The Basis of our Endurance

Intro : It’s what we in the Christian world know as Holy Week.

It’s what we in the Christian world know as Holy Week.

it is the week before Easter Sunday or Resurrection Sunday.

Any Pastor worth His salt, will take this opportunity, while the world focuses on the cross work of Christ and then His resurrection.

Next Sunday, the message I will preach will be the resurrection.

Please turn with me in your Bibles to

Abi yesterday: I can’t do it. It’s tough being little. I would have done it for her.

For this purpose you have been called.

I want us to ask the question that if we are honest, we often do ask and that is the question: How will we ever get by?

Peter here is chapter 2 has already given us some instructions for living as new believers and for older believers.

In verse 1, We are told to neglect sin.

In verse 2-3, We are invited to treasure and long for the Word of God.

In verses 4-8, We are told that God Himself is building His church. A Spiritual House, a royal priesthood and that spiritual house is being laid upon the foundation of Jesus Christ Himself.

In verses 9-10 we are reminded of the grace in salvation and how we who were not the people of God are now the people God.

In verse 11, we are urged to flee the lust of the flesh.

In verse 12, we are commanded to be excellent in our behavior among all people.

In verse 13-17, we are told to honor authority that has been placed above us.

In verse 18-20, we are told that suffering well and patiently enduring when that authority abuses us finds favor with God.

In reality, verses 1-20 of , give us a formula for Christian living in world that hates Christ and His followers.

And if verses 1-20 give us the what, verse 21-25 give us the how.

How are we supposed to live?

Righteously, fleeing lust, honoring authority, and suffering well.

We are to suffer well for Christ. We are to endure well for Christ. We are to be sick well for Christ.

Why? because its fun, no. because it will give us Health wealth and prosperity, No.

So that I can have my best life now? No.

Did Christ have his best life now on earth?

Isaiah 53:3–5 NASB95

He was despised and forsaken of men, A man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; And like one from whom men hide their face He was despised, and we did not esteem Him. Surely our griefs He Himself bore, And our sorrows He carried; Yet we ourselves esteemed Him stricken, Smitten of God, and afflicted. But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, And by His scourging we are healed.

Isaiah 53:

We suffer well because Christ suffered well for us.

Christ became the suffering Servant, so that we might be empowered to take on the suffering of this world knowing that we have full and final victory over all suffering through His suffering and resurrection.

Look at verse 21.

1 Peter 2:21 NASB95

For you have been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in His steps,

We have been called to this purpose.

To live righteously in a world that hates righteousness.

To speak the truth in a world of lies.

To be silent when everyone else is talking.

And when they hate us for it, we remain faithful.

Just like Christ.

Christ sets the example of how to suffer well.

He suffered while being sinless.

1 Peter 2:22 NASB95

who committed no sin, nor was any deceit found in His mouth;

Peter is exegeting and explaining to these people how the suffering servant of lived a life worthy of example.

Peter calls us to righteousness, to live a life unstained by the world, because thats what Christ did.

He we should stop and appreciate this for a moment.

Jesus is not our Savior apart from his perfect life.

We cannot become the righteousness of Christ apart from the righteous life of Christ.

The cross means nothing apart from his righteous life.

His active obedience w

His sinlessness then has just as much apart of saving us as his bearing our sin does!

But not only was he sinless in his suffering.

He suffered while being silent.

While being reviled...

The word his means to endure abusive speech.

And he was well acquainted that.

Just think of the comments made by the Jews from last weeks sermon.

They said he was demon possessed, a Samaritan.

He endured a constant barrage of speech against.

And here we see the difference between us and Jesus.

Our immediate response when spoken against is to fire back. We train ourselves in this. A lot of us take pride in this ability to “tell that person off” or to shut them down.

But we have to ask, Is that what Christ did?

No in fact he kept silence while for your and my inability to do so.

This was not an easy task.

But even further, while suffering he uttered no threats.

Jesus the Creator and sustainer of the world utters no threats when suffering.

Our tendency is to say, Oh boy you are gonna pay for this one.

Instead of speaking harshly or threatening, Christ provides us an example.

He kept entrusting Himself to Him who judges righteously.

And here we see its in the midst of our hard times and suffering that we know who our God is.

Its important that we be grounded in Scriptural truth of who our God is.

That He is just.

That he is holy.

That he is gracious.

That he has a plan, and that plan may include suffering, but it is for our good.

He guides me in the cpaths of righteousness

For His name’s sake.

4 Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,

I fear no evil, for You are with me;

Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.

New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update (La Habra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995), .

In the beloved , David reminds of this as well

Psalm 23:3–4 NASB95

He restores my soul; He guides me in the paths of righteousness For His name’s sake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil, for You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.

He suffered as a substitute.

Psalm 23:3–4 NASB95

He restores my soul; He guides me in the paths of righteousness For His name’s sake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil, for You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.

It was for my sins that he died.

My lies, my temper, my impatience, my idolatry, the lust of my flesh, my wandering, my failures, my faithlessness, my speech.

Isaiah 53:5–6 NASB95

But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, And by His scourging we are healed. All of us like sheep have gone astray, Each of us has turned to his own way; But the Lord has caused the iniquity of us all To fall on Him.

It was for me that he died. Not his sin, but mine.

This echoes the pattern of the OT.

We look to the cross and say that should have been me.

But he dies for us that he might empower us to live righteously.

1 Peter 2:24 NASB95

and He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, so that we might die to sin and live to righteousness; for by His wounds you were healed.

There is a purpose to the cross that means more than just securing our sin debt was paid. The cross also gives us strength and victory over sin, because Christ has defeated sin for us.

He lives as our shepherd and the guardian of our souls.

John 10:27–29 NASB95

“My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand. “My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand.