Well, turn over to the first
epistle of Peter. The first epistle of Peter. You know in recent weeks I've
been trying to find the correct scriptural balance. I always
want to be true to what the scriptures say in all things. The scriptures
are quite clear. As we read in those few words
from the book of Jonah, God is the author of salvation. Salvation
is of the Lord. Salvation from death and condemnation
to eternal life and glory. That salvation is of God. It is not of man. There are so
many in the world today who preach that what makes the difference
between one person and another person is that one person was
good enough to choose God and another person wasn't good enough
to choose God. That is not the message of the
Scriptures. the Scriptures teach from cover to cover that God
is sovereign. God means sovereign. The one who is God is sovereign. By definition, the one who is
God must be able to do all that he says he will do. Things are
not random. This is not just a big clock
that's been wound up and left to itself to go. God is sovereign. If you believe the message of
this book from cover to cover, it is that God is in control
of all things. The Psalms tell us that, you
know, we've got all this trouble with governments at the moment
and corruption and it's in the news every single day. But the
Scriptures say the heart of the King, the government, the heart
of the King is where? In the hands of God. He is sovereign
over all these things. It's a blessed comfort to hear
that and to realize it and to have God show you the true meaning
of it. That He is sovereign in all things
and He's sovereign in all matters to do with salvation. The Scriptures
teach what most who preach in the name of Christianity despise
this message. I'm telling you the truth. Most
who stand up today with a Bible in their hands and preach what
they tell you is the message of the gospel of God in the Scriptures
hate what I'm going to tell you. But what I'm going to tell you
is what this book says and we'll see it clearly in these verses
from 1 Peter chapter 1 shortly. It is this, that salvation is
because God has chosen a people from before the beginning of
time. The scriptural references to that are numerous, numerous. Before the beginning of time,
chosen in Christ before the world was made. That's what he says
about his people. Out of all mankind that would
exist, God chose a people. And those people he put in the
Lord Jesus Christ. Who is the Lord Jesus Christ?
He is the second person of the Trinity. He is God. He is very
God of very God. He is as much God as God the
Father is God and yet He is not the Father and He is not the
Spirit. The three in one. And He covenanted to become a
man, to be born of a woman, to take upon Him flesh in the likeness
of sinful flesh just as we are with no comeliness that we should
desire Him and come to this earth and live judicially in the place
of those people whom the Father had given to him before the beginning
of time so that in the reckoning of God everything that Jesus
Christ did from the moment he was born to the moment he ascended
back to heaven everything that Jesus Christ did those people
who were chosen in Christ from before the foundation of the
world they did all of those things and so when we're all called
to give an account before the judgment seat of Christ which
we must surely be For that's what 2 Corinthians chapter 5
about verse 10, 11, 12, that sort of area tells you. We must
all stand before the judgment seat of Christ and give an account
for the deeds done in the body. But those who are in Christ give
the account of Him who did those deeds in their place. This is
the idea of a substitute and of a surety and of a guarantor. This is what the scriptures teach.
That His people lived and moved and died and rose in Him. It
is absolutely clear from cover to cover of this book. That's
what all the Old Testament types and sacrifices were pictures
of. The pictures of the people of
God being in Christ and therefore being saved. Because when God
the Father looked at God the Son walking this earth, what
was his testimony of him? This is my beloved Son in whom
I am well pleased. And when you, if you're in the
Lord Jesus Christ, stand before that judgment seat of Christ,
he will say, this is my beloved child. in whom I am well pleased."
That will be His testimony. Because that's what His Word
says that He will do. His people reckon in Him. So
that there's a sin debt, because we're sinners. And if anyone
says he doesn't have sin, he deceives himself. And the truth
is not in him. But what about the sin that we
have? How can we deal with that? For God cannot be God and just
turn a blind eye to sin. God cannot just forgive sin.
God cannot just, you know, like you might forgive a debt and
say, oh, it doesn't matter. In the nature of God, God cannot
just forgive sin. He has to pay for it and then
forgive it. The books have to be balanced. The sins have to
be blotted out of the books. Read Revelation at the end of
it. It talks about the books being open. Those sins have got
to be blotted out. And in Christ's death on the
cross, it says that He bore our sins. He who knew no sin was
made sin for us. He bore our sins in His own body. on the tree. It says it here
somewhere in Peter's Epistle. I can't put my finger on it right
at this minute. He bore our sins and He bore
the punishment, the just punishment. He paid the sin debt penalty
for those sins on behalf of each and every one of His people.
And so what happens? He is the Lamb slain from before
the foundation of the world, we read in the Scriptures. At
the right time He came into history and in history He represented
as the substitute his people perfectly and procured and purchased
their salvation. He redeemed them. You know like
you do at the P-A-W-N shop, the pawn shop, the old thing where
you go and you're short of money and you take your suit because
the wages are running out and you put it into the pawn shop
and they give you some money and a ticket and then you go
and redeem your suit. You buy it back. You buy it back
from the shop with a little bit of interest when you've been
paid your wages. That's how it used to be. in London and other
big cities in this country. It was the life. I'm sure my
grandparents on one side would tell you that that was the way
that they lived from week to week, was taking things and getting
some money for them and then going and redeeming the items. And Christ, we read in the Scriptures,
redeemed his people. He bought them back and the money
that he paid was his lifeblood. For he poured out his lifeblood
as the penalty for the sins of his people. For the soul that
sins, says God, It must die. It shall die. Christ died in
the place of His people. And then in time, every one of
those people, what are they like? How do you tell them? You're
looking around. How do you tell them? Oh, they've got a halo
on their heads. No, they haven't. No, they haven't. Indistinguishable
from everybody else. Indistinguishable. No different.
Just as Christ in His physical appearance was no different.
to anyone else as He walked this planet. That's what Isaiah tells
us. There was no comeliness in Him that we should desire Him.
There was no glow. You know, you see the artists
paint a picture of Jesus walking the earth with a great glowing
halo around His head. If He had, the people would have
flocked behind Him. But they didn't. They crucified
Him. He had no comeliness that we should desire Him. And so
it is with His people. They're just the same. They're
sinners. They're fallen. They're weak. They fail on every
single front. Yet at a point in time in their
lives, the Holy Spirit comes and plants a new nature. You
have a body, but you are a soul. You are an immortal soul, who
for a while on this life, in this life on this planet, has
a body. But at a time, the Spirit comes
and for everyone that Christ died for, He plants a new nature. It's called the rebirth. It's
called the new birth. They're born again of the Spirit
of God. He comes and puts a new nature in. And that new nature
is quite different to the old nature, the sinful nature. And
they war against each other, and that's the believer's experience
in this life of conflict. As Paul says in Romans 7, when
I want to do good, then I do evil, and when I don't want to
do evil, it overtakes me. That's the experience. But the
new nature has certain characteristics and certain abilities. The new
nature has the ability to hear the voice of the shepherd. Jesus
said, I am the Good Shepherd. I call my sheep by name. They
hear me and they follow me." That's what he says. And do you
know what he said to the Pharisees? He said to the Pharisees. Now,
how many places will you hear this proclaimed? How many places
will you hear it? Do you know what he said to the
Pharisees? They said, we don't believe you. He said, that's
because you're not my sheep. He said, you don't believe me
because you're not my sheep. That's what Jesus, you know,
Gentle Jesus, meek and mild. That's what he said to the religious
leaders in his society. He said, you don't believe me
because you're not my sheep. You're not in on this. You don't
become a sheep because you believe him. You believe him because
he's made you a sheep. He comes and gives you that new
nature. But when you have that light revealed, and when you
have that light shining, the scriptures again and again exhort
that God's people must respond to the light. Because Jesus says,
I think I said it last week, He says, Come unto me, all you
who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Oh,
He puts that burden of repentance in the hearts and minds of His
people. He gives that light of seeing your true state before
God. He gives that light of seeing
what you're really like and what eternity bears for you, the dread
of it, the fearful judgment of it, what there is there for you.
He gives you that. But in that moment he says, come
unto me. He doesn't say, sit back and
wait and see if I come and pick you up and bring you to me. He
says, come unto me. And so it is, receiving the light,
receiving the ability. Like the man with the withered
hand, who couldn't stretch out his hand. And Jesus gave him
the ability to stretch out his hand. And he said, stretch forth
your hand. And the man exercised the will
he'd been given, and the power and the strength he'd been given,
and he stretched out his hand. People would say that's mixing
man's work with God's work as a cooperative effort in salvation.
Not at all. So why are we coming to the first
epistle of Peter? I want to do a series on the
first epistle of Peter. It's because I want to get that
scriptural balance quite clear. Not compromise, balance, scriptural
balance. And you see, 1 Peter is a summary
of that scriptural balance and that's why we're coming here.
Just look at 1 Peter chapter 5 and verse 12. Right at the
end. Third verse from the end. He
actually used Sylvanus to write this down. Without a doubt he
dictated it. A faithful brother unto you,
as I suppose, I have written briefly. It's only a brief epistle
as the epistles go. Exhorting. Exhorting. Encouraging. you know, trying
to get you to do something positive, exhorting and testifying that
this is the true grace of God wherein you stand. That's what
he's written for. The true grace of God wherein
you stand. And there are exhortations that
go with it. And his subject is in verse 9
of chapter 1. Chapter 1 and verse 9. Receiving
the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls. This
is Peter's subject. in this epistle, the salvation
of your souls. That's what it's about, the salvation
of your souls. What does it mean? People talk
about salvation. You know these word association
games where you say something and the person has to say the
next thing that comes into their head. If in this country you
were to say to somebody salvation, I bet the next word they would
say would be army. Because just about everybody knows about the
Salvation Army because their bands play carols at Christmas
time in the shopping centers. What is salvation about? You
know what salvation is when it comes to a dark and stormy night
and you've fallen overboard from a cross-channel ferry and you're
in the English Channel and the waves are 40 feet high and there's
shipping that's going to mow you down any moment and you're
about to drown and out of nowhere a helicopter comes and plucks
you out of the ocean. You know that's salvation. You've
been saved from certain death and destruction. You've been
saved. You've been rescued. You've been grabbed You've been
utterly unable to do anything about it yourself. You couldn't
become a cross-channel swimmer. You're dead. It's impossible
to do it. But you've been saved. Salvation. And that's what it
is. Salvation. Salvation from the consequences
of our sin under the just judgment of God to the glorious hope of
eternal life that is in Jesus Christ and for all who are in
Him. That glorious, glorious hope.
That removal of the fear of death. by which all men, through all
their lives, walk through this life, putting it off, making
jokes about it, trying to disguise it, going to funerals, seeing
others go before them, and trying to pretend, it's not going to
happen to me just yet. But yet all knowing, it is appointed
to man to die once. And then, the judgment. We must
all face the God, who is the God of the universe, the God
whom we've offended. And this is what salvation is
about. The end of your faith, the salvation of your souls.
And so the foundation of it, which is what I want to look
at this morning, is in the first five verses. I could have gone
on for the first twelve verses, but for the sake of time, I just
want to look at the first five verses this morning, because
this encapsulates that salvation is God's work from start to finish. It's all of God's grace. There
is no contribution from the sinner who is saved to their salvation. So why is he writing this? Do
you know, he's writing to people who are facing terrible persecution
for being different from the world. That's who he's writing
to. Strangers who are scattered, but we know from the historians
that the time he was writing, we think it was about 65 AD. That seems the most likely time
this was written, 65 AD. The Emperor Nero had come to
power in Rome. The Emperor Nero, for a while,
as we saw last week, He was ignoring the Christians and the Jews.
I think that was maybe the week before. He was ignoring them.
He was leaving them alone. But he became a vicious, vicious
persecutor. And he was the one, you know
the expression, fiddling while Rome burns? It was him who fiddled
while Rome burned. He set fire to a bit of Rome
to burn it down so that he could build a nice big palace there.
And it got out of hand and it burned the entire city to the
ground. It reduced it to a pile of ashes. And so he wanted somebody
to blame for that error. And so he picked on the Christians.
And tremendous persecution came about. And this is where we all
know about the Coliseum and throwing Christians to the lions. And
they did dreadful things. If the historians are to be believed,
they did dreadful things. Do you know what they would do
to Christian believers? People like you and me, if we're believers
this morning, They would take them and bind them and cover
them with tar and tie them to a pole and set fire to it to
act as a torch for the parties that they were having. That was
the sort of thing. These people, for being different
from the rest of society, for being people who loved the Lord
Jesus Christ and loved one another and posed no threat to society
at all. They weren't terrorists. They weren't fundamentalist terrorists.
They posed no threat to this society, for Jesus said, If my
kingdom were of this world, he said, if my kingdom were of this
world, my servants would take up swords and fight. But they
don't, because it isn't. Christ's kingdom is not of this
world. It's an eternal kingdom. It's the kingdom of his gospel.
It's the kingdom of his church. It's the kingdom of his grace.
And so they don't take up swords. They pose no threat. True Christians
pose no threat to the society in which we live, none whatsoever.
All they do is they pray for order that the gospel might be
able to be preached, that Christ's people might come to know Him.
But they pose no threat to society. But people like Nero and the
society that they were in found them good targets for persecution.
And so it has been down all the ages, right through, you know,
the women that were tied to the stakes and drowned in the Solway
Firth, those that were tied to stakes in the middle of London
and burned for their faith because they wouldn't deny Christ and
so it is it's always been the case these people were facing
great persecution and so he's writing to them to encourage
them and he lays the foundation of their faith that's what he
lays first of all but I want you to notice before we move
on that in the rest of the epistle I've just picked out a few from
the first two chapters the epistle on the basis of that foundation
The epistle exhorts right choices in the way we live. Just look
at some of them with me. Look at chapter 1 and verse 13. You
see, it says, all these things are true. Salvation is entirely
of God from beginning to end. So what? Sit back and do nothing
because salvation is all of God from beginning to end. It doesn't
say that. It says, wherefore, gird up the loins of your mind,
be sober, and hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought
unto you. You see? Do something. It's an
imperative. Gird up the loins of your mind.
Verse 15. But as he which hath called you
is holy, imperative, so be ye holy in all manner of conversation.
The idea being that you have a choice not to be holy in all
manner of conversation. So he's saying imperative, be
holy in all manner of conversation. Verse 22. The end of the verse. see that ye love one another
with a pure heart fervently do it don't don't be passive don't
drift into not loving one another because that will be the natural
tendency just as water flows downhill that will be the natural
tendency but he's saying no imperative love one another fervently out
of a pure heart at chapter 2 and verse 2 as newborn babes leave
your Bible sitting on the shelf and never look at it because
God will do everything for no desire the sincere milk of the
word that you may grow thereby verse eleven of chapter two abstain
second half abstain from fleshly lusts abstain from fleshly lusts
which war against the soul verse thirteen submit yourselves to
every ordinance of man be a good citizen don't be dis don't be
uh... disruptive don't don't uh...
don't be don't be uh... a problem for the government.
Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake, whether
it to be the King as Supreme. Verse 17, honor all men, love
the brotherhood, fear God, honor the King. We could go on. It's
full of exhortations, but in the context, every one of them,
in the context of salvation, being of God, of absolute sovereign
grace, but within that sovereign grace, a willing response. Why
do His people give a willing response? Because the Psalm says,
Psalm 110 verse 3, He makes His people willing in the day of
His power. God makes His people willing
to do these things. This is not legalism. It's not
saying if you do these things better than the next man, you'll
be a better Christian, and you'll get a better prize, and you'll
be more fitted for glory. Not at all. If you're in the
Lord Jesus Christ, you are complete in Him, says Colossians chapter
2 and verse 10. You are complete in Him. In Him
dwells the fullness of the Godhead bodily and you are complete in
Him. There's nothing that you can
add. Nothing whatsoever. It isn't legalism. You see, the
way we live, the way we live does not affect our standing
with God one little bit. The only thing that affects your
standing with God is this. Are you in Christ or are you
outside of Christ? If you're in Christ, you're in
Christ and perfect and complete in Him. It doesn't affect our
standing with God at all. I could give you an example.
David, after the sin with Bathsheba, terrible sin of adultery and
of murder, effectively because he contrived the murder of Bathsheba's
husband, and a dreadful thing. And when Nathan the prophet came
to him and pointed it out to him, and he told him an allegory
about a man stealing another man's little lamb, which was
the only thing he had, And David was furious. And he said, Where
is this man that I can bring justice to him? And Nathan said,
You, David, you are the man. Because you stole that man's
wife and then you had him killed. And then David was convicted.
And he knew. All that time he knew, but the
prophet brought it to his attention clearly. And God said, You are
the man. You are the man. It's your sin.
You are the man. And then he went on to say this,
But you shall not die, for your sin is covered. That's what he
said. You shall not die, your sin is
covered. Even that sin is covered. How bad can it get? Even that
sin is covered. Hey, that's good, isn't it? Doesn't
that give us an excuse as Christians to go out and commit adultery
and all sorts of other fraud because every sin will be covered,
won't it? Isn't that right? No, that's
antinomianism. That's not true. You see this, the way we live
does not affect our standing with God But our standing with
God most definitely affects the way we live, if it's true. It
does. You cannot have seen the truth
of God in the Lord Jesus Christ and habitually want to live in
a state of sin. You cannot do it. It's alien
to your nature. You cannot do it. If you can,
it's good evidence that you were never, ever one of his people.
So then, let's look, in the time we have available, at God's work
salvation the foundation for this God's work of salvation
in these first five verses verse one that was a long introduction
I know and I'm probably going to abbreviate this section and
maybe come back to it in a bit more detail next week but I just
want you to see in these verses this summary of the fact that
everything else he goes on to say is built on the rock solid
foundation of God's work of salvation in the Lord Jesus Christ. On
this rock, he said, will I build my church. What was the rock?
It was the rock of the foundation of Christ, for He is the rock. He was the rock that went with
the children of Israel in the wilderness. He is that rock.
And so let's look. It's from, in verse 1, it's from
Peter. It's from Peter, an apostle of
Jesus Christ to the strangers scattered throughout various
places. From Peter. was the first disciple with his
brother. The first one we read of being called. I'll tell you
what he was not. He most definitely was not the
first pope or any other pope. He was not the first pope. And
where was this written from? If you go right to the end of
the epistle you can see where it was written from. Verse 13
just before the end. The church that is at Babylon
elected together with you. He wrote it from Babylon. What
do you mean figurative Babylon like the revelation talks of
Babylon being fallen religion, false religion. Babylon in the
Revelation is false religion. No, he meant literal, physical
Babylon. Probably Baghdad thereabouts
in these days. That's where he was. He wasn't
in Rome when he wrote this. Surely the first Pope would have
been in Rome when he wrote his letter, wouldn't he? No, he was
in Babylon, in the middle of modern-day Iraq. That's where
he was when he wrote this. Written from Babylon, not Rome.
And Christ is the rock, not Peter. You know, when Peter said, you
are the Christ, the son of the living God, and he said, blessed
are you, for flesh and blood hasn't revealed this to you,
but my Father in heaven. And upon this rock will I build
my... Peter is not that rock. No other foundation can any man
lay than that which is laid. Who is that foundation? It's
Christ. If you want to know more of that,
because we haven't got time to delve into it this morning, and
you've got the new Focus magazine, the current one, then there's
a very good article, three pages or so, by Don Faulkner, Thou
Art the Christ. And that puts paid to any of
those superstitious myths completely. No, who was this? Who was this
Peter? Quite a holy man, you might think,
yeah? Quite a high and holy and man
to be revered. Man to be respected, yes, because
he was an apostle of Jesus Christ. But do you know what Peter's
testimony of himself was? Another one of those fishing
incidents, where he knew that he couldn't even fish correctly. He knew he couldn't even do that
which was his profession correctly. until he saw what God did. And in Luke 5 verse 8 he said,
Depart from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man. That was his testimony
of himself. I am a sinful man. Depart from
me. He was a blasphemer because having
said how much he would not desert Christ at the crucifixion, having
said how he would stand with Him and never deny Him, a few
hours later he's cursing and blaspheming and saying he knew
nothing of Him. He was headstrong. It was him,
I think, who cut off the ear of the high priest's servant.
And yet, at the same time, he was so weak when he couldn't
stick with anything he'd committed to. He's so like us, isn't he? And yet, he was commissioned.
Do you remember when we read that earlier? End of John's Gospel,
Chapter 21. There he is, feeling unworthy
to be amongst those people. And Christ is restoring him to
his position, and he commissions him. He commissions this weak,
weak disciple, this headstrong disciple to feed his sheep, to
feed his sheep. And in these epistles, in 1st
and 2nd Peter, that is what he's doing. He's feeding Christ's
sheep. Commissioned to feed his sheep
because God has made Peter what he is. He is an apostle of Jesus
Christ. Not the apostle, not the supreme
apostle, just one of the twelve. An apostle of Jesus Christ. He's
fallible as a man, even as an apostle. He's fallible as a man.
We know that because Paul says in Galatians chapter 2 and verse
11, I withstood Peter to the face for he was to be blamed.
Peter the apostle. After Christ has risen, after
all these events, Peter was to be blamed. So he was fallible
as a man. But when he wrote this letter, we know that all Scripture
is inspired of God. All of it is God-breathed. And
so by Holy Spirit inspiration, God breathed out his word and
Peter wrote it down, and when he wrote these things, what we
have here, we can rely on as absolutely infallible. And he's
writing to strangers. And all believers are strangers.
All believers are strangers, in a sense, in this world. Because
you think in a way that the world doesn't think. And you have a
hope that the world doesn't have. You see spiritual things. You
read this book, and the Spirit of God speaks to you by this
book, when it doesn't speak even to religious people. It speaks
by the Spirit of God to you. We're strangers in this world.
You can read in John chapter 17, where Jesus said that His
people are not of this world, just as He is not of this world.
His people, those He calls, are not of this world. And He's writing,
verse 2, to Christians. And how does He describe them?
These strangers who are Christians, these strangers who are believers
in Christ and in the true gospel of His grace. This is how he
describes Christians. Listen, religious world out there,
claiming to preach the gospel of Christ in the name of Christ.
This is how he describes them. Elect. Elect, according to the
foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the
Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ,
grace unto you, and peace be multiplied. The people who are
believers, who are Christians, he calls elect. according to
the foreknowledge of God. Chosen. Chosen ones. Chosen by
God. According to the foreknowledge
of God. There was a man I was once debating a point with years
and years ago. And he was saying that he believed
in the election of God. But he said this is how he believed
in the election of God. He said God says I will elect
a people. Who will I elect? And do you
know what he said? Whoever will have me. That's who he'll elect.
That is not foreknowledge. That is not scriptural foreknowledge. God didn't look forward like
Gypsy Lee at the fairground and go, oh, that was a good person.
Oh, no, that one wouldn't be a good person. That one was a
good person, and I'll choose them to be. No, not at all. Not
in the slightest. Couldn't possibly be like that.
This is sovereign election of God, the Father, for a specific,
particular people. Foreknowledge is not looking
into a crystal ball to see what's going to happen. foreknowledge
is sovereign power to ordain. That's what it is. You cannot
predict the future unless you can perfectly control the future.
Is that not true? You cannot predict the future
unless you can perfectly control. Do you know one reason why I
believe, just one rational reason, never mind the sight of the soul,
one rational reason for believing this is true is that if you take
all of the prophecies of it, that undoubtedly historically
were written before they happened. You know, Isaiah writing about
the coming of Christ 800 years later, and all of those things.
If you were to take all of those and calculate mathematically
the probability of them being right by chance, just by going,
oh, I think it's going to be sunny next Saturday, or I think
on the third Sunday in September it's going to be pouring with
rain. If you just got all of those right, The probability
against it is so great. You just run out of notes. You
just cannot calculate how improbable it is. And yet it's all come
true. And of all the prophecies in this book, there's only one
still to come true. And that is for Christ to come
again. For Christ to come again and take his people to be with
him. That's the one thing that yet has to happen. This foreknowledge
is predestination. And why predestination? Because
he saw that they'd be good people? No. When did Christ, how does
God commend His love to us? Romans 5 verse 8. He commends
His love to us in this, that while we were yet sinners, Christ
died for His people. Not while they were looking quite
lovely people who would be inclined to choose Him, but while they
were sinners. Whilst they were in the eyes
of God, in the senses of God, the most revolting things, He
loved them. And by sovereign grace, chose
them. And how did it come about? through sanctification of the
Spirit. Sanctification is a setting apart to be different. A setting
apart for holiness. And it's the sanctification of
God the Spirit, the third person of the Trinity. Holy Spirit sanctification. He sets apart these people in
the Lord Jesus Christ, making them holy. And on what basis?
Unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ.
He sets apart on the basis of the faithfulness of Jesus Christ
in doing all that was required to bring a people to glory, to
have a people declared holy, the righteousness of God in Him,
to have a people declared sinless, justified, acquitted, the books
cleared, the sins blotted out on the basis of His obedience,
on the basis that He walked this earth on behalf of them to establish
righteousness and that He shed His blood on the cross of Calvary.
all of these things on the basis of Christ's obedience unto death. There we see in that one verse,
you know, you say the Bible doesn't explicitly speak of the Trinity. There's a very clear verse in
1 John chapter 5 that very clearly states it, but the modern translators
have translated it out of their modern versions that speaks of
the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, the three of the
Trinity. But it's here in this verse,
the foreknowledge of God the Father through sanctification
of the Spirit and to obedience and sprinkling of the blood of
Jesus Christ. Quite clearly there, the Trinity of God is there in
the scriptures for us that all three persons in the one, the
triunity of God were involved, were the cause, were at the root
of the salvation of his people. And so therefore, Peter prays
that grace would be unto them. and peace be multiplied." It's
a prayer for grace and peace to abound in their experience.
This is the result. You know, this is a result of
it. If you go on into verse 3, "...blessed be the God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to His abundant mercy
hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus
Christ from the dead." Thanks. That's what it is. Blessed be
the God. His heart is overflowing as our hearts should be overflowing.
with thanks. Where would we be without the
mercy of God? Where would we be without the
grace of God? We'd be facing a lost eternity.
We'd be as Ephesians 2 verse 3 says, children of wrath even
as the others, even as everybody else, no different. We'd be as
Hebrews 10.27 says, just with this fearful, fearful waiting
for judgment. This appointing to men to die
once and then comes the judgment. A fearful dread of the judgment
to come. And yet in Christ, in Christ,
born again, begotten again. He's begotten us again to a lively
hope. Born again to a lively hope.
A confident assurance based on the resurrection. Why based on
the resurrection? Because the fact that Christ
rose from the dead is God's vindication that everything He had done on
behalf of His people was satisfactory. It paid the price. It cleared
the debt. It established the righteousness.
It did everything that was necessary to bring those who were not a
people to be the people of the living God. It did it all. And
so therefore, what's the result? We have this lively hope, a lively
hope of this, that there's no condemnation. As Paul writes
in Romans 8 verse 1, there is therefore now no condemnation
to those who are in Christ Jesus. If you're outside of Christ Jesus,
there's nothing other than condemnation. waiting from the God of the universe
when you must meet Him. But in Christ Jesus, there is
no condemnation. Christ was delivered and raised. Romans 4.25, He was delivered
up for our offenses. He paid the price of our offenses,
but He was raised for our justification. It proved that He had paid the
debt in full. The sin debt was paid in full,
and so we have a lively hope. And I would just refer you to
1 Peter chapter 3, And verse 15, where again there's another
exhortation, there's another imperative. Sanctify the Lord
God in your hearts and be ready always to give an answer to every
man that asketh you a reason for the hope that is in you with
meekness and fear. You have a hope, a lively hope. Well, be ready to give an answer
to anyone that asks you, what's the reason for that hope? What's
the reason for my hope? that Jesus Christ has borne everything
in my place and done everything to make me right with God. And
so, verse 4, there's a certain inheritance, a definite inheritance,
incorruptible, undefiled. We don't see it now, for as 2
Corinthians 4.18 says, the things that are seen are just temporal,
they're just for a while, but the things that we don't physically
see, they're the eternal things, they're the permanent things,
they're more certain than the physical creation. And for the
believer, there's treasure. Matthew 6.20, laid up in heaven. Treasure. Where moth and rust
and the things that corrupt on this life don't corrupt. Because that treasure is God
Himself. He, our Lord Jesus Christ. Look
at Psalm 16. Psalm 16. I'll be finished in
a couple of moments. Psalm 16 and verses 5 and 6. The Lord is the portion of mine
inheritance and of my cup. Thou maintainest my lot. The
lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places. Yea, I have a goodly
heritage. It's God himself. It's our Lord
Jesus Christ who is our inheritance. He is our exceeding great reward,
as God said to Abraham in Genesis 15 and verse 1. And so we're
kept, verse 5. God not only starts salvation,
he not only accomplishes salvation, He not only calls His people
to that salvation that is accomplished for them, He not only has an
inheritance reserved for them, but He keeps them to the very
end. You are kept not by your own strength, but by the power
of God. And through what medium? It's
the medium of faith. You cannot be kept without faith.
God gives the gift of faith. Not of yourselves, it is the
gift of God. That's what He says about faith. He gives the gift
of faith. that sight of the soul, that
spiritual sight to see the things of Christ and through that sight
by the power of God he keeps us for that salvation ready to
be revealed at the last time. This is God's salvation. It's
summarized in what has been called down the years the five points
of Calvinism. In a way I don't like mentioning
that because it speaks of man's work when it's all God's work
but it's a good summary and you know how you can remember it?
Tulip. Tulip. Total depravity. Unconditional
election. Limited atonement. Irresistible
grace. Perseverance of the saints. Let
me just briefly, very briefly, tell you what they mean. Total
depravity? That's what we're like by nature.
Totally unable to save ourselves. Not even the slightest whim from
us of doing anything to recommend us to God. Or why else? Why else
would Christ need to shed his blood? for the sins of his people,
were totally depraved. There's no hope in man as he
is. You cannot appeal to the innate ability of man to come
to God because he has no innate ability to come to God. But God
unconditionally, not because he saw something good, unconditionally
elected these people. Verse 2, elect according to the
foreknowledge of God. And who did he do it for? Everybody
that would ever live? No. If Christ died for everybody
that ever lived, nobody's going to hell. If Christ paid the sin
debt for everybody that ever lived, everybody is justified
in the sight of God, but that patently isn't the case. It's
an atonement limited to those whom the Father gave to the Son
from before the beginning of time. Who are they? Isn't this
limiting the salvation of God? They're a multitude which no
man can number, of every tribe and tongue and kindred in all
ages. They're the people of God who are bought brought by His
grace, His irresistible grace, because it's by sanctification
of the Spirit, His irresistible grace. You know, conversions
of different people can be dramatically different, but I tell you, God
takes some who are most blatantly and obviously heading full speed
downhill to a lost eternity and God the Spirit gets them and
brings them Irresistibly by His grace and He keeps them by His
power to the end. That's God's salvation. Is that
the salvation that you know? Is that the salvation that we
hear preached in other places? Is that the ground of your confidence
for eternity? If it isn't that salvation then
you better look at this book and see what really is the ground
of your assurance for eternity.