The Longings of Angels: 1 Peter 1:3-12
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Intro:
Need for examination (Dr. Google)
Mom and dad bring kids and they stoop/look under the table.
This exact image, the peering around/under captures the phrase that ends our passage to a “T”. Angels longing to look into these things. That grabs our attention because we long to look into matters of angels right? Angels, eternal created beings not human not God with consciousness, rulers of realms unseen to our eyes, servants, and ambassadors of both God and Satan. We are fascinated by angels and yet, angels Peter tells us are fascinated by something we have.
So let's read our text and see what angels long to know.
Read the passage
1 Peter 1:3-12
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls.
Concerning this salvation, the prophets who prophesied about the grace that was to be yours searched and inquired carefully, inquiring what person or time the Spirit of Christ in them was indicating when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glories. It was revealed to them that they were serving not themselves but you, in the things that have now been announced to you through those who preached the good news to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven, things into which angels long to look.
As we examine our passage this morning we are going to be swept into Peter’s soaring theological genius. We will behold the glory of God through Peter’s words and view the longings of angels in a way that no other man could have written with such understanding. If I was to ask each of you to describe Peter you would probably rattle off similar adjectives: impetuous, brash, fiery, short-tempered, bold, arrogant, and aggressive. However, that is very little of the Peter I’ve come to know in preparing this text. Peter is a brilliant writer and a master of story, and that is right up the alley of angels. We will see why in our time together this morning. Three truths of the Christian life have captured the imagination and attention of angels.
1. The New Birth
2. Christian suffering
3. Faith
First, let’s look at the new birth to see why angels are fascinated
Read vs 3-5.
1 Peter 1:3-5
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.
The section begins with Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. The word that starts off, Blessed, is the Greek word that gives us our English word Eulogy. It’s the term for praise or to speak well of someone. Praise God, Peter begins and he continues to explain his reasons for this living eulogy to God. The great mercy or better-translated compassion of God caused us to be born again. But why are angels interested in this? We could I think, ask Nicodemus from John chapter 3 about this topic because as you’ll remember he was quite puzzled by this idea as well. Think further of angels, observing the goings-on of God after he created them and before the creation of mankind. And then they watch as God decides to create. Land, Sea, Fish, Birds, and finally MAN, in his own image. Angels know what it is to be subject to a creator but to see the creator place his own image upon humanity would have been baffling. Then angels watch as man is given dominion over the earth, a realm to rule over and subdue, and then the fall from favor with God by sin. The story of mankind, already curious to them, becomes quite the page-turner with rebellion and expulsion from the garden. Angels then, anxiously awaiting the next movement of the plot, see God eventually become man and on the cross, erase the effects of man's rebellion and sin.
Angels have stood at the edge of history at every moment, intently observing in amazement.
We can all relate to that in one way or another. How many of you remember those seminal moments in history that unfolded before you? Challenger Explosion, 9/11, Kennedy assassination, etc. We see something, we know it’s historic and we are fascinated, mesmerized, and shocked by what it is and what it could possibly mean for humanity. This is what it is to be an angel and see history unfold.
Peter in verse 3 says that this new birth is caused by the great mercy, the compassion, of the Father.
1 Peter 1:3
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,
And not only is there a new birth for humanity but there is, attached to the new birth a living hope secured by the resurrection of the God-man Jesus Christ.
There is a hope, a future beyond the short earthly lives of humans, that accompanies this new birth and all made possible by Jesus. What a story! Its glory is reimagined when we read of it like angels desire to see it, to understand it, they long for the mysteries of God and his story, us in the midst of it. We can read it and be impressed, inspired, and awestruck.
And not just a new birth with a living hope but an inheritance as Peter layers more details into the story with verse 4.
1 Peter 1:4
to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you,
Inheritance is a deferred gift, an unearned favor that is guaranteed upon fulfillment of the terms. Peter fortifies the inheritance, we receive with three words, three words loaded with implications. Imperishable, undefiled, and unfading. Think again of the angels and their longing to understand this. The angels have stood witness to the kingdoms of the world rise and fall. Kings with vast inheritances set up for their posterity and then like Solomon in Ecclesiates says they watch as the spoils are enjoyed by their enemy; all the profit, all the investments of those kingdoms fall and benefit someone else entirely. Angels have seen the perishable vows from one generation to the next, the defiled contracts, and the fading inheritances that are spent by others before it ever reaches the children’s children. And yet, this is a new thing the angels are seeing. They are seeing a new birth people Like Abraham in Hebrews 11
Hebrews 11:8-10
By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance. And he went out, not knowing where he was going. By faith he went to live in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise. For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God.
Abraham had sight of the new city, this imperishable, undefiled, unfading city built by God, and Abraham’s inheritance is one and the same inheritance we receive and it boggles the minds of angels.
The inheritance given by God to his children, starting with father Abraham, of the new birth, through the resurrection of Jesus is IMperishable, UNdefiled, and UNfading.
Hebrews goes further and makes clear that angels are more than aware of this inheritance.
Hebrews 12:22
But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering,
Angels are actually gathered festively to see the inheritance revealed. They are so struck by the inheritance that they party at the gates of the new city! What a striking thought to know that the angels’ attention is so fixed on our story!
Finally, in this section we are seeing God’s power exercised on us to keep us, to guard us, for this salvation (the greek word meaning deliverance, redemption).
1 Peter 1:5
who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.
Angels not only see God’s people given the gifts of new birth, living hope, and a guaranteed inheritance but God gives his own power to keep them from stumbling, from losing their way. Do you know Church that God’s power keeps you faithful? Do you understand that you are secured in covenant with Christ by his power? The same power that holds every atom in the universe together at every moment is the same power that holds you fast. Held fast in him and holding fast to the living hope of the inheritance waiting for you. No wonder angels are so interested! The very power of God is resting on his people. Can you imagine having eyes to see this? To have eyes to see that reality would be incredible.
Thus far, we’ve seen the incredible acts of God in Peter’s words, we’ve seen how his living eulogy and praise of the Father has captured the imaginations of the angels as they behold the mystery of the new birth, the living hope, and the resurrection and now we’ll move on to peer into the lives of God’s people and their suffering as Peter reveals more of the story.
1 Peter 1:6-9
In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls.
In this, Peter says, because of all this we’ve just looked at, we rejoice. We have joy. That makes sense, God is good and we are benefactors of that goodness and it makes us happy and we have joy. 1+1 = 2. But, and this is where angels get curious once again, suffering defines the life of the Christian, not ease and comfort. It certainly didn’t in Peter’s day. The little while of verse 6 is the vapor that is our life here on earth. The child of God, guaranteed all the goodness of God’s love, guarded by his power; will live with suffering, will have turmoil, will face trials of various kinds, will be struck with loss and heartache and lack many things including for some, health, shelter, adequate protection, even basic human rights. And all of that while under the power of God to keep them faithful to their inheritance. This is a monumental paradox. Who can understand this? God’s hand, his very power is perfectly over each of you in Christ this morning and yet your lives are not perfect. Many of you sitting here are suffering even as we gather. Some of you fight back tears so you can come in and be “okay”. Some of you here are suffering in ways that would astonish us if we knew the depth of your pain and yet you live in the power of God. How can this be, say the angels?!!! Peter tells us the truth of suffering. He wants us to not only understand the paradox of this reality but he wants us to embrace it, to wrap our arms tight around this. The life we’ve been given in Christ is beautiful because it is through the Christian life of suffering that God saves us to the uttermost. Suffering in the life of the Christian is a tool in the Lord’s hand to shape us more into his image. It is a decisive and exacting tool. God uses suffering and trials to make us more dependent on Him, more reliant on his power to sustain us. Our lives, broken and sometimes shattered, are rough and jagged lumps of clay being formed into the perfect image of Christ. We bear the marks of Christ’s sufferings on our bodies just as Paul says to the Galatians,
Galatians 6:17
From now on let no one cause me trouble, for I bear on my body the marks of Jesus.
Christian, you are marked with the wounds of Christ. The Power of God that rests upon you even this morning in your pain, in your grief and in your suffering, is making you more perfectly the Body of the Beloved Son. And this is reality church, that your suffering is not to your shame but to your glory! And your glory leads to worship. Look at verse 7
1 Peter 1:7
so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.
Various trials, suffering for the sake of refinement into Christ’s image results in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of the precious King who died, was raised, and reigns forevermore. The praise and glory and honor are not of ourselves, remember we are kept by God’s power and his power alone. Like wood from a tree, smoothed of its imperfections, yielded completely to the carpenter’s tools, we proclaim the one for whom we are marked.
So Christian suffering, the great paradox of the Christian life, rightly forms us into worshippers.
Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls.
The paradox is that worshippers of the God who heals all pain, who ends all tears and stops all death are subject to pain and tears and death. The formation of Christ worshippers is a process that invites us, leads us deeper into the truth that God is Ruler and was Sufferer. we are in him and in the world. He was bruised by the serpent and he crushed the dragon, we suffer and we rejoice. We do not suffer, die and then rejoice in heaven but we suffer in this life and we rejoice simultaneously.
I think this is the most crucial feature of our lives that angels long to comprehend. It is for them, just as it is for the world, the problem of pain as C.S. Lewis puts it. How can an all-loving and all-powerful God allow or ordain Christian suffering? The answer, Peter tells us is that it is the divine paradoxical picture of victory by seeming defeat. Just as Jesus defeated death by death, we are in him victorious and we receive the outcome of our faith, the salvation of our souls, by the perfecting wounds of our suffering.
Christian suffering is then as we’ve seen a paradox. It is confusing to the world as they peer in - calling foolishness that which is the wisdom of God. It is likewise perplexing for angels as they search the mysterious depths of God and his people.
We’ve looked at angels’ longings to know the new birth and inheritance, to understand Christian suffering, so let’s look then at the last truth that angels long to understand from our passage, that being faith.
1 Peter 1:10-12
Concerning this salvation, the prophets who prophesied about the grace that was to be yours searched and inquired carefully, inquiring what person or time the Spirit of Christ in them was indicating when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glories. It was revealed to them that they were serving not themselves but you, in the things that have now been announced to you through those who preached the good news to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven, things into which angels long to look.
Let’s look at these prophets. These men sought carefully and relentlessly, by the Spirit of Christ, to know the sufferings and glories of Jesus, making them much more like the majestic inquisitive angels than boring old dead guys. I think as we look we will find in them a deep and abiding faith, a faith, much of the time underappreciated but hopefully, we can come to more fully recognize as we search out Christ in their words.
And why is this important? Why do we need to see that the writers of the old testament searched for Christ? The same Christ the same Jesus that we worship this morning? Because we are not as one person said, “practitioners” of a new religion of the New Testament, over and against the old religion of the Old Testament. We are instead, brought into the work that Jesus began with the creation of man in his image, the work that Jesus was doing through Isaiah, and Ezekiel. The message of the good news we preach today is in quintessential union with the words given by inspiration of the Spirit of Christ to the old testament writers. Jesus revealed himself to them and they served us by revealing Jesus to us. Our mission, our goal is one and the same with them. To be recipients of his salvation and to preach Christ and his sufferings and subsequent glories.
Did they understand the fullness of the Christ revealed to them? In a mystery beyond me and the angels, yes! They surround us as a great cloud of witnesses, they lived with the Spirit of Christ residing within them. It was revealed to them that their words were given to serve you and me. That through their faith we would be made perfect.
So let’ look at a few examples of the prophets and their careful searching for Christ. what of Ezekiel? How did he serve us? How do his words speak the truth of the good news to us this morning?
Remember verse 12 says he spoke, in service to us, the good news we now call the gospel.
It was revealed to them that they were serving not themselves but you, in the things that have now been announced to you through those who preached the good news to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven, things into which angels long to look.
Ezekiel 37 is the familiar story of the valley of dry bones. We see in verse one of that chapter a familiar person
The hand of the Lord was upon me, and he brought me out in the Spirit of the Lord and set me down in the middle of the valley; it was full of bones.
The spirit of Yahweh, the spirit of Christ.
The story unfolds with Ezekiel receiving various commands to prophesy over the bones. First to prophecy that to the bones that the although dead they would live again. They would be given a New Birth. Then he prophecied to the breath of life. That it would come from the four winds and animate the slain. Finally, Ezekiel is told that the bones, now knit together and standing on their feet was the whole house of Isreal. The Spirit of Christ tells Ezekiel that he will open the graves of the of this his people and breath his spirit into them that they might live in the land that he had given to them.
Church, this is glorious. Not only does Ezekiel serve the Israelites of his day but more ultimately he serves us the whole house of Isreal, Christ’s body that now includes not only the nation of one people but the nations of the world. Ezekiel, by his faith, reveals that we are those dry bones, lying desolate in the valley of death, unable to revive ourselves, unable to piece together our life out of the deadness and depravity of sin. But God, in his great compassion breathed his Spirit into us and raised us to new life! The good news, the gospel, given to us through the faith of a man thousands of years before us, and yet we are very much like him in Spirit and truth.
We have every page of the scriptures available to Peter as he writes this passage, and they are full and overflowing with Christ. Let’s look in one more time at another diligent Christ-seeking prophet. Isaiah.
His searching is unique in that he gives an oracle that illuminates for us not only the face of Christ but the sufferings and glories that attend him. The faith of Isaiah to see these visions, to write these words and to remain patiently faithful dwarfs our faith like the mustard seed and the tree that provides shade for all the earth.
Let’ read a small part of Isaiah’s vision in
Isaiah 53:2–5 (ESV)
For he grew up before him like a young plant,
and like a root out of dry ground;
he had no form or majesty that we should look at him,
and no beauty that we should desire him.
He was despised and rejected by men,
a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief;
and as one from whom men hide their faces
he was despised, and we esteemed him not.
Surely he has borne our griefs
and carried our sorrows;
yet we esteemed him stricken,
smitten by God, and afflicted.
But he was pierced for our transgressions;
he was crushed for our iniquities;
upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,
and with his wounds we are healed.
We know Jesus, in part, because Isaiah revealed him to us. Our faith is supplemented, like a plant watered by heavenly rain, we are flourishing because Isaiah had faith in the Suffering Servant that he saw. He showed us Christ. There is no other picture of Jesus of Nazareth as powerful as this. Isaiah did as we must with suffering, even the suffering us his messiah. He followed this smitten and afflicted savior. He trusted in the power of God to pierce Jesus for our transgressions and he embraced the mystery that the great Messiah, the one great King that would rule and reign over every authority would be one of no reputation, would be like a withered branch that seemed hopelessly weak.
So we see the prophets, strong in faith, serving with their faith those who would be partakers of the new birth, whose bones would rise and stand once again. Those who would read of the Christ crucified and would read the accounting of his sufferings and glories. Church we are afforded such an advantage by these prophets who sought Christ and as we stand where we are, we look back and the road that brought us here, brought us to faith in Christ is paved with the faithful intentions of Scripture’s authors. Their faith is our faith, their hope is our hope, their God is our God and their Christ is our Christ. Understandable how the angels are fascinated by the long history of faith in all its forms throughout time. Faith is the cord of God’s power sewn into his people from the very beginning. A strong cord that binds the redemption story of Christ and his bride over the timeline of history and all the angels can do is look in, stooping low, straining to see such a magnificent story.
our faith is made stronger by examining the faithfulness of the prophets. Examination takes time, it can be tedious and at times it seems to bear no fruit but it is what is required to see more clearly. I mentioned at the beginning this morning that I have some very interesting cases come through my office and that exams are a critical part of caring for each person. One person comes to mind, she was a familiar patient, I had seen her dozens of times over several years, I had seen her children grow up and she was a joy to take care of. One day she mentioned off-handedly that she had noticed a slight spasming that would run from her neck to her arm and then somehow skip to her leg. It would only last for a few moments and then be gone for days at a time. She hated to bother me about it but she thought it was weird so she’d mention it. I had not planned to exam her that day, it was going to be tedious, it would probably be nothing and I would be behind schedule with other patients and probably run late getting home that evening. I decided to check it out. We took the time to go over what she was experiencing again in more detail. I tested some things and I looked into her concerns with intention and careful detail. Long story short she had a tumor twice the size of her spinal cord pressing itself against the base of her brain and spine. i still have her thank you card on my desk that she sent during her recovery from a successful surgery. In it she said, thanks for taking the time and wanting to know what was going on. This is our life, Church to spend in the scriptures, taking the time, wanting to know more of Christ.
Just as angels long to know more about the new birth, Christian suffering and faith we can take with us today the good news that in Jesus we have been given a new birth into a great inheritance, that we are kept even through suffering by the power of God, and that scriptures hold for us the whole Christ as we look to the faith of those God chose to reveal all these things to. May we like the angels be ever impressed with God’s love for us, and ever be plumbing the depths of God and his Son in personal devotion and covenant community.