Title: Armed with Attitude
Text: I Peter 4:1-6
FCF: We often struggle responding well to unjust suffering.
Prop: Because our suffering for doing good is temporary and revelatory, we must arm ourselves with Christ’s attitude.
Scripture Intro:
[Slide 1] Turn in your bible to I Peter chapter 4.
Last week was a little more on the academic side. I hope in spite of that you were able to learn and grow. Today, Peter takes all the theology and academia and aims it at the hearts of his audience. Indicative switches to imperative. Telling them what IS transitions to telling them WHAT TO DO.
Of course, every New Testament writer, when commanding their audience to do something, grounds that command in truth. And even though Peter just proved conclusively that Christ suffered for doing good and was given glory because of it… he will add a couple more pillars of truth to undergird his command to his audience today.
I am reading from I Peter 4 in the NET which starts on page 1366 in the pew bible. You can follow in whatever version you have.
Transition:
Not near the uncertainty of last week but much to get to. Let’s get right to it.
I.) Because suffering means we have been stopped from sin, we must arm ourselves with Christ’s attitude. (1-4)
a. [Slide 2] 1 – So, since Christ suffered in the flesh, you must also arm yourselves with the same attitude,
i. Peter’s point is inescapable for his audience and has been for some time.
ii. They may in fact suffer for doing good. But they ought not live in terror over this. Why? Because the fear of suffering for doing good is relegated to this earthly, fleshly, and temporary existence.
iii. Since this world is a temporary illusion of the eternal state, his audience ought to suffer without fear, instead trusting and fearing Christ while living harmoniously and humbly, even with those who persecute them, seeking to give an answer for the hope they have.
iv. Their example of doing this is none other than Christ Himself.
v. Peter has conclusively proven that Christ suffered in the flesh.
vi. He came to earth and suffered for doing good. In fact, His suffering was God’s good. His suffering proved He was blessed of God.
vii. Because in that suffering not only was He doing the will of the Father, bringing glory to God the Triune, but He was also rescuing His people and bringing them back to God, since they were separated from Him by their sin.
viii. Christ died for sinners. The just for the unjust.
ix. And in that death His mission was complete. Thus began His victory march to the realm of the dead, back to the realm of the living, and then to God’s realm itself.
x. Now Peter comes to chapter 4. Because Christ suffered in the flesh, in this physical realm, in this temporary plane…
xi. That gives Peter the springboard for this command…
xii. Arm yourselves. This is battle language. It is “get your sword ready! Draw your weapons!”
xiii. But notice! What is our sword?
xiv. Christ’s attitude.
xv. What was Christ’s attitude in suffering in the flesh?
xvi. I think He demonstrated it best in the Garden of Gethsemane.
xvii. Was his human nature afraid? Oh yes. He did not want to experience physical death. And he did not want to experience temporary separation from the Father.
xviii. But who did He fear more than death and separation?
xix. “Yet not my will, but yours be done.”
xx. His human will feared the will of God far more than death or separation. For it was the will of God for Him to suffer.
xxi. His attitude was exactly what Peter has said. Trusting and Fearing God.
xxii. And then he went like a lamb to the slaughter without saying a word. Meek and mild they hung Him on the tree.
xxiii. So, Peter’s audience when facing suffering for doing good, they must arm themselves with the faithfulness of Christ in fearing and loving God to continue to do His good, and the meekness of Christ so that in that suffering they may do so gently and courageously.
xxiv. This… is so…. Backward. We don’t think this way.
xxv. I keep saying Peter wrote, Peter wrote, Peter wrote… but I hope you understand… God’s Spirit penned this through Peter. Because Peter would have never said this in his own flesh. Indeed, Peter was the one who armed himself with an actual sword and sliced off someone’s ear defending this meek Christ as He went obediently to the cross for our sins.
xxvi. Now he tells his audience… arm yourselves with the attitude of Christ.
xxvii. In many ways this is part of Peter’s ongoing repentance. Don’t be like me. Be like Christ.
xxviii. But this isn’t the only thing in this text that we will see that seems backward…
b. [Slide 3] Because the one who has suffered in the flesh has finished with sin,
i. What?
ii. Haven’t most people suffered in life? Does this mean that all people who suffer no longer sin?
iii. Well, it certainly can’t mean that. So, what does this challenging little phrase mean?
iv. First, By suffering in the flesh, we must assume that he means suffering for doing good in the will of God. To pare it down to simply suffering would violate all that Peter has been saying since chapter 2.
v. Now the tricky phrase – has finished with sin.
vi. I could enter into a longish explanation about what is happening here in the Greek… but the conclusion is that the Greek doesn’t help us. Why? Because the best translation is something like “He has been stopped from sin.”
vii. How is it that a person who is suffering for doing good has been stopped from sin?
viii. Although there are many views, Peter is making a statement that at first seems quite unlikely but will later demonstrate it to be true. So, let’s, for the time, assume it to be true outright.
ix. And let’s keep reading.
c. [Slide 4] 2 – in that he spends the rest of his time on earth concerned about the will of God and not human desires.
i. This phrase explains what it means to have been stopped from sin.
ii. In this it is implied heavily in this text and verified in others that it was our sin that kept us from truly being concerned about the will of God and enslaved us to human desires.
iii. In other words, the only reason that Peter can command them to have the attitude of Christ is because they have been stopped from sin and freed to concern themselves with the things of God and stop concerning themselves with human desires.
iv. Now that we have been stopped from sin – we can spend the rest of our lives in the flesh (or on earth as the NET says) being busy about God’s business. Seeking His kingdom and righteousness.
d. [Slide 5] 3 – For the time that has passed was sufficient for you to do what the non-Christians desire.
i. Peter stays on the topic of time.
ii. You’ve been stopped from sin so that you can spend all your remaining time on earth concerned about God’s things and not natural desires.
iii. Because the time (on earth) you had before being stopped from sin was more than sufficient for you to have fulfilled those desires.
iv. Now what is Peter saying here? Is this the “sow your wild oats” passage? Is Peter saying that it is ok to allow young people to spend time indulging their sinful desires – get it out of their system – so they can come back ready to focus on heavenly things?
v. No. In fact, I think Peter is saying the opposite.
vi. The shortest amount of time spent with sin, is more than sufficient to allow you to experience the depth and darkness of your wickedness.
vii. Indeed, speaking to persecuted Christians suffering for doing good – it may be in their minds to dabble in some of their old ways in order to get some relief.
viii. But Peter says… no.
ix. That time has passed. It is gone. You can’t get it back.
x. And would you want to?
xi. Don’t you remember who you were? Before we look at Peter’s reminder to them, for who they were… why don’t you spend some time thinking about who you were before God opened your eyes. Before God lavished His grace on you. Who were you? What did you live in? What has Christ freed you from?
e. [Slide 6] You lived then in debauchery, evil desires, drunkenness, carousing, drinking bouts, and wonton idolatries.
i. Peter calls out his audience for all that they were and it wasn’t a pretty picture.
ii. I’ll not go into each of these words in too much depth. Essentially at the core they lived lives that were governed by their desires. Their bodies, their relationships, and even their spiritual selves were turned in on themselves. There was nothing they weren’t willing to do for themselves. And if it was worth doing… it was worth doing to excessive proportions.
iii. If we take what we have already seen about sin, how it prevents mankind from being concerned about the things of God, and makes it impossible for mankind to stop sinning, we can position ourselves to interpret Peter’s words accurately here.
iv. We can see that such is the natural disposition of all men’s hearts. They may not commit every sin or be the vilest of sinners. But sinners will sin. That is what they do. Although to varying degrees – they are slaves. Not just to sin, but to Satan as well.
v. Cast off the illusion that in order to be enslaved to Satan you must die and go to his domain and be tortured by him. My friends that is myth designed to disguise the truth. That is happening right now. Every single person who is not in Christ is a slave to the vicious will of their father the devil.
vi. Understanding this helps us to realize…
vii. We ought not look at Peter’s audience and think – wow what a loathsome bunch of pagans they were. Nor should we see their testimony and pine for ours to be like it.
viii. People get really weird when they see the testimony of another believer that is particularly jarring.
On the one hand you have some who have convinced themselves that they have always believed in God, and have always tried to live a life for Him. So, the testimony of someone like this is appalling to them because after all- they were never THAT bad.
On the other hand, you have some who hear a testimony like this and wish they had one similar. “Wow God saved them from so much sin and muck… it makes my testimony of getting saved in Sunday School at the ripe age of 6 seem so anticlimactic!”
ix. Both of these conclusions make the same error. The error is the assumption that their personal sin is less than these listed.
a. [Slide 7] I have put Luke 18:9-14 on the screen behind me. It serves as the justification for my next statement.
b. You may want to reevaluate if you are a Christian or not.
c. My friends if our sin prevents us from being concerned about the things of God, if our sin has enslaved us to fulfill its desires and the desires of Satan as the scriptures says, if our sin has separated us from God… then to say you have always believed in God or always tried to live as He wanted you to. To look at Peter’s audience or others around you and think – well I’m glad God got me before I was that bad – to do this is to suggest that you don’t understand sin and that you don’t understand God.
d. Meaning that your claim to have always believed in God and tried to serve Him is false. And your satisfaction over not being as bad as others… is a delusion you have made for yourself.
e. You were as bad… and more, as we’ll see in a moment.
a. The scriptures do not teach us that we all start out in a neutral position to which the sins we commit makes us a vile sinner.
b. Rather we begin as a child of wrath enslaved to sin. As we live it manifests in various expressions, the most heinous of which we learn to hide quickly like lying, jealousy, hatred, pride and idolatry. The more obvious expressions of sin like these listed in this text are the natural outpouring of a heart that already has all of these more egregious sins fully gripping it.
c. That being said – if the Lord lavished grace on you early, catching you before you descended to these baser and more obvious expressions of wickedness – your testimony is the same as a prostitute, a drug addict, a murderer. For the core of all these sins was fully formed and operational in you when the Lord delivered you from sin.
d. Stop cheapening God’s grace by thinking it was no big deal to save you. Stop arrogantly assuming that you were not a vile sinner at the age of 5. Your parents know better.
x. That is why Peter says the time has been sufficient for you to do as the non-Christians desire.
xi. The time of your slavery, however long it was, was enough.
xii. But we still lack clarity on the end of verse 1. How does someone suffering for doing good prove or show that they have been stopped from sin?
xiii. Are you ready? Peter will draw the conclusion.
f. [Slide 8] 4 – So they are astonished when you do not rush with them into the same flood of wickedness,
i. The natural mind of man cannot comprehend the fact that former sinners are not now pursuing sin.
ii. This sharpens what Peter means when he says “he has been stopped from sin.” It is not a declaration of wholesale cessation from sin. We aren’t talking about perfectionism here.
iii. But we are talking about the death of sin in the heart of someone in Christ.
iv. And when non-Christians don’t see even a desire in you to do as they do… if you looked at this list and thought ugh… who would want to do these things?
v. If you look at this list and started putting in sins you used to do before you were converted….
vi. Is there even a desire for them anymore?
vii. The world will not understand this.
viii. They can understand you wanting to “drink a little less” but that doesn’t mean you have to stop coming to the party!
ix. They may understand that you got a new “religion” but that doesn’t mean you can’t work on Sunday.
x. Ok, so you are committed to your wife – but that doesn’t mean you can’t come to the strip club!
xi. Right, so people matter to you, that’s great, but you need to make your employees afraid they’ll get fired if you want them to be productive.
xii. My friends, the world… just… doesn’t… get it.
xiii. They can accept minor life changes with subtly new passions and priorities. They can even accept people turning over a new leaf to engage in culturally accepted behavior. But they cannot wrap their minds around wholesale life change based on the work of an invisible force, purchased by a man who was killed 2000 years ago, revealed in an ancient book, that cuts across what is culturally acceptable.
xiv. And what do we humans do when we don’t understand something in this way?
g. [Slide 9] And they vilify you.
i. If you swim against the stream everyone thinks YOU are the problem.
ii. If you stick out, everyone makes YOU a target.
iii. And doing all this while claiming to be following a God that THEY should be following too?
iv. Well, those are fighting words. Because to live a holy life before the ungodly is to instantly reveal their own sin to them. And that is not comfortable.
v. Pretty soon, they will make you out to be everything that is wrong with the country, the company, or society in general. Since you won’t join them, they’ll make sure you never can.
vi. And this is Peter’s point.
vii. This is why Peter can confidently say that if you suffer for doing good you have been stopped from sin.
viii. The evidence of the death of your sin, is that you resist it to the point of suffering for doing so. That is the true test for whether your sin is truly dead.
ix. The answer to this riddle is revealed.
x. And it proves to be just as Peter said. To suffer in this temporary life for doing good and abstaining from the desires of the flesh, is to prove beyond shadow of doubt that you have been stopped from sin.
xi. Why?
xii. Because if you haven’t been stopped from sin… you could not and you would not suffer for doing good. You would simply go back to what you did before.
h. [Slide 10] Passage Truth: Peter reminds his audience that their present suffering for not continuing their sinful practices of their former life, proves that they have been stopped from sin. Not sinless – but certainly these sins have been put to death. Based on the fact that their suffering for doing good proves this to be true of them… how ought they to view suffering for doing good?
i. [Slide 11] Passage Application: They must arm themselves with the same attitude of their suffering Savior. His attitude of faithfulness to fear and love His Father above His own human fears. His meekness when facing intense suffering for doing good. This is the attitude of Christ, and it must be taken up as their weapon.
j. [Slide 12] Broader Biblical Truth: Zooming out to the rest of scripture can we find this truth? Indeed, we can. If we are bound by sin, enslaved to it. If we are children of wrath. If every man is not righteous. If no one seeks after God. If all men’s hearts are evil and desperately wicked. If even David admits to having been sinful at conception. And if sin prevents us from being concerned about God or seeking Him or His ways. Then what happens when you find someone resisting sin to the point of their own physical suffering. What do you know of that person? That sin – whatever they are resisting – is dead. It has ceased. Indeed, this was the primary concern of the writer of Hebrews toward his/her audience. In fact, the contexts are so similar with differing conclusions we need to go there to see it. READ HEBREWS 12:1-4. Peter’s audience and the author of Hebrews’ audience have the same truth presented to them but with different conclusions. Peter is assuring his audience that their struggle against sin to the point of suffering for not doing it is proving them to be of the faith. Whereas the writer of Hebrews states this as a reason for why he/she has doubts about some of them.
k. [Slide 13] Broader Biblical Application: So, my friends, what does this mean for us? We too must arm ourselves with that Christlike attitude. He obeyed His Father, doing what He was commanded, even though it would mean great suffering. He set his eyes to the cross and went there meekly and gently. He hung there willingly though He could call all the host of heaven to His defense. And He stayed there until He fully paid the penalty for our sin. We then must arm ourselves with that same faithfulness and meekness. We too must be fearful of our God above the pressures of this world. If we are truly believers, those in Christ would rather suffer in their bodies then sin against their God. And as they suffer they meekly and gently face those who harm them with an answer for the hope they have. This must be us. We too must arm ourselves in the fight against our sin – even if comes to the point of bloodshed. And the only way we can arm ourselves – is with fear for our God and meekness toward others.
Transition:
[Slide 14(blank)] But there is another attitude of Christ that the writer of Hebrews displays that Peter now raises. For Christ endured the cross and suffered the shame for the joy set before Him – the promise of sitting down in approval and victory at the right hand of God. His victory is also why we continue to arm ourselves with his attitude.
II.) Because all men will be judged according to God’s standard, we must arm ourselves with Christ’s attitude. (5-6)
a. [Slide 15] 5 – They will face a reckoning before Jesus Christ
i. Peter has one more riddle for us in this text.
ii. He sets it up first by assuring his audience that for all the persecution that they are experiencing at the hands of the wicked, not one bit of it has been overlooked. Not one injustice has been forgotten. Not one insult to the people of God will be unaccounted for.
iii. Every sin against God’s people is a sin against Him. And one day, there will be a reckoning. This is why WE must be meek and gentle with those who would oppose us.
iv. As God says “Vengeance is MINE, I will repay.”
v. His vengeance is just and measured. His vengeance will not exceed what is due and will not come from selfish motives.
vi. As the Holy God, creator of all there is, possessing all control, all authority, seated on the throne above all thrones… Jesus Christ will justly give what all people have earned.
b. [Slide 16] Who stands ready to judge the living and the dead.
i. Who are the living and the dead?
ii. Jesus stands ready to judge them.
iii. Based on the previous statement about a reckoning we may conclude that the living and the dead are those who are living and dead who are non-Christians.
iv. Or perhaps we could conclude that this is talking about judging the physically living and physically dead, Christian and non-Christian alike.
v. However, then Peter says this.
c. [Slide 17] 6 – Now it was for this very purpose that the gospel was preached to those who are now dead,
i. So now we have to wonder where Peter is going.
ii. Is he talking about dead people getting another chance to hear the gospel?
iii. You might say – no it says those who are “now dead.” But here is the thing – the word now is not in the text. It has been added for clarity.
iv. Why was it added?
v. Peter continues…
d. [Slide 18] So that though they were judged in the flesh by human standards they may live spiritually by God’s standards.
i. Peter is playing jump rope with the terms living and dead.
ii. With this last statement it is clear that the ones to whom the gospel was preached who are dead, are those who like Christ have died in their physical body.
iii. Even though all of humanity considers them dead – by all human standards they are dead.
iv. God actually determines whether or not someone is dead. Because though physically dead, they are spiritually alive in Christ. Just as Christ was made alive in the spirit.
v. So when he says that Jesus stands ready to judge the living and the dead – he is not speaking in physical terms. Rather, he is talking in spiritual terms.
vi. In this he both comforts his audience that death in this life is not always a defeat. But he also warns that the living are not necessarily the victors either.
vii. God determines who is living and dead. And Jesus will judge those who are either spiritually alive or dead.
e. [Slide 19] Passage Truth: Peter reminds his audience that God alone determines who is alive or dead. That your physical existence is little more than a blimp on the way to your eternal existence. Peter reveals that this world is oftentimes the mirror image of the world that is to come. What seems one way is often the other. And Peter makes it clear that God’s perspective is how things actually are.
f. [Slide 20] Passage Application: Therefore, they must arm themselves with the attitude of Christ. For His attitude reflects the world through the mirror. The world that is right.
g. [Slide 21] Broader Biblical Truth: So much in scripture is written to get God’s people to stop focusing on this world. Although it is true that God created this world and when He created it, it was very good. What is certain is that His plan was never to have His people dwell in this place. He would have them dwell with Him. In scripture it says that the sufferings here is not worthy to be compared to the glory to come. God remains the judge of all things. And so many things in this life work opposite of the way God says they actually are. Death is not the end, nor is life all there is. Yet spiritual death is the end and spiritual life is all there is. To determine anything by what we see or feel, is to be like a person observing the world around them by looking at a mirror. It is oftentimes… backward. But the one thing we know is that God’s perspective is all that matters.
h. [Slide 22] Broader Biblical Application: So for us CBC, we must have the attitude of Christ. We must face suffering for doing good boldly. We must be faithful to our God, fearing Him more than any earthly thing. Knowing that all this is temporary. We must instead fear God who has the power to cast us into hell. We must love Him and serve Him with our lives. And when we suffer for doing this, may we meekly and gently face those who would scoff at us. May we have an answer ready for the hope we have.
Conclusion:
[Slide 23 (end)] Peter gives two reasons in this text that we ought to arm ourselves with the attitude of Christ.
First, because suffering for obeying God and resisting sin is evidence that sin has been put to death in our lives.
Second, because this life is temporary and all that happens here will be judged by God and none other.
In light of both of these – we must arm ourselves with the same attitude that Christ had when He endured suffering for us.
How did Christ endure suffering for us? What was His attitude going to the cross?
It wasn’t masochistic. He didn’t enjoy suffering or desire death. He wasn’t seeking it out. In fact, he left Jerusalem in the early part of his ministry to delay His crucifixion.
And even in the Garden of Gethsemane he did not desire it. Not really.
But what was His one desire?
The will of God to be done. And what was the will of God? That Christ would atone for the sins of His people with His death on the cross.
And once resolved to obey the Lord, how did he treat his captors? His judges? His persecutors? His executioners? His deserters?
My friends the world we live in is consumed with us vs. them. Left vs. Right. White vs. Colored.
Can we just take a moment to recognize that all of this is a farce? Do you want to know how the world is actually split?
The spiritually living and the spiritually dead. The seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent. The children of God and the children of Wrath.
And here is the key. Only God sets the standard for who’s who.
And what does Peter say in this text? Suffering for doing good and resisting sin shows you are alive. Even if the world kills you for it… you are alive.
How are you going to possibly suffer for doing good and resisting sin without the attitude of Christ going into that?
What are you willing to suffer for? When is the last time you suffered to the point of physical harm in order to not sin against God?
My friends very soon our culture will turn on us. It has already begun. Things that have been age old beliefs of the church for faith and practice are beginning to be hurtful, misogynistic, abusive, and counter to progress and a free society. Very soon the Christian faith will be classified as it was in Peter’s day.
You see the Romans at this time thought their civilization was the peak of human progress and advancement too. They too thought that their society was free and the best chance at happiness that the world had ever known. And how did they come to view Christianity? It was known as a “pernicious superstition” that sought to topple the established order because they refused to honor Caesar as a god, ensuring of course that calamities of the gods would fall on them. Thus they became enemies of the state. They were accused of “hating the human race” because they believed and lived the way they did.
My friends, we are only a few steps away from this being the prevailing thought about Christianity in this nation.
Why do I bring this up? Why all the doom and gloom?
Remember the words of Peter. Arm yourselves with the attitude of Christ. Very soon resisting sin may come with a price tag. Very soon doing good may cost you a pound of flesh. Very soon being humble and harmonious with people may mean they laugh while killing you for it. Or your wife. Or your kids.
Know that God sets the standard for who is among the living. And realize that suffering for resisting sin is an assurance of its death in you. For if we are alive to God, we are dead to sin. And with this in mind… Arm yourself with the attitude of Christ.