I thank the Lord for each one
of you, for your faithfulness, your commitment to the gospel
of our Lord Jesus Christ. Three-day weekends are difficult
for most churches, but I'm thankful for your faithfulness, your commitment,
and I pray this evening as we look at the last five verses
in 1 Peter chapter 5. We read it just a few minutes
ago. Let the Lord bless our time together
tonight. I have four points I want to
make. Most of the message concerns
the first point. But first of all, we see we have
a closing prayer. But the God of all grace, who
hath called us unto his eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after
that you have suffered a while, make you perfect, establish,
strengthen, settle you, to him be glory and dominion forever
and ever. A closing prayer. First thing
we notice about this, it is directed to the God of all grace. Of all the truths that we have
revealed unto us in the word of God, none is more precious
than the truth of God's wonderful, amazing grace. To every child
of God, I don't think there's any word which is more precious
than the word grace. A child of God loves to sing
about the grace of God. the amazing grace of God. I remember years ago when the
Lord first began working in my heart, I was convinced that John
Newton's hymn, Amazing Grace, surely would be one of the hymns
that we will sing in heaven. It just spoke to my heart as
I know it does to yours. We sang that hymn just at the
beginning of the service. I know that my Redeemer liveth
and also in that hymn we sang that we know that grace and power
are in his hand. There's not a word any more precious
to a child of God than the word grace. It's God's grace that
gives us hope. It's God's grace that gives us
hope. that we will be saved and we
will enjoy God forever in heaven. For the scripture says, for by
grace are you saved through faith and that not of yourselves. It
is the gift of God. I very seldom have one day, especially
when I go to the Lord in prayer, that I do not think of that verse
in Romans chapter five. But where grace abounded, where
sin abounded, grace did much more abound. That's my hope. That's my hope. Where sin abounded,
and I know it abounded and abounds in me, but grace does much more
abound. It is for grace that every child
of God prays. Almost every day we pray for
grace, don't we? Whatever the need may be. It
may be preserving grace, keeping grace, whatever grace that we
need. And we have God's promises that
His grace will always be sufficient, no matter what tribulation or
affliction that He causes to come into our life. It is God's grace upon which
we trust will carry us all the way home. All the way home. Now, I want to give us tonight,
first of all, three important truths about grace. I know every
one of us here know the definition that is usually given, and it's
a good definition, of course. Unmerited favor. That's what
grace is, unmerited favor to the ones who are unworthy. God extends his mercy and his
grace. But there are three truths about
grace I wanted to mention. A fourth one, I know we could
talk about tonight, and that is God's grace is eternal. It's
eternal, just as God himself is eternal. But the first thing
I point out to us about grace, grace is an attribute of God. Just like his omniscience and
his omnipotence and his immutability and his mercy and his justice
and his wrath, all of these are attributes or characteristics
of God, so is grace. It's an attribute of God. We might think of grace like
a spring, water springing up out of the ground. And we might
think of grace like a spring in the heart of God, which flows
up, and in that spring, in that flow, is God's method of salvation,
the way God has chosen and ordained to save sinners, as the apostle
wrote in 2 Timothy, who hath saved us and called us with a
holy calling according to his own purpose and grace which was
given us in Christ Jesus before the world began. It's sometimes hard to distinguish
between grace and mercy. What's the difference? I think
the best definition I've ever found is the one that Arthur
Pink gives in his book on the attributes of God. He shows how
the holy angels, angels who never fail, how that they have been
recipients of the grace of God, but not mercy. They never needed
mercy. Mercy is for the fallen. Mercy
is for the miserable. But the holy angels have received
God's grace. First of all, God chose them. They are called the elect angels. Out of all the angels, God chose
some. And it wasn't because they were
better than the others, because they deserve more than the others.
The same is true of His sovereign election concerning us, concerning
men and women. No, it's God's grace. He chose
those that He chose. And then secondly, He preserved
them. He kept them from falling. While
the others followed Satan and fell into sin, the holy angels
Recipients of God's grace, they were preserved with Christ as
their head. And another thing that shows
the grace of God to the holy angels is where they live. Where they live. We saw that
this morning, didn't we? In that passage in Matthew chapter
18, the holy angels, they live in the presence of God. They're
always beholding His face. That's the greatest blessing
that any being can receive. Beatific vision to see God. To see God. So that's the first thing about
grace. It's an attribute of God. The second thing about grace,
it is a power. And this is where I think so
many people are deceived. So many people are deceived about
this. They've heard about grace. They
know that grace is an attribute of God, but in their mind, it
is like it's just a big supply of grace, a big lake, if you
please, a reservoir of grace. And it's there if you want it. It's there if you put it into
operation. But that's not true. That's not
true. Grace is a power. Grace gets
the job done. Grace is effectual. It's a mistake
to think of grace as just something that is out there somewhere in
space, and if you are so inclined, you can take advantage of it.
No, grace is a power. It is a power that makes God's
salvation effectual. And a third thing about grace,
its effect. When God is gracious to a person,
look with me in 1 Thessalonians, just a moment, 1 Thessalonians
chapter one. Grace stands for some change
which is wrought in the life of those to whom it comes. When
God's grace comes to an individual in saving power, that person
is, there's going to be some changes. There's going to be
some changes. And we know, we talk about these
three cardinal graces. What are they? Faith, hope, love. Everywhere where God's grace
comes in saving power, then the objects are sure to manifest
faith, hope, and charity, or love. We see it here as Paul
writing back to the church at Thessalonica. He says in verse
two, we give thanks to God always for you all, making mention of
you in our prayers, remembering without ceasing your work of
faith, labor of love, and patience of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ,
in the sight of God and our Father. To whom this grace comes in power,
there will always be these graces to accompany it. Some may see
more faith, some may see more of love, some may see more of
hope, more of peace or joy, whatever, but these are all graces that
come into the lives of those who are recipients of his grace.
And if you look here in the text, the apostle prays, he says, but
the God of all grace. Now this is a prayer. And usually
we direct our prayers to God, our father, don't we? Our Lord
taught us to pray like that. When you pray, say our father. which are in heaven. But this
God of all grace includes the Father, yes, but not leaving
out the Son, nor the Holy Spirit. The Son, for you know the grace
of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your
sakes he became poor, that you through his poverty might be
made rich. And in Zechariah, the Old Testament
prophet there speaks about the grace of the Spirit, the God
of all grace. All grace comes from God, the
Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Now, I love to point
this out, don't you? Love to hear it, I trust you
do, that God is our Savior, that God saves us. Yes, we emphasize
the work of the Son, Him coming into this world and being made
flesh, and offering Himself as that one sacrifice to put away
our sins. Yes, we emphasize that, but we
know that the Father, He plans salvation. And the Son came,
and He executed the plan. And the Holy Spirit, He comes
to us. For without Him, we wouldn't
know anything about the grace of God, experiencing the grace
of God. I read the other day this illustration. It may help you, but a person
wants to build a house. So the first thing he does, he
hires an architect. And the architect, he designs
it and draws out the sketches and everything. And it's just
like he wants it. It's perfect. This house is just
his dream home. But then what does he do? He
hires a contractor. And the contractor is in charge
of building the house, making sure that the plans are accomplished
just as the man desired. But then when the house is built,
there's a moving company. The moving company comes. and
picks up all the belongings of the family and moves them into
the house. God the Father planned salvation,
didn't he? And God the Son came into this
world. And he executed that plan. And God the Holy Spirit makes
that real to his people. Notice the second thing here.
But the God of all grace, who hath called us unto his eternal
glory by Christ Jesus, who hath called us unto, and I want to
emphasize that, unto. He hath called us unto. He didn't call us close. He didn't call us near. He didn't
call us starting off. No. He called us unto his eternal
glory. Now, this calling is what we
refer to as an effectual call. As the Apostle Paul wrote to
the church at Corinth, remember, he said that we preach Christ
crucified unto the Jews, a stumbling block, and unto the Greeks foolishness,
but unto them which are called. Christ, the power of God, and
the wisdom of God. Everywhere the gospel is preached,
there's a call. Remember in the parable our Lord
gave of the man who prepared his feast, he said, everything's
ready. Everything was ready, and those
he invited, they didn't need to bring anything. And that's
what salvation is. It's what God has done for us. But they began to make excuses,
and some wanted to go here, some there. And finally, he sent out
and said, compel them to come in. Now, everywhere the gospel
is preached, there's a call. And even where the gospel is
not preached, I believe, even in creation, there's a call. There's a call that goes out
into all the world. There's no place on the face
of God's earth where a man might be born and live and die and
never have God revealed unto him in the sense that there is
a creator. There is a creator. But then
the gospel comes and many times it just goes off a person. goes
over his head, you know? I think I've told you this before,
but there was a man in England, his name was William Wilberforce. You've heard of him. He was the
one who worked for so long and so hard, he was a member of parliament,
to outlaw the slave trade. And he had a friend named Mr.
Pitt. And Mr. Pitt eventually would
become the Prime Minister of England. But when they were younger,
well before, he said, come here, come here, this man preach, you
got to come here, this man preach. And he was just insistent. And
so one time, William Pitt went to hear John Newton preach. And
when they left the place, William Pitt said, I don't, I
don't get it. I don't get it at all. You know, why you, why you are
so excited about hearing him preach about that message? Well,
obviously one man had been called and one man had been passed over. That's God's sovereign will,
isn't it? Can't explain it. But this call
here that Peter's talking about, the God of all grace who hath
called us unto his eternal glory. He didn't call us just to start
out on the way. And this eternal glory, of course,
is what we would call heaven, what we would refer to, I believe,
as heaven. It's to be conformed to the image
of Christ. That's eternal glory. To be conformed
to the image of Christ, it is to behold Christ in all his glory. The psalmist said, in thy presence
is fullness of joy. At thy right hand are pleasures
forevermore. He's called us, those to whom
Peter is writing here, He's called us unto eternal glory. And I want to emphasize the eternal
security of every child of God. It doesn't say he's called us
just to start off. Can you see that with me? It
doesn't say he's just called us to make our best effort, to
give it our best shot. No, no. He's called us unto his
eternal glory by Christ Jesus. The saint of God who is called
and saved by the grace of God, washed in the blood of Jesus
Christ, justified by his righteousness, is eternally secure. In Romans 8, the apostle said,
moreover whom he did predestinate, them he also called, and whom
he called, them he also justified, and whom he justified, them he
also glorified. You see, those who are called,
they also are glorified. He's called us unto his eternal
glory. I read this past week three arguments
that men make against eternal security. In other words, they
teach and believe that a person can be saved today and lost tomorrow,
that he can be a child of God today and a child of the devil
tomorrow. And they gave these three arguments
for maintaining, I guess you'd say, their position. But the
first one was this. It is impossible, and I quote,
it is impossible for God to make the believer's final salvation
absolutely certain without destroying his moral free agency. And if that be destroyed, man
is no longer a man. But, and men are free moral agents. Now that's not saying man has
a free will, you understand that. But men are free moral agents,
and if they're not, there could be no judgment. Yes, there's
going to be a judgment, and men are going to be judged by their
actions, by their works. Why? Because man is a free moral
agent. But their argument was the only
way you could make their salvation secure is to take that away from
a man, and then he wouldn't really be a man. But to show how foolish
that is, we ask these two questions. Number one, is God a free moral
agent? Is God a free moral agent? Well,
of course he is. Is his apostasy possible? Can
God apostatize? Of course not. The holy angels,
the same question might be asked about them. And then a second
argument they gave was he, that is, man, he was free to begin
salvation, his salvation, begin the Christian life or not, as
he chose. He is the same, he in the same
manner, now is free to continue this life or not, as he may decide. Well, we will take issue, of
course, First of all, who began your salvation? Who began man's
salvation? Well, God did. Absolutely, God
did. Who takes the initiative and
starts the Christian life? God or man? Well, the scripture
says, according as he has chosen us in him before the foundation
of the world. And then their third argument
was they had maybe 10 verses that they said showed that a
man could be saved and then lose his salvation. But I noticed
in every one of those verses the little word if. If. But how many verses do we have?
There's no if. in the verses that we would quote.
They're assertive, they're declarative verses of scripture. For instance,
as our Lord said, I give unto them eternal life and they shall
never perish. Amen. Neither shall any man pluck
them out of my hand. My Father which gave them me
is greater than all and no man is able to pluck them out of
my Father's hand. And then that verse in first
chapter of Philippians, being confident of this very thing,
that he which hath begun a good work in you shall perform it
until the day of Jesus Christ. Verse after verse, there's no
if, there's no maybe, there's no perhaps, no, the Lord says,
I give unto them eternal life, and no man shall pluck them out
of my hand. Now notice the third thing here
in this prayer. Peter goes on saying, after that
you have suffered a while. Make you perfect, established,
strengthened, settled you. The Greek here is having suffered
a little. Having suffered a little. And it's not sure, it's not for
sure if it means suffered a little time, having suffered for a little
time, or having suffered little degree. But it makes no difference. Your suffering will be short
compared to eternity. Now, I know it's easy for a preacher
to stand up here and say something like this. And I know that we
all know people who have been in bed for years suffering. But it's still true, in comparison
to eternity, their suffering will be short. Yes, will be short. And also, as to the degree, no
matter how great the suffering is in this world, it is light
in comparison to that eternal weight of glory. that He has
prepared for His people. Look back to 2 Corinthians with
me just a moment. 2 Corinthians chapter 4, verse 16. And we all know that the Apostle
Paul knew something about suffering, didn't he? He was beaten, shipwrecked,
just one thing after another. For which cause we faint not,
but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed
day by day. For our light affliction, which
is but for a moment. worketh for us a far more exceeding
and eternal weight of glory. While we look not at the things
which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things
which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not
seen are eternal. After you have suffered a little
while. And then he goes on, And he says
in his prayer here, look back in our text, but the God of all
grace who hath called us unto his eternal glory by Christ Jesus,
after that you have suffered a while, make you perfect. This perfection here has to do
with growth, with growth. In Christ, who is our head, all
believers are perfect. We're accepted in the beloved.
All believers are perfect. He has perfectly put away our
sins. He has perfectly satisfied God's
law. We are all justified with a perfect
righteousness. So this Peter's request here
is for growth. Grow, as he says in the second
letter, grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus
Christ. And the only way to grow in grace
is to grow in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. establish or establish you. This
establishment, I believe, has to do with our hearts, the firm
persuasion in our hearts of our interest in God's everlasting
covenant. Like David said, though my house
be not so with God, yet he hath made with me an everlasting covenant
ordered in all things, and sure, and though we make it not to
prosper, This, he said, is all my salvation. Establish you in
this truth. Strength, strengthen, strengthen
you. The strength that we need as
we go through this life is ours in Christ. One of the promises,
you let us in that hymn, Standing on the Promises, God my Savior. You know, one of the promises
in the Old Testament was given to the tribe of Asher, I believe
it was. God said, as thy days, so shall
thy strength be. And that's a promise to all of
God's children. As your days demand, so shall
your strength be. Don't be looking for strength
to deal with something that's gonna come up five years from
now. But as your days demand, day by day, We love to sing that
hymn, great is our faithfulness, don't we? One of the lines in
that is strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow. Amen. And then he says, strengthen, settle you, settle you. Settlement is upon Christ the
rock. Just like that house our Lord
spoke about, illustrated in Matthew chapter seven, the house that
was settled on the rock, built on the rock. And then it ends, to him be glory
and dominion forever and ever, amen. And this is an emphatic
statement, to him and to him alone and to him only be glory. be glory, not unto us, but unto
him. The second point, and I'll be
brief, these last three points, a faithful brother. Notice in
verse 12, but Silvanus, that is Silas, a faithful brother
unto you, I suppose. What a testimony. What a testimony
in the word of God for Silas, a faithful brother. That's what
we all want to be our testimony, isn't it? A faithful brother,
a faithful sister. Now we know Silas, he was a companion
of Paul on Paul's second missionary journey. And I believe that's
what Peter has reference to here when he says, a faithful brother
unto you, I suppose. In other words, Peter is writing
to people he addresses as strangers he had never ministered among
these people, but Silas is with him, and Silas is the one who's
actually writing the letter as it's dictated by Peter, and then
he carries the letter. And so, Silas, a faithful brother
unto you, as I suppose, I suppose, not that there was any question.
Peter had never been among these people with Silas, but they knew
Silas. They knew he was a faithful brother. And then we see an inspired writer
in verse 13. The church that is Babylon elected
together with you, saluted you and so does Marcus, my son. Now
let me say something about this. Babylon. There never, now listen
to me, there never has been any solid, sure evidence that Peter
ever was in Rome. There never has been. Now you
know the Roman Catholic Church. They believe he was the first
pope and they have a lot staked on the fact that he was a bishop
there in Rome. But again, I say there has never
been any real solid evidence that Peter was ever in Rome.
And if you read Romans chapter 16, the letter that Paul wrote
to the church at Rome, and he names individual after individual
after individual, faithful men that he knew, and he never mentions
Peter. Does that make any sense to you?
Not to me. No. And so they have latched
on this word Babylon. Peter says the church that is
Babylon and they take Babylon, spiritual Babylon from the book
of Revelation and say, well, that he just didn't want to use
the word wrong. Just didn't want to use the name
wrong, but he was in wrong. No, there was a place in Assyria,
a town in Assyria named Babylon. And most likely that's where
Peter was when he wrote this letter. You know, something like
that, it doesn't make any difference
one way or the other, does it? If Peter was in Rome or he never
was in Rome, it doesn't make any difference. It doesn't change
The faith, it doesn't change the truth about God and about
salvation. It doesn't make any difference
one way or the other to us. But see, if you put a lot of
emphasis on the church as the one who administers grace, then
it does make a lot of difference to them. It's a point of contention,
great contention. And the last, and he calls his
son Mark here, and this is interesting. Saluted you and so does Marcus
my son. Now, this could have been his
son who the Lord had saved. It could have been John Mark,
and it could have been another Mark that Peter calls his son
like Like Paul referred to Timothy, my son, in the faith. Timothy wasn't his literal son,
but because we know that Peter was married, this may well have
been his son, his child, whom the Lord had saved. And then
we close with this choice blessing in verse 14. Peace be with you
all that are in Christ Jesus. Amen. A choice blessing. Peace. Peace. Peace with God. Peace in my conscience. And peace among my brothers and
sisters in Christ. Peace be with you all. We're
going to sing a hymn and we'll be dismissed.