Participants: Tom Shepherd & Deyvy Rodriguez
Series Code: PBOTB
Program Code: PBOTB00016B
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00:01 And we're back to "Books of The Book."
00:03 We are studying the Books of 1 and 2 Peter, 00:05 but right now we are at the last Chapter 00:08 or Chapter 4 at the last verses 00:11 and we're talking about suffering. 00:12 And, Dr. Shepherd, why does Peter bring up 00:15 another way of suffering in verses 15 and 16? 00:19 All right, so we should--we should read those verses again. 00:20 So everybody's clear as what he is saying. 00:22 In verse 15, it says, "But let none of you suffer 00:27 as a murderer or a thief or an evildoer or as a meddler. 00:32 Yet if anyone suffers as a Christian, 00:34 let him not be ashamed, 00:36 but let him glorify God in that name." 00:39 All right, so he says, it's good to suffer as a Christian, 00:44 but it's not good to suffer as thief or murderer 00:48 or something like that, 00:49 that something that Christians should not do. 00:52 It's part of his emphasis 00:53 on Christian character and lifestyle 00:55 that he has been emphasizing all through the book. 00:59 Don't do this, do this instead, 01:02 you know, don't follow the pagan way, 01:04 follow the Christian way. 01:06 If you live like the pagan, 01:07 it's gonna bring reproach on the Christian faith. 01:10 So society around them was pressing in on them, 01:12 but they were to stand true and he said, 01:15 and they're going to persecute you 01:18 and try to bring shame on you. 01:19 He said, "But you mustn't be ashamed." 01:21 He says, "You should glorify God in this name." 01:25 The name is Christian. 01:27 And it's one of the first places, 01:30 you know, the Antioch was the first place 01:32 they were called Christians. 01:34 But the term Christian isn't used 01:36 a lot of times in the New Testament. 01:37 This is one of the places where it shows up. Okay. 01:41 Verse 17, "For the time has come for judgment 01:43 to begin at the house of God. 01:46 And if it begins with us first, what will be the end of those 01:49 who do not obey the Gospel of God?" 01:52 Now, how does this verse here support these previous verses? 01:56 Okay, so he has been talking about suffering 01:59 as a Christian being persecuted by the pagans then he says, 02:03 "Don't do the wrong way, 02:05 don't be suffering as a murderer or a thief or anything." 02:09 And of course, that's out of step 02:11 with God's valuation, God's law. 02:13 You shouldn't follow that path. 02:14 You should follow the Christian path. 02:16 And then he says, "God is going to judge the world." 02:20 We have already talked about judgment before several times. 02:22 But here he, you know, continues this discussion. 02:26 It is time for judgment to begin at the household of God. 02:31 And of course, the household of God 02:33 is his whole metaphor for the church, isn't it? 02:37 That he has been using all through this book. 02:38 We are His children, He is our Father, 02:41 He has built this into a spiritual house 02:43 to offer sacrifices to Him. 02:45 And so now he says, and guess what? 02:48 That's where judgment is going to begin. 02:51 Now in the process what he's alluding to very strongly 02:54 is to Ezekiel 9:1-6. 02:59 So we need to read that passage in Ezekiel 03:01 just to get the context of Peter's ideas. 03:06 Ezekiel 9:1-6. Okay, and he says. 03:12 "Then He called out in my hearing with a loud voice, 03:15 saying, 'Let those who have charge over the city draw near, 03:19 each with a deadly weapon in his hand.' 03:22 And suddenly six men came from the direction of the upper gate, 03:25 which faces north, each with his battle-ax in his hand. 03:30 One man among them was clothed with linen 03:33 and had a writer's inkhorn at his side. 03:36 They went in and stood beside the bronze altar. 03:39 Now the glory of the God of Israel 03:42 had gone up from the cherub, 03:45 where it had been to the threshold of the temple. 03:50 And He came to the man clothed with linen, 03:52 who had the writer's inkhorn at his side. 03:55 And the Lord said to him, 03:57 'Go through the midst of the city, 03:59 through the midst of Jerusalem, 04:01 and put a mark on the foreheads of the men 04:04 who sigh and cry over all the abominations 04:08 that are done within it.' 04:11 Go to the others He said in my hearing. 04:13 'Go after him through the city and kill. 04:16 Do not let your eye spare, nor have any pity. 04:20 Utterly slay old and young men, 04:23 maidens and little children and women, 04:25 but do not come near anyone on whom is the mark 04:29 and begin at My sanctuary.' 04:32 So they began with the elders who were before the temple. 04:35 Then He said to them, 'Defile the temple, 04:38 and fill the courts with the slain. Go out.' 04:41 And they went out and killed in the city. 04:44 So it was, that while they were killing them, 04:47 I was left alone; and I fell on my face and cried out, 04:50 and said, 'Ah, Lord God. 04:52 Will You destroy all the remnant of Israel 04:54 in pouring out Your fury on Jerusalem?' 04:57 Then He said to me, 04:59 'The iniquity of the house of Israel and Judah 05:01 is exceedingly great, and the land is full of bloodshed, 05:05 and the city full of perversity, for they say, 05:08 'The Lord has forsaken the land, and the Lord does not see.'" 05:12 All right, well, it's quite an amazing story, 05:14 isn't it there in Ezekiel? 05:16 And you notice that there are several things that go on here. 05:20 He has this executioners come to him in his vision. 05:24 And he also has a man with a writing case. 05:28 He sends the man out with the writing case to go out 05:32 and they're supposed to put a mark on people 05:35 who are crying over the abominations 05:38 of the land and of Jerusalem. 05:42 And they go out and they put a mark on their forehead, 05:45 these people who are faithful to God 05:49 and showing it by their weeping. 05:51 Then the executioners go and they start to kill. 05:53 They notice those who have a mark 05:56 and those who don't have a mark. 05:57 Now, of course, we know in the Book of Revelation, 06:00 we have something called the Seal of God. 06:02 And the Seal of God marks people 06:04 as His servants and protects them. 06:06 And those without the Seal of God will perish, 06:11 you know, at the end of time. 06:12 So here is Peter linking into Ezekiel's message as well 06:18 just like we get over in the Book of Revelation. 06:22 And he links into this message 06:23 and points out that there's a protecting mark. 06:26 And so judgment is going to begin with the household of God. 06:29 Begins with us and then it goes out from there. 06:32 And he says, well, if the-- 06:33 he quotes from Proverbs 11:31 and he says, 06:37 "Well, if the righteous person hardly is saved, 06:42 then what's going to happen to the wicked." 06:44 You know, there's no--there's not gonna be space for them. 06:47 So he has been talking about Christians 06:50 that they need to do good deeds and not bad deeds. 06:55 And then he supports us with the message of judgment. 06:57 He says, "Look, if you don't follow the message of God 07:02 you will be marked for destruction, 07:04 you have to follow-- you can't just play with God. 07:07 You have to have your faith has to lineup 07:11 with what He has been teaching you all through this book." 07:15 So now we are finishing Chapter 4, 07:17 but how does that he conclude the section? 07:19 Then he comes to verse 19. 07:22 And then he says, "Therefore that those who suffer 07:25 according to God's will entrust their souls 07:28 to a faithful creator while doing good." 07:33 Now in this verse 07:37 there are three interlocking ideas, okay. 07:41 Three interlocking ideas. 07:43 Suffering, suffering according to the will of God. 07:47 And we've talked about that already. 07:49 It's not God's will for us to suffer. 07:51 It's God's will for us to do good. 07:53 And if we suffer as a result, okay, 07:55 that's better than doing bad. 07:57 So suffering according to the will of God. 08:00 He talks about entrusting your soul, 08:03 entrusting your soul to the faithful creator. 08:07 And then he talks about doing good. 08:10 Now of these ideas the will of God 08:14 we've seen already it's been throughout the book. 08:17 It's a theme that runs through this book, 08:19 it focuses on the idea always of doing good. 08:23 It's usually linked up with concepts of suffering 08:29 or people around you or the pagans around you 08:31 giving you a difficult time. 08:33 In 1 Peter 2:15 he says, "That if you do good, 08:37 doing the will of God you'll shut the mouths 08:39 of ignorant people who are trying to say 08:42 bad things about you." 08:43 In 3:17, "It's better to do good and suffer than to do evil." 08:47 In 4:1-2, "Suffering persecution for living a Christian life 08:52 in according to with the will of God. 08:54 The Christians purpose is to live for the will of God 08:56 and not for human passions." 08:58 And then our passage here verse 19 09:01 where you're suffering and you're doing good. 09:03 So the will of God is always tied up with this, doing good, 09:07 doing the right thing and as a result you will suffer. 09:10 God does not want His people to suffer, 09:12 but He does want them to do the right thing. 09:14 And sometimes we have to have the courage to face off 09:17 against the evil and not let it out or take us. 09:20 Second then he talks about suffering 09:24 and entrusting ourselves to the faithful creator. 09:27 I wanna talk about that just a bit more, 09:30 but let me talk about the third point 09:31 and that is doing good throughout the book. 09:35 Christians are called to a high moral way of life 09:38 that expresses Christian ideals 09:41 to all around them, to all the world. 09:43 It is not enough simply to entrust one's life to God, 09:47 one must let him workout his goodwill in the life. 09:52 We must do good. 09:53 We must be about our Father's business to encourage others. 09:56 But I want to come back to this idea 09:57 of the concept of the faithful creator. 10:02 You wonder when he talks about this experience of suffering 10:07 and he says, "Entrust your life to God," that make sense. 10:12 You've heard that kind of idea before 10:14 and it seems to go along with, 10:16 you know, the whole theme of the book. 10:18 But this is one of the few places 10:20 where in the book where he makes reference to creation. 10:25 And he says, "You are supposed to entrust-- 10:29 entrust yourself to a faithful creator." 10:35 Now, why to a-- why this reference to creation? 10:39 Well, he likes to talk about eschatology. 10:42 You know, he talks about the end. 10:44 He talks about the Revelation of Jesus Christ. 10:45 He talks about how God is going to save you. 10:47 How things are gonna be good, 10:48 He's got an imperishable inheritance for you, 10:50 all things are gonna-- 10:51 he really focuses on that a great deal. 10:54 But once in a while he pulls back the curtain 10:56 and talks all the way back to the beginning. 10:59 You know, he talks about this idea of creation. 11:02 It's kind of like these big bookends. 11:05 God made the world, He was the faithful creator 11:08 and He is going to bring the world to an end. 11:09 He'll take care of you from beginning to end. 11:13 That's kind of the picture you get. 11:14 But there is something we need to notice 11:16 about this idea of faithful creator as well. 11:20 There are some people that present the idea of evolution 11:23 as the way that God created the world. 11:24 They called theistic evolution. 11:27 That God created life at the beginning of the world 11:29 and then He let it develop through long billions of years 11:33 from little molecules of little microbes, 11:38 you know, and then it built up and eventually came up 11:40 and then eventually became people. 11:42 And the process involved lots of death and lots of suffering, 11:46 lots of tooth and nail and the survival of the fittest. 11:50 Yeah. Now if that's the picture of creation that Peter had. 11:57 And he said, "O, give yourself to the Creator." 12:02 It would give them no comfort at all. 12:05 Consequently, we can say that 12:08 Peter did not have that view of creation. 12:11 Peter's view of creation was not, 12:14 you know, something coming up 12:15 through long billions of years working overtime, 12:19 survival of the fittest tooth and claw, 12:21 lots and lots of death and suffering, no. 12:25 Peter's view of creation, 12:27 the faithful creator is He who spoke and it was. 12:31 He expressed His word and there it was. 12:33 He made the world just simply from free out, 12:36 just He spoke and the world came into existence. 12:40 And so it was a faithful creator who set the world in place 12:46 and began it and, so they can entrust their lives. 12:51 This principle that shows us that 12:56 Peter rejects those kinds of ideas that later come on 13:00 and teaches evolutionary kind of concept. 13:02 So it's really a beautiful passage about suffering, 13:05 passage wonderful linkage into creation and God's faithfulness. 13:11 Dr. Shepherd, thank you once again. 13:13 I think we've run out of time. 13:14 And if we did have more time, 13:16 I think I'd ask you to help us or teach us 13:19 how to undo a tie and do it back again. Okay. 13:21 But maybe next time. 13:22 Well, thank you once again, friends. 13:24 God bless you till next time. |
Revised 2014-12-17