Sermon Tone Analysis

Announce Text

Please turn with me in your Bibles to 1 Peter… I want to encourage you to follow along with us in your Bible, so if you don’t have one, feel free to use the one that’s in the rack in front of you, and you’ll find our text on page 1,014.

Scripture Introduction

So we’re going to be starting a new series this morning… now, you might be thinking to yourself, “didn’t we just start a new series last week?

Aren’t we going through the book of Hosea?”

And yes… we did… we’re not skipping that…

But this is a different “new series.”

Normally when I have the opportunity to preach, what I’ll do is exposit a passage of Scripture, something that the Lord has laid on my heart or something that I’ve been reading through in my personal devotional time… but I’ve decided to do something a little different this time… I figured that since I’m going to be preaching for the next two weeks, rather than choose two passages of Scripture to preach through, what I’ve decided we’d do is start walking expositionally through a book of the Bible.

In this case, 1 Peter.

So the way that it would work is this - this week, we’re going to start with the introduction… just two verses…

We’re going to point out some of the features of the landscape… We may fly a little close here and there…

But I figured that since I’m preaching this week and Lord-willing the next, I thought I’d do something a little different than what I normally do and take us through an entire book of the Bible… not in 2 weeks but over time… As the Lord wills, and as I have opportunities in the future, we’ll just continue with it…

This isn’t replacing that series… but it’s supplementing it… Now, normally when I have the opportunity to preach, what I’ll do is I’ll choose a passage of Scripture, something that the Lord has laid on my heart or something that I’ve been reading through in my devotional time… and I’ll preach on that.

And what I thought I would do this morning is two things… the first thing is, we’re going to take a bird’s-eye view of the entire book.

So this time, we’re doing something a little different…

And what I thought I would do this morning is two things… the first thing is, we’re going to take a bird’s-eye view of the entire book.

So what I thought I would do this morning is two things… the first thing is, we’re going to take a bird’s-eye view of the entire book.

It’s like climbing to the top of a mountain and looking out over the landscape.

And when you do that, what you notice is the big features… what you notice is the valleys and the peaks… you get an overall view of what the terrain looks like.

And then the second thing we’re going to do is, we’re going to come down off the mountain and we’re going to start heading down a path… and that will allow us to examine some of the features of the terrain in more detail.

It’s going to allow us to notice some things that we couldn’t necessarily see when we were on top of the mountain… So this week, we’re going to examine the greeting…

And then next week, Lord-willing, we’ll get into the heart of Chapter 1.

And then in the weeks and months that follow, as I’m given opportunity, we’ll just pick up where we left off…

And over time, as the Lord wills, we’ll walk our way through this entire letter… a letter that’s so rich and deep with meaning…

A letter that really speaks to us today as we try to figure out how to live our lives as Christians… as we strive to please the Lord in a world that seems to be turning further and further away from the things of God.

So why did Peter write this letter?

You see, for us, our identity as Christians is not only the source of great joy, but ironically, it’s largely the the reason why we suffer…

For us, because of our faith, we’re often marginalized by society… we’re often alienated in our relationships… and threatened with - if not experiencing - a loss of honor and standing in society.

And that’s just here… that’s just in the United States… that says nothing of the persecution faced by our brothers and sisters around the world… some of whom have literally lost everything, including their lives, for their faith in Jesus Christ.

But as followers of Christ, we’ve all experienced some form of suffering and loss because of our faith…

It could be the friends or family members who no longer invite you to gatherings because they’re tired of hearing about Jesus… and they don’t even tell you, they just stop inviting…

Or maybe they do tell you, and that’s a source of much grief…

Maybe it’s the co-workers who snicker about you by the water cooler because you won’t partake in gossip or crude joking…

Maybe it’s the friends at school who think you’re weird because you want to honor God by remaining sexually pure…

Or maybe you’re a Christian business owner and you realize that it’s just a matter of time before you’re asked to do something that violates your convictions and causes you to lose everything.

Or maybe you’re the Pastor who realizes that your stand for Christ and the sanctity of marriage could one day land you in jail… and that day is right around the corner… it could be tomorrow.

You see, what Peter wants us to understand is, the way to stand fast in this present evil age is by understanding first and foremost who we are before God in Christ…

That we are His people… that He has set his love upon us… that He has separated us from the world and called us to holiness…

And we’re not called to do this alone… He’s given us His Spirit… He’s given us one another…

An important thing to know about 1 Peter is that it’s written primarily to Gentiles…

Why is that important?

Because for them, identifying themselves as God’s chosen, set-apart people a radical idea…

yes, he refers to them as “the Dispersion,” and yes… the three other times that word is used in the New Testament, it’s referring to Jews who have been “dispersed” or scattered outside of Israel… but not here.

Peter is writing to Gentiles…

After all, God’s people were the Israelites… but for these Gentiles, it changes everything… it makes all the difference.

So, how do we know it was written to Gentiles?

You see, when you come to Christ in repentance and faith, the Bible says that you are a new creation… the old has passed away and behold, the new has come.

He wants us to really lay hold of this idea… that in Christ, we have been given a new identity… and this identity is glorious.

And because of this, we have to think of ourselves and our relationships to family and society differently from how we did when we were unbelievers.

We need to be transformed in our thinking about who we are in Christ and what that means for our relationships… our relationships with family, friends, co-workers, society in general… and especially, with other believers… so how we relate to one another in the church.

So, how do we know this?

After all, Peter refers to them as “elect exiles of the Dispersion.”

Well, we don’t know with absolute certainty, but look with me at vv. 1:17-19, it says,

It would be odd for Peter, who was a Jew, to say that his Jewish forefathers lived in futility.

After all, the Jews were God’s elect people…

And then, 4:3-4, which says,

1 Peter

What Peter is saying is, the time for living this way is over… it’s behind you… but be prepared… because everyone you know, who are expecting you to live this way… and expecting you to join them… are going to be surprised when you don’t…

That would be an odd thing to say to Jewish believers who never would have identified themselves with sinful living like that…

So why is it so important?

Why is it significance?

He wants us to really lay hold of this idea… that in Christ, we have been given a new identity… and this identity is glorious.

And because of this, we have to think of ourselves and our relationships to family and society differently from how we did when we were unbelievers.

We need to be transformed in our thinking about who we are in Christ and what that means for our relationships… our relationships with family, friends, co-workers, society in general… and especially, with other believers… so how we relate to one another in the church.

So why is it so important?

What’s the significance?

Peter wanted his Gentile readers to conceive of themselves as the people of God.

He wanted them to shift their identity.

He wanted them to identify themselves with the new creation… because that’s what the Bible says…

You see, when you come to Christ in repentance and faith, you’re a new creation… you’re part of the new creation… the old has passed away and behold, the new has come.

And he wants us to really lay hold of this idea… that in Christ, we have been given a new identity… and this identity is glorious.

And because of this, we have to think of ourselves and our relationships to family and friends and society different ways than we did before.

We need to be transformed in our thinking about who we are in Christ and what that means for our relationships… relationships with family and friends… with our co-workers… with society in general… and especially, with one another in the church.

We’ve become resident aliens because we realize that living the way the world does wars against the soul… and that makes us foreigners… it makes us strangers in a strange land.

You see, Peter wants us to know that by believing in Jesus Christ, we have become part of the true Israel of God… we see this in Chapter 2, where Peter identifies the church as “a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession… a people whom he has called out of darkness into his marvelous light (vv.

2:9-10).

They had become part of the true Israel of God by believing in Jesus Christ… we’ll examine this idea further when we explore Chapter 2, vv.

9-10.

And for Gentile Christians in Peter’s day, this idea that they were part the chosen people was vital…

This is exactly how Moses identified the Israelites in …

And this idea is vital to our faith…

But for the Gentile Christians in Peter’s day, this idea that they were part the chosen people was vital…

Peter wants us to understand that the only way that they would have the strength to endure the suffering and distress of this present evil age was by recognizing that they were part of a rich and glorious heritage in Christ…

to encourage believers in his day to stand fast while they endure suffering and distress in the present evil age, knowing that a great reward will be theirs on the day of salvation… on the day that Christ returns in glory.

Understanding that we have been chosen and set apart, that we’ve been cleansed by the blood of Jesus, that we’re heirs to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled and unfading… this understanding gives us the strength to remain faithful through suffering and trials and tribulations.

They

And this is vital to us as well…

He wrote this letter to encourage them and us to stand fast while we endure suffering and distress in the present evil age, knowing that a great reward will be ours on the day of salvation… on the day that Christ returns in glory.

Peter calls us to perseverance… and we demonstrate this perseverance by living godly lives, by living as good citizens, as gentle wives… and as understanding husbands.

And when we live in this way, we say to the watching world that we are placing our hope in God rather than in the joys and comforts of this world.

In other words, we who hope and trust in Christ will have the strength to endure whatever comes our way in the present.

And that’s the theme of the entire book… So what’s 1 Peter about?

So standing on top of the mountain, here’s what we see…

Peter starts out by grounding our identity in the redemptive work of the Triune God… Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (1:1-2).

Peter starts out by grounding his readers’ identity in the redemptive work of the Triune God… Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (1:1-2).

Then he praises God in an act of worship for granting believers new life… that God has caused us to be born again into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead (1:3-9)… and that this glory was part of God’s sovereign plan from the beginning, predicted in the Scriptures (1:10-12).

And then he calls us to live a life of holiness that is rooted and grounded in the redemptive work of Christ.

Because God is holy, we are holy.

Because Jesus ransomed us and we’ve tasted his goodness, we put away sin (1:13-2:3).

Because we are God’s chosen nation, we abstain from sin and live honorably, even when we’re slandered (2:4-12).

Then he praises God in an act of worship for granting believers new life… that God has caused us to be born again into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead (1:3-9)… and that this glory was part of God’s sovereign plan from the beginning, predicted in the Scriptures (1:10-12).

This holiness that we’re called to manifests itself socially, in submission to governing authorities and earthly masters (2:13-25).