Pilgrims in a Fallen World: Gospel Centered Living
I Peter
2:21-25
Introduction:
I started thinking about the theme of our current series in I Peter in November
of 2015, as we looked on the Sunday of Thanksgiving week at Psalm 84. The Psalmist writes in verses 5-8 of the
promise of strength for the journey,
Blessed is the man whose strength is in You, Whose
heart is set on pilgrimage. 6 As they pass through the Valley of
Baca, They make it a spring; The rain also covers it with pools. 7 They go from strength to strength;
Each one appears before God in Zion. 8 O LORD God of hosts, hear my prayer;
Give ear, O God of Jacob! Selah.
The Lord is
our strength, and even when we go through a desert place, a valley, a place of tears, we can dig a well, and go “from strength to strength.” In other words we can not only survive, we
can thrive, we can grow stronger through times of trial. Peter is writing to pilgrims, to “exiles”
scattered among the nations, and encouraging them (and us!) to persevere and to
stay “on mission” despite the trials they are encountering. In this section of his letter, he has been urging
his readers to submit to the authorities that God has placed in their lives. Government authorities, the workplace, he’ll
talk next about the family. He emphasizes that there is a motivation to accept
authorities, despite that fact that we may not be treated fairly. 1) God is sovereign, he is the ultimate authority,
and He has arranged the circumstances of our life. Jesus said “All authority has been given to me in heaven
and on earth.” We can trust him. 2) We are pilgrims, passing through the
world, we are here for just a little while, but we were created for eternity. 3) Because we are in a fallen world we should
expect trials, hardship, even injustice to touch our lives, but we can be
encouraged because like another apostle said, “The sufferings of this present world are not worthy to be compared to
the glory that shall be revealed to us.”
The best is yet to come! Today we’ll
be reminded that, 4) Jesus is our example. Jesus, the perfect and sinless Son
of God suffered, and in his suffering accomplished God’s good purpose. As pilgrims in a fallen world, we shouldn’t be
surprised by suffering...
The Maine* Idea: As we follow
Jesus, we may suffer for His sake, and for the sake of winning others through
the message of the Cross.
I. A Pattern to Follow: As Christ suffered unjustly for our sins, we may be called to
suffer unjustly (21,22).
21 For to this you have been called, because Christ
also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his
steps. 22 He committed no
sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth.
Jesus never promised the Christian Life would be easy (21). Just this week I was listening to a sermon by Alistair Begg in a
series he has been doing on evangelism.
I was driving so I couldn’t take notes but something he said really
struck me. After presenting the gospel, after calling someone to recognize
their sin and to put their trust in Jesus and his finished work, he said we should
make it as difficult as possible for them to believe! His point was that too often we make it sound
easy, and we don’t call them to count the cost. “God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life. Let go and let
God.” That is all true if said in the proper context, but it is only part
of the question. Jesus said, “If anyone
would be my disciple, let him deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me...” Not many of us reflect deeply on what He is
saying there, because the “cross” doesn’t impact us in the same way that it
would those in the first century, in a world under Roman oppression. The cross
was an instrument of torture and death. It was a totaling humiliating public
execution.
Notice first of all that he says, “...Christ suffered for you...” This
anticipates what will come in vv.24,25. He is our substitute; He suffered
for our benefit, in our place. I read this week the story of a young boy
who was consistently late coming home from school...
...He always got distracted playing with his friends and almost never got
there when he should have. His parents warned him that he must be home on time
that afternoon or there would be consequences. Nevertheless he arrived later
than ever. His mother met him at the door and said nothing. His father met him
in the living room and said nothing.
At dinner that night, the boy looked at his plate. There was a slice of bread and a glass of water. He looked at his father's full plate and then at his father, but his father remained silent. The boy was crushed.
The father waited for the full impact to sink in, then used that as an opportunity to teach his son about grace. He quietly took the boy's plate and placed it in front of himself. He took his own plate of meat and potatoes, put it in front of the boy, and smiled at his son. He had given his word, there had to be consequences. But he took the consequences on himself. When that boy grew to be a man, he said, “All my life I've known what God is like by what my father did that night.”
At dinner that night, the boy looked at his plate. There was a slice of bread and a glass of water. He looked at his father's full plate and then at his father, but his father remained silent. The boy was crushed.
The father waited for the full impact to sink in, then used that as an opportunity to teach his son about grace. He quietly took the boy's plate and placed it in front of himself. He took his own plate of meat and potatoes, put it in front of the boy, and smiled at his son. He had given his word, there had to be consequences. But he took the consequences on himself. When that boy grew to be a man, he said, “All my life I've known what God is like by what my father did that night.”
Peter is
talking about suffering and He is talking about substitution. Think about what that says, about what it means to you
personally, “Christ suffered for YOU.” For your benefit, and as the passage
will make clear, in your place. He knew
you from before the foundation of the world. Including your sin, your rebellion.
And He loved you, and sent the Son to die for you. The hymn writer seems overwhelmed by the
thought of it when he asked,
“Was it for crimes that
I have done He groaned upon the tree? Amazing pity, grace unknown, love beyond
degree!”
That moment, that truth, is the supreme demonstration of
love. While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us! With that truth sinking in, consider the rest
of v.21, “...leaving you an example, that
you might follow in his steps...” How can we follow Him? He was the
perfect, sinless Son. He sacrificed His life so that all who trust in Him could
have life.
The call to be
his disciple is a call to follow Him. That is literally what disciples did in the
time of Jesus. They would follow their
teacher around and listen to him and ask questions and learn. A Christian is called to be a follower of
Jesus. We touched on this concept in our
“vision statement,”
“We envision a community of Christ followers, rooted in the
Word, treasuring God as supremely valuable, and proclaiming the riches of His
grace to the world.”
The more we know Him, the more we will love Him, the more we
will treasure Him. Then it will be our joy to point others to Him. The disciples were commissioned to bring the
message of His grace to the world. You
might think, “What difference can I make?” You too are called to be a world
changer – starting with your household, your oikos, those people that you know and rub shoulders with on a
regular basis. Their good is more important than your convenience.
He was perfectly sinless yet He
suffered (22). We shouldn’t miss the implication of this. He
was sinless, we are not. He was perfect, we fall short. We suffer, often
because of our own choices, sometimes because we live in a fallen world. Not
all hardship and suffering is because of being persecuted for righteousness’
sake. When I would do something that caused
me trouble growing up my dad would say, “If you’re gonna be dumb you gotta be tough!”
[I would not recommend that as a way to build self-esteem in your kids!] Sometimes
we reap the consequences of our own sinful choices. Other times we may experience hardship just
because we live in a fallen world. God
told Adam after the fall that the ground would start to bring forth thorns and
thistles, and that they would eat of its fruit only by the sweat of their brow.
He said life would be hard. Believers in
Jesus are not exempt from that. As we
follow Him, we may suffer for His sake, and for the sake of winning others through
the message of the Cross.
II. A Call to Patient Endurance: Jesus endured
suffering, and steadfastly trusted in the Father (23).
23 When
he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not
threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly...
As Peter holds up Jesus as an example,
he points to His patient endurance, His steadfast trust in the Father’s
plan. The writer to the Hebrews lifted
up Jesus as our example and motivation in Hebrews 12:2-3,
...looking
to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set
before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right
hand of the throne of God. 3
Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so
that you may not grow weary or fainthearted.
Are you feeling weary, ready
to “lose heart”? Consider Jesus, the
sinless and perfect Son of God, came into the world, and not only did He suffer,
but He came in order to suffer unjustly,
so that ultimately, by faith in Him, we might receive grace rather than
justice. The word Peter uses in I Peter
2:23 has the idea of “delivering himself” or “handing himself over” into the
hands of the Father. He did not speak in his own defense. He entrusted himself
to the will of God. He knew the plan,
devised in eternity within the Godhead. And though He knew what it meant for
himself, though in the Garden he would pray that if it was possible the cup
would pass from him, He trusted that God’s plan and God’s way is the best way. And
so, as Isaiah spoke of the Servant 700 years earlier,
“He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth; like
a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers
is silent, so he opened not his mouth...” (Isa
53:7).
Remember the context. Peter is telling his readers
that they too may not be treated fairly in this world. That shouldn’t surprise
us. We live in a fallen world. Since Adam and Eve sinned this good
creation has been twisted and darkened by the Fall. We may suffer injustice, at
work, in the market place, at the hands of government, even at home. Exercise
your rights, fine, but that is not the first priority. God’s glory, God’s mission, must be our first
priority. We have been left here, in the world on assignment. We have to
love God enough to seek His glory above anything. And we need to seek his glory
by loving our neighbors enough so that the most important thing for us is to seek
to point them to Jesus. Do you remember one of the Sunday school classes that
we had on “evangelism,” one writer said that God’s glory is both “the fuel” and
“the fruit” of evangelism. Our heart’s
desire should be to see His fame spread through the world, one person, and one
household at a time. Paul was talking about
the perseverance of believers, living as pilgrims in a fallen world when he
said in his second letter to the Corinthians,
...as
grace extends to more and more people it may increase thanksgiving, to the
glory of God. 16 So we do not
lose heart. Though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being
renewed day by day. 17 For
this slight momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory
beyond all comparison, 18 as
we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For
the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are
eternal. 5:1 For we know that
if the tent, which is our earthly home, is destroyed, we have a building from
God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. 2 For in this tent we groan,
longing to put on our heavenly dwelling... (2 Corinthians
4:15-5:2a).
The Christian life is not a promise of health and prosperity
in this life. In fact, you can pretty much count on the fact that you will
suffer hardships and injustice in the world. Sometimes, because we are
pilgrims, because we are on a mission to share Christ with the people we rub
shoulders with, we will suffer rejection or persecution because we follow Him.
Jesus did say after all, “...in
the world you will have tribulation...” But that doesn’t define us, and it shouldn’t
paralyze us. Why? Because of the second part of that verse, “...but be of good cheer, for I have overcome
the world!” (John 16:33). As we follow Jesus, we may suffer for His
sake, and for the sake of winning others through the message of the Cross.
III. A Message to Proclaim: Through
His substitutionary sacrifice we have been reconciled to God (24,25). That is the Gospel, the
Message He has called us to proclaim to
the world!
24 He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree,
that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been
healed. 25 For you were
straying like sheep, but have now returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your
souls.
It’s pretty clear that Peter’s mind is
on Isaiah 53 once again. The prophet wrote in 53:4-6...
4 Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed
him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted.
5 But he was wounded for our transgressions; he was crushed
for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and
with his stripes we are healed. 6
All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way;
and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all.
First note that He has borne our sins, or as Isaiah
said, “He has borne our griefs and
carried our sorrows... He was crushed for our iniquities... the Lord has laid
on Him the iniquity of us all...” How
many ways can the prophet say that He was sinless, and that He suffered for us
and became our substitute? Do we sometimes suffer wrongly? Does injustice seem
to prevail? We are sinners living in a
fallen world! Jesus was sinless, perfect, yet willingly, he took our sins “...in His body on the tree...” The language here is intentional and
powerful. Peter chose his words
carefully so that his readers would think of the Old Testament, not only of the
Servant from Isaiah 53 who would bear our sins as our substitute, but also of Deuteronomy 21:22-23,
22"And if a man has committed a crime
punishable by death and he is put to death, and you hang him on a tree, 23 his body shall not remain all
night on the tree, but you shall bury him the same day, for a hanged man is
cursed by God.”
What kind of
crime is punishable by death in God’s sight? Romans 6:23 says “The wages of sin is death...”! Jesus took our sins in His body on the tree... He was cursed by the
Father... for us, in our place. The language of blessing and cursing in the
Bible is the language of life and death, of salvation and judgement. He was scourged
so that we could be healed. He became a
curse so that we could receive blessing, he died so that we could have life.
What is God saying to me in this passage? As we follow Jesus, we may suffer for His sake, and
for the sake of winning others through the message of the Cross.
What would God have me to do in
response to this passage?
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