Your Faith

Introducing 1 Peter

We are now on the other side of the cross. It is empty! Over the coming weeks, we are going to be looking at what kind of changes happen to our lives because of this wonderful truth. To do that, we are going to be learning lessons from a redeemed disciple. Peter goes from denying Jesus to dying for Jesus and the turning point for him was that empty cross. So we are going to look at 1 Peter to see what kind of lessons we can learn from his life and the changes that took place within him.

So take your Bible and turn to 1 Peter 1:3-9 as we begin to look at our text today. This letter was written to a number of cities all located within Asia Minor. The odd thing that scholars struggle with is that there is no proof that Peter ever visited any of these cities but he still writes to them. It is also important for us to understand that Peter is writing to them because these churches are in the midst of persecution and plague…the latter fitting well with our current conditions. So if you are able, please stand for the reading of God’s word in 1 Peter 1:3-9.

1 Peter 1:3–9 NRSV

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! By his great mercy he has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who are being protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. In this you rejoice, even if now for a little while you have had to suffer various trials, so that the genuineness of your faith—being more precious than gold that, though perishable, is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. Although you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and rejoice with an indescribable and glorious joy, for you are receiving the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls.

This is the word of the Lord and together we say, “Thanks be to God”. Let us pray.

I can’t believe its not butter!

It seems like over the past couple of years, the trend to come up with food substitutes has increased exponetionally. It started with things like butter and now we have meat that isn’t meat, noodles made from vegitables, and milk milked from things that can’t be milked. It is insane! All of this is done so that people can enjoy the food that they want but not with the same consiquences if they used the actual ingredients.

Amy will try to do good by baking things that are healthier but there are certain things that shouldn’t be messed with. A brownie should not be made with black beans and unless it is banana bread, keep stinkin bananas out of my food! Above all else, I will live and die on the fact that biscuits cannot be made without the use of real butter and or lard. A biscuit without these ingredients are useless to me.

We cannot substitute certain things.

In case you did not get it yet, there are just certain things that should not be substituted in life. While I feel passionately about things like food, you might have something else that must always be the same. Maybe it is a certain brand of clothing that you just have fallen in love with and nothing compares. I know there are certain devote fans of car brands, especially when it comes to trucks. People also stick by things like their cleaning products as the only ones that ever work for them.

Whatever it might be, we all can understand that there are certain things that just cannot compare to what we are used to. This same idea applies to our lives when we begin to look at our relationship with God and his church. Some of the things that we have learned over these past few weeks of isolation is that there is no substitution for the gathering of the saints. Can I get an amen? There is also no substitute for reading God’s word, or praying, or worshiping God in song. That is why we hold these things near and dear to our hearts. Time and time again has proven that we need these things within our lives. Unfortunately in this time, we must put up with this virtual substitute but I hope that throughout this time it just goes to assure us of the need for true human interaction. I know that this time has taught me that as cool as technology is and as amazing as it is that we can do all of this online, it is not enough to sustain us for the long run.

But there is another lesson for us to learn today.

Peter learned not to substitute either.

Peter is teaching us today that we cannot have a substitute for where we place our faith. He learned this the hard way as he deny Jesus during his trial and cruxificion. You see, Peter had placed his faith in Jesus but not in the way that he was supposed to. He had faith in Jesus the man, Jesus the miracle worker; not as Jesus the Son of God and his savior. That was his downfall. Having his faith in Jesus in any other way was less than ideal and led to unstatisfied hope.

Now that he is looking at an empty cross, Peter has learned the importance of where his faith is placed. So as he writes this letter to churches in the midst of persecution and plagues, he reminds them of the same lesson that we are learning today.

Your Faith must be in Christ our Risen Lord!

Faith in Christ our Risen Lord gives us an inheritance.

The first point that Peter makes here is that only by having our faith in Christ our Risen Lord do we share in the inheritance that God promises. This is a point that would make more sense to the Jews in that time than it would to many others. The Jews were used to hearing about the inheritance that God promised. It was the foundation of their entire culture. Everything that Abraham was promised and everything that they hoped in was in the inheritance that God was promising to his people.

What Peter, and many other Jews, missed before the Cross was that receiving this inhereitance was based upon their faith in God through the Messiah, not by their observance to the Law that was given to Moses.

They had substituted the basis of their faith and just like substituting margarine for butter, it falls flat of what it could have been.

The weakness of the Law was that it could not save. It could not redeem people in an everlasting way. The law, as the writer of Hebrews says, was only able to show us that we were sinners but it could not resolve the issue of sin.

When our faith is in Christ our Risen Lord we are able to receive the true inheritance promised, which is:

Imperishable

Undefiled

Unfading

These are three unique characteristics of the inheritance that we receive.

The first adjective, imperishable, speaks to the nature of our life. We will no longer be subjected to the issues of death or decay.

The second adjective, undefiled, is looking at the morality of this inheritance. It cannot be corrupted, sin cannot destroy it. It is directly tied to the undefiled nature of God himself.

The third adjective, unfading, is tied to the idea of beauty. Unlike the beauty of this world that is here today and gone tomorrow, this inheritance never fades. Or as we in Michigan understand it better; unlike how spring is here one day and winter returns the next, the inheritance will always be the same.

These three adjectives paint the beautiful picture of the inheritance we receive when we believe in Christ our risen Lord. This is what we receive but the question still remains; Why must your faith only be in Christ our Risen Lord? Why can’t we substitute it with anything else? Even Christ, the man...

Your Faith in Christ our Risen Lord sustains you in suffering.

We all have faced, are facing, and will face suffering in various forms. For the readers of this letter, it was persecution and plagues that were their current trials. For us it is this virus. We shouldn’t be concerned about how we can lessen or never face suffering in this life because it is never going to happen. Rather we need to look at what can happen during the times of these hardships.

Only by having our faith in Christ our Risen Lord can suffering be turned into a good thing. Look at the way Peter speaks about trials in 1 Peter 1:6-7.

1 Peter 1:6–7 NRSV

In this you rejoice, even if now for a little while you have had to suffer various trials, so that the genuineness of your faith—being more precious than gold that, though perishable, is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.

What was once bad can be turned to good. That is the amazing transformation that happens when your faith is in Christ our Risen Lord.

In many ways, our faith is kinda useless if it isn’t tested. The analogy that Peter uses with Gold is a good illustration. Gold has value but if it is not refined in a fire, it has not reached its full potential. It has impurities and imperfections.

In the same way, your faith only has potential value until it is tested in times of trials. When suffering comes, it is able to burn away the impurities and helps smooth out the imperfections.

For Peter, the denial of Christ refined his perspective on where his faith was focused. The same can be done within our lives. All throughout high school and college I remember hearing the phrase, “letting go of your parent’s faith and gaining your own.” The point was that until we faced hardship that tested where we placed our faith, we did not have a faith that was valuable.

Your Faith in Christ our Risen Lord leads to Uncontrolled Worship

So not only do we receive an inheritance, not only are we sustained during times of suffering but our faith will begin to pour out uncontrolled worship. Now this might sound scary but that is okay. Realistically how many of us really believe that we have any kind of control in our lives anyways?

Think about how absurd our faith is:

Although you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and rejoice with an indescribable and glorious joy.

We don’t see Jesus but we love him, we don’t see God but we believe in him and that faith alone causes us to rejoice with an indescribable and glorious joy. There is nothing more absurd in human standards than this right here. People want proof. People want tangible and here we are clapping our hands, shouting for joy, and giving thanks in times of suffering because we have faith in someone we have never seen! Our worship of God is shallow and incomplete if we do not allow our faith to solely rest in Christ our Risen Lord.

There is no substitute for Your Faith

There is no substitute for your faith. Your faith must be 100% in Christ our Risen Lord. Anything short of that will leave us unfulfilled and lacking. Peter stumbled and failed because he only had faith in Christ the teacher. That is why he denied Christ and was presented with his time of trial.

Tofu hotdogs will not taste anything like a good beef kogels. There is no substitute for wheat flour when you want a nice loaf of bread. Whipped Cream is only whipped cream when you actually use cream.

In the same way, our faith cannot be substituted with anything else in this world. This is why we don’t believe in Jesus a good man, Jesus the teacher, or even Jesus the prophet. We believe in Jesus our Risen Lord!

Only by this do we receive what is most longed for, “the salvation of our souls”. The salvation that brings the inheritance of God’s kingdom, the salvation that brings the hope in suffering, the salvation that frees us to worship God in ways the world cannot understand. Do not substitute anything for your faith in Christ our Risen Lord because nothing else will do.

Charles Spurgeon wrote about the basis of our belief, He says this:

“Say ye to the righteous, that it shall be well with him.”

—Isaiah 3:10

It is well with the righteous always. If it had said, “Say ye to the righteous, that it is well with him in his prosperity,” we must have been thankful for so great a boon, for prosperity is an hour of peril, and it is a gift from heaven to be secured from its snares: or if it had been written, “It is well with him when under persecution,” we must have been thankful for so sustaining an assurance, for persecution is hard to bear; but when no time is mentioned, all time is included. God’s “shalls” must be understood always in their largest sense. From the beginning of the year to the end of the year, from the first gathering of evening shadows until the day-star shines, in all conditions and under all circumstances, it shall be well with the righteous. It is so well with him that we could not imagine it to be better, for he is well fed, he feeds upon the flesh and blood of Jesus; he is well clothed, he wears the imputed righteousness of Christ; he is well housed, he dwells in God; he is well married, his soul is knit in bonds of marriage union to Christ; he is well provided for, for the Lord is his Shepherd; he is well endowed, for heaven is his inheritance. It is well with the righteous—well upon divine authority; the mouth of God speaks the comforting assurance. O beloved, if God declares that all is well, ten thousand devils may declare it to be ill, but we laugh them all to scorn. Blessed be God for a faith which enables us to believe God when the creatures contradict him. It is, says the Word, at all times well with thee, thou righteous one; then, beloved, if thou canst not see it, let God’s word stand thee in stead of sight; yea, believe it on divine authority more confidently than if thine eyes and thy feelings told it to thee. Whom God blesses is blest indeed, and what his lip declares is truth most sure and steadfast.

Let us pray:

Benediction

Blessed are you,

O God of our Lord Jesus Christ,

in whom we receive the legacy of a living hope,

born again not only from his death

but also from his resurrection.

May we who have received forgiveness of sins

through the Holy Spirit live to set others free,

until, at length, we enter the inheritance

that is imperishable and unfading,

where Christ lives and reigns with you and the same Spirit. Amen.

I now send you out into your communities to make Christ-like Disciples, go in the Grace of God.