Christ's
Example
1
Pet 3:18 – 4:6
John Orlando
New Life
Presbyterian Church of Dresher, July 27, 2008
Introduction
God has a wonderful plan for your life!" That
phrase is often used as sort of sales pitch, so that the reason a person should
come to Christ is so that they can get joy, peace, or meaning and purpose in
your life, or even more crassly, a person should come to Christ so that they can
get a nice job, a nice house, and a nice car, and live a comfortable life with
no stress or suffering.
Well, God does have a wonderful plan for our lives, and in
Christ we certainly do have joy, peace, and purpose.
However, the Bible teaches that God's wonderful plan for our lives
includes the very thing that most of us are trying to avoid:
cross-bearing and suffering. Jesus said, "If anyone
would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow
me." (Mk 8:34) Jesus said, "All men will hate you because of
me." (Mk 13:13) How's that for a sales pitch?! Sign me up!
And as we come to our text today, we note that suffering
is really central in Peter's thinking.
Look at v. 18. The word
"For" in verse 18 connects this passage with everything
that has been stated in the letter up to this point, but especially verse 17
where Peter says "It is better, if it is God's will, to suffer for
doing good than for doing evil…For (v 18) Christ died
for sins…
So, Christ's Example, which we are to follow, is seen in our text as it relates to suffering for doing good, and I believe Christ's example is seen in 4 ways: Reconciliation, Proclamation, Sanctification, and Assurance of Salvation. So, let's look first at Christ's Example in terms of:
I. Reconciliation (3:18): "For Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God"
First we see what Jesus did: He died for sins once for all. God requires perfect obedience to all that He has commanded in word, thought, and deed. But we are all law-breakers and stand guilty and condemned before God. But God sent His Son to be our substitute to pay the penalty of divine condemnation that we deserved to pay, and He paid that penalty once for all, that is, only one time in history. Jesus is not being re-sacrificed over and over again. There is no more sacrifice for sins, because Jesus perfectly accomplished our redemption over 2,000 years ago on an old rugged cross!
Third, the purpose of the work of Christ was "to
bring you to God." The fact
that we had to be "brought" to God highlights the
fact that we who were dead in sins could not bring ourselves
to God. We had to be brought to
God by
God and His sovereign grace and power alone.
Paul tells us that we who were once "far away have been brought
near through the blood of Christ," and in 1 Cor 1:30 he says that,
"It is because of Him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has
become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness
and redemption."
King Jesus is our everything!
So Jesus, by His sacrifice, reconciled us to God.
Where there had been a broken relationship, and separation and enmity,
there is now peace. And like Christ,
we have been called as a royal priesthood to a life of sacrifice as ministers of
reconciliation that people might be reconciled to God, declaring "that
in Christ, [God is] not counting men's sins against them."
I think there is also an application here to our personal
relationships. Is your relationship with your spouse, kids, or a co-worker or
friend broken? Or, let me put in a way that you might be able to better relate
to: Are you at war
with them?!
I think 1 reason some of our relationships
may be broken is because whether it is through the silent treatment, or a verbal
assault, we count, as it were, the other persons sins against them. We
keep a record of wrongs and we dig in our heels against the other person.
But reconciliation is costly: It
always involves sacrifice, and sometimes you will have to make all of the
sacrifice and absorb all of the offense in order for a relationship to be
restored.
This is precisely what God did for us!
He took the initiative and made all of the sacrifice so that even while
we were still His enemies, Christ "bore our sins in his body on the
tree" (2:24). He didn't retaliate when He was insulted, but He
"entrusted himself to him who judges justly."
II. Proclamation:
Look at verses 18- 20: "…He was put to death in the body but made alive
by the Spirit, 19 through whom also he went and preached to the spirits in
prison 20 who disobeyed long ago when God waited patiently in the days of Noah
while the ark was being built…"
There are basically 3 plausible interpretations that have been offered concerning this text, and I take the position that says the Spirit of Christ was preaching through Noah to those who were disobedient then and who are now "spirits in prison," that is, they are awaiting the final judgment to occur at that the end of time. So it was the Spirit of Christ in Noah preaching at that time, and I think Peter uses the flood narrative to both encourage and embolden his readers.
I mean, just imagine how foolish Noah must have looked!
Here he was building an ark nowhere near water, telling people to repent
because God was going to destroy the earth with a flood!
I can just hear the people doubled over in laughter!
"That Noah, he must have been sippin a little too much of the
nectar." To them, Noah and his message was absolutely foolish!
But the source of Noah's strength and confidence was the Spirit
of Christ in him. So, the
point of Noah's example would be, "hey, don’t think it strange that
the whole world hates you for proclaiming the Gospel!
Look at Noah and take heart! Christ
has overcome death, and like Noah, the Spirit of Christ is in you,
and is proclaiming His Gospel through you!"
The message of the cross is as an offense and foolishness
to the world! Sadly, many
Evangelical's have forgotten this, and in the name of being "relevant"
or "seeker sensitive" we try to make sure that we say and do
the "right" things so that people won't be "offended."
But look at Noah: He
preached and no one repented. Look at Christ: He was mocked and ultimately put
to death for His preaching. And we
can take solace in Peter's words in 4:14 that you are blessed if you "are
insulted because of the name of Christ…for the Spirit of glory and of God
rests on you!"
Let us pray then for those who are suffering for the faith,
and let us examine ourselves: Are we
avoiding the persecution or unpopularity that may come our way, because we don't
want to look like a radical Jesus Freak? But
I want to just stand up and let the world know: "I'm a Jesus
Freak…I'm a fool for Christ, and the love of Christ compels me, and I
implore you on Christ's behalf, be
reconciled to God!" We will
we be laughed at? YES! Will we
suffer? YES! You see:
And this promise of Christ's presence and His salvation is
something that I think Peter highlights when he mentions baptism.
Peter tells us that Noah and his family were saved "through
water, 21 and this water symbolizes baptism that now saves you also…
Baptism is the sign and seal of essentially 3 things:
1) our union with Christ in His death, burial, and resurrection,
remission of sins, and spiritual regeneration 2) our admission into the visible
church; and 3) it is our public commitment to be a dedicated follower of Christ.
Now, the first thing to notice in our text is that the waters of the flood "symbolize" baptism. How so? Well, the waters of the flood brought both judgment and salvation, and the waters of baptism picture a similar thing in that they declare that sin was judged and that salvation was secured by Christ. Jesus Christ is our "ark" then, who brings us safely through the waters of judgment and washes us with the purifying water of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit.
Secondly, we note that water baptism of itself does not
save a person, for Peter qualifies his statement saying, "not the
removal of dirt from the body but the pledge of a good conscience toward God. It
saves you by the resurrection of Jesus Christ…" So the sacrament of
baptism itself does not save, rather, it is everything that is signified and
sealed in baptism that saves us—it is Jesus by His resurrection that saves
us—and we appropriate that salvation by grace alone through faith alone, that
is, through the pledge of a good conscience toward God.
So, when an adult comes to Christ and gets baptized, he is
publicly professing that everything that is signified and sealed in baptism is
true of him. And for infants the
covenant sign of baptism carries with it, among other things, the responsibility
of the child to exercise faith and repentance towards Christ when he is able. It
is only then that the child is saved, and his public profession of faith then
serves as a confirmation, so to speak, that everything that was signified and
sealed in his baptism is in fact true of him.
Ultimately I think Peter refers to baptism as a shorthand
way of telling his readers to rest in the salvation that is in Christ.
Just as Noah and his family were delivered from judgment, so we too have
been delivered and are identified with Christ in His life, death and
resurrection.
And when the enemy comes and whispers his accusations in my
ear, trying to get me to either doubt my salvation or the goodness of God, I can
look back to my baptism and take hold of God's covenant
pledge and promise in Christ that He will never leave me nor forsake me:
"yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I
will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort
me." (Ps 23:4)
Our baptism also reminds us that there is no such thing as
a lone ranger Christian: when we were baptized, we were entered into the
covenant community; a community that has collectively been called to live
as "obedient children of God." and this takes me to
Christ's Example in:
III. Sanctification
(4:1-5): Look at 4:1-5 (due to time, I did not read, but referred people to
text): "4:1 Therefore,
since Christ suffered in his body, arm yourselves also with the same attitude,
because he who has suffered in his body is done with sin. 2 As a result, he does
not live the rest of his earthly life for evil human desires, but rather for the
will of God. 3 For you have spent enough time in the past doing what pagans
choose to do-living in debauchery, lust, drunkenness, orgies, carousing and
detestable idolatry. 4 They think it strange that you do not plunge with them
into the same flood of dissipation, and they heap abuse on you. 5 But they will
have to give account to him who is ready to judge the living and the dead."
The Westminster Shorter Catechism states that
sanctification is "the work of God's free grace, whereby we are renewed
in the whole man after the image of God, and are enabled more and more to die
unto sin, and live unto righteousness."
In our day-to-day lives, God is in effect calling us to be
who we are: since we have been
declared forever righteous in Christ, we are to live unto righteousness by God's
grace alone. Just as Christ is holy,
we too are to be holy in all that we do. And
here in our text Peter tells us:
a. That since Christ suffered in
his body, we should have the same attitude, because, "he who has
suffered in his body is done with sin." In Jesus' case, this refers
to His once for all sacrifice for our sin, so that Jesus is done with sin in
this sense. In our case, I think
this refers to the fact that through the work of Christ sin no longer has
dominion over us. We who "belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the
sinful nature with its passions and desires" (Gal 5:24).
b.
Secondly, there are only 2 ways to live:
either we will live for evil human desires, or for the will of God, and
we are called to make a decisive break with the kind of life that we used live.
Either we will follow the broad way that leads to destruction, or the
narrow way that leads to life. Either
we will follow Christ, or we will follow Satan.
Either we will live for the
c.
And third, when we do make that decisive break, we will most likely face
persecution as a result. Our friends, family, and co-workers will, "think
it strange that you do not plunge with them into the same flood of dissipation (reckless
immoral behavior) and will "heap abuse on you."
This is tough because no one wants to have abused heaped
upon them! Most of us do not want to be unpopular, and most of us want to be
accepted by our peers. And let me
tell you who faces the biggest challenges in the church today:
our young people. In many
universities there is a palpable hostility to Christianity, and living for the
will of God there can be traumatic, because they are in the lions
den, so to speak. If you're a young person here today, let me tell you that all
of the carousing, wild parties, and sexual promiscuity that your peers are
running after is an "empty way of life." Trust
me, I can relate!
The year was 1994. I was in the military, and my friends and I gladly engaged in every form of self-gratification we could think of, from wild parties to sexual immorality. But while I was the life of the party on the outside, on the inside I was empty. But then one evening, by God's grace, I committed my life to Christ. My friends noticed a change and asked what was going on, and I told them excitedly, as if they would really be happy for me, "I gave my life to Christ! I want to live my life for God!" Sure enough, as Peter says, they thought that I was strange! And one of them responded mockingly, "Oh! What! You gonna be a preacher now!" Now, that's not to say that I've never struggled with living for the will of God. I have (my family can testify)! But I can testify that nothing compares to living a life that is radically committed to Jesus Christ.
a. First, the Gospel teaches
us that we are no better in and of ourselves than anyone else, and the more
grow, the more we discover how far short of God's glory we fall.
This should produce humility in us so that we can reach out
compassionately to the unbelievers around us.
b. Second, when people see
that we want to live for God, one of the reasons they get bent out of shape is
because they know that there is a right way and a wrong way to live, and your
life is actually serving as a testimony against them.
The apostle Paul tells us that to those who are perishing, we are in fact
the aroma or smell of death (1 Cor 2:15, 16), so they know that they must give
an account to God, "who is ready to judge the living and the dead."
(1 Pt 4:5-6).
c. Third, there is just no
sugar coating it: We will
suffer, but don't lose heart! Look to Jesus, the author and finisher of
our faith, who Himself endured such hostility from sinners!
And let us resolve to live "such good lives among the pagans
that...they may see [our] good deeds and glorify God on the day he visits
us." (1 Pt 2:12)
IV. Assurance
of Salvation (4:6) "6 For this is the reason the gospel was preached even
to those who are now dead, so that they might be judged according to men in
regard to the body, but live according to God in regard to the spirit."
The idea here is that the Gospel was preached to Christians
who have since died, and those who have died in the faith do not need to fear
the judgment to come. Even though
they were like other men in regard to the body (in that they were guilty sinners
before God) they nevertheless "live according to God in regard to the
spirit," that is, they have eternal life.
So, there is a judgment to come, but we have life in the resurrected and
ascended Christ who has been exalted to God's right hand, and we too shall live
and reign with Him forever!
We also have the same assurance that Jesus had, who for the
joy set before Him endured the cross, looking to the future glory and the
salvation that would come through His sacrifice.
So as we fix our eyes on Christ, we can endure the crosses that we have
been called to bear, because like Jesus, we know that the suffering we endure
doesn’t compare to the glory to be revealed!
Christian history is filled with stories of Christians who have been persecuted for the faith. One example that has always impacted me is that of Betsie and Corrie Ten Boom. They were thrown into a Nazi concentration camp, and Corrie watched her beloved sister Betsie die right before her, but in the midst of that deep dark pit, and in spite of all the external evidence that would seem to indicate otherwise, Betsie told Corrie that there was no pit so deep where Jesus isn't deeper still, and one of Corrie's favorite expressions was "Jesus is Victor!"
So, in those times of discouragement where we want to cry
out: "Why! What is this all for!" I've determined to live for God,
but I am suffering for doing good! My
friends and family have rejected me! My co-workers mock me!
I am suffering with sickness in my body!
My loved one has died!" we can take hold of the truth, beloved,
that God works all things according to the council of His will (Eph 1:11).
We can look to the fact that we are indeed, as the writer of Hebrews
tells us, surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses (Heb 12:1), and their
testimony and their lives were not in vain, and neither is ours!
"Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the
morning!" (Ps 30:5)
Conclusion
God does have a wonderful plan for your life, but it entails following the example of the Master in cross-bearing and suffering. And Peter doesn't try to comfort his readers by promising them that if they are they faithful, God will end their suffering, or bless them with material possessions. Instead, he comforts them with other-worldly things—things of eternal value and significance—he comforts them with the Gospel, and then points us to the Example of Christ.