The Witness of Communal Love - 1 Peter 3:8-12

Introduction

Peter has been devoted at some length to a treatment of what a modern theologian might call Christian ethics. Peter would call it an explanation of excellent conduct among the Gentiles.

In other words, Peter’s heart for this dispersed church is that they would understand the implications of their hope of future glory for their lives right now. If my future is guaranteed by the resurrection of Christ, how do I live?

Peter gives guidance under 4 categories: the Christian’s relationship to the government, the Christian’s relationship to unbelieving masters, the Christian’s relationship to an unbelieving spouse, and today and next week, the Christian’s relationship toward all people.

As we begin, having been off for a few weeks, I want to zoom out, rewind, and see where we’ve been.

Peter’s intent with this epistle is to encourage a group of scattered Jewish believers in their commitment to Christ. This is the only letter that is expressly addressed to multiple churches. We can therefore deduce that one church would receive the letter, read it aloud to the congregation, write down a copy, and then send the original on to the next church. Peter is therefore ministering to a wide variety of people through this letter, which is what makes it so accessible to us even today.

Peter’s goal then, is to encourage these Christians by giving them a roadmap of the Christian life in the form of a metaliterary progression from spiritual birth to spiritual old age. He spends relatively little time compared to his colleagues Paul and John in establishing theological matters, or what we might call indicative truths. He is chiefly concerned rather with imperative truths, or ethical and practical matters. This is demonstrated simply by the fact that he jumps into imperative commands as early as 1:13, and explicitly in 2:1.

So if chapter 1 is dealing with the indicative reality of being born again, chapter 2 begins dealing with the imperative realities. What does this new life, given by God in Christ, actually look like?

Peter begins in chapter 2 with internal affairs. How does the church deal with itself internally? How do individual Christians relate to one another? Peter’s controlling principle in this comes from 1:22: fervent love ought to be the guiding light of Christian conduct within the church.

This conduct of fervent love bears itself out in 2:1 with a laying aside of malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander, all things that are antithetical to Christian brotherly love. So if you lay aside these things, what ought to fill the void for the Christian? It might be easy to say relationships or discipling or whatever, but Peter is clear: if sin is to removed from our lives, that void must be filled not with relationships or people or anything else. It must be filled with the Word of God. Which on a side note is why, for the Christian, nothing can come between you and your regular, systematic communion with God in the Word and prayer. I love my wife Sarah, but on any given day, I will not have a serious conversation with her before I have a serious conversation with God. In fact, I would submit to you this evening that the strongest marriages, the strongest families, the strongest Christian friendships are the ones in which communion with God through His Word and prayer is the priority, not the other people. It’s only when the Word is consumed, feasted upon, digested, that brotherly love can be truly fervent the way that Peter describes it. No saturation in the Word, no Christian love in any relationship, marriage, family, or friendship.

Interestingly enough, however, when dealing with the behavior and conduct of the Christian, Peter only devotes about 10 or 11 verses to the behavior of Christians with other Christians. Peter devotes a considerable amount of space on the page from 2:11 onward to Christian behavior with non-Christians, with those outside the church, which Peter euphemizes as Gentiles.

As I mentioned at the beginning, this excellent conduct toward the Gentiles falls under four categories, and tonight and next week we will be dealing with Peter’s instruction for how the Christian is to live in the world in general terms. What is the Christian’s relationship to their coworkers, to random people on the street, to the members of their rotary club? It is to these matters that we will devote our attention tonight.

As we begin, I just want to make a brief general comment of application here.

Peter, simply by virtue of the amount of ink he devotes to Christian relationships with non-Christians as opposed to Christian relationships with other Christians, assumes that Christians are actually spending most of their time interacting with non-Christians.

This is counterintuitive, especially with some of our own spiritual heritage in America. Whether you are aware of it or not, if you trace our roots back as a church to the late 1800s and early 1900s, we come from a church tradition known as fundamentalism. Fundamentalism is not necessarily bad or problematic in terms of it’s intentions. It was concerned with liberal theological drift that was affected the beliefs and actions of churches and Christians in the US. The issues arose with how it sought to deal with those problems. The solution for fundamentalists was isolation. Rather than living in the world and engaging with the world, the solution was to hide from the world. For fundamentalists, the world was not a theater for God’s glory, as Peter describes it in 2:12. Instead, the world was the enemy. This belief took shape in such famous fundamentalist practices as not allowing their constituents to dance, play cards, or go to movies, much less spend significant time with any non-believers. After all, they are the enemy, not a theater of God’s glory, at least for the fundamentalist.

But for Peter, he assumes and expects us to be spending most of our time with unbelievers, not to be influenced by them into immoral behavior, but to be putting forth a display of God’s glory by our excellent conduct.

So I would submit to you tonight, if you can’t remember the last time you spent time with an unbeliever, Peter wouldn’t recognize your Christian walk. As we get started tonight, we need to think about how we can commit to placing ourselves in the lives of unbelievers, not for the purpose of chastising or proselytizing them, though we do want to share the gospel with them. Peter wants our primary goal to be demonstrating God’s glory to them in our every day conduct and behavior.

With those introductory matters in mind, let’s jump into the text.

I’ve called this message tonight The Witness of Communal Love, and I hope to demonstrate that Peter’s point here is to encourage his readers, and us, to continue in love for one another and in love toward the outside world, for the purpose of giving a blessing to others and inheriting a blessing from God, so that we might demonstrate to the outside world the hope that is within us.

We will attempt to stick to the following outline:

Be - Verse 8

Don’t be - Verse 9a

Give a blessing - Verse 9b

Get a blessing - Verse 9c-12

Let’s take a look.

Be - Verse 8

Peter begins verse 8 with the phrase “Now to sum up.” So what exactly is he summarizing? I believe he is summarizing everything he has taught from 1:22 onward. This summary is a summary of Christian life and conduct toward fellow believers and toward the outside world, the two primary objects of his teaching thus far.

So how is the Christian to act? What are the core character traits, the essential virtues of a Christian, from Peter’s perspective?

He provides a list, so let’s work our way through.

Like-mindedness

To be like-minded is to be harmonious, to be united or unified. This like-mindedness or unity is one of the key themes of the book of Acts. We see it occur as early as Acts 2:1, when the apostles are awaiting the coming of the Helper, the Holy Spirit, and they are all “in one place.” So we can observe that the church ought to be physically unified, or gathered together in one place. Moving on to Acts 4:24 and following, we see that the disciples are “in one accord,” now not only physically but also spiritually as they pray together in one accord. Again in chapter 4, now in verse 32, the congregation is now “of one heart and soul,” and that works itself out in the free generosity of the believers, one to another, as they share all that they have. So the book of Acts alone teaches us that like-mindedness has a physical reality, a spiritual reality, and a resource-related reality. In other words, if God’s people are to be like-minded, harmonious, and unified, they need to be together, they need to pray together, and they need to give of themselves to one another. Let’s bring this home tonight? How often are you with your brothers and sisters outside this context on a Sunday morning? When was the last time your home was open to the church so that you could be together? I thank God for Pastor Scott and Jenny’s example in this. One of my favorite times of the week is Taco Tuesday at the Julian house, many of you have been there. This is a perfect example of the physical togetherness that the church must seek. Do we share meals together? Do we share life together? Do we walk with one another in the mundane? I had a mentor who told me once that the best way to build life on life unity was to ask someone from your church to accompany you while grocery shopping. He then promptly told me to meet him at the grocery store. For 8 weeks, every Friday at 3:30, we met at the grocery store. Those were times of immense spiritual blessing to me at the Save Mart in Kingsburg, CA. We must also seek spiritual unity. This takes shape, I believe, in how we pray and what we believe. First, in prayer. A church that prays together, stays together. In the four years that I’ve been at West Hills Church, the turning point in our spiritual and numerical growth was when we started doing this prayer time together on Thursday nights. As it might be said, a church that prays together, stays together. So we have to ask: are we unified, are we harmonious in prayer? Or are our prayers combatting and opposing each other? I believe a great way to be harmonious in prayer is to pray the Scriptures for one another, to pray the prayers of the Bible for individual members of our church. We have many members and regular attenders who have not once submitted a request to the prayer sheet. How do we pray for them? We pray the Scriptures for them. I was blessed this week in my personal time of communion with God by Paul’s prayer for the Thessalonian church, a church that I think bears a remarkable resemblance to West Hills Church.

1 Thessalonians 3:11–13 LSB

Now may our God and Father Himself and Jesus our Lord direct our way to you, and may the Lord cause you to increase and abound in love for one another, and for all people, just as we also do for you, so that He may strengthen your hearts blameless in holiness, before our God and Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all His saints.

If you don’t know specifically what to pray for someone, pray the Scriptures for them.

Secondly, I would urge you to not just pray through the prayer list, but pray through the church directory. Go alphabetically by last name and pray for one or two people per day. If you know of a specific request, pray for that. If you don’t, pray the Scriptures. This is how our church will grow in our unity in prayer. Think about this: how can you hold a grudge against someone that you pray for like Paul prayed for the Thessalonians?

We are also to be unified in what we believe. Raise your hand if you’ve read the church doctrinal statement in the last 6 months. I’ll make it easier for you. Raise your hand if you can recite the Apostle’s Creed from memory. I’ll make it even easier for you. Raise your hand if you have ever heard of the Apostle’s Creed. Do we stand firm together on the essentials of Christian doctrine? Do we all affirm the same truths about God, Christ, the Bible, the church, salvation, and the last things? While we recognize that there is room for latitude on certain secondary doctrinal issues, a church that is following the model of the book of Acts and following Peter’s model here is unified on the core orthodox doctrines expressed by the ancient creeds of the church.

Therefore, as the world watches and wonders at Christ’s church on earth, Peter insists upon like-mindedness and unity of that church. Our unity ought to be perplexing and attractive to a world that is constantly fighting, bickering, and arguing about small matters. A unified church therefore carries a powerful witness before the watching world. Likewise then, this command by Peter also serves as a warning. Unharmonious churches marked by infighting and petty disputes are no different than worldly organizations. Why should an unbeliever leave that world when they come into the church and experience the same thing? And many times in my experience the conflict and infighting that occurs in the church is actually far more severe than that outside the church. If we would be committed to the Great Commission, to making disciples of all nations and taking salt and light to the ends of the earth, it starts with us handling our family business. Fervent brotherly love plays out in harmonious, unified, peaceable life with one another in Christ’s church.

Sympathy

Peter moves outward as he lists his second Christian virtue. A Christian ought to be sympathetic in their dealings with others. A brief analysis of the original Greek word yields a rich concept here. This is the idea of sympathizing and having compassion on those who suffer. Quite literally it means suffering together with the one who suffers. This idea of suffering is a key thread in Peter’s tapestry in this epistle. The idea is expressed by him in every chapter, and indeed could be put forth as the main theme of the book. In fact I would say that 1 Peter could be summarized simply as Peter’s instruction for living and suffering for the hope of glory.

So his point here is that, if suffering is to be guaranteed part of the life of the Christian, all Christians are called to suffer together. Our call as Christians is to sympathize with and share in the sufferings of our brothers and sisters. As Paul says in another place, when one member suffers, all suffer together, and in another place, he calls us to weep with those who weep.

We live rather cushy lives, I think. None of have been imprisoned for our faith. We’ve had brushes with losing jobs or losing money or tax exempt status or whatever. Those things certainly fall into the category of Christian suffering, but by and large, compared to other parts of the world and other parts of history, we enjoy relative freedom and prosperity as Christians. In that, we have a clear commission from Peter: sympathize with compassion with those who suffer. Are we the priests and religious leaders who see the wounded man and pass by on the other side of the road? Or do we load him on our donkey, take him to get help, and pay for his rest and recuperation at the inn?

Further, Peter’s language suggests that sympathy is not limited to our relationship with our brothers and sisters in Christ, though they are certainly included. We are called to be sympathetic toward all people.

We live in a dark part of the world. We live under a regime in California that claims compassion as it’s guiding political virtue and yet people suffer immensely in our state, and even in our own community. I rue the fact that the church has so willingly released it’s responsibility for compassion to a corrupt and wicked government system. I urge you to think about the people you pass on the streets. The people asking for a tank of gas at the gas station. The people asking for food outside McDonalds. Now I’m not encouraging foolish or foolhardy behavior. I’m not encouraging you to encourage or enable addictions or unethical behavior. What I am encouraging you to think about are ways that you can, with wisdom and grace, adorned with Christ and the gospel, sympathize with your community. Suffer with your community. Have compassion in your community. Peter’s promise is this: such compassion adds fuel to the fire of Christian witness. It pours gasoline on the burning signal fire atop the Celestial City on the hill. Christian compassion declares to a watching world: Come to Christ, all who are weary and heavy laden, and He will give you rest.

Brotherliness

Applying a chiastic literary framework to Peter’s list yields brotherliness as the central Christian virtue in Peter’s mind. For Peter, this is the zenith of Christian conduct. This ought to come as no surprise to us, having read 1:22, where Peter states in no uncertain terms that the purpose of our sanctification is so that we might have a fervent brotherly love for one another, a fiery affection for our fellow believers.

Now Peter puts this type of love in the context of Christian witness, and he’s not alone in doing so. Someone read John 13:35

John 13:35 LSB

“By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”

Simply put, the love you have for your Christian brothers and sisters, expressed in likemindedness, sympathy, tenderheartedness, and humility of spirit, is a powerful witness to the work of Christ and His gospel among His church to a watching world.

Our commitment must then be to walk in love with one another so that as the world watches, our love for one another reveals to them our love for the Savior, and our love for the Savior makes them want to know Him as we know Him and love Him as we love Him.

Tender-heartedness

Tender-heartedness speaks of that inward softness toward others. It might be translated compassion and is similar to the idea of sympathy. The tender heart is the heart that breaks over the suffering of others, the heart that weeps when a sheep is lost and likewise rejoices when it is found. A tender heart is the heart of Mary, who sat patiently at the feet of Jesus, drinking in every word He said. A tender heart is the heart of David, who mourned bitterly over his sin against God, Uriah, and Bathsheba. A tender heart is the heart of Christ, who welcomed children into His arms, comforted grieving women, and wept over the death of His friend Lazarus.

To fervently love one another is to be tender-hearted, warm, and compassionate toward each other. There is no room in Christ’s church for cold, heartless, unemotional, unfeeling Christians.

And for Peter here, our tenderheartedness is like a warm fire that beckons the world to come into the church, out from the cold, and find rest in the warm, brotherly love of Christ and His church.

This works itself out in the way we treat visitors to our church on Sunday. Do we approach first-time guests with warmth and tenderness, beckoning them, as it were, to come sit with us by the fire of Christ and His church? Or do we look upon strangers with suspicion, holding them at an arm’s length because they are not part of the club? My challenge to you is this: the next time you see a first-time guest here at our church, leave your comfortable friends behind and welcome the strangers into Christ’s church. Show them love by showing them warmth and tenderness.

Humility of spirit

Finally, Peter is concerned to urge the church on to be humble in spirit. I could wax on about humility and what it means and what it looks like, or I could simply direct you to the most magnificent treatment of humility God has given us in Scripture. Someone read Philippians 2:1-11

Philippians 2:1–11 LSB

Therefore if there is any encouragement in Christ, if there is any consolation of love, if there is any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and compassion, fulfill my joy, that you think the same way, by maintaining the same love, being united in spirit, thinking on one purpose, doing nothing from selfish ambition or vain glory, but with humility of mind regarding one another as more important than yourselves, not merely looking out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others. Have this way of thinking in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although existing in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, by taking the form of a slave, by being made in the likeness of men. Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore, God also highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus EVERY KNEE WILL BOW, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and that EVERY TONGUE WILL CONFESS that Jesus Christ is LORD, to the glory of God the Father.

Jesus Christ, in His descent from the throne of heaven, is the greatest example we have as Christians of humility. The blazing center of humility then comes from verse 3: regarding others as more important than yourself.

Humility is often confused with self-abasement, and that could not be further from the truth. Self-abasement says “I am a wretch. I am a terrible person. I am the chief of all sinners.” But that’s not true humility. Why? Who is still at the center of all those statements? Me. I’m still the most important. I’m a bad person, but it’s still all about me. Humility says “I serve a great Christ. My church is faithful and full of love. My family loves the Lord.” Humility puts God and others in the spotlight, and leaves yourself out.

As it has so helpfully and concisely been said: Humility is not thinking less of yourself, but thinking of yourself less.

Andrew Murray, a Dutch Reformed pastor in South Africa in the late 1800s, wrote a fantastic little book on humility. Listen to what he says about it’s importance in relation to our passage from Philippians:

Humility: The Beauty of Holiness Chapter II: Humility: The Secret of Redemption

In this view it is of inconceivable importance that we should have right thoughts of what Christ is, of what really constitutes Him the Christ, and specially of what may be counted His chief characteristic, the root and essence of all His character as our Redeemer. There can be but one answer: it is His humility. What is the incarnation but His heavenly humility, His emptying Himself and becoming man? What is His life on earth but humility; His taking the form of a servant? And what is His atonement but humility? ‘He humbled Himself and became obedient unto death.’ And what is His ascension and His glory, but humility exalted to the throne and crowned with glory? ‘He humbled Himself, therefore God highly exalted Him.’ In heaven, where He was with the Father, in His birth, in His life, in His death, in His sitting on the throne, it is all, it is nothing but humility. Christ is the humility of God embodied in human nature; the Eternal Love humbling itself, clothing itself in the garb of meekness and gentleness, to win and serve and save us. As the love and condescension of God makes Him the benefactor and helper and servant of all, so Jesus of necessity was the Incarnate Humility. And so He is still in the midst of the throne, the meek and lowly Lamb of God.

If this be the root of the tree, its nature must be seen in every branch and leaf and fruit. If humility be the first, the all-including grace of the life of Jesus,—if humility be the secret of His atonement,—then the health and strength of our spiritual life will entirely depend upon our putting this grace first too, and making humility the chief thing we admire in Him, the chief thing we ask of Him, the one thing for which we sacrifice all else.

Christian witness cannot be separated from Christian love. If we want to be salt and light before a watching world, we must be adorned as individual Christians and as a church together with love.

This is what we are to be. Now let’s look briefly at what we are not to be.

Not Be - Vs 9a

Peter contrasts the 4-pronged perspective on brotherly love in verse 8 with a double rebuke against behavior that Christians should not be engaged in.

Namely, Christians should not be engaged in retributive or retaliatory behavior.

We know that people will sin. Certainly those outside Christ’s covenant church will sin against us, and even within these four walls, sinful people will do sinful things. Peter’s exhortation to us, in light of the love that we are to share and demonstrate in verse 8, is to not return sin for sin.

Someone read Matthew 5:38-48

Matthew 5:38–48 LSB

“You have heard that it was said, ‘AN EYE FOR AN EYE, AND A TOOTH FOR A TOOTH.’ “But I say to you, do not resist an evil person; but whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also. “And if anyone wants to sue you and take your tunic, let him have your garment also. “And whoever forces you to go one mile, go with him two. “Give to him who asks of you, and do not turn away from him who wants to borrow from you. “You have heard that it was said, ‘YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR and hate your enemy.’ “But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven; for He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. “For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? “And if you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? “Therefore you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

Peter certainly has Christ’s teaching in his mind as he writes these words. The response of the Christian to evil should never be more evil, but should always be good. To utilize Peter’s own language here, the response of the Christian to evil should never be more evil, but always love.

Therefore, for us, we know that people will sin against us. We’ve probably experienced it today. People will hurt us. People will defame us. People will try to cause division. Our response must always be unity, like-mindedness, sympathy, tender-heartedness, and humility.

Give a blessing

Peter further contrasts returning evil for evil with giving a blessing. What does it mean to give a blessing? Walter Bauer describes giving a blessing as speaking positively or favorably of someone. Tom Schreiner takes it a step further in this context when he says

1, 2 Peter, Jude (5) Conclusion: Live a Godly Life (3:8–12)

By “blessing” Peter means that believers are to ask God to show his favor and grace upon those who have conferred injury upon them.

This is a powerful response to mistreatment by those who oppose Christ, his gospel, and His church. Again we see Peter exhorting the church to radical, powerful, illogical witness to the power of the gospel before a watching world, to be demonstrated primarily in the way we deal with unbelievers.

This is what Jesus meant in Luke 6:28-29

Luke 6:28–29 LSB

bless those who curse you, pray for those who disparage you. “Whoever hits you on the cheek, offer him the other also; and whoever takes away your garment, do not withhold your tunic from him either.

Therefore, as Christians, our purpose wrapped up in being salt and light and giving blessings, both physically and spiritually, in a dark and depressed world. Christians ought not to seek retribution or retaliation but instead seek to bless and pray for those who oppose and oppress them.

Get a blessing

The result of all this is tied up in the reason we were called as Christians.

Called to receive blessing.

Psalm 34, David running from the opposition and oppression of Abimelech, suffering as a member of God’s covenant, his response/encouragement: do good, not evil.

The watching world sees our ethics, sees our morality, sees our love working itself out in humility and harmony, sympathy and compassion, sees our blessing of those who curse us, and takes notices.

Do Christ and the gospel adorn our lives in the world? Peter gives us a charge here: walk worthy before the watching world. In that, Christi is honored and disciples are made.