Tag: 1 Peter

Categories
Lord's Day Liturgy

A Gospel Salvo

For our Sunday evening series this upcoming year, we’re going to have the elders preach through First Peter. We’ve never rotated through paragraphs of the same book before, and this will cover the letter from different angles. It seems like an especially timely study, full of teaching on true submission and costly, righteous suffering.

One of my favorite verses in 1 Peter is one I have to hold off using too frequently as a reminder of forgiveness.

For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that me might bring us to God (1 Peter 3:18)

That is not actually the entire verse, let alone the entire sentence, which extends to the end of verse 20. It introduces what is probably the most difficult and debated paragraph in 1 Peter, and I volunteered to preach that passage when we get to it. But this gospel salvo is worth celebrating.

It is also what we’re doing here at the Lord’s Table. We are thinking about Christ, the promised and perfect offering. We remember His righteousness, His unjust suffering, His payment for our sins, and we remember what we get from it. Yes, we are saved, but saved for what? Saved as in brought to the Father.

We are forgiven for forgiveness’ sake, because in our guilt we needed it. We are forgiven for justice’s sake, so that God might be just and the justifier of those who have faith in Jesus (Romans 3:26). But we are also forgiven for fellowship’s sake, because we were far away. “Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people” (1 Peter 2:10).

Categories
Lord's Day Liturgy

Internal Adornment That Shows

Moses does not paint a flattering picture of Sarah, Abraham’s wife, in Genesis. Twice she resents and punishes others in her household. Twice she followed her husband’s lead and lied to those outside her household. Once she even laughed at the promise of God. She did praise the LORD for the birth of her son Isaac, but the very next thing she did was lash out and demand that Abraham “cast out this slave woman with her son.” She couldn’t even bring herself to use their names.

Yet there must be more to her life. The author of Hebrews wrote, “By faith, Sarah herself received power to conceive, even when she was past the age, since she considered him faithful who had promised” (Hebrews 11:11). Initially she doubted, but her heart turned around.

And at the beginning of 1 Peter 3, Peter used Sarah as an example, even exalted her as the “mother” of all faithful women who “do good and do not fear anything that is frightening” (1 Peter 3:6). Sarah illustrated internal adornment and the sort of external conduct that can “win without a word” a husband who does not obey the word (1 Peter 3:1). Respectful and pure conduct adorn women who hope in God, and this is a powerful testimony.

Ladies of faith, what have you learned from your “mother,” Sarah? How do you view your husband, and your future? If you’re not married, how are you practicing heart obedience to your dad? Are you repenting from Sarah-like pettiness and resentments? Above all, are you pursuing Sarah-like faith in and obedience to the LORD?

Categories
Lord's Day Liturgy

Close to Home

God will test our faith. The apostle Peter wrote that various trials cause heaviness:

so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. (1 Peter 1:7)

Solid faith, not faith-leaf—like gold leaf, a thin layer of faith hammered around the outside—solid faith now will result in our being esteemed and rewarded by God when we see Jesus Christ and will no longer need faith.

In the meantime the “various trials” that do this testing are manifold. One could translate the Greek adjective “multi-colored.” The trials come in different shapes and sizes. They also come in different degrees of importance to us.

God tests our faith through national elections, but that doesn’t hit quite as close to home as, say, losing your home. Or if He’s given you a job, you know it was by His grace that you got the job, and now He appears to be taking that job away by requiring you to stand up for righteousness. Or if a child or a spouse gets very sick. Or if the plans you had, plans to be productive and minister for Him, get interrupted. These and more will test your trust in God.

I’ve heard it said, “Put your Isaacs on the altar.” If God wants you to surrender something you think is important, even crucial, for His mission, then You must trust Him that He will bless you as He takes it away. This is a test of faith, a purifying of faith, and a strengthening of faith. We need it. And if we fail a test, we don’t have to wait a certain amount of time before we try again, we just need to repent and turn back to Him in trust.