Living Out the New Life

Transcript

GR 1944
03/06/2016
Living Out the New Life
I Peter 4:2-6
Gil Rugh

We are going to I Peter in your Bibles. You know as we study the book of the I Peter and we know so much of Peter’s life from the role he played during Christ’s earthly ministry as one of His closest followers, his role in the establishing of the church in the early chapters of the book of Acts, it is easy to forget that he was a common fisherman on the sea of Galilee when God called him to the ministry of proclaiming Jesus as the Messiah, Peter, James and John.

It is amazing how God uses common ordinary people. Who would have thought that the fisherman who was called to follow that wandering teacher who was proclaimed as the Messiah of Israel, that fisherman would be used to write portions of the New Testament that have endured down through the centuries of time. So a reminder of God’s grace and how He uses us in ways that we don’t know and you don’t know the impact of your life. Maybe God won’t be using you to write Scripture but the way He is using you has eternal importance and significance.

We are in I Peter chapter 4 and we just started this chapter in our last study together. The chapter began with remember, “Therefore, since Christ has suffered in the flesh,” here is what you are to do. Again this repeated emphasis on exhorting believers to conduct themselves as they should and that exhortation is based upon the fact that Christ Himself has acted on our behalf and set the example for us. The ‘therefore’ goes back to chapter 3, verse 18. “For Christ also died for sins for all, the just for the unjust so that He might bring us to God having been put to death in the flesh but made alive in the Spirit.” That suffering and death and then life becomes the pattern.

Chapter 4, verse 1: “Since Christ has suffered in the flesh” and He died to pay the penalty for our sin. “You arm yourselves with the same purpose, because He who has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin.” And we noted that pattern. We are identified with Christ in His death, burial and resurrection so we have new life in Him. Now we have the mind of Christ as we considered and so we approach the suffering and difficulties and trials we face as He did and Peter has talked about that earlier in the letter.

We see ourselves as done with sin as Christ was done with sin. He is done with it in a different way but the picture is there for us. Christ never sinned but when He died on the cross He said, “It is finished.” His work in dealing with sin was over.

Go back to Hebrews chapter 9 for review. Look at verse 28: “Christ also having been offered once to bear the sins of many will appear a second time for salvation without sin.” As you have in there, ‘without reference to sin,’ not to deal with sin, “to those who eagerly await for Him.” So with His death on the cross He was done dealing with sin in that sense. The penalty is paid in full. Salvation is provided, complete. He is done with sin. Now we who have become identified with Him and have died with Him, we are to be done with sin too. It has been dealt with in our lives in that sense.

So now we arm ourselves with the same thinking, back in I Peter chapter 4. We are ready for the battle, the conflict with the persecution, with the suffering, with sin. Sin might attempt to reinsert its control in our lives.

Verse 2: “So as to live the rest of the time in the flesh no longer for the lusts of men but for the will of God.” That is what it means for us who have suffered with Christ, died with Him as we talked about back in chapter 2, verse 24: “He bore our sins in His body.” We looked in Romans 6. We are identified with Him, His death, burial and resurrection, crucified with Him.

Come back to Romans 6. We were in this passage when we left last time and I just want to connect it to some other passages that deal with this matter, Romans chapter 6. The whole passage deals with this and as we noted in our previous study it opens up, “Are we to continue in sin that grace may increase?” Since God’s grace is so great and greatness of sin just magnifies the greatness of the grace that has cleansed us from sin, does that mean it is alright to sin because it magnifies God’s grace? No. That is a corruption of a great truth that the magnitude of sin provided an occasion for the magnitude of God’s grace to be demonstrated. But that doesn’t mean it is okay to go on and sin. So, no. Why? And then we noted we died with Him, verse 6 “Knowing we were united with Him in His death, His burial and His resurrection.” The end of verse 4: “So we might walk in newness of life. If we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death we will be in the likeness of His resurrection.” Just as surely as we died to sin and its power and authority has been broken we will be identified now with Christ in new life just as He was raised from the dead. “Knowing this our old self (our old man) was crucified with Him in order that our body of sin (this body controlled and dominated sin) might be done away with.” That word there, ketargeo. Its power might be broken. It doesn’t mean it ceased to exist but its power and authority to control us has been dealt with.

So we no longer are to be slaves of sin. We were slaves of sin. “He who sins is the slave of sin” Jesus said but we have been set free, why? Our old man, what we were apart from the saving work of Christ, translated ‘our old self’ in our Bible. We have identified with Christ and His death. We died with Him, we were buried with Him, we were raised with Him.

So verse 8: “If we have died with Christ we believe we will live with Him.” Verse 11: “Even so consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ.” Verse 12: “Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body that you should obey its lusts.” Verse 13: “Do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin (to be used for unrighteousness.) “Present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead, (the part of your body used) as instruments of righteousness.” Verse 14: “Sin will not be master over you, for you are not under law.” The Law had no power to deliver you. The law could require of people but it could not enable people but under grace, provision has been made. Then he went on, verse 17: “Thanks be to God though you were slaves of sin, you obeyed the Gospel” to summarize it. Verse 18: “And having been freed from sin you became slaves of righteousness” and then he repeats that. “You present yourselves” and the parts of your body “as slaves to righteousness,” the end of verse 19. Verse 22: “Having been freed from sin, enslaved to God you derive your fruit (translated benefits, the word fruit) resulting in sanctification.” The outcome – “eternal life.”

Come over to Galatians chapter 5, just after Corinthians where we were. Romans, Corinthians and Galatians, chapter 5. Look at verse 24: “Now those who belong to Christ have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.” The flesh in many ways is referring to the same thing as the old man. It’s the root of sin in us. It has been crucified with Christ. The old man, the flesh, crucified with its passions and desires. They are no longer to control us.

Come down in to chapter 6 of Galatians, verse 14: “May it never be that I would boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ through which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world.” We talk about the world, the flesh and the devil and we find the flesh, I take it that is another way of referring to the old man, what I am apart from the work of the Spirit in my life. It has been crucified with Christ. The world with its allurements, all that is in the world is “the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the boastful pride of life” as we have in I John. But it’s been crucified. The world has been crucified in me, I to the world. Its power, its authority, its control has been dealt with.

Come over to Hebrews chapter 2. Look at verse 14: “Therefore since the children share in flesh and blood He Himself likewise partook of the same that through death He might render powerless him who had the power of death that is, the devil” to break the power that is what we talked about in Romans 6, the power of the devil. Jesus told the religious people of His day, “You are of your father the devil and you always do his will.” But that is no longer to be the case.

So you see all aspects of sin have been dealt with in the death of Christ. He has set us free from the devil’s power to control us, from innate sins, power to control us from the world with its lusts and desires to control us. It has all been dealt with. The only way for it to be dealt with is through death because the penalty for sin is death. To have its power in all aspects severed, we have to die with Christ. That is why reformation doesn’t work. You can stop one sin but you can’t be free from the power and authority of the devil and sin apart from dying with Christ.

Come back to Peter. This is the foundation he is dealing with. We were identified with Christ that is why he keeps coming back to that as we noted. That is crucial. He is writing to those Jewish believers who have been set free. Now he wants them to manifest that in the lives that they live.

So verse 2, we have been set free from sin so we live the rest of the time in the flesh, no longer in the lust of men. There the word flesh is just referring to this physical body. We don’t live it for the lust of men but for the will of God. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God. There the word ‘flesh’ is used of the old man so sometimes it refers to the physical flesh of the body. Sometimes it refers to that non-material part, the old man. Sometimes we refer to the sin nature where sin comes out, “out of the heart of a man proceed all sorts of evil things,” Mark chapter 7 says.

He continues this theme then. We are not going to live for the lust that characterizes unredeemed men but we are going to live according to the will of God and His intention and desire for us which is a new life, totally different. That is what we talked about earlier in our study today. The unbeliever, remember does anything that pleases God because those who are without the Spirit of God, those who are just unredeemed people cannot please God. Nothing they ever do is pleasing to Him because it is not done with the root desire and intention to honor God, to give Him glory. They are unable to do that.

So now, he reminds these believing Jews. “For the time already passed is sufficient for you to have carried out the desire of the Gentiles.” These are believing Jews he writes to before they were saved that time in the past that was sufficient. You have carried out the desires that characterize the Gentiles. Not only unbelieving Jews but the Gentile world and you realize unbelieving Jews basically to a large extent live just like the unbelieving Gentile world. They have a veneer of godliness but that heart, there was nothing different and the things that characterize them, they pursued a course of sensuality, lust, drunkenness, carousing, drinking, parties, and abominable idolatries and now they are surprised you don’t do the same thing with them. In many ways these are Jews living outside of Palestine. Sometimes Hellenistic Jews have been influenced by Greek culture more than those in that insolated environment in the land of Israel but they were living godless lives out there.

Now the word ‘Gentiles’ here I take it means Gentiles, non-Jews. A word here, we have seen this come up this letter to Peter several times from the start when Peter says he is writing to the twelve tribes of the diaspora. We noted that word diaspora referred to Jews living outside the land. We noted those who say the church has taken over Israel say well that is just terminology showing that the church has taken over the promises of Israel. I mention that because in verse 3 it says, “The time has already passed for you to have carried out the desire of the Gentiles because even though the Jews saw themselves as being different than the Gentiles in their sinful conduct and living lives controlled by sin,” think of what Jesus said to the Pharisees and the religious leaders of His day, “You are of your father the devil and you always do his will.” In that spiritual sense how were they different than the non-Jews? At heart they weren’t. The Gentiles were of their father the devil and they always did his will and Jesus said to the Jewish leaders of His day, “You are of your father the devil and you always do his will.” He was a liar. You are liars. He was a murderer. You are murderers. I say that because what we refer to as covenant theologians who believe that the church has taken over the promises of Israel say the word ‘Gentiles’ here, let me read you one covenant theologian. I just ran a copy out of a book. “The use of the word ‘Gentiles,’” we get the English word ‘ethnic’ from this Greek word, “The use of the word ‘Gentiles’ for unbelievers without comment indicates that Peter understood believers in Jesus Christ as part of Israel, members of the new people of God.” People just read their theology into these passages instead of letting these passages shape and determine. Why would you say that the word ‘Gentiles’ here just means unbelievers and is another way of showing that believers in Christ are part of Israel?

Here is another covenant theologian so you see this other one is not an exception. “Since Peter has frequently viewed Christians as the new people of God, the true Israel.” I don’t think he has frequently. In fact I don’t think he has at all and we have looked at that in chapter 1 with the diaspora; in chapter 2 where those who were not God’s people are His people and we went back to Hosea and looked. That is a reference to Israel, not that Gentiles have become a new Israel.

“Since Peter has frequently viewed Christians as the new people of God, the true Israel earlier in this letter it is quite natural for him to carry through this terminology by using the term ‘Gentiles’ to refer to people who were not Jews, not to people who were not Jews but to people who were not Christians.” So he is saying Gentiles doesn’t refer to Gentiles in distinction from Jews. Gentiles just refers to unbelievers.

I take Gentiles here is referring to non-Jews but he is showing and drawing attention to these believing Jews. Your life before Christ was no different than the unbelieving Gentile world. They were no closer spiritually to God than the unbelieving Gentiles were and they practiced the same sins. They were of their father the devil and always did his will. I read some of these commentators like I just shared with you and they say “oh, the Jews never would have done these things.”

Come back to Matthew 23, Matthew 23. Again Jesus is addressing the Jewish leaders. Now what are the people like that follow these religious leaders? Remember they are blind leaders of the blind. Jesus says in verse 13, Matthew 23: “But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, you shut off the kingdom of God from people. You are not entering yourself and you don’t allow others to enter in.” Remember Jesus told Nicodemus, the teacher in Israel, “You must be born again.” The Jews weren’t open to this and they didn’t want people to believe in Christ.

Verse 14: “Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; you devour widows’ houses and for a pretense you make long prayers. You will receive greater condemnation.” Verse 15: “Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; you travel on land and sea to make one proselyte. When he becomes one you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves.” Verse 16: “Woe to you blind guides. Whoever swears by the temple that is nothing. Whoever swears by the gold of the temple is obligated. You fools and blind men.” He goes on to show their religious activity. It is nothing but hypocrisy. That is what he is talking about; the temple and the sacrifices and their oaths and all of that.

Down in verse 23: “Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites. You tithe minutia but you are not characterized by justice and mercy and faithfulness.” Verse 24: “You blind guides, you strain out a gnat and swallow a camel. Woe to you scribes, Pharisees, hypocrites. You clean the outside of the cup and the dish but inside they are full of robbery and self-indulgence.” Verse 27: “Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites. You are like white washed tombs which on the outside appear beautiful but on the inside they are full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness.” You know these tombs and they are up out of the ground. So they would whitewash the outside and make them very attractive. You see this in some of our cemeteries with mausoleums. You know rich people have done ornate things. You say that is really beautiful but you know what it is? On the inside it is a hold for dead men’s bones. This is what he said they are spiritually. No matter what you look like on the inside, here is what you are like.

Verse 28: “Outwardly you appear righteous to men. Inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness. Wow to you scribes and Pharisees. You honor the prophets. You adorn monuments to them” and you say, “Oh, we wouldn’t have mistreated the prophets like they did in our history.”

Verse 31-33: “You testify against yourselves, that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets. Fill up then the measure of the guilt of your fathers. You serpents, you brood of vipers, how shall you escape the sentence of hell?” It doesn’t sound to me like these men are of any different character than the unbelieving Gentiles. What more could he say about unbelieving Gentiles than he says about these unbelieving Jewish spiritual leaders and the Pharisees are the most meticulous in the law. But this is their true spiritual condition. So you know, I read these men that say in Peter this is an evidence that the church is the new Israel because Israel was never this bad.

Come over to Romans chapter 2, as Paul is establishing the guilt and sin of all people in Romans chapter 1 that is where the Gospel starts. He is unfolding the Gospel. You start with demonstrating that “all have sinned and come short of the glory of God and that there is none righteous.” So in chapter 1 beginning with verse 18 and the rest of the chapter he shows something of the character and conduct of the Gentile world, if you will, but then you start chapter 2 he turns his attention to the Jews who would agree those dirty Gentiles. Remember even in the early days of the church when Peter went and took the Gospel to Gentiles, the house of Cornelius in Acts 10 the apostles in Jerusalem, we are in the 11th chapter of Acts call him to account for going and having that kind of contact with Gentiles. They still didn’t grasp but God’s salvation could reach even to Gentiles. Then Peter explains to him, “I never would have done it if I didn’t get special revelation from God that I had to do it.” And then their eyes are open and God’s salvation is going to include Gentiles.

So in chapter 2 you see something of the condition of the Jews. Verse 4: “You think lightly of the riches of His kindness, tolerance, patience not knowing the kindness of God leads you to repentance. Because of your stubbornness, unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath for yourself in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God.”

Then he shows it is not enough to have the law. For Gentiles who don’t have the law they will be judged apart from the law. For Jews who have the law they will be judged by the law but you remember having the law does not save you. You would have had to have kept it perfectly to be saved by the law and that did not happen.

So verse 17: “If you bear the name Jew and you rely upon the law and boast in God and know His will and all of that and you are confident you are a guide to the blind, a light to those in darkness, a corrector of the foolishness” it sounds like some of the things Jesus was addressing in Matthew 23. They thought they were a guide to the blind. Jesus said, “You are blind people leading blind people spiritually.” He asked them, verse 21of Romans 2: “You therefore who teach another, do you not teach yourself? You who preach that one shall not steal, do you steal? You who say one should not commit adultery, do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples? You who boast in the law, through your breaking the law do you dishonor God? The name of blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you, just as it is written.” Because he has quoted that from the Old Testament passages you have in your margin.

So you come down to chapter 3, verse 9 what has he said? “We have already charged that both Jews and Greeks are all under sin.” And he quotes that extensive list of quotes you can see in the capital letters that follow, “As it is written.” He is going to quote from the Jewish Scriptures to show there is no difference between unbelieving Jews and unbelieving Gentiles. “There is none righteous, not even one,” not even among the Gentiles, not even among the Jews. “None who understands. There is none who seeks for God. They have all turned aside. Together they have become useless. There is none who does good, not even one.” These are all quotes from the Old Testament. This is describing the condition of unbelieving Israel. It is also describing the condition of unbelieving Gentiles. He has shown in chapter 1 they are all under sin.

So well to say, “I don’t think this could be said of Jews,” God says it about Jews. That is what He is saying here. I mean verse 9: “We have already charged that both Jews and Greeks are all under sin” and then this list of quotes from the Old Testament. The point – the Jews who thought they had the law that made them better than the Gentiles. It made them more guilty because they had greater light. They had the Word of God but it didn’t make them any less lost because just like people who have a Bible but that doesn’t save you unless you respond in faith to the truth presented in it, you are lost. That is the point.

So down in verse 19 if you are still in Romans 3; “Whatever the law speaks it speaks to those who are under the law so every mouth may be closed, all the world may become accountable to God; because by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified in His sight; for through the Law comes the knowledge of sin;” nothing wrong with the Law. It did shine the light and make clearer sin as sin but you can’t be justified by it because nobody could keep it. That is why the law includes the sacrifices so that your breaking the Law could be dealt with; so all of that.

Come back to I Peter chapter 4. When it says verse 3: “The time already past is sufficient for you to have carried out the desire of the Gentiles.” He is telling these Jews that are now saved, before your salvation you lived in sin just like the Gentiles. Maybe they didn’t do this specific sin or that specific sin. It doesn’t matter. Just like religious people of our day that would be proud they don’t do some of the grosser sins as we would evaluate them but we who know the Scripture know they are no different, they are servants of the devil and always do his will just like all of us were before our salvation.

So verse 3: “You pursed a course of sensuality, lusts, drunkenness, carousals, drinking parties and abominable idolatries.” And these are just various kinds of sin. That first word, ‘sensuality’ we have mentioned it on other occasions. It appears in what we call ‘vice list, sin lists’ in Scripture asolgaya and it is just that uncontrolled life.

The Jews liked to think of themselves, the Pharisees, in special ways. What did Paul have to say, all of that had to go on the dung heap in his testimony in Philippians 3. I thought I was doing better than most and I was. It was all worthlessness and all done for pride and self and so on. Lust of various kinds, the passions that control men, drunkenness, carousing, partying, some would translate it orgies.

What do they have a problem with on university campuses, fraternities and so on? It becomes the party place. You know, the more restraints are removed and often young people come to college, they are free from even some of the restraints they may have had in their home and now great, you get to drink, you know puke all over the place, stick your head in the toilet. Just a wonderful life, freedom brings. Why do you do that? They can take drugs. At least I can hide some of this, drinking parties, the two sort of go together. The previous two drunkenness and carousing – you put that together and you have the drinking parties.

Abominable idolatries, some of the commentators will make note, well after the Babylonian captivity Israel didn’t practice idolatry. Not formal idolatry but they were connected. Why? Do you rob temples? We read that in Romans chapter 2. You say you wouldn’t worship in the temple but you rob temples and they were not worshipping the true and living God. All involved in things in one way or another.

So unbelieving Jews in their sin were no different than unbelieving Gentiles. We see some of this with scandals that come out and so on and the truth is revealed. There are other lists like this throughout Scripture but you are familiar with those. We don’t need to go to those.

So this is what Peter is doing. Christ sets you free. You understand religious people aren’t free. Saved people are free. Believers in Jesus Christ are free. Others are trying to conform; other religious systems. We mentioned Roman Catholicism and their priesthood because of their form but Protestants they are just the same. Only those in Christ are free. Like we talked about earlier today there is a repeated emphasis of Scripture.

So what Peter is reminding his readers of is we have new life. We are to live new life. We aren’t to be drawn back into the old ways. God didn’t save us so that we could now continue in our sin knowing that someday we would go to heaven. He saved us so we could begin living the life He has prepared for us in heaven now, free from sin, serving Him, honoring Him, doing His will. The end of verse 2: “We no longer live for the lust of men but for the will of God.” His desire is now our desire as we have become partakers of the divine nature. You know we wasted enough life in that. We live as we talked out of Psalm 1, enough of a worthless life, a chaff life as Psalm 1 has it. Now we live the new life we have in Christ.

Now what will be the impact on the unbelievers? Verse 4, that is where he picks up, this change, its impact. “In all of this they are surprised that you do not run with them into the same excess of dissipation, and they malign you.” First reaction in this, “they are surprised,” they are shocked. What happened to you? What brought about that change in you? They are surprised that you do not run with them into the same excess of dissipation.” Now some people’s lives obviously are not lived in the same overt involvement in sin as others. You know some are raised in a Christian home and their life has conformed to certain practices, certain style of conduct even before they were saved and there is not the radical change evident within the changes. The change is just as radical because we all have the same heart which is “deceitful and desperately wicked above all things.” But we thank God for that common grace that restrains sin and it is a blessing to be raised in that environment. Your testimony might not be quite as striking as the person who says “I was in the gutter, living a life of dissipation and drunken, on drugs and God took hold of me and I turned from my sin and trusted Christ.” Obviously the visible evidence is different but the impact is there and they are surprised “you don’t run to the same excess of dissipation and they malign you.” Then they want to know how you were changed so they could be like you.

The devil doesn’t let go of his family members easily. So he doesn’t want the impact of a saving life to have a saving impact. “They malign you.” “Oh, you think you are better than us? You don’t come to the party like you used to, you don’t drink. You’ve become a ‘goodie two-shoes.’ You think you are better than us. You don’t want to hang around us.” They slander and then they find reason to attack, to say slanderous things against you.

Your life is a testimony. Living a godly life in an unbelieving world is a testimony but sometimes it doesn’t have the result you would like it to have. Peter talked about back in verse 3 for a wife who is a believer who has an unbelieving husband, verse 1: “In the same way, you wives, be submissive to your own husbands so that even if any of them are disobedient to the word,” they are unbelievers, they are in rebellion against God’s Word, “they may be won without a word by the behavior of their wives.” Sometimes the Lord uses a life. It may be over time but often the result is otherwise.

Why did they persecute Christ? He never did any sin. He never did anything wrong. Why did they want to crucify him? The man who told them the truth, because that is offensive. So “they malign you.”

Peter has referred to this already in back up to chapter 2 of I Peter, verse 12: “Keep your behavior excellent among the Gentiles.” This is what he is elaborating on in chapter 4, “excellent behavior” because these are Jews out of the land of Israel. They are in the diaspora. They are living in a Gentile world. It does not even have the visible conformity in many ways that would have taken place among Jews living in the land that masked as Jesus talked about in Matthew 23. Their ungodliness they tried to hide under a veneer of whitewash. Now they are out in the Gentile world and use the analogy. It is like some young people coming from homes that were maybe even believing homes but at least more homes that had certain standards and now the restraints come off because I am in a fraternity and everybody drinks and everybody is involved in these activities. These are Jews now living in the Gentile world. So “Keep your behavior excellent among the Gentiles so that in the thing in which they slander you as evildoers.” They are going to tell lies. They are going to say things that aren’t true. They are not going to accept that you are living a godly life “But because of your evil deeds as they observe them that they may glorify God in the day of visitation.” It may be over time that your life and your sharing the truth will be used of God to bring them to salvation so that the judge of all will be able to declare them righteous in Christ and they pass the judgment so to speak.

In chapter 3, verse 15: “You sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts.” He reigns in my life. He rules in my life. He is my Lord. He is set apart as Lord in my heart and then verse 16: “You keep a good conscience in the thing in which you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame.”

So when you come over to chapter 4, verse 4, you don’t practice the sinful things that are going on in that unbelieving world out there and they are surprised you don’t do those things, they malign you, they slander you, speak against you. That shouldn’t change your conduct. Sometimes we would talk about, wanting to fly under the radar and we don’t want to come across as too goodie, goodie and we shouldn’t come across in a self-righteous way but we ought to be comfortable, if I can use that word, in our godliness and that is the way we want to live our lives out there. God doesn’t say He is going to take us out of there. Oh, if I didn’t live in this environment and sometimes I have a choice and I realize it is better with my walk with the Lord that I don’t put myself in that environment but there are some things you don’t have a choice.

My dad worked at U.S. Steel in the steel mill so after high school I got a job at the steel mill. That is what my dad did to provide a living for our home. You know you just can’t say, “Well, I will only work for Christians.” And as it is when you are out in the world, it can be what we might say, “an uncouth environment.” The language, the jokes, it is a different world. But that doesn’t mean well now, I want to fit in here and be one of the guys. I have to live my life of godliness and that is true for many of you and wherever we are. We think well if I fit in with the world and they know we are like them. Well we are like them. I mean we are normal people. I don’t want to come across as self-righteous and super spiritual and all I can talk about is spiritual things. But I can’t be drawn into their things. I can’t adjust and live their liftstyle no matter what they say.

So there is a reminder, verse 5: “They will give an account to Him who is ready to judge the living and the dead.” It is a reminder to all there is a judgment coming and they will give an account. That is why we are proclaiming the Gospel. That’s why we know the importance of placing our faith in Christ and having Him as our Savior because there is coming a day of judgment.

Back up to chapter 3, verse 15: “Sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you, yet with gentleness and reverence; and keep a good conscience,” even though they revile you. You see that godly character and we give an account of the hope that is in us and we can speak of the future without fear of judgment. They will give an account of their life to the God who is the judge of all men.

You know this awareness is to shape us. Just before Peter you have the letter of James also written to the Jews in the diaspora, these Jewish letters, letters to believing Jews specially. Back in James chapter 5, verse 7: “Therefore, be patient brethren until the coming of the Lord.” He uses that picture there, that farmer waiting for the harvest. Verse 8: “You too be patient; strengthen your heats, for the coming of the Lord is near. Do not complain brethren against one another, so that you yourselves may not be judged; behold, the Judge is standing right at the door. And for an example of suffering and patience look to the prophets.”

So you see even for us as believers the Judge is right at the door. I mean He could turn the latch, pull the handle at any moment and be right there. We are to live like we are on the edge of His coming. The unbeliever, back in I Peter chapter 4, verse 5: “They will give an account to Him who is ready to judge the living and the dead.” Judgment comes and you know we have removed that from the world. We have removed that in the thinking of men. There is no fear of God. That is not new but it is very blatant in our day and we as believers then can become numb. We still have to live godly, lights in the darkness. We still share the truth and remind people there is judgment. Judgment is coming. They will give an account.

So we as believers don’t want to be drawn into their conduct, into their lifestyle as we talked about from Psalm 1, the same idea. We don’t take counsel from them. We don’t stand in their path. We don’t sit in the seats with them. That doesn’t mean we think we are too good to rub shoulders with them in a sense or have contact with them or work next to them. We are lights in the darkness. We just don’t run and hide and huddle with our lights together. There is time for us to be together as lights but then God sends us out there to shine in the darkness with lives that are a testimony to the power of His salvation with a message that shares changed lives.

Look at verse 6: “For the Gospel has for this purpose been preached even to those who are dead, that though they are judged in the flesh as men, they may live in the spirit according to the will of God.” That is why the Gospel is preached to those who have died, that Peter can relate to. They have experienced the death of fellow believers. They heard the Gospel and believed it. Well, they died as mortal men but they are men who have been made alive in the spirit according to the will of God and they will live that new life in the spiritual world that they have now moved to. To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord.

So from the outside it looks like well, there was a believer. He died. They put his body in a grave. There is an unbeliever. He died they put his body in the grave. What is the difference? Well one has been made alive in the spirit and someday these physical bodies will be made alive and we’ll have that spiritual, glorified body that we referred to in I Corinthians 15. That is why we share the Gospel. We want people to hear this before they die.

We looked recently into Luke 16 and the account of the rich man and Lazarus and what happens after death. You know we live with an understanding the world does not have. We talk about being in the world but not of the world and God keeps us in the world for a purpose. If He had left me in an environment with no contact or influence with believers how would I ever have gotten saved? How would I have hope in the world? How would I have heard the Gospel that could set me free? I am glad God didn’t isolate His people. That is what we are and He wants these Jews as believers now out in a world, hostile, against them because they are Jews and because they are believers to maintain their testimony.

You will note our lives make an impact but it is the Gospel that saves. Verse 6: “For the Gospel for this purpose has been preached, proclaimed to those who are dead.” We have to hear. Faith comes by hearing. Our lives are to be a testimony of the life changing power of the Gospel but people aren’t just saved by observing our lives. They must hear the Gospel. “Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the message of Christ.” And “How shall they hear without a proclaimer?” “And how shall they proclaim the Gospel if they have not been sent and how beautiful are the feet of those.”

So we think of that I am here, out here in this world and God uses me to share the Gospel. If I don’t share the Gospel who will? God has put me here in this context with these unbelievers who need to hear the Gospel. It is not enough for me to pray that God will send someone to share the Gospel with them because He already has sent someone. I may be that someone. That doesn’t mean that I don’t pray for others but I want to cease the opportunity.

So the reminder that is repeated; the power of sin has been broken in the lives of those who have trusted Christ. We have new life. Now we are to live the new life. Don’t be drawn back into the old life and expect, you know sometimes we are discouraged. Oh I thought when they saw the change in my life they may malign you. They may slander you. Don’t let that get you off track because that is just a further testimony you have a new life that comes from within and the things that people may do to you from the outside don’t change the course of your life because the course of your life is now set within. You are a new person, a new man in Christ. May we live that out this week.

Let’s pray together. Thank You Lord for the riches of our salvation and Lord the wonder of it grows in each one of us as every day we are privileged to walk with You in fellowship with the living God being the Spirit of God Himself living in us to enable us, empower us in all we do. May the lives that we live before a world that is watching be lives that are a testimony of Your grace. May we be bold with the truth that we have come to know and believe so that others may have the privilege of hearing this life changing Gospel, being exposed to Your power that can change their lives so that by Your grace they too might come to believe in the Savior that we love and serve. May that be the testimony of our lives as we are sent out in the world in the days of the week before us we pray in Christ’s name amen.