? I
did at the first. I'm telling you, before God saved
me, I'm a rounder right now. I'm not trying to say that I,
you know, I'm not. But I'm not what I was. I was
an outward rebel in every sense of the word. Outward rebel. And I thought, boy, when I baptized,
I thought my family and my community and everybody was just going
to, with open arms, accept me and love me. They found out what
I believed, and I found out that they liked me better when I was
a rebel. I had more acceptance as a rebel
than I do as a preacher. Did not God find us among the
rebels? And did the message of grace
not sound strange to you the first time you heard it? Did
it not sound strange? Contrary to everything you ever
heard. And think about this, how patient and long-suffering
was God in his dealings with me? Oh, my soul. I should have been cut off a
hundred times. I should have been treated as
a rebel and shackled in chains of darkness like those fallen
angels and reserved under judgment. I should have been. I deserved
to be. But God was gracious. God was merciful. And He sent
me a messenger. And then another. And then another. And then another. How kind and
patient and tender was God in His dealings with me. How longsuffering
He was in His dealings with me. And this is our calling. This
is something we ought to know something about. This is our
calling to minister to those who are sinners. This is our
experience, and Peter's telling us this is our example in Christ. See Christ. This is the God man. See him in the manger in Bethlehem. See this tiny babe. The king
and all that was under his authority were trying to put him to death.
Did you know that? Trying to put him to death. See him as a young child. God
leading him in his providence to Egypt to preserve him because
they wanted to kill him. See him as a boy. scolded by
his parents for doing God's will. See him despised and rejected
of men. See him healing the sick. See
him in the midst of his good works, casting out demons and
feeding the hungry and giving sight to the blind and cleansing
the lepers, being accused of doing such things in the spirit
of Beelzebub. Did he not suffer? See him as
he teaches the multitudes, being ridiculed as a lawbreaker, kicked
at as being a man of filthy hygiene, he eats with unwashing hands.
See him in the homes of chosen sinners, being set forth as one
having too much affection and tolerance for fallen women and
too open in his company with sinners. See him with his disciples,
drinking a glass of wine, and all of his enemies without looking
in and saying he's a goodness man and a winebibber. See him
as he stands in the crowds, in the courts of false religion
and in the courts of evil magistrates. Is there anyone in all the crowd
to take up his case? Anybody. Not Jew or Gentile. Nobody take up his case. See
him as Pilate gives him an opening for his release to the people
and hear the people give us Barabbas. Give us the rebel. Give us the
murderer. Give us the cheat. Give us him
and you crucify him. See him after the resurrection,
his whole discipleship forsaken him and going back to their nets.
and see him as he stands before his own in the flesh, fully resurrected,
and hear one saying, except I could put my finger in the holes of
his hand and thrust my hand in his side, I will not believe."
Has he not left us an example of what it is to minister to
sinners? He did all of this that we might
have life. He suffered all these things
that we might have liked. And He didn't open His mouth.
He didn't open His mouth. He suffered for us. Suffered
in order to minister to us. And suffered being obedient to
His Father. And suffered to call us out of
this world. Suffered for the people's sake.
Suffered for those precious souls given to Him of God. And this
is our example. That's what Peter's telling us.
Here's your example right here. You think you're suffering for
no reason? Look at this. He did no sin. He had no sin. Some of you have raised children,
and some of you are raising children. Before it's over, you're going
to know what it is to suffer for your loved ones. You're going
to know what it is. God has a people. And as the
elect of God, they are brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers,
fellow heirs with us. And we're called to suffer in
order to minister to them and to suffer with them after their
calling and to suffer throughout this life. We live as strangers
and pilgrims in this world. Think it not strange? Isn't that
what James said at the fiery trial? It's not strange. It's common to the people of
God. And then listen to this. Christ is our example. And listen
to this, what he says about Christ here in 1 Peter 2.22, who did
no sin. My soul, he said, which of you
accuses me of anything? Any sin, which one of them? And yet you despise me. He did no sin. And then listen
to this, neither was guile found in his mouth. I was talking to
Kathy about this coming up here this morning. Guile, what is guile? Guile is,
it's taking the truth and dressing it up to make it acceptable to
men. It's disguising the truth. It's
exaggerating the truth. It's making the truth into something
else. It's guile. It's guile. And when Paul talked there in
2 Corinthians chapter 4, he said, I was delivered from these things,
this craftiness, handling the word of God with craftiness. That's what he's talking about,
with guile. Christ did no sin, yet he suffered. No guile. He didn't hide the
truth with cunning craftiness. He didn't disguise the truth. He wasn't fraudulent with the
truth. There was no deceit, lies, or
exaggeration in his mouth. He was genuine. He was true.
And he had only the best intents in all that he said and did.
He loved with a pure love and was merciful in the perfect sense,
yet he suffered." All right, look at verse 23, 1 Peter 2,
23, "...who when he was reviled..." What's that mean? Reviled. That means when a man gets in
your face, that's what they're talking about. Gets right up
in your face. Get that finger, gets right up
in your face. False accusations. Called him
a wine-bibber, a gluttonous man, demon-possessed, and on and on
and on it went. When he was reviled, he reviled
not again. When he suffered, he threatened
not. argument comes about and somebody
takes a swing at you and maybe they connect, hit you in the
jaw. Boy, you look at them and you
say, that's the last one of them you're ever going to do, and
you tie into it. When he suffered, he didn't
threaten. But he committed himself to him
that judgeth righteously. What's that mean? That means,
I want you to listen to me for just a minute. He was there on
his father's business. I must be about my father's business. My father worketh hitherto, and
I worketh. He was there on his father's
business. He was a man subject to death, subject to cold and
heat and pain and hunger. He was there not only as a man,
but as a representative man, as the God-man, as the one mediator
between God and men, the man without whom all would perish,
the man without whom death would be victorious, the man without
whom all would be lost. He was there on his father's
business, and he was in his father's care, and he was content with
his business with men to commit himself and to commit his message into
his father's hands. They said, if you go to Jerusalem,
you're going to die. He said, I'm going to Jerusalem,
and I'm not going to die. They would have taken him out
and threw him off the brow of the hill. That city was on a
hill. They hated him. They despised what he said. He
was God come into the flesh, and they were going to take him
out and throw him over the hill. He walked right through their
midst, and they never laid a hand on him. I don't need to revile back or
defend myself. My father set everything straight.
He set it straight. Beloved, knowing the end of ungodly
men ought to be enough for me just to shut my mouth, knowing
their end. David said he was angry. He was
angry. He saw the wicked. There was
no bans in their death. They weren't worried. They weren't
suffering in this life. They were living a life of ease.
They had riches. They had everything a man could
ever want. They had a good wife, a good
home, a good job. They didn't worry about it. When
they died, they died at ease. He said, I was angry at them.
I was angry at them. He said, and then I learned their
end. I learned their end, so I wasn't angry anymore. Really
ought to be enough for us. We ought to be content with that.
I know their end. Stephen standing there. Listen,
we get the idea that stoning somebody, picking up a bunch
of gravels out here in the parking lot and stinging them with them.
That's not stoning. Stoning is when they pick rocks
up that big around and bast your brains out. It was to death. And the Scripture said, when
they were stoning Stephen, he bowed his head, appeared as an
angel to them, and he said, don't lay these things to their charge.
He knew their end, didn't he? When Christ our example suffered,
he threatened not, but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously. And then watch this, 1 Peter
2.24, 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 we were heeded. This one who is being ridiculed,
lambasted, scorned by men, is not only the
sinless Son of God, but He is the sin-bearing substitute of
God. You talk about unjustified suffering,
my soul. Jesus Christ must suffer the
just wrath of a holy God, bearing our sins in His own body on the
tree. And I'm not even going to pretend
like I can enter into the depth of what that's saying. That statement is as deep as
God. I know that He was made to be
sin for us who knew no sin, made to stand before God in a body
representative of His whole church. and to stand there in such an
actual union as to stand there in their room instead. It was
not a principle that God was punishing on that cross. It was
a man. And yet he punished me and was
just in his punishment. poured it out without reservation
on the sinner because it was a just punishment and a righteous.
He held back nothing. He poured it out on this man,
Christ Jesus. So that when God looked on him,
he looked on me. And when he judged him, he judged
me. And when he poured out his wrath
on him, he poured out his wrath on me. And when he died, I died. And when He rose again, I was
raised up with Him. And when He ascended into glory,
I was raised up with Him and seated in the heavenlies in Christ
Jesus." That's how actual that union is. No sinner is spared his life
so he can continue on in that state and condition that God
bound him in. He was raised to live in righteousness. Not His, but Christ's. Listen to this, 1 Peter 2, verse
25. We'll do the last verse and complete
this chapter. For you were as sheep going astray,
but are now returned unto the shepherd and bishop of your souls. Cherish this thought. You were
as sheep going astray. This world went astray in Adam,
been going astray ever since. This world will continue on going
astray until they wake up in hell. But the master has some
sheep, and you were his sheep going astray. That's why the
master sought you out. You were his sheep. Which of
you, he said, haven't Having a hundred sheep would not leave
the ninety and nine and go out and get the lost lamb. Huh? He didn't go out and seek it
because it was a sheep. He went out and sought it because it
was his sheep. It was his lamb. Among them that are gone astray
are some of the master's sheep, and it's not his will that any
of his sheep should perish, but they have everlasting life. He
said, they're in My hand. No man can pluck them out of
it. You believe not, because you're not My sheep. That's what
He told them. It's His sheep that He seeks, His sheep that
hears His voice, His sheep that knows Him, and His sheep to whom
He gives eternal life. They were His sheep gone astray,
but now are returned unto the shepherd and bishop of our souls. God Almighty gave us into the
hands of His Son. to redeem, to love, to keep,
and to present before Him holy without blame in love. And He
did. That's our example. If He so
loved us as to suffer who did no sin, let's not kick about
what little suffering you and I have to do to minister to men.