A Call To Good Works

Introduction

Have you ever felt out of your element?

I recently began a new job and in this new job i was being trained by a lady who held different views than I have on some doctrine.

She was an apostolic Pentecostal. This is a Oneness Pentecostal. Amongst other things this group doesn’t believe in the trinity.

When she heard I was a youth pastor and a Southern Baptist she quickly tried striking up a conversation with me regarding my views toward the trinity.

I told her that I do believe in the trinity, but when she proceeded to ask what verses Southern Baptists use to support the trinity. At that, I froze up and in the midst of feeling uncomfortable and out of my element proceeded to shut down on the topic.

It was a civil discussion and she was a nice girl, but she highlighted one key thing in me

That I do not enjoy being out of my element and uncomfortable.

We often freeze up and get uncomfortable when we are out of our element.

Peter wrote this book as a reminder to the Christians to glorify Christ even as Aliens in a fallen world. He wrote it to the Christians in Northern Asia Minor who were facing intense persecution and perhaps felt out of their element?

Body

Point 1 - Don’t be afraid to be an Alien in this world

1 Peter 2:11–12 CSB

11 Dear friends, I urge you as strangers and exiles to abstain from sinful desires that wage war against the soul. 12 Conduct yourselves honorably among the Gentiles, so that when they slander you as evildoers, they will observe your good works and will glorify God on the day he visits.

Anytime You ever hear about Area 51, Space ship sightings or anything else of the sort. Humans tend to be astonished at the thought of unfamiliar life. If you ever look at movies involving aliens you see that humanity tends to behave towards aliens aggressively, the primary reasons that we act that way are:

Aliens stand out

Aliens cause Change

Aliens see the world differently than humans

Brothers, we are not professionals! We are outcasts. We are aliens and exiles in the world (1 Pet. 2:11). Our citizenship is in heaven, and we wait with eager expectation for the Lord (Phil. 3:20)

John Piper

We are in this world, but not of this world.

We are placed here to change lives for the lord and through the lord by living out the great commission

We are called to see the world for what it is. A place full of sin. This is our temporary home. We live our lives here with our hearts set on eternal life with God and to have a deep understanding of the magnitude of eternity.

1 Peter 2:13–17 CSB

13 Submit to every human authority because of the Lord, whether to the emperor as the supreme authority 14 or to governors as those sent out by him to punish those who do what is evil and to praise those who do what is good. 15 For it is God’s will that you silence the ignorance of foolish people by doing good. 16 Submit as free people, not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil, but as God’s slaves. 17 Honor everyone. Love the brothers and sisters. Fear God. Honor the emperor.

Point 2 - Be Holy As God is Holy

In the world that we live in as Aliens we are called by God to submit to our leaders, our governors, our government, and even our president.

This was an extremely challenging thing to read for me.

To submit and respect the government. The same government that pushes for non-biblical policies all the time.

It is striking how similar our circumstances are to the Christians Peter is speaking to in this passage.

Roman authority and persecution was harsh and difficult to the Christian, but the author still tells us to submit to the government?

The bible tells us that God puts the world leadership into place.

While I don’t completely agree with everything that our government does. I still strive to be an outstanding citizen, I pay my taxes. I don’t break the law, I support the governments leadership on factors that don’t disagree with my faith.

If God placed the Government into place that means God is more powerful than the government and as such we should first obey God and not the government.

The Roman leadership would have taken offense to the fact that God is more powerful than them. In many ways the bibles explanation of that is a shot at worldly leaders and not an affirmation. It is to say that Christians are not of this world and we are to obey the ways of God before we obey the ways of our government.

Closing

God has called us to live as resident aliens in the world.

If you missed anything I said remember this:

We are called to be different than the world.

We are called to evoke change in our culture and set it towards Christ

We are to live our lives in a Christ glorifying way and see the world as he does

In everything we do, we are to be great commission living, soul winning Christian Aliens through the power of God.