5 W’s

1 Peter 1:18–2:3 “You know that from your empty way of life inherited from your ancestors you were ransomed—not by perishable things like silver or gold, but by precious blood like that of an unblemished and spotless lamb, namely Christ. He was foreknown before the foundation of the world but was manifested in these last times for your sake. Through him you now trust in God, who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God. You have purified your souls by obeying the truth in order to show sincere mutual love. So love one another earnestly from a pure heart. You have been born anew, not from perishable but from imperishable seed, through the living and enduring word of God. For all flesh is like grass and all its glory like the flower of the grass; the grass withers and the flower falls off, but the word of the Lord endures forever. And this is the word that was proclaimed to you. So get rid of all evil and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander. And…”

Introduction: I am a big fan of the 5 W method.

In this passage, we’re going to break down the Who What When Where Why of the Gospel.

I want to read the whole thing one more time:

1 Peter 1:18-2:3

1 Peter 1:18–2:3 NET 2nd ed.

You know that from your empty way of life inherited from your ancestors you were ransomed—not by perishable things like silver or gold, but by precious blood like that of an unblemished and spotless lamb, namely Christ. He was foreknown before the foundation of the world but was manifested in these last times for your sake. Through him you now trust in God, who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God. You have purified your souls by obeying the truth in order to show sincere mutual love. So love one another earnestly from a pure heart. You have been born anew, not from perishable but from imperishable seed, through the living and enduring word of God. For all flesh is like grass and all its glory like the flower of the grass; the grass withers and the flower falls off, but the word of the Lord endures forever. And this is the word that was proclaimed to you. So get rid of all evil and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander. And yearn like newborn infants for pure, spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow up to salvation, if you have experienced the Lord’s kindness.

Who is the Who we’re talking about in this passage.

Who: Verse 19, says we were ransomed not by perishable things like silver or Gold,

1 Peter 1:19 NET 2nd ed.

but by precious blood like that of an unblemished and spotless lamb, namely Christ.

Jesus Christ, and his Death, Burial and Resurection is the center point of all of the history of the Universe.

We tell time based on when Jesus was born. AD, stands for Anno Domini, the year of our Lord.

We take the Lord’s Supper, communion Every Single week.

And that’;s not on accident. It’s because the death, burial, and resurection of Jesus that’s what we’re remembering, that’s what we’re Proclaiming.

1 Corinthians 11:26 “For every time you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.”

We believe that’s important enough to remember every single time we gather together.

But the only time i’ve ever left a church. Not because I moved, or anything like that, but truly felt like “I can’t stay at this church”

And I’m not going to tell you the name of the church, because they were super nice people, and acted like Christians to the core, so I had no ill-will, it was just a difference in theology,

We had been attending for several weeks, and I noticed that they didn’t take communion.

And I asked, like hey, The lord’s supper is Really important to me . I see an example in the new testament that the early church took the lord’s supper every sunday when they met together.

Acts 2:42, Acts 20:7, 1 Corinthians chapters 10 and 11.

And I said, so I was just wondering if that’s something you guys do, or what’s the deal.

And they said, oh we have a little table in the back, if you want to go and take it by yourself, that’s fine. But we don’t really do that.

They said, well it just got too repetetive, and monotonous. so we stopped doing it.

And like I said, I don’t say that to bash on other churches or denominations. But I am saying is that I but that’s not us.

My desire is for us to place Christ at the Center of Everything we do here at ACC.

And I think we do a pretty good job of it.

I would love it if communion, the central point, the one thing that tangibly and visibly represents the death burial and resurection of Jesus Christ was THE central part of church when we gather.

so that we could say, I’m not going to church to sing songs, I’m not going to church to hear a sermon.

I’m going to church to reflect on the death burial and resurection of Jesus at communion.

And everything else was design to prepare your heart for that.

The 5 W’s of the Gospel, obviously, the who is Jesus Christ

What.

What is it that Jesus accomplished when he went to the cross.

1 Peter 1:18 NET 2nd ed.

You know that from your empty way of life inherited from your ancestors you were ransomed

Some translations say “you were Redeemed”

As we get a little farther on into chapter 2, we’re going to discover that a lot of the people Peter was writing to were household slaves.

And they would have understood the concept of being purchased for your freedom, being ransomed out of slavery into freedom intimately well.

And throughout the old testament, the story of the Jewish People centers on the idea that they were redeemed, they were ransomed out of slavery by god .

(Expand on idea of slavery in the first century, being purchased to a better situation)

The other idea that comes up in this passage for what it is that Jesus accomplished on the cross, it say in verse 22 “you have purified your souls”

and in verse 23 it says

1 Peter 1:23 NET 2nd ed.

You have been born anew, not from perishable but from imperishable seed, through the living and enduring word of God.

I have this conversation when people are considering getting baptized. One of the things I will tell them is, look, the Bible describes being baptized and becoming a Christian as a death.

Romans 6 says all who were Baptized into Christ Jesus were Baptized into his death.

We are buried with him in baptism so that we may too live a new life.

John 3 says unless a person is “born again” he can not enter the kingdom of God

Matthew 16 Jesus says anyone who wants to be my follower must take up his cross and follow.

Take up the cross. The cross was a death sentence.

And so when I have conversations with people about becoming a Christian, one of the things I tell them is, “look, when you go down into that water, you are going to die. The old you will be dead. We’re going to leave him in the grave.

And from that moment, when you come out a new you will be born.

That means all the sin, all the old habits, all the old fears and addctions, all the yuck of sin and evil that you’ve been carying around, that’s the old you.

And we’re putting the old you to death.

It’s the only way.

Application If you have a tree in your yard with a disease. And you’ve tried everything. but no matter what you can’t rid it of that disease.

Chances are it’s in the roots.

Which means the only way that you’re going to have a healthy tree is if you uproot and kill the old tree, and plant a new one.

Who: Jesus Christ, and his death burial and resurection

the what: We’re ransomed from our sins, our old self dies, and we are born again.

When:

1 Peter 1:20 NET 2nd ed.

He was foreknown before the foundation of the world but was manifested in these last times for your sake.

I think one of the biggest mistakes we can make, as we’re going through scripture, especially as we read the old testament, is to get this idea in our head that Jesus was God’s plan B.

I think a lot of us, whether we’re trying to or not, have this picture in our mind where we think ,

Well God tried doing the whole Adam and Eve in paradise thing.

But he gave them free will, so that really didn’t work.

So then God tried sending a flood. And it turned out that didn’t work .

So then he tried rescuing the Jewish people out of Egypt and giving them the law and the sacrificial system, and well, that didn’t work

So then he tried giving them a King to rule over them and keep them in line, but that didn’t work.

So then God was like, I know, I’ll send them to exile in babylon. But then that didn;t work.

And then finally, God was like “ok, I’m just going to send my son Jesus”

And that was the one that finally stuck.

That’s bad theology.

Jesus was God’s plan A since before the creation of the world.

And when we don’t acknowledge the fact that even before God said the words “let their be light” it was his plan to send his son to redeem the world.

When we don’t acknowledge that, we cheapen God’s soviergn reign over all creation.

Who: Jesus Christ

What: Ransomed and born again

When: Since the foundation of the world.

Where

Back up to verse 18:

1 Peter 1:18 NET 2nd ed.

You know that from your empty way of life inherited from your ancestors you were ransomed—not by perishable things like silver or gold,

I used to work with a Guy

His name was clint. He was probably one of the crustiest old guys on the jobsite I’ve ever met.

He was the superintendent of a lot of the jobs I did

Smoked like a chimney, had a five o’clock shaddow no matter what time of day it was.

And one of his favorite phrases to say was “how’s that working out for you”

He’d see someone struggling to do something, usually because they didn’t do it the way he’d tell them to in the first place.

and instead of correcting them, instead of telling them, hey, the way you’re doing it’s not going to work.

He’d just go over there, and watch.

Cigarettte hanging out of his mouth, and he’d just watch you struggle.

(Continue story)

Look, when it comes to our sin, when it comes to our old way of life, it ain’t working out so well for us.

I hear people say all the time things like “Just be you” just be yourself, just you do you.

and I’m like, no thank you because me doing me wasn’t working out for me very well. I think I’d much rather have something better, thank you very much.

which is why I thank God that I was ransomed out of that empty way of life.

Who, what when where,

And the big question I think we ought to ask is, Why.

Why

I want to give you a free Bible reading tool .

Whenever you’re asking the question “why” when you’re reading the bible, look for words and phrases like “so that” or “in order to” or “because”

Why were we redeemed, why did Jesus go to the cross for us, why were we born again?

And I think if you asked most people they would say “So that we can go to heaven”

So that we can live forever.

Because God wanted us to live forever, and God wanted us to go to heaven.

But let’s look at what Peter says here in verse 22

1 Peter 1:22 NET 2nd ed.

You have purified your souls by obeying the truth in order to show sincere mutual love. So love one another earnestly from a pure heart.

Now don’t get me wrong, Going to heaven, I’m looking forward to that very much.

Living forever with God, yes please, I’ll take that.

But that’s not the reason God saved us.

That’s just really fortunate side effect, but it wasn’t God’s main motivation.

His main motivation his reason for ransoming us was so that we might love, sincerely, and earnestly from a pure heart.

Because a corrputed sinful heart can not love properly.

Jesus says the two greatest commandments are to love god and love our neighbor, but if our heart is full of sin we can’t love the way God desires us to.

And that’s the reason he saved us.

Which means when we’re saved, we’re not done.

God doesn’t expect us to follow Jesus, and get our ticket punched. That’s not what the Bible teaches at all.

We are put on this earth to love.

How:

How do we continue to love the way God calls us to?

how does our transformation take place?

Number 1, it’s from the continuing work of the holy spirit dwelling within us as Christians.

And we find that in other places in Scripture, but here in 1 Peter, god is focusing on another element of that.

1 Peter 1:23–2:2 NET 2nd ed.

You have been born anew, not from perishable but from imperishable seed, through the living and enduring word of God. For all flesh is like grass and all its glory like the flower of the grass; the grass withers and the flower falls off, but the word of the Lord endures forever. And this is the word that was proclaimed to you. So get rid of all evil and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander. And yearn like newborn infants for pure, spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow up to salvation,

The word of God. The living and enduring word of God, the grass withers and the flowers fade away, but Gods word endures forever.

He says the first thing we need to do if we want to love the way God intends us to is to

1 Peter 2:1 NET 2nd ed.

So get rid of all evil and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander.

Relationship destroying sin.

And then he says to

1 Peter 2:2 NET 2nd ed.

And yearn like newborn infants for pure, spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow up to salvation,

[Compare this analogy to other analogies in Hebrews 5]

How often do newborns eat… (Expand)

Closing:

Jesus Christ, and his death burial and resurection, cleanses and purifies us, and redeems us, and causes us to be born again, putting our old sinful self to death.

And this wasn’t god’s plan b, it was his plan from the foundation of the world,

To ransom us out of slavery, out of sin, out of our empty way of life.

So that we could love.

And as we continue on in faith, we crave after God’s word, so that we grow up into our salvation.

Pray.