1 Peter, 2:18-25

Alright, let's go ahead and read them verses. Oh, golly. You know, many of them might be less messy if I just read them. For the sake of the tape. Servants, be submissive to your masters with all respect, not only to those who are good and gentle, but also to those who are unreasonable.

For this finds favor. If for the sake of conscience towards God, A person bears up under sorrows when suffering unjustly. For what credit is there if, when you sin and are harshly treated, you endure it with patience? But if, when you do what is right and suffer for it, you patiently endure it, this finds favor with God.

For you have been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in His steps. who committed no sin, nor was any deceit found in his mouth. And while being reviled, he did not revile in return. While suffering, he uttered no threats, but kept entrusting himself to Him who judges righteously. And He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, so that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. For by His wounds you were healed, for you were continually straying like sheep. But now you have returned to the Shepherd and Guardian of your souls.

So, this is kind of an exciting passage. I mean, it cross-references so many cool things that we're doing right now. I mean, obviously, you've probably already picked up, and Vern, I think, has referenced in previous weeks, that Peter is quoting Isaiah and Isaiah 53, the passage we're in right now, repeatedly here. And it's just an amazing and Just a fantastic passage. Also, we'll notice there's a little bit of Roman VI cross-referencing and then all the word servants matches beautifully with the words of Paul to servants and masters.

So, it's just an amazing passage to get to study and you'll be so thankful that I didn't do as much as I did in previous weeks. So anyway, it's a fun crossover and we'll continue to bring out some of those similarities and things that Peter's done here.

So we'll start with 1 Peter 2, 18 through 20, which reads, Servants, be submissive to your masters with all respect, not only to those who are good and gentle, but also to those who are unreasonable, for this finds favor. If for the sake of conscience toward God a person bears up under sorrow when suffering unjustly, for what credit is there if, when you sin and are harshly treated, you endure it with patience? But if, when you do what is right and you suffer for it, you patiently endure it, this finds favor with God. So, who's Peter talking to in these verses? Servants? Absolutely. Servants. Actually, this word is different than the servants that we saw before. Consider yourself bond slaves of God in verse 16.

This is oikotes, which is built on the root word for house. So, it's more the idea of a household servant or someone who's within the family. One commentator, actually it was Hiebert, if you wanted to know, talked about this is viewing the servant as part of the family, part of the family unit. And it really goes well with what we'll talk about later with it being hupotasso, coming up under to support and be a part of the unit as a whole. So, even though you're not in the family per se, the servant is a part of the family and should be holding up that structure.

I've read different resources and all the numbers are high, but one resource that I read said between a third to a half of the population of the entire Roman Empire were slaves. And even a higher percentage of that of the Christian community would have been slaves. So when Paul's writing to the Christian community, chances are a large, large number of the people that he's writing to were servants or slaves in some facet or respect. So anyway, that's one reason for Peter to single out slaves here.

If I were crafting a letter to a group of people, I wouldn't necessarily single out, and you who sell cars, you do this, this, and that. But he saw fit, due to the context of the culture, to address slaves specifically. And I think we'll get into more specific reasons as to why why it's so important, and it goes on later, but they have a special ability to display Christlikeness as slaves. They have a unique opportunity, in a way that possibly no one else in society does, to replicate the life of Christ to the non-believers.

So, we'll get into that a little bit later, as we hit into the second half of this. Even still, none of us are slaves or household servants for the most part. Who can afford a butler? I know I can't. Maybe you can. But it's just not a common institution that we see anymore. So we can just skip over all this and go right to 22. Right? Why not? Why not? Scripture says, by love serve one another. Absolutely. Amen. Amen. We're to be servants of one another. What else?

Given the context here, now we have this nasty habit of displaying everything we know in our culture or reading everything we know in our culture back into theirs. So we think of slavery and we think of the horrible tragedy that wracked our country not so long ago. But that's not the Roman institution of slavery. It wasn't really even a shadow of it.

There was absolutely some slaves who were taken as the spoils of war and that did supply some of the deficit of slavery that was needed to continue to keep the Roman machine running. But the reality is that a lot of slaves were sold into it because they'd gone into debt, because their parents or family had sold them into debt, or because they'd been left out as Just left out for someone to pick up and they made a slave of them. Babies who were put out to be exposed. and were rescued, and rescued into slavery. And also, it's really important to notice that the Roman institution of slavery didn't have our moral appeal that we have. We talk about slavery, oh, they're just, they're slaves. That's slave wager, that's slave labor, that's, you know, and we talk about slavery as one of the worst ills that could ever befall a human, to have to be a slave.

And that wasn't a part of their context. It was a necessary and to them not a dishonorable thing to be a part of. Just because you're a slave didn't necessarily make you less of a person, though it did kind of make you property. But there wasn't the level of, oh, you own slaves? That's bad. So anyway, there's not the same moral grounding.

I guess what I'm getting at with all this is really the Roman institution of slavery, in my mind at least, bared a lot more similarity to our system of employment. than it did to what our conception of slavery. I mean really, a slave surely couldn't exchange his employer at will or his slave master at will.

I'm sure he would want to at times, but he couldn't and we can and that's a luxury we have. Although really, do we have that luxury? Sometimes, depending on your field, depending on where you are, depending on your qualifications. It's not always that easy to find a better job, find another job, find a different job.

So really, we wind up being fettered to our bosses similarly, often times, as we talk about to slavery. So, I think it's an absolutely clear and... and simple indirect application that we can make to our lives. As we read all these passages about slaves, obviously Paul talked about it a number of times, Titus, and it's just something that we can see again and again. And it's something that we can apply to our lives, once again indirectly, and yet at the same time has immense value to us. immense value to us as those of us who are employed. So anyway, employed by another, sorry. So that covers pretty much to whom. So now we get to this verb again. Yes, Jack.

Is there any kind of a distinction between servant and slave, and the position that Christ had in the servant of God? I am not prepared... What is the definition of servant or slave? Honestly, I can tell you... He took upon him the form of a servant, the scripture says. I don't know if that word servant in that context is the same as this, but certainly he hunted himself to the point of death. You know, washing disciples of feed also, I mean, he went as low as any servant, any earthen servant could ever go.

Amen. Yeah, and when you think about the disparity between it, I mean, we talk about humbling ourselves to be servants. We might feel like that's degrading ourselves or humbling ourselves, but how much more so from the position of Christ to humble himself to the point of a servant. In direct answer to your question, I don't know when Christ is called a servant.

That's a due loss. That's a due loss, okay. I'm talking about Philippians, the Philippians passage, it's a due loss. Okay, so it looks like that's the bond slave that we talked about last week, the piercing of the ear, a voluntary slave or servant to God. And this is the Oikero. This is the Oikero. This is the household servant that we're talking about here, that's right.

Most of these were owned slaves. It's possible that someone could be a servant and be a hired servant, but most of them were owned slaves. Yeah, and all the commentators, the good commentaries that I read, definitely didn't draw much of a distinction between servants and slaves, as far as it was just assumed, by most of them at least, and it seems completely legitimate. The slaves in that time, would they have been, their masters had been believers, and that's how they became believers? Because it seemed like they didn't have much freedom to go around, to go to I would think that that's highly unlikely. I don't know that for a fact.

An example of that situation would be, here's your servant, and your servant's job is to go get some food down at the market. There's your opportunity for exposure. Water. Those kinds of things. So just getting things regularly would put them in contact with others.

And at the auction of the master, slaves and servants were allowed to take time off for attending a church gathering or something of that sort. Like the slaves in this country, they usually have their own churches. They establish their own places of worship. Absolutely, yeah, the Lord won't be fettered by our puny little institutions.

For sure. Does that answer your question, Marilyn? Awesome. Yeah, I think that's a really good question. Alright, so, what's that verb again? What's the verb here? Submissive, be submissive, or submit. And you notice that it doesn't say servant, submit to your masters, because it's not an imperative.

We're going back to that participle thing again, where he's saying, and I think, personally, it's because he moved back to something more naturally. Like we talked about last week, I feel like it was, It was something so unnatural that Peter felt like to say, okay, this government that's killing you and persecuting, you need to submit to them. Not just submit in our Western sense, submit, submit, but come up under them and uphold them and try to support them in any way you can. I think that was so unnatural to the idea of coming up under and supporting something that you know is persecuting you, trying to wipe out all that you know to be good and true in the world, and you're supposed to come up and support.

I think that's why he used imperatives in the last few verses when talking about the government. Now he's back to things that are just natural. If you're a servant, you're expected to be submissive, anyway, in the secular context. That's what a servant is. A servant is someone who's submissive to their master, right? I was looking at this, he says, with all respect, a lot of the plays of the day, you know, we would have our sitcoms, a lot of the sitcom type plays of the day would show in comedy servants sneaking around behind the Master's back and making snide comments and pretending to be obedient and doing the opposite as soon as the Master turns back, etc. So, you're saying he interjects with all respect, not just the fake, in front of your face kind of submission.

Absolutely. Isn't that hilarious though? And then when Paul says writing to Titus, don't make a mockery of the faith, it's because of that. You don't want to be that sitcom. You don't want to be that joke. You don't want to live out that joke for the world to continue to mock us as believers.

So, it's really an amazing thing. And also, slaves were notorious for stealing, stealing something or taking something out. One Roman, I'm afraid of the name, I don't remember, but he said, every slave that we keep is an enemy that we harbor. So there was definitely that tension between slave masters and slaves, or owners and slaves, just like one would expect. If you were born into slavery, you'd kind of resist it in every way. You wouldn't feel like, why do I have to do this? Why do I have to fight against that? I mean, it's part of our rebellious human nature, right? It's a kick against that. So yeah, pretty fascinating stuff. Oh, so we're back to submit.

So he's saying, servants, You should be submitting. You're walking in Christ. You're walking out of your position. You're submitting to your Masters with all respect. I know you are, because I know you're walking in the Spirit. I know. So it's that kind of back to the participle thing. And just to go over Hupotasso, as Randy pointed out last week, because I jumped over it, I'm sure you guys are grateful for any jumping that I do, but in this case we'll just highlight it again. To come under, to come up under and support, and voluntary support. Not as if someone was behind you with a whip saying, you know, support this, support that, or do what I say, do it that. But voluntarily, in this case, coming to the master and saying, okay, what do you want me to do next?

I saw that the cows hadn't been fed today or whatever, I'm going to go do that. So voluntarily, actively serving, actively being a good member. Imagine what that would do in terms of your life as an employed human, if you are an employed human. Imagine, isn't that the ideal employee for most, probably not every, but most bosses? Someone who's saying, you know what, I'm going to go do this. Someone who doesn't need to be directed necessarily. Someone who's voluntarily supporting the company or the structure or whatever. It's just amazing. Well, we'll move forward. To what and to whom?

Wyss tells us that these slave masters, who could be called gentle, were viewed as the milk of human kindness. Because while there were laws in place saying that you had to keep your slaves at a certain standard, they were pretty bare bones. They weren't, you know, and you shouldn't beat your servant seven times a day, or and you shouldn't make your servant do something that they really, really don't want to do, or you should really respect your servant's choice of faith.

That's way, way, way out of left field. So a kind or a gentle master was like the kindest of the kind. Because he's being kind to people who have no ability to pay him back. He's being kind to people who have no sway or authority, no way to spread rumors for the most part. I mean, these are the people that, for all intents and purposes, you can be as mean as you want to and there's no repercussion. So, a kind master was just an amazing phenomenon of humanity that wasn't probably too terribly commonly seen.

Many masters were harsh and abusive, taking advantage of their slaves in every way imaginable, and as they were property, that was completely permissible. Beating their slaves constantly, and really, as you can imagine, this dark-hearted human, and this rage that he's playing out on this slave, this poor little slave, how much more would it be inflamed by being exposed to the light of the life of Christ in the believing heart?

Imagine the proud man looking into the eyes of their slaves who bow down before them and obey them, and seeing the One whom all men should bow down before, trust in, and obey. Imagine the dichotomy. Imagine how much that would anger and frustrate a slave master. I beat him? He thanks me. I beat him and I look into his eyes and I see that there's something in there way more than me, way more than Rome, way more than the Emperor.

How much would that just infuriate the hubris, the pride, the vanity of these slave masters who are ultimately taking out whatever their issue is on their slave? How amazing. We can't assume that just because, like I say, this would make the ideal employer the ideal slave, that the slave master or our boss is going to just all of a sudden say, oh, well, you're the best employee I ever had. You're the best slave I ever had.

They could react in the exact opposite way. And that's not like a release clause. Okay, I did my thing and they're still mean. Okay, I don't have to be nice anymore. I don't have to be a good servant anymore. I don't have to submit anymore. Absolutely not. All the more so. All the more so. So Peter here tells slaves that regardless of whether their master is kind or cruel, they're to be in full submission to that master. Now I'm moving to finding favor.

The literal translation of this is, for this is grace. The word this in this passage is indisputably referring back to the submission of the suffering slave, the submission of the unjust slave. Some commentators, like I say, the literal, if you were just to bring it directly across in English and say, this is grace. Some commentators have taken this then to mean, this is the mark of grace, alluding to the fact that the only way that one could do this is by the grace of God, and the grace of God through Christ in our lives. And while that is absolutely true, I think the reason the bulk of commentators have chosen favor over grace, is one, contextual, as we'll get into later, talking about credit, and two, it's acceptable given the fact that it's going to later find favor with God. And that next favor at the bottom of verse 20 is also the same word, keres, grace. So, in this case, it's not that we're finding grace, or that it's necessarily about that.

It's alluding to the idea of Christ and the idea that Christ spoke of, and the idea that's talked about in the Old Testament, that this pleases God. This finds favor with God. It's not talking about if you don't do this, you're out, or if you don't do this, you're in trouble, or God's going to be supremely unhappy and stomp on your birthday cake. It's the fact that this finds favor with God. This pleases God. This is what God wants to see in us. So, verse 20 reiterates the point, so as not to be misunderstood.

The word translated here, credit, carries the idea of fame, reputation, or glory. I believe the King James Version brings it across as glory. And it's not doxa, the usual word for God's glory, but it's a different word, which more is the idea of fame and reputation. Fame and reputation are positive, being positively viewed by another, if you will.

So this points to the translation of grace above, again, as the word favor. So once again, He's talking about credit to us or God imputing good, favorable outlook towards us. That doesn't quite jive with the whole, if you were to say, that's the mark of grace. It's kind of talking about this exchange of viewpoint and fellowship with God, if you will, that it pleases God. This also points to the translation. Okay, so there should be no spreading of good There should be no spreading of good reputation. That is to say, it's not commendable to endure the punishment for wrongdoing patiently if we actually were wrong.

That's expected. That's natural. That's normal. I know plenty of non-Christians who do something wrong, get caught, and put up with the punishment with a straight face. They're not happy about it, but at the same time, it's an expected, normal, and natural thing to put up with your punishment that you've been given justly. It's supernatural to put up with unjust suffering.

It's beyond the natural to be able to take a beating or take something that is not due you and still have a smile on your face, if you will. Still, praise God, still enduring it patiently, if you will. I don't know if you could say that you're required to have a smile on your face. But definitely enduring it patiently and with grace and love.

That's supernatural. That's something that we can't do. Maybe you're a better person than me. I could never do that outside of walking in Christ, outside of beholding Christ and being conformed to His image. And we'll talk about that as we get further, because that's the comparison he draws. That's supernatural power working in our lives as we submit to the unjust blows which are coming in our lives, whether by a master, a governor, or someone who is over us, as we submit to those with patience. we're displaying God's supernatural power in our lives, and that's really cool. It's really cool that Christ will work in us that way. So, moving on to 1 Peter 2, 21-25. Oh, sweet. Okay, 2 Peter 2, 21-25.

For you have been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow. in his steps, who committed no sin, nor was any deceit found in his mouth. And while being reviled, he did not revile and return. While suffering, he uttered no threats, but kept entrusting himself to him who judges righteously. And he himself bore our sins in his body on the cross, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. For by his wounds you were healed. For you were continually straying like sheep, but now you have returned to the shepherd and guardian of his souls.

We are so going to make it. This is awesome. Pump it back up. Don't I know you from somewhere? As was mentioned before, Peter's quoting or referencing Isaiah, if you like. Peter was obviously saturated with the Old Testament notion of Christ and totally convinced that Jesus' first coming was so obviously foretold by passages like Isaiah 53 and Psalm 22. Peter knew very well who those passages were talking about, and he knew very well that the Messiah had come and done what he had come to do.

Just to draw your attention to this, I believe Vern's going to actually pull it out in the service today, so I won't fall too heavily on it. No, I take that back. I'm going to talk a lot about it. But you can skip this passage here because we're going to go through it piece by piece.

So it becomes really important to recognize what Peter is doing. He's specifically singing about the servants, the slaves, and compared them to Jesus Christ in a special way. It's so easy to get wrapped up in the beauty of these verses. I mean, whenever the Bible starts talking about Jesus in these gorgeous, almost poetic passages, He suffered for you, and it's so easy to get wrapped up in ourselves, isn't it? I mean, He suffered for me, and it's true, it's not to say that... misapplication of the verses at all, and He's an example for our footsteps, and He committed no sin, nor was any deceit found in His mouth. I mean, it's so easy to just be so in awe of Christ and beholding Christ, and I think that's just and right, absolutely.

But this passage is connected to the servants. This passage, this characterization, this view, this picture of Christ is intimately tied to the servants. to a low, low, low, what we would call, from a human perspective, a low position in society. He especially singles out the servants. He especially singles out the people who are doing the small jobs. It's so strange.

In our human perspective, don't we look for, oh man, if so-and-so became a Christian, they could really make an impact for Christ. If that person, oh man, if governor so and so what and what, really decided to have a fire for Christ, wouldn't that make a difference? Wouldn't that really make it happen? Peter says, you know, super, whatever. Oh, if we could just get Constantine to ruin the faith for 500 years, that'd be fantastic! But no, he says, you know where you're going to really make that difference? That small thing, that servant, that's what's going to do it for you. That's where Christ wants to work. That's where Christ's life can be displayed and played out in ways that it can't be played out elsewhere, or may not be played out elsewhere.

It's amazing. To me, it's just mind-blowing. Vern pointed out that he came to shepherds. The humility of it all just blows my mind. Absolutely blows my circus. Majorly cool. So, let's see. It's when slave bears up under the unjust hardship that they are the most like the one they are positionally in. So logically, Since they are positionally in Christ, their actions with their masters are to reflect the one in whom they are.

What did Jesus do? Peter's not asking what would Jesus do, or what would Jesus do in the situation that you're in, but what did Jesus do? You want to take something for your example, take the fact that Jesus did this. Jesus held up this way under suffering and that's what he's going to show.

It wasn't just that the crucifixion of Christ came on a good day for Jesus. It wasn't like, man, good thing I got a full night's sleep two nights ago because otherwise this would have been really hard and Jesus would have been yelling at people and threatening. No. This was something that was prophesied years and years and years before that he wouldn't open his mouth. And that all these things that are talked about, Isaiah told us that this is how it would be centuries earlier. So this is not just the fact that, oh man, good thing we got the good Jesus that day.

This is who he was by his very character and it was prophesied that it would happen as it did centuries before and that's also really cool. So what an example. It's an amazing thing that Jesus provided the example of how to behave for our suffering. The word here example is hupogrammon. Obviously we get our word under and then we get our word grammar, I believe, from that word and it's the word for right. So the idea of underwriting, maybe it draws to mind the picture of, we all did second grade, first grade here, right?

So, and even if you didn't, maybe you saw pictures, they have all those big, big, big, where the lines are like this far apart with the big dotted line in the middle, and then there's the dashed letters in that you're supposed to trace over it and fill it in. Trace over, G, G, G, and then after a while all the dotted lines fade out, so you just have to do it yourself. Oh, where do I go? You know, so it's great. It's a great tool. That's what it's picturing.

It's picturing a young boy or girl in their education with that clay, they had a clay tablet or a wax tablet, and the teacher would write on the top of their tablet, you know, beta, beta, beta, and they'd have to write all their betas out, not the fish, the letter. although they'd have to write their betas all through until they did a good job. It brings to mind the image of maybe a child when they're learning to write, it's not that they can't see that their letter doesn't look like the letter in front of them. It's that their muscles aren't ready yet. They're not honed enough. They're not refined enough. One way to get those muscles right is to have a mother's hand over the child and form the letters for her. to forming the letters, making it happen.

It's just a majorly cool idea of what it is that Christ is our example. Christ is our thing and we just do it again and again by His power, by His hand on ours, again and again and again. And it's the only way it's going to get done. It's the only way. And it just also brings to mind that He could have saved us impersonally. He's God.

I'm sure he could have figured something out when he was planning it all out before Genesis. He could have said, yeah, I think I'm just going to, you know, appease myself by waving my wand over earth and going... He could have done it, but he humbled himself.

He came and walked among us. It's amazing. It's an amazing expression of love and care for us individually and corporately. He didn't just wave his magic wand and say, okay, tell you what, find the magical bowl, sacrifice it and we're all good. He came to him personally.

He didn't just provide the sacrifice, he provided an example. He showed us how to live at the same time as justifying us and reconciling us to himself. Jesus didn't just, you know, come and save us. He also gave us an example, someone to behold, an earthly ministry, a life. So, yeah, it's pretty powerful that our God is our example. Do you think Zeus would have made a very good example?

Not likely. Ares? I hope not. I mean, it just, yeah. So, now let's talk about that example. I told you I'd talk about that and we're going to make it. We're still going to make it. Fear thee not. Okay. Alright, so in case I wasn't clear enough about what I'm doing here, here's the example. What I've done is lifted these right out of the passage and then just put a little short paragraph on each of them.

So, he committed no sin, nor was any deceit found in his mouth. In following the example of Christ, the first thing is to be not doing wrong. As we saw in the previous preceding verses, it's not commendable to suffer for wrongs that one has done, but only for unjust suffering. The first way that we are to model ourselves after Christ's example as employees or as people is to refrain from doing that which we know to be wrong. Not to lie, not to be false as slaves were commonly known to be doing, not to be pilfering or stealing from our companies or our relative employers. If he gave you the company car just to drive to and from work, don't drive it to Vegas for the weekend vacation, unless he said that's okay. So, just not to be doing wrong is the essential start. Now, this is a part of our being conformed to the image of Christ in whom we are by the grace and action of God.

Honestly, I don't know if you're always in the right. I'm usually not. At my current job, I've definitely had to submit to some punishments that I deserved. I goofed. I messed up. I did wrong. And yet, nevertheless, to try to continue to strive to be above reproach before all men. And that, I think, is part and parcel to the comparison that Peter's making here.

While being reviled, he did not revile in return. The word revile is about heaping abuse upon someone continually. I'd heard the word revile before, and I'd probably even used it before, but I wasn't totally sure if I knew what it meant. So, this idea of constantly heaping abuse, and specifically has the idea of verbal abuse. So, it's just built in.

So, there's no doubt that Christ experienced this throughout His first coming, and He did not return slanderous talk, but He controlled His tongue. What kind of impact does that make? What kind of impact does that make when someone is slandered or reviled and they take the high road? It seems like in our culture, it's not very... It's really almost a down time.

Because everybody wants to go to everybody. Absolutely, isn't it? You do. Absolutely. And that's as we get into... Vern is always looking to teach a course on biblical anthropology, which I would be in if he ever does. our culture's ideas of masculinity and femininity are so goofed up.

There's a person at work who says, She's a clerk with us. She says, I'm more of a man than anyone else in this place. I'm more of a guy, I'm more of a man than anyone else in this place. I've been working with her for nine months now, so I've kind of gotten used to it and understood finally what she means. What she means by saying, I'm more of a man than anyone else, she means I can be a jerk. I don't care what other people think. I don't care what other people feel. I can be as mean as anybody else. I'm more of a man than anyone else.

That's this culture's view of masculinity. If you just bear up under these things, if you accept the slander and don't fight back, you're a wuss. A wimp! Can you imagine? Can you imagine the biblical view of manhood and womanhood? is now, or manhood specifically in this case, is viewed as, or just being a good person, being who God wants us to be. You're a wuss. You're a wimp. Huh? Milk toast.

Exactly. Can you imagine? Who'd do that? Who would do that to us? I don't know. Maybe there's some larger plan of evil out there trying to mess up our vision of who we are to be. To make kindness and make gentleness and make a loving and non-vindictive attitude out to be wimpy. Out to be something that is not to be admired. I'm sure we all have plenty of examples. Milk toast, man. So there it is. So, it's truly amazing how we can stand out when we're the only ones not slinging mud around as if making others dirtier will somehow make ourselves cleaner. It's just, I mean, and as much as you're right, our culture doesn't value that at all. You're a wimp. How could that person manage other people? They don't even stand up for themselves. How could we move that person up in the company? They're not even willing to fight with their peers to come out on top.

It's an amazing thing, but the Bible comes out to be true again. If we're walking with Christ, if we're living the life that Christ wants to live, if we're walking in the Spirit, we might not make all that we want to happen, happen as far as the world is concerned. It's a harsh reality. People aren't going to look up to us just because we're doing what Christ wants us to do.

But one life might be touched. Amen. Absolutely. One life might be touched. One person might be affected. Someone, God could be stirring up in their heart. When we look at Romans 8, 28-31, we know that even if we go through this, the point is that it's conforming us to the image of Christ. And that's the goal. Absolutely. And that's what people will see. They're either going to like it or not. Amen. Just in case, for the tape's sake, she said that as we look at Romans 8, these are the trials that are conforming us to the image of Christ. These are what we should be thankful for. And I think that's, once again, the evangelistic heart of Peter.

I think everything that he's said so far in the last few weeks that we've studied is geared towards, hey, someone's watching you and you don't know who it is. Someone's looking at you and you may never know. There's stories upon stories of Christians. You ask them to tell their testimony, they say, well, there's this one guy in the 8th grade, and I don't know where he is now, but he made such an impact on me that 30 years later, I trusted Christ.

So, don't think that just because we don't get to reap that the seeds that we sow aren't there. I mean, that's the constant discouragement that I face. Feeling like, oh, no one's watching. No one sees. But if God's moving in their hearts, they see. Okay.

While suffering, he uttered no threats. Throughout Christ's passion, we find that he was greatly suffering. It's amazing that no person in history, no human being in history had more power at his command. No one walking to the cross, if anyone ever bore the cross on freshly scourged shoulders, no one could have issued a threat and followed through with it except Christ. He's the only one.

He could have, as he said, called down legions of angels if he wanted to. He could have just absolutely broke the cross over his back and said, you know what, that's it, I'm out. But he didn't. He could have just, you know, been up there on the cross suffering and thinking, boy, that guy right there, saying, physician, heal thyself. Dead. He could do it, but he didn't.

The restraint, the amazing restraint. So how much more so as we are suffering unjustly, just as he did, how much more so should we not be breathing threats Don't you ever notice in the world or maybe as you read or watch television shows or whatever, whoever is below or has less authority is always looking for their little thing that they can hold on to. That little thing that they can hold above the person above them so they can have power, so they can have control over their boss.

I'm sure you do too. You work with humans, right? human scheme. They say, I saw my boss do such and such and so and so. Boy, if corporate found out about that, they'd be gone. I'm going to hold that. So if I ever get in trouble, I can pull that out and hold it over them and threaten to take them to it or take them to task. People are always grappling after power or control or authority that's not theirs to have. I think it's a very real temptation. for us to try and make friends or influence things up the road for our favor.

Oh, we're going to do it. Have faith in me. We're going to do it. Okay. Jesus uttered no threats. That's the example that he left. That's the thing to resist. Oftentimes the threats that we utter are completely empty and sometimes they're not, but the point is that that's not to be our attitude under suffering, especially in this case with Masters.

Kept entrusting himself to Him who judges righteously. What an amazing insight into what Christ was thinking and where His Spirit was throughout the suffering He endured. It just struck me as incredibly powerful. We always wonder what Jesus was doing that whole time on the cross and we have a couple of statements. Forgive them Father, they know what they do. We have some little snapshots into the mind of Christ during that time. This is something that undoubtedly must have been supernaturally, or maybe after the resurrection, relayed to Peter. Maybe he just knew. He knew Christ very, very well. It's just amazing to get to see what was Jesus doing on that trip to the cross. What was he doing?

He kept continually entrusting himself to the one who judges righteously. continually trusting himself and his judgment to the judge, knowing that all the shame and injustice of the persecution that he survived would melt away when all see what God's evaluation of the event at the cross and the one among there is. Or as Hebrews 12 puts it, for the joy set before him, he endured the cross, scorning its shame. Because in God's valuation, it was worth it. In God's judgment, in Christ's judgment, in God's judgment, it was worth it to go through that shame to save us. Alright, so what's the secret of that kind of life?

We could easily say that this is all well and good, but we simply are not capable of that. Peter shifts here to the reason for that. Echoes the writings of Paul in Romans chapter 6. Peter clearly spells out that here our sins, for those who have trusted Christ, are no longer an issue. The sins have been dealt with on the cross. This is how we are blameless. This is where the old guilt is gone. He goes on to tell us that we're dead to sin and alive to righteousness.

What an amazing confirmation of our position in Christ. Isn't that where Peter gets us? Where Paul would write a chapter, Peter will write a sentence. And where Peter will write a chapter, Paul will write a sentence. What an amazing balance we have in Scripture. And what a fascinating and amazing testament to the unity of the Word of God and the apostolic faith.

Peter and Paul didn't spend all that much time together. They didn't spend years and years and years sitting in the same room hashing out all the theological issues. They just knew. They shared the faith in common. Two men riding miles and miles away in ministries that were very far apart in their nature, in some respects, could have the same view. It's just fascinating that he would highlight this amazing, glorious unity and harmony of the Word of God. And even the smallest details, but obviously that's a large one. So, we were wounded and broken is the implication. That is, by His wounds we were healed. The implication there is that by His wounding that Isaiah told us about, we're absolutely restored to our right standing with God.

You know, psychology has taken over the world, it's the new religion. We're going to work out your issues, we're going to heal up your wounds, we're going to bandage it all up, cover it all up, make it all right. Secular psychology is the world's new religion. People spend hours and hours on couches in front of people who may not be any wiser than they are, to bandage up their wounds. to deal with their issues, whatever it is. And I'm not saying that counseling is all bad, because I think there's a very important biblical place for counseling, specifically pastoral counseling. So I'm not trying to demonize the idea that we should express and work through our issues.

Jesus, Shepherd, Guardian. As we read through Psalm 23, a song written by another Shepherd, we can easily identify the fact that the beauty of Christ is the Shepherd of our souls. The Shepherd cares for His sheep, feeds them, protects them, cleans them, and watches over them day and night. Much of the protection that the Shepherd offered His sheep is from the sheep itself. Christ is our awesome Shepherd, and we can trust Him.

Does anybody have any questions before I go massively over? I did better. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we praise you for your amazing, wonderful, wonderful Word. Lord, both written and living. Lord, and living and active. Please let it pierce through to us. Let it break through all the crust that builds up around us from walking through this world. and penetrate to our hearts. Let us live by it, because we know that it is true, that Jesus is the truth. In Jesus' name, Amen.