Suffering to the Glory of God

Expectations shape our lives. So, for instance, if you woke up on Thursday morning and you were expecting something really extravagant under or around the tree, your day went one of two ways, right? You either got what you wanted and you were thankful for it, or you didn't and you were sorely disappointed. On the other hand, if you woke up expecting nothing, and you got something, then you'd be really grateful. And if you didn't get anything, well, you would have been fine. This is true not just on Christmas. This is not bitterness, by the way. I didn't expect anything. I got something. My day was great. This is true. It carries over for everyday life as well. If I get up every morning expecting my kids to sleep until 8 or 9 a.m., I'm going to be disappointed. If you live north of town and you drive on 29 South every morning and you expect to have a traffic-free commute, you're going to be frustrated. If you go to work expecting your day to be stress-free and calm and quiet, you get where I'm going. The point is not being pessimistic. The point is being realistic and wise to know what to expect out of life. And because of how much our expectations actually govern the way that we think and feel. So this carries over into Christianity as well. What do you expect as a Christian? Did Jesus come to solve all of your problems, to make you handsome and wealthy and wise? Did he come to just secure your place in heaven? Or did he come for something else? What do you expect your life to be like as a disciple of Christ? Do you expect growth to be fast and easy and sort of carefree? If you're here this morning and you're not a Christian, what do you think it means to actually be a Christian? What would you expect life to be like as a Christian? These are good things for us to be thinking about. And this morning, I want us to think as Christians about a specific expectation. Do you expect to suffer. Do you expect suffering to be a part of your daily life or a frequent part of your life as a Christian? I think for most of us, at least initially, the reaction is a resounding no, of course not. I don't expect suffering at all. We avoid suffering. And for the most part, that's why typically when suffering comes into our lives, we don't handle it very well. This morning, we're going to be thinking about suffering as we continue our study through the book of First Peter. We're going to be in chapter four today, verses one through eleven, page one thousand sixteen in your few Bibles. And as you're turning there, I want us to take a minute just to get the context, to remember where we are in the text, in the study so that we can can. going to be informed as we approach our text this morning. So Peter is writing to Christians in Asia Minor, modern day Turkey, and they are the new people of God through Jesus Christ. So through the gospel, no longer is Israel God's focus. Now it's the nations. It's all of those who are in Christ. And he's calling this people to be hopeful in their suffering because of Jesus's life and death and resurrection. He has created this people. He's he's given them a new life to be characterized by hope. It's a living hope. It's a living hope in a salvation that is coming, that is secure. It is something that Jesus has purchased by his death and resurrection, and therefore it is guaranteed for God's people. They are protected, guarded for this inheritance by God himself for the last day when their salvation is actually realized. And so because of that, because of that secure hope, they are called to live this life now in the midst of war. So after going through their identity in chapters one and two, Peter tells them to abstain from the passions of the flesh that wage war against your souls and to live honorable lives in front of the Gentiles before God. So he's calling us to war. He's calling us as Christians to warfare. Now, the nature of this warfare is not physical, but spiritual. The battle is one of trust. Will we trust God despite suffering? Will we believe that he's good? Will we believe that his reward is worth waiting for, that his promises are true? And will we even suffer for that belief? This is this is the grand narrative of our lives as Christians, but it's played out in very mundane aspects of life, like submitting to God's authorities like government and submitting in work to employers who may even be unfair and submitting in the context of marriage. Jesus came to serve both as the example for how we navigate those difficult situations and as the one who empowers us to live that way in the midst of our suffering by his suffering as our substitute. So this morning, Peter is wrapping up the main body of the letter from chapters the middle of chapter two through this section in chapter four, and then he'll be moving into final instruction. And so what I want us to take away from our study this morning is this. Because our time is short, Christians are called to suffer in the world and in the church for God's glory. So because our time is short, we as Christians are called to suffer both in the world and in the church to the glory of God. So let's listen as I read First Peter, chapter four. Since, therefore, Christ suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves with the same way of thinking. For whoever has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin. So as to live the rest of your time in the flesh, no longer for human passions, but for the will of God. For the time that is past suffices for doing what the Gentiles want to do, living in sensuality, passions, drunkenness, orgies, drinking parties and lawless idolatry. With respect to this, they are surprised when you do not join with them in the same flood of debauchery and they malign you. But they will give account to him who is ready to judge the living and the dead. For this is why the gospel was preached, even to those who are dead, that though judged in the flesh the way people are, they might live in the spirit the way God does. The end of all things is at hand. Therefore, be self-controlled and sober minded for the sake of your prayers. Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins. Show hospitality to one another without grumbling. As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another as good stewards of God's varied grace. Whoever speaks as one who speaks the oracles of God, Whoever serves as one who serves by the strength that God supplies in order that in everything God might be glorified through Jesus Christ to him belong glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. The first thing I want us to look at this morning is the mindset of our suffering, the mindset of suffering in verses one and two. We see that Peter begins with this since therefore, so the passage this morning is very closely tied to the last section where Peter talks about Jesus's suffering in the flesh. Jesus's suffering was substitutionary in nature. His death was once for all the righteous for the unrighteous that he might bring us to God. So Jesus's suffering was different in the sense that his suffering accomplished something for us. And now, on the basis of his suffering, Peter is calling his readers to arm themselves with the same way of thinking. Now, this is the language, again, of warfare. To arm yourself. That's what a soldier does to get ready for battle. Again, we saw at the beginning of the letter in the body, the main section of the letter, this warfare image when Peter said, Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your souls. War is the nature of our life as Christians. So this calls us back to the first question I asked about expectations. War is life and death. There are friends and foes. War is intense and bloody and painful. It has a very narrow margin of error because the stakes are high. It requires effort. War is about strategy and courage, discipline and precision, perseverance and grit. Part of the soldier's daily procedures is the gear up, the being equipped for the fight. Each soldier has to put on the proper attire and get the proper equipment so that he can perform his specific duties on the battlefield. And this is exactly what Peter is writing to us about. For Christians, part of our daily gear, our daily equipping for the battle, is taking on this mentality. Expect suffering. Arm yourself, prepare for suffering. Jesus lived the perfect life and ultimately he was crucified for it. By his death, he delivered the fatal blow to the enemy. He severed the heart of the world's rebellion against God. And he now leads those who were rebelling against God to fight on God's side, to fight against the evil one, to break that pattern of rebellion, to live in submission to God's authority. But even though the battle has been won, the rebellion continues. And so we find ourselves as Christians right now in a world that's in opposition to God's good rule. And so as a result, as a result of that conflict, there is suffering. Now, everyone suffers, we all suffer in all kinds of different ways, all of our suffering is the result of sin in the world. In other words, before Genesis three, there is no suffering. Everything is right between God and man, between man and man, man and creation, all is well. After Genesis 3, after the fall, when sin enters the world, so does suffering. Now that doesn't mean that all suffering is directly tied to specific sins, but just consider some of the different ways that we suffer as human beings. So we suffer just from the general brokenness of the world. So there are natural disasters, there are earthquakes and tornadoes and hurricanes that destroy things. Not necessarily because somebody spinned and brought that about, but just because that's the way the world is. It doesn't work as it was intended to. We suffer health-related causes. Again, not because we always do something to bring those about, but just because our bodies don't work as they ought to. We suffer from the sins of other people just broadly. So things like that happen culturally that just affect us in negative ways, or political decisions that are made that aren't things we had anything to do with, but they have a bearing on our lives. We suffer specifically from individuals' sins against us. And then we also suffer because of our own sins and bring suffering into our lives. Regardless of the kind of suffering, At the root of our suffering as Christians is how all of it relates to a good and sovereign God. For Christians, for all people, really, but for Christians, the battle is this in the midst of in the midst of my suffering, I'm wrestling with the reality of this suffering is happening. God is good and God is sovereign. So if God is really sovereign. Then why didn't he stop this suffering from coming into my life? Is he not powerful enough to do that? Or if God is sovereign, then is he not good enough to stop? Does he not really love me? Does he not really care for me enough to stop suffering from coming into my life? But the gospel tells us that God can be both powerful and good, and yet suffering can still happen. And one of the reasons there's a lot of reasons more than we have time to answer this morning. But one of the reasons is that suffering provides the context for us as Christians to display God's glory to the world as we trust him while we suffer. And by demonstrating that. So it's obvious to the watching world. So God is magnified when we show that he is worthy of our trust, worthy of our allegiance, despite the reasons, despite having a good reason for what's happening. When I trust him anyway, that magnifies his greatness and his worth and his authority to the world. So just to be clear here, Christians should expect suffering to be a part, a normal part of your lives. expecting suffering. We have the mentality for armed and ready for suffering. It'll make us profoundly thankful when we don't have suffering in our lives. It's like a soldier is happy when he comes back at the end of the day and he has the same amount of ammo as he had that morning because he didn't encounter conflict that day. So to we as Christians will be extremely thankful when we're not suffering. But more importantly, we will be prepared when suffering does inevitably come. We'll be able to suffer in a way that brings glory to God, and that's what we'll be thinking about for the rest of the text this morning. We'll see specifically that the kind of suffering Peter's talking about here in this first section is avoiding sin. So he talks about this a little bit in chapter three, suffering for righteousness sake, when you do what is good, when you do what is right and you get mistreated because of it. The reason for this suffering, he says in our verse, so we're back in we're still in chapter in verse one, whoever has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin. So Peter is saying not that once you suffer, sin is taken away, but he is saying that once you as a Christian have resolved to suffer, you've made up your mind. If it comes to this fork in the road, I'm going this way. I'm going to suffer. I'm not going to fall into sin. I'm going to suffer. I'm going to avoid sin, even if it takes suffering. Once you've made up your mind there and then you've actually suffered, you've actually been willing to enter into suffering for God's cause. It shows that the decisive break has taken place in your heart, in your allegiance to sin. You have actually taken that road. You've gone away from sin and chosen God's way. So it doesn't mean that once we become Christians, we never sin again, or that if you're here this morning and you're struggling with a sin, that you're necessarily not a Christian. It doesn't mean that. It means that once you've committed to suffer, once you've endured persecution, once you've trusted God through a trial, you have already begun to triumph over sin. Rather than choosing to curse God, rather than following the pattern of the world, when you suffer out of love for and allegiance to God, it shows that you've been changed. Your heart has been transformed. Sin's dominion over you has been broken. And so we as Christians are called to have a mindset that expects suffering, that anticipates it, and that's prepared to use suffering as an opportunity instead of sin to have its way to glorify God, to turn it on its head and say, no, I will worship. I will glorify my God. And so now Peter is going to get a little more specific in how this plays out first in the world and then in the church. So suffering in the world beginning in verse two, I'll go ahead and read that again. So as to live the rest of the time in the flesh, no longer for human passions, but for the will of God, for the time that has passed, suffices for doing what the Gentiles want to do, living in sensuality, passions, drunkenness, orgies, drinking parties and lawless idolatry. With respect to this, they are surprised when you do not join them in the same flood of debauchery and they malign you, but they will give account to him who is ready to judge the living and the dead. For this is why the gospel was preached, even to those who are dead, that though judged in the flesh the way people are, they might live in the spirit the way God does. So the purpose of our suffering, as Peter says, is so as to live the rest of our time in the flesh, no longer for human passions, but for the will of God. So we see here that the battle lines are drawn very clearly. There is no neutral ground. There is living for human will or there's living for God's will. They are mutually exclusive. We only have so much time and energy and resources and we're either investing it in God's will or we're investing it in the will of the flesh. And so we see here in this text that the Christian life may actually get harder rather than easier. It may have seemed more natural and easy to follow God when we first heard the gospel, when the invitation was given, whatever, when we first responded, when God granted us faith and we we turned to him. That may have been easy compared to some of the things we face as Christians. So don't let it surprise you when you find your faith is tested. Don't let it don't doubt the authenticity of your faith. Expect your faith will be tested. Remember this warning, heed Peter's words, commit to act on your confession of faith, even when it's hard. Peter is stressing the urgency of this command here, for the time is past. The time that is past suffices for doing what the Gentiles want to do. Now, notice he's using the phrase Gentiles to refer to people that ethnically would have been Gentiles, that is not Jews. But we see here that the amazing change that's taken place through Jesus Christ, there are Gentiles that he's referring to, not because they're not Jewish, but because they're not Christians. Peter is making it clear that Christians are the true Israel, those who are united to Christ by faith are God's people and everyone outside of that are the Gentiles. And so those outside of Christ are characterized by a certain kind of behavior, sensuality, passions, drunkenness, orgies, drinking parties and lawless idolatry. Now, because this is first century language, let me help you understand what some of these terms mean in the 21st century. They mean sensuality, passions, orgies, drinking parties. Sin has not changed that much. It all involves a departure from God's good design. It involves taking what God has made and given to us to enjoy according to his ways and turning it into something that exists purely for our pleasure. It may be packaged somewhat differently now, may be accessible in different forms now, but the substance of sin is always the same. So what Peter is describing here may may have some connection with cultic worship in first century Rome. We'll talk a little bit about that in a minute. But brothers and sisters, this is the same place that takes place on college campuses and in clubs. It's what's glorified in the media that we see all the time. It's what's accessible 24-7 on the Internet. We don't call it worship, but don't be fooled into thinking that it's anything other than that. And Peter says the time that is past is sufficient. So whether you're here this morning, young or old, whether you're deep into these patterns of sin or you're just flirting around the edges, Peter is saying you have had enough right now. Today is the time to break that pattern of sin, to turn away from it and turn toward godliness. Verse four starts to give us insight into what life was like as a first century Christian, he says, with respect to this. They are surprised when you do not join them in the same flood of debauchery and they malign you. So we get a sense in that verse of this this frantic search on the world's part for pleasure and meaning and identity, that they're just going from thing to thing, literally running from experience to experience, constantly disappointed and yet still pursuing fulfillment. Just like water cascading over a waterfall, so they are rushing to their own destruction. In the first century, to be Roman was synonymous with a lot of this kind of idolatry and behavior. Romans considered it their civic duty to gather into these festivals, to worship the emperor, to participate in these kind of behaviors. And so as people came to Christ, as they heard the gospel and responded and became Christians, they broke these patterns. They identified them as sin and they cut them off. They stopped participating as they did before, and as a result, the response of the world first is surprise. You see that here first, they are surprised. What do you mean you're not coming? And then that surprise quickly turns to hostility. They malign you. They were slandered and ridiculed. for their morality. Christians were considered unpatriotic and viewed with suspicion and became social outcasts in the first century. See, even even non participation in sin is threatening because when we don't participate, we're implying moral judgment. We're saying that there is a line. We're taking a stand for what's not allowed, and then we're condemning, therefore, those who disagree. Sinners respond to that kind of hostility. to that kind of judgment with hostility. They justify themselves and then they condemn others. They condemn Christians for not participating. So we need to see this morning that living as Christians means that we very well may be out of step with the culture around us. So when people come to us and say, haven't haven't you seen this or haven't you read that or haven't you been to this place? Didn't you hear about what's going on with this person? Don't you have the latest X thing? What do you mean you don't believe that? We as Christians must be willing to take a stand and say, no, no, I haven't. I don't have that. I don't do that. I don't go there anymore. I'm not into that. I believe the Bible. I follow Jesus Christ. I fear that right now relevance is a big category, topic, thing that Christians are thinking a lot about. And I feel that too often in the name of relevance, we're at least getting misted, if not completely immersed in the flood of the world's debauchery. Brothers and sisters, the time that has passed is enough. You have devoted enough of your life to sin. So don't give into the temptation to identify with the world in anything. Arm yourself with willingness to suffer for righteousness by being out of step with the culture around you. The suffering that we experience in this way really comes in two waves. So the first wave is just not participating in these things, right? There is suffering that comes when we resist the passions and impulses of our own flesh. Sin has pleasure. It's fleeting, but it is real pleasure. It's there. Christians are called to forfeit that temporary pleasure of sin and to choose the greater pleasure that comes from God's reward. So that's the first way. But then the second wave comes when we're persecuted for doing that. So when we abstain, when we when we don't participate in something and we don't haven't seen or heard or thought whatever it is with the world, we haven't been identified with the world. we get persecuted for it. And Peter is writing to these first century Christians and to us and telling us to set our expectations accordingly. If you are going to be faithful to Christ, this will happen. Someone might make fun of you. You might lose friends. You might miss out on opportunities. You might eventually be hurt because of your faith. Expect it. Expect that kind of reaction. Suffering will never be relevant. The call upon us is not to be relevant to the world, it's to be light in the darkness. Light stands out, it's uncomfortable if you're used to the dark, but we were made for the light. Those of you who are here this morning that are young people, we're glad that you're here, we're glad that you're here every week, but you need to hear this word especially because you are the ones in the center of the world's crosshairs. You are the one who is specifically targeted in so much of what the world is doing, and so you need to be armed and ready. Consider this text a wake-up call. You are in a war for your soul. There is no neutral ground. Seek Christ while you can. In verses five and six, Peter goes on to tell us how to think about those who are in the world. So we're thinking a lot about our our division, our break from the world. And so in the next verse, he really helps us to think about how we should consider those in the world. He says they will give an account to him who is ready to judge the living and the dead. The reality is that there is a final judgment coming. God is ready to judge all humanity, both those who are currently living and those who have already died. This idea of giving account is legal language. It's defending oneself before a judge. And so this puts persecution in perspective. If God is going to judge them, then we don't need to fear them. We don't have to defend ourselves because God's judgment is just. When the battle is over, God will commend his people for holding fast to him and he will vindicate the wrong done against them, punishing those who continue in their rebellion. And you see, ultimately, when we are rejected, when we are persecuted for our faith, ultimately they're rejecting God. Perseverance matters because judgment is coming. And so Peter is warning them, don't give in to the pressure to conform, because when the judgment comes, God will sort it out. And you want to be on the right side. You want to be on God's side when the judgment comes and not identified with the world. But at the same time, this is not a call to passivity. It's not a call to withdraw from the world. Peter goes on to say, this is why the gospel was preached, even to those who were dead, that though judged in the flesh the way people are, they might live in the spirit the way God does. The gospel is the good news that Jesus Christ came into the world to rescue sinners from their rebellion against God. He lived the perfect life that we owed. He died the death that we deserve for our sin. He was raised from the dead to offer new life to all those who believe in him. That's the message that was preached in the first century. It's the message that's preached here this morning. It defines Christianity. So if you're not if you're here this morning as a non-Christian, that's the message, that's the content that defines us as the people of God. And I'd be happy to talk to you more about the gospel and its implications for you. You may be wondering this morning what Peter means when he says that the gospel was preached to the dead. And I think that the simple, easy answer is that the word now that is supplied in a lot of translations to those who are now dead, it's people who are now dead, some of them who are Christians who were once living in rebellion against God. They heard the message of the gospel, they believed, but then they went on to die. From the perspective of the world, it looks like their faith didn't accomplish anything. Looks like their lives had the same outcome as everyone else's. They died. But for Christians, death is not the end of the story. Because Jesus Christ was raised from the dead, because he has conquered death, therefore he has conquered death on behalf of all those who are united with him by faith. And so even though Christians die, Christians die with hope in a resurrection. They will be raised by the Holy Spirit, just like Jesus does. And so to the death of believers, really, it shouldn't surprise us because the gospel was never intended to save people from physical death. That was not the message. The judgment of man that Peter is talking about is universal. It comes to every human being because we're all identified with Adam. But the gospel was preached and is preached now in order to give eternal life in the spirit. salvation from final condemnation. That's what the gospel delivers us from, not suffering here and now, not death here and now, but eternal death and eternal suffering. So this text really helps us to think about those outside of the church. The last in the verse five, we see we shouldn't fear them. We shouldn't let their persecution and words carry too much weight because we know God is going to have the final say. But we also see here that we shouldn't be indifferent toward them. The gospel is good news for sinners. Each of us was at one time in that rebellion against God, we were with them in their sin, but the gospel came to us and changed us. And so there's hope for every sinner out there that the gospel can change them, can rescue them from their own destruction. We will all face death and judgment, and the gospel is the only true source of hope and security through God's judgment. Eternal life is found nowhere else other than the name of Jesus Christ. And so we are called not to withdraw, but to go boldly into the world and to make the gospel known. That's what we sing about in O Church Arise. Put your armor on, hear the call of Christ, your captain. The second verse. our call to war, to love the captive soul, but to rage against the captive. And with the sword that makes the wounded whole, the word of God, the gospel, we will fight with faith and valor. The main way we suffer as Christians is by abstaining from evil and even enduring persecution for doing so. And then also by proclaiming the one message of hope for sinners. Next, we're going to think about suffering in the church. So verses seven through eleven, we're going to see how Christians are called to suffer in the context of life together in the church. Now, before we we start into that, I just want us to wrestle with that that concept for a minute, because is it really right? Should we really expect suffering in the church? I mean, isn't isn't the church supposed to be a safe place, a haven from suffering? At one level, of course it is. It's absolutely a safe haven and should be, considering the kind of persecution Peter's talking about. This should be a place where the church should be a safe place from persecution. It should be a place where we're encouraging one another in godliness, where we expect that from one another. It should be a place where there's a positive peer pressure and that we all may not pursue Christ in exactly the same ways. There's this general expectation that we're all here because of a mutual commitment to follow Christ as King. So that kind of suffering, of course, we shouldn't have in the church. But there are ways that we still do suffer in the context of our life together. for one reason, because our flesh never rests. We find ourselves suffering because we do what we don't want to do, and we don't do what we want to do, even in the church. We also suffer because of other people, because we enter into relationships with others. In some ways, the church is a place where we actually commit to suffer together. We enter into suffering with each other by sharing in one another's sorrows. So as members of a church, we don't get to insulate ourselves from the suffering that each other experience. We commit to bear each other's burdens. But then we also suffer in the church because our sins against one another can actually cause greater pain. It's one thing to just sort of be hurt by someone out there who doesn't mean as much to you. It's an entirely different thing to be hurt by someone in your family, to betray, to have that kind of trust betrayed. And the reality is that we will hurt one another. That brings about a unique kind of suffering, but as Christians, we're required to reconcile, to agree, to pursue unity and harmony with one another. And that causes an even different kind of suffering where we have to when we're offended, we have to set aside the hurt. We have to let go of that pain and give give give way for forgiveness and grace instead of pursuing revenge. So so, yes, even in the church, we should expect suffering. Let's look at verse seven, the end of all things is at hand. Therefore, be self-controlled and sober minded for the sake of your prayers. Now, Peter wrote the end of all things is at hand 2000 years ago. Now, I'm just going to tell you, I don't think Peter was confused. When Peter said the end is near, he wasn't he was not saying near in terms of time. It's going to happen soon. What he's saying is that we are living in what the Bible refers to as the last days. God's plan from the beginning was creation, fall, redemption and glorification. Jesus came into the world at God's appointed time, as we thought about this week. He lived the perfect life. He died a substitutionary death. He was raised from the dead. And before he ascended, he said, I'm coming back soon. The end is near because the only thing that remains to happen is the return of Jesus Christ. That's the only thing left in salvation history. Has it been a long time? Has it been a long time? Maybe in our perspective, maybe it has. But listen to second Peter three. Scoffers will come in the last days with scoffing, following their own sinful desires. They will say, where's the promise of this coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all things are continuing as they were from the beginning of creation. For they deliberately overlook this fact that the heavens existed long ago and the earth was formed out of water and through water by the word of God. And that by means of these, the world that then existed was deluged with water and perished. But by the same word, the heavens and the earth that now exist are stored up for fire, being kept until the day of judgment and destruction of the ungodly. But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord, one day is a thousand years and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you. not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance. So it may feel like a long time for us, but rest assured, it is not a long time for God. And we can't get lulled into thinking because it feels like a long time that nothing is going to happen. Peter is calling us to action, to perseverance. The nearness of the end should motivate us to finish well. He's telling us that there has got to be an urgency to the way that we live because the stakes are so high. The judgment is coming and we must be ready. Now, in light of that, we might expect some dramatic calls to do something crazy, to do something radical and irrational. And yet what follows in these verses is a very plain, very normal picture of a Christian life. Praying, loving and serving. See, the urgency that God is calling us to actually results in a very sort of mundane living in light of God's heart's dependence upon him and loving the things that he loves. That's what he calls us to. That's what he expects of us. So we'll consider those things. First, suffering in prayer. He says, therefore, be sober, self-controlled and sober minded for the sake of your prayers. Those are serious words, self-controlled and sober minded. They tell us that this is a mentality that's not going to happen naturally. It's going to take effort. We have to constantly remind ourselves that the stakes are high and that the way that we live matters. For the third time in his book, in the last two chapters, he's telling us that the way that we live affects the way that we pray. We're used to thinking the opposite, that prayer affects how we live, and that's certainly true, but we don't want to miss what Peter is saying here. A serious, disciplined, godly life is necessary for an effective prayer life. The call to be self-controlled and sober-minded is a call for a mindset that informs our prayers. It means that we have to be thoughtfully engaged with the world as it's unfolding around us. Knowing what God thinks, knowing how he would have us understand and how he would have us act in response to those things, taking those requests to God and seeking him and his purposes in the moment. We have to move beyond a sort of mentality of prayer as just kind of a spiritual power up. We certainly can and should go to God in the day to day moments of life, but we have to see prayer as more than that. In prayer, we have the opportunity to commune with the living God. We bring our praises to him for who he is, a God who is holy and righteous, but also merciful and patient. To bring him thanks for the things that he's done, for sending Christ to die and rise again for us. To confess our sins to him and experience forgiveness, to bring our requests to him, especially requests that are in line with the return of Christ. See, prayer is an opportunity for us to align our hearts with God's heart, to be reminded of his purposes, to seek his purposes as we go about our lives. And with the seriousness of this time in view, it's a way to depend upon God completely for the grace to persevere. The more we discipline ourselves to remember God's eternal plan and look toward our fulfillment in the return of Christ. the more we will be driven to pray in Jesus' name for his kingdom to come and his will to be done in those day-to-day mundane moments of life. Next, we'll see a call to suffer in love, verses 8 and 9. Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins. So Peter says this is above all. This is the most important thing. As I leave my words for you, passing the torch on to the next generation of the church, as I leave this with you, this is the most important thing I want you to hear. Keep loving one another earnestly. The reality is that our love as Christians easily grows cold. Just like a fire that has to be stoked and shifted and have fresh wood added to it to keep it going, so too it takes active effort on our part to keep loving each other. One of the ways that we practically pursue loving each other is spending time together. It's easy to not love people that you're not with. Sometimes it's hard to love people you're with, but but the point is, it's easy to forget about people when you're not with them. So one of the practical applications is just not to miss the regular gatherings of the church. And I realize I'm saying that to people who are at the regular gathering of the church, but see this time is important and protected because it's easy to not care about these people around you when you're not around them. The command for us is to love and not just to feel love. Often we confuse those two. We sort of have this expectation in our culture that if we're not feeling it, we're not being authentic and real, and therefore it's a good excuse not to act on that. If you're not feeling love towards someone whom you ought to love, then the problem is probably with you and not that person. We see in this text that Peter is giving us why love is so difficult. Because love covers a multitude of sins. The reality is that all of us are here as sinners. You would be much easier to love if you would stop sinning so much. And I would be much easier to love if I stopped sinning so much. Sin is the great barrier to love. It drives people apart. It separates them. And that's why, Peter says, this is above all. This is why the commitment to love is the most important characteristic in the church. Love is like oil in an engine. If an engine doesn't have oil in it, the friction and the heat will cause it to seize up in a matter of seconds. In order for us to be what God calls us to be, love has to be at the core of how we think about and interact with each other. So this verse, again, calls us back to our expectations. Do you, as a Christian, expect to be sinned against by other Christians? If your answer is no, then I fear that you are putting unbearably crushing expectations on the people in your life. Now, it doesn't justify anybody's sins. Our sins are never justified. But if you don't expect people to sin, then you're not going to be equipped to deal with sin when it actually does happen. And further, I fear that if that's you, if you're here this morning and you don't expect anybody else to sin, you may not understand what the Bible has to say about our nature as human beings, even as redeemed human beings. There's only one person whom we don't expect to sin, and his name is Jesus. He is the righteous one. For the rest of us, we shouldn't be surprised at some level by the sins of others. Peter is calling us to be armed with the gospel so that when we are sinned against, not if, but when, we are ready to overlook that sin. When we don't have love, we always view each other with mistrust and suspicion. We're always on the verge of conflict, but love allows us, as Paul says in First Corinthians 13, to bear all things, believe all things, hope all things and endure all things. So let's let's be clear, though, as we're thinking about love covering sin, this doesn't mean that we never confront sin. Matthew 18 tells us clearly that we have an obligation to confront a brother or sister who is in error, and it also doesn't mean that it's not loving to confront. In some instances, it's the most loving thing we can do. If you're a parent and your child is is heading toward danger, running toward the street, The most loving thing you can do is is interrupt that process, confront them and save the child. And that may be painful. It may be intense, but it is absolutely loving. What it does mean, what this verse does mean is that we don't allow sin to run its course and to destroy our relationships with each other. When we grow in intimacy, we are going to see each other since it's going to happen. the context of relationships, in relationships, we just can't possibly right every wrong, we can't correct every sin. So there's a time when, out of love, we set aside the sin, the hurt that a person has caused against us, and we continue to love that person. So one of the hard parts is determining when do we confront and when do we let love cover. And so here's a few things to consider. Is this a pattern of sin in this person's life, or is this just a one-time occurrence? Is my desire to confront more about vindicating myself and making this right for me, or is it about truly helping the other person see what he or she doesn't see? Is this the right time, the right way, the right place to go about this? Am I the best person to bring this correction? If the answer to any of those questions is no, then that may be a situation where love should cover. But now, if love is going to cover, this is what I say in premarital counseling, then love actually needs to cover. So love covering a sin means that it's truly covered. It's blotted out. It's buried. It's gone. It's not set aside in a closet to bring out the next time a conflict happens. When love covers, the result is continued fellowship, continued even warmth, despite the hurt. Often we can use the phrase and say love is covering this sin when we're really just not confronting, but we're holding on to anger and bitterness and forcing the other person to pay us back for the hurt that they've caused us. So this that's why this command to maintain love is a gospel centered command. It flows out of the understanding of how God has related to us, has set his love upon us and has covered our sin millions and millions and millions of times over. In response to that grace, we are to live that way, covering each other's sins. The next verse, verse nine, is a practical extension of the command to love. Show hospitality to one another. without grumbling. I love this verse, I love this verse because of this, the beauty and the glory of Christian hospitality, of sharing our lives together, but also Peter's realism. Do it, but don't complain about it. We see another aspect of just practical suffering in our lives together. It certainly is the emotional and relational weight of sinning and forgiving and reconciling. It's all of that. But it's also the practical sacrifice and effort and intentionality it takes to love, to live together as a community. Do it, but don't complain about it. Now, the way that we can go about hospitality without grumbling is to remember who and whom we're serving. We're serving God's people purchased with the precious blood of Christ. This is his body, his bride, his flock, his treasured possession. What an honor to serve God's people. But most of all, we're serving God. He's our master. He's given us this task. And so we should do it with faithfulness and thanksgiving and joy. Hospitality in the first century meant hosting Christian missionaries that they went from town to town trying to expand the advance of the gospel, hosting them in your home to provide lodging and food for them as they went about their travels. It also may have meant hosting the church gatherings. The early church met in people's homes, and so it took a home with enough space for enough people to be there. It took time and money and effort. Hospitality now certainly could be hosting missionaries, could be hosting church functions, home groups and things like that. But I think hospitality should be something much more basic and something that all of us can do. Now, some of us, when we hear the word hospitality, we find it very intimidating because some people here even are extremely gifted in hospitality and they can put on a gourmet meal, serve it on China and with silver in a formal dining room in a house that you can wipe everything down and it passes the white glove test. That's awesome. We love those people that can do that. That's incredible. But that's beyond the horizon of what we're talking about when we're thinking about Christian hospitality. When we think about Christian hospitality, we should think of humble hospitality. So the simplest way to think about hospitality is just inviting other people into your lives. So I'm going to confess I'm stealing this from another pastor that I heard preach this, but I think this is the vision for hospitality that I would like for us to have as a church. And this is about as practical as I can get in a sermon. So here's what hospitality should look like. Go to the grocery store. Buy cans of soup. Two cans for every three people. Okay? Buy styrofoam bowls, plastic spoons, plastic cups. Invite people over to your house. Dump all of the soup into a big pot. Use a ladle to dump after it's warm to put the soup into bowls. You have one pot to clean up, one ladle to clean up, and that's it. Everything else can be thrown away. Okay? Bread and crackers, optional. Nice, but optional. And then invite people over to your house and sit in your living room or at your dining room table or whatever it is and ask each other, how are you doing? What's what's going on? What are you encouraged by? What are you struggling with? How can we pray for you? What are you learning from God's word? If hospitality is exhausting or intimidating to you, I fear that your standards are wrong. The goal of hospitality is not to impress the people that are coming to your house. It's to fellowship with them. And so we want to have humble hospitality. I'd love to see everyone here making your goal to do that once a month, twice a month, something like that, rather than having one elaborate meal every year. Make it your goal to get other people into your lives. Last, we'll see the call to suffer in service. As each has received the gift, use it to serve one another as good stewards of God's very grace. Whoever speaks is one who speaks oracles of God. Whoever serves is one who serves by the strength that God supplies. So we see this this call to use our gifts to serve others. And I want to make a couple of observations. So first, Peter tells us that we are stewards. So the gifts that we have are not ours. They are God's. When you are a steward of something, your outlook changes. If I own something, I don't have to answer to anyone for how I use it, for how what condition is in it, for anything else. But if I'm a steward, I am accountable to somebody else. And so it is with our gifts. God expects us to use our gifts for their intended purpose. Second, God has given a gift to each. So when you become a Christian, God equips you with some gifts. some talent or ability empowered by the Holy Spirit for ministry in the church, and he expects everyone to contribute. Now, this doesn't mean that everybody has the same gift or the same amount of the same gift. He is portioned all according to his will, but it is clear that everyone has a gift and everyone is supposed to participate. Third, God has given to each a gift for the purpose of serving others. That's the reason that God has gifted every Christian and the responsibility before every Christian is to use his or her gift to serve others. This is one of the reasons that a local church is so important and, in fact, necessary for you to be a faithful Christian. You can't make sense of this verse apart from a regular gathering of a particular body of believers. This isn't something that we do at our convenience, in our own way, to whom we want. It's based on the people that God has sovereignly placed around us, whom we commit to love and then figure out how to do it. The local church brings about this kind of suffering in a way that nothing else does. And so according to these verses, in fact, you are not being faithful as a Christian if you are not pursuing participation in a church where you can regularly use your gifts to build up the body. One of the questions when we get to a passage like this is, what are these gifts? What is what is he talking about? And they're they're all a form of serving. That's very clear. Peter tells us that there are two categories, their speaking and their service or practical need meeting. We see elsewhere in the New Testament gifts are listed out. I'm not going to read them all, but Romans 12, First Corinthians 12, Ephesians four. We see these lists of gifts that are given and they still fall into these two basic categories. Both are for building up the church, either through speaking or serving in a practical way. In all of these passages, it's clear that no gift is more important than another. In order to have a healthy and functioning church, both kind of gifts have to be in operation. The church is not fulfilling its mission. If everyone is speaking, even speaking the oracles of God, or if everyone is serving, even serving in the strength that God supplies, both of them have to be taking place for the church to be healthy. Now, the real question for all of us this morning is, what's my gift? That's what we all want to know. God doesn't give us an ID card when we're born again that tells us what our gift is. But what he does give us is each other. So rather than looking inward, the best way to discover your gift is to look outward. Who has God placed in your life and how can you serve that person? Your ministry, if you start to think that way, your ministry is going to gravitate toward one of two sides. You're either going to find that you're often speaking things to each other that God is using in their lives, or you're often practically helping people in ways that they need. So the way to discover your gift is to start seeking to serve others and see how your gifts are affirmed in the context of a church. It may be that you did something or said something that God has used and you see how the body affirms that gifting. You'll notice those two categories, the speaking and the serving, correspond to the offices of the church, the elder and the deacon. And so one of the things practically that's helpful for us as elders is that as you observe, as you experience in the life of the church, people serving you, either by speaking or by serving, to let us know that because as we seek to call out officers, it's helpful for us to know who is acting and who's fulfilling their call, who's being used by God in the body for those purposes. It's also just a practical thing that you should consider it part of your ministry as a member of the church to encourage and affirm where you see God having gifted and used people to bless and encourage you. Finally, we see the purpose for our service as Christians in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ to him belong glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. All of it, all of our suffering, all of our effort, everything we're about ultimately is that God would be glorified. God is glorified in us when his purpose is brought about in individual lives, when sinful men and women who at one time hated God, who rebelled against him, when they are transformed by the gospel of Jesus Christ into people who give themselves to God, who willingly suffer for the good of others. God is glorified because his power and his goodness and worth and authority are on display for the world to see. His very grace is like a diamond. It reveals the multifaceted complexity of God's goodness. And so notice that our serving is either speaking God's words, speaking as the oracles of God or serving in God's strength. So true Christian service is never in our own wisdom. It's never in our own power. And this means one thing that we'll never say to God, one thing that we will never say to God is you're welcome. We will never tell God you're welcome because everything we do is ultimately from him and through him and to him. So whatever good we do as Christians, it comes from God and it's ultimately for him. He's magnified in us by changing us from being rebels against him to those who promote him in this world. And nothing, brothers and sisters, does that more than when we suffer. When we follow Christ and it costs us and we suffer for it and we do it anyway, it shows that he is supremely worthy of our trust and our allegiance and our worship. We show the beauty and riches of his grace. We show the vastness of his wisdom and the greatness of his power. So, brothers and sisters, let us arm ourselves with the resolve to suffer for God's glory and fight for his fame in the world. Let's pray. Our Father in heaven, we praise you today for the suffering of our Lord Jesus Christ. We thank you that he suffered for us, he suffered in our place, and so he suffered in a way that we never will. We thank you that his suffering also serves as a pattern for us, as an example for us. And we thank you that by his suffering, we are empowered to suffer. So, God, we ask that you would help us even this week, even this afternoon, to suffer well, to arm ourselves with the mentality of Christ to suffer. We pray that we would see your purposes behind our suffering. Pray that we would seek your glory in the midst of our suffering, and we pray that we would suffer with the absolute hope and confidence in a future that is secure through Jesus Christ. And so we ask that you would use us in this world to promote and spread your fame and your glory through Jesus. Amen.