God is opposed to prideful Christians. What does this mean? The devil seeks to devour Christians. What does this mean?
God Wants Me to Humbly Trust Him in the Midst of Anxiety and Suffering because He Really Does Care for Me
1 Peter 5:5-14
Pastor Kerry Kinchen, Bridgeway Bible Church
Please turn to the end of 1 Peter. Turn to 5:5-14. This morning, we are completing our verse-by-verse study of 1 Peter. Going through the epistle has been a faith building experience. The time we have been spending in it has been instrumental in maturing us in our Christian growth. We remember that Peter's overall thrust has been to encourage Christians who were experiencing persecution in the church throughout the Roman empire. Consequently, Peter has been explaining that we, who are God's elect, are special to God because God created us to be special. He reconceived us. We are born again. He adopted us. Now, we are His set apart race that He created for Himself. We are His royal, kingly, priesthood. You, and I, exist to proclaim His excellencies. You are the living Temple of the life giving Spirit. Peter has been explaining that God cares for us. He cares for you in the midst of the trials and fiery ordeals of life that you go through each day. God's grace-permeating love for His elect is the basis of this relationship we have with Him. And though it seems like a settled issue, it is still an issue that we need to be reminded of. Peter finishes the epistle with these kinds of things in mind. Please follow along with me as I read;
"5b ... all of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, for God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble' 6 Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you at the proper time, 7 casting all your anxiety on Him, because He cares for you. 8 Be of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. 9 But resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same experiences of suffering are being accomplished by your brothers who are in the world. 10 After you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ, will Himself perfect, confirm, strengthen and establish you. 11 To Him be dominion forever and ever. Amen. 12 Through Silvanus, our faithful brother (for so I regard him), I have written to you briefly, exhorting and testifying that this is the true grace of God. Stand firm in it! 13 She who is in Babylon, elected together with you, sends you greetings, and so does my son, Mark. 14 Greet one another with a kiss of love. Peace be to you all who are in Christ." 1 Peter 5:5-14
Please prepare your heart to learn, along with me, in this final sermon in our 1 Peter series, titled,
God Wants Me to Humbly Trust Him in the Midst of Anxiety and Suffering because He Really Does Care for Me
[prayer]
This morning, I want us to explore some vital principles from Peter's final comments in respect to the comforting fact that God wants you to humbly trust Him in the midst of anxiety and suffering because He really does care for you.
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The first principle is that God demands certain actions from us which have to do with the fact that He cares for us. The principle is that this is true even though the consequence for disobedience may seem like He does not care for us. That may sound confusing, so listen. The action I am talking about is humility toward one another in humility under God's hand. The result is God's favor. The result of being prideful is God's opposition.
"5b ... all of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace [charin in the Greek] to the humble. 6 Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you at the proper time, 7 casting all your anxiety on Him, because He cares for you." 1 Peter 5:5-7
At first, when we see this exhortation, we can give it a cursory reading, and in doing so, we could possibly think of it as a warning that has to do with God showing that He will not care for you based upon your sin even though you are the elect. In other words, it looks like Peter is saying that if you have pride, then God is opposed to you in such a way that He no longer keeps you in the grace of His forgiveness of sins for eternal spiritual salvation. Some synergists, Pelagians, and Arminians, believe this. Their presuppositions drive their thoughts to bend the actual statement that Peter is making to supposedly be proof of conditional security in salvation. But that is not what Peter is saying at all. In fact, this statement has nothing to do with attaining eternal spiritual salvation, or supposedly losing it. Notice that Peter says that God "cares for you" already even though you need to be instructed not to be prideful. In other words, Peter is wanting people that God "cares for" already in spiritual salvation, to clothe themselves with something that they don't have on. Peter is really saying the opposite of what the "fall from grace" preachers suggest. Peter is actually explaining the depths of God's care for you. You are once saved in eternal spiritual salvation (OSIESS). You are His child in Christ. No matter how prideful you are, you are the very righteousness of God Himself, in Christ Jesus 2 Corinthians 5:21. You are not what you did, or are doing. You are what Christ did for you on the cross and in the miracle of your regeneration. You are what Christ is doing in you each day, even when you are sinning. God does not give up on you. God does not reject you as His child; Peter never says that He does. Yet, there is a strong revelation here:
God really does oppose you in a certain sense in your pridefulness.
But, there is another strong revelation here:
In doing so God is actually showing His care.
I know this may be hard to understand, but stay with me. Think about ways that this particular care is manifested when God opposes you in your pridefulness. One way is demonstrated in the fact that God has the rest of His people in mind that are around you. So what is God doing in this opposition? He's exhorting you to be humble, as a Christian He's molding you into humbleness, so that the rest of the body will be benefitted by your humility. In other words, God wants me to experience a humble you. He wants you to experience a humble me. In this way, the expectation is that we bless others by manifesting our thoughts, demeanor, and actions of humility toward them, and around them. This is why Peter uses the metaphor of clothing. We are to cover our naked pridefulness with the godly decency of humbleness. We do this for others to see our outer garment. We do this because the clothing is really a manifestation of Christ. Think about when Peter first used this kind of metaphor for Christian wives. Remember he said,
"3 Your adornment must not be merely external ... putting on dresses; 4 but let it be the hidden person of the heart, with the imperishable quality of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is precious in the sight of God." 1 Peter 2:3-4
The imperishable qualities of a gentle and quiet spirit come from the hidden person of the heart that God has made that way in Christ. These things are intimately married to humbleness. All of it is precious in the sight of God and the rest of the body of Christ. Pridefulness, on the other hand, walks all over the rest of the body. Pride retaliates, and irritates. Pride is the stain of self exaltation. Humility is the only antidote for this disease that the rest of the body gets infected with from us. But there are other ways that this exhortation is God's blessing and care. Think about it:
Doesn't this also mean that God is talking to the rest of the body too?
In other words, He is talking to you--but He is not just talking to you alone. The principle that the Spirit is revealing here applies to all of God's people. So, everyone is covered. As others seek to be obedient to the Spirit, then we will all be benefitted by their humility toward us too. God wants all of us who are His royal priesthood, and set apart nation, to clothe ourselves with humility toward one another, so he reminds us, in love, of how He is opposed to the proud. Though a Christian is saved in unmerited favor, God withholds His grace-favor upon their daily lives of prideful self exaltation. In this way, every single one of us benefits from what God is commanding here in His care for us. Then there is another way. It is the grace of God in actually giving the revelation of this principle to us so that we will not be ignorant of it. What I mean is that it is the blessing privilege of having the revelation that, at one time, we had no idea existed. So, through God's recorded word, He is letting you know a principle that has existed from the beginning. It has to do with Who He is. It has to do with His Holy nature. Opposition to pride comes from what He is. Favor to the humble comes from what He is. So, we need to think about the beauty of this. He is not revealing this to us so that we will be cursed as if He has lack of care for us. No. He is revealing this to us for the purpose of bringing us blessing. By explaining the principle to you in His word, He shows you that He cares for you specifically for you to get favor. Notice that in telling us to clothe ourselves with humility to one another, Peter makes the statement about God's opposition. He opposes the proud. And then there is the grace part. He gives grace to the humble. A question to ask is:
What exactly does Peter mean?
To really understand this, we must first recognize that Peter is referencing a passage from the Old Testament. James refers to the same passage in His New Testament epistle too. James essentially says the same thing,
"6 But He gives a greater grace [charin in the Greek]. Therefore it says, 'God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace [charin in the Greek] to the humble. ... 10 Humble yourselves in the presence of the Lord, and He will exalt you." James 4:6, 10
@1 God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace which is favor to the __________________________. James 4:6
James, and Peter, are referencing Proverbs 3:34 from the Greek translation of the Old Testament which, when read in its context, indicates merited favor from God, where God exalts His people when they humble themselves. The Greek word that Peter and James are using that certain English Bibles translate as "grace" is a word that simply means "favor." This is why the Amplified Bible, and the NLT, both translate this word as "favor" here. One reason why this can be confusing is because we typically think that anytime the word "grace" is used in the New Testament, that it must mean "unmerited" or "undeserved" favor. After all, isn't salvation something that we can not earn? Aren't we saved through God's unmerited favor? Don't we call this "grace?" Lost in sin, we are prideful in our spiritual deadness. We don't lose our pride, and then God saves us because we humble ourselves to make ourselves acceptable to Him. No, God saves us from our pride that we have, as a state of being, while lost in the inherited sin nature of Adam. God does it by unmerited favor alone, through faith which is a gift from God alone, in the finished work of Christ alone; and actually it is all a gift from God alone, Ephesians 2:8. When it comes to spiritual salvation, "unmerited" "undeserved" or "unearned' favor is the accurate definition of God's grace in respect to its process. This unmerited favor is what Paul means in Romans when he says concerning eternal spiritual salvation,
"... there has also come to be at the present time a remnant according to God's gracious [charis, as chariton] election. But if it is by grace, [charis] it is no longer on the basis of works, otherwise grace [charis] is no longer grace [charis]." Romans 11:6
This is the grace that we are most familiar with. This grace is not based upon works, or actions, that earn merit. This salvific grace is not based upon humbling yourself, which is a work, or action, that earns merit to not be opposed by God. This grace is completely unmerited, undeserved, and unearned, favor. The reason why this is important for us to understand is because some favor is deserved; it is earned, and it is merited. But on the other hand, there is some favor that is not, and can not be earned. This particular type of favor in 1 Peter 5:5, and James 4:6 is earned by God's people, and it is earned by humbleness. Let me briefly share a few examples of where the Greek is used to show grace, as favor, being bestowed upon certain people because they merit getting the favor:
"52 And Jesus kept increasing in wisdom and stature, and in favor [cariti] with God and men." Luke 2:52
Jesus had favor with men because Jesus was worthy of it. He merited this "increasing" favor among men. We also read in Acts 2,
"45 and they began selling their property and possessions and were sharing them with all, as anyone might have need 46 Day by day continuing with one mind in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, they were taking their meals together with gladness and sincerity of heart, 47 praising God and having favor [charin] with all the people." Acts 2:44-47
The favor they had with all the people was favor of merit. And we read,
"19 For this finds favor [charin], if for the sake of conscience toward God a person bears up under sorrows when suffering unjustly. 20 For what credit is there if, when you sin and are harshly treated, you endure it with patience? But if when you do what is right and suffer for it you patiently endure it, this finds favor [charin] with God." 1 Peter 2:19-20
@2 When I, as a Christian, do what is right and suffer for it, and patiently endure it, this finds __________________ with God. 1 Peter 2:19-20
Patiently enduring unjust suffering because of doing what is right is the action that finds favor with God. Peter says, it is "credit." The Greek is translated as favor in all of these passages, and each passage shows that the favor is merited, earned, and deserved to the person's credit. With this in mind, then, we see that the Spirit clarifies one exclusive arena of merited favor for Christians. It is the one that Peter and James are both talking about. So, for us to really get the sense of this passage, it is better rendered like this,
"5b ... all of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because God is opposed to the proud, but gives favor to the humble. 6 Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you at the proper time, 7 casting all your anxiety on Him, because He cares for you." 1 Peter 5:5-7
And in James,
"6 But He gives a greater favor. Therefore it says, 'God is opposed to the proud, but gives favor to the humble. ... 10 Humble yourselves in the presence of the Lord, and He will exalt you." James 4:6, 10
The favor is His exaltation of you, instead of your exaltation of yourself. The point is I have been working through all of this to show the important element here that gets missed by legalists. What we see is that God is actually showing His care for us in revealing this principle to us so that we will bless others in our humbleness, and further, we will be blessed by being exalted through the favor that God will give us because of our humility. Another way that we see that God cares for us in this process, is that God does not want us to be anxious about any of the things that beset us where we are required to put on humility. God shows His care for us by telling us that as we seek to be humble, we should cast our anxiety upon Him. There is another way that we see that God cares for us in this process. It is the demonstration that God has given us of this whole process in Himself. What I mean is that God clothed Himself in humility to stoop down into humanity to be the sacrificial Lamb. Then, while facing the rejection that was about to come in a matter of minutes, Christ the Son, in His humbleness, cast His anxiety onto the Father in intense prayer. Finally, after being crucified in the most heinous act in history, Christ the God-man was resurrected to reign in exalted glory at the proper time. The point is that we, as our Father's children, must make it our ambition to humble ourselves under God's might hand and cast all our anxiety upon Him in the legacy of our Lord because we can, and should, trust Him in the great love relationship He has designed to have with us.
/2/
This leads to the second principle that we can glean in respect to the fact that God wants me to trust Him in the midst of anxiety and suffering because He really does care for me: God teaches us to be spiritually aware. He teaches us that we are in a spiritual war now; and He teaches us that in the warfare, we are not to be surprised. We must be ready. We must be sober for both the fight and the suffering that comes in the battle as we await our future with Christ. Peter says,
"8 Be of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. 9 But resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same experiences of suffering are being accomplished by your brothers who are in the world. ... 13 She who is in Babylon, elected together with you," 1 Peter 5:8-9
Peter just urged toward soberness earlier, when he said,
"The end of all things is near; therefore, be of sound judgment and sober for the purpose of prayer." 1 Peter 4:7
Christian action that springs from ready awareness, comes in many packages. God knows this, and He cares for you. So, He alerts His elect to the spiritual warfare that we are involved in on a daily basis. The war is spiritual, and yet we feel the battle's effects. We experience them in the physical realm. When someone makes fun of you for being a Christian, you feel it don't you? When someone accuses you, you feel it. When non-Christians relentlessly campaign for everything that we Christians are opposed to, we feel it. Typically, in the Bible, the devil (Greek diabolos, meaning accuser, slanderer) is a reference to the accusing adversary. This designation also includes the word "Satan" which means "adversary (Greek satana). In Peter's context, he is talking about the devil as the accusing adversary of God's people. We read in Revelation,
"9 And the great dragon was thrown down, the serpent of old who is called the devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world; he was thrown down to the earth, ... the accuser of our brethren has been thrown down, he who accuses them before our God day and night." Revelation 12:9-10
The devil (Satan) whether in a spiritual entity creature sense, a metaphoric sense, symbolic sense, or any other manifestation sense, like for example, the apostate Jews who persecuted the true followers of Messiah, is always about the task of accusing the brothers and sisters. For example, we know that the apostate Jews were called the children of their Father the devil by Jesus when they were seeking to accuse Him in their sin and deception. In Revelation, we see the apostate Jews described as being a synagogue of Satan. God says that He knows
"... the blasphemy by those who say they are Jews and are not, but are a synagogue of Satan." Revelation 2:9
The apostate Jews were not really Jews of God's recognition. They were accusing adversaries. They became a synagogue of Satan. Governments are like this too. In fact, the Bible refers to governments as being roaring lions. We read it in Proverbs,
"15 Like a roaring lion ... is a wicked ruler ..." Proverbs 28:15
So, with this sense in mind, we can recognize what Peter has been writing about from the beginning of the epistle. We must be aware that Satan is accusing us and is looking for an opportunity to devour us. We must be aware that the people who are lost in their spiritual darkness, are always seeking to accuse us Christians of believing something false, and of doing wrong things. They want to make us out to be the social problem. We always have an enemy who is seeking to rip, and chew, us up. Why? Because the true biblically described Christ (the historic Christ) is their enemy. And since you are saved by Him, and you serve Him as your Lord, then you are also the enemy. The main point is that with this caring warning in mind, we must heed our Father. When it comes to the spiritual enemy, we must be in continuous awareness mode, and we must be in resistance mode. Notice that the way we are urged to battle is with two weapons: One is to resist the accusing adversary firmly in your faith. The other is to do so, knowing that the same experiences of suffering are being accomplished by your brothers and sisters who are in the world. Peter is even referring to his own persecution in Jerusalem by calling the church there, "she who is elect." By the way, the elect lady in Babylon, that Peter mentions, is not a reference to the church in Rome. Peter is writing from Jerusalem. He is writing to the elect in the city of Rome and its surrounding jurisdictional territories. Peter is writing from Jerusalem which represents the great city which had become apostate in rejection of her Messiah. Jerusalem is the same Babylon which is the whore that the Spirit condemns all through Revelation as the great city;
"And their dead bodies will lie in the street of the great city which mystically is called Sodom and Egypt, where also their Lord was crucified." Revelation 11:8 cf. Jeremiah 23:14-15
"The woman whom you saw is the great city, which reigns over the kings of the earth." Revelation 17:18
"standing at a distance because of the fear of her torment, saying, ' Woe, woe, the great city, Babylon, the strong city! For in one hour your judgment has come.'" Revelation 18:10
Historically, and contextually, apostate Jerusalem, the Satanic accusing adversary of God's true children, had become like a lion seeking to devour God's true children in Christ. The apostate Jews were exactly as Jesus called them when He said "you are of your father the devil." Peter understands all of this in a personal way. He is living in the midst of the attack upon Messiah's people. He also knows that there is only one way to overcome. Faith is the victorious ground that you must stand on in the midst of the fiery ordeals. But your faith must be grounded in facts. Everything you know about the glory of your salvation is your faith. All that you know about being persecuted for Christ must be considered. All that your faith is grounded in must be rallied to the fight whenever you are in the battle of persecution. Think about your faith in the future. This is your weapon against pain and suffering that seems like it won't let up, or ever go away. Your heavenly hope is waiting for you. It is worth it. So, the Spirit is strongly urging us to think about whatever we go through in this temporary life as momentary light affliction when compared to our eternal rewards. This is our faith. And we have a lot of ammunition. For example, we know, in faith, that God is our Father. We know that we are His children. We know, in faith, that we are the ones who are the righteousness of God our Father in Christ Jesus His Son. We know, in faith, that we are on the right road spiritually. We know, in faith, that we are not living a fantasy religion. Paul calls it the shield--the shield of faith. And we also have that other weapon. It is the weapon of knowing that we are not alone in this struggle. We recognize, that the same experiences are common to Christians all through history, all over the world. We know that
"Indeed, all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted." 2 Timothy 3:12
You believe that don't you? Well, it is your faith. So when it happens, you have faith based upon facts. It is supposed to happen. We know the blessing that Peter has been telling us about already,
"But even if you should suffer for the sake of righteousness, you are blessed; and do not fear their intimidation, and do not be troubled," 1 Peter 3:14
"If you are reviled for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of God rests on you." 1 Peter 4:14
You believe that don't you? Well, it is your faith. So when it happens, you have faith that you are blessed based upon facts. So, as you fight the fight of faith, the Spirit is urging you to consider that what you are going through is part of the blessing of what happens to all Christians in the experience of our faith. It proves that you are on the right side of the battle. This is why you must be prepared to stand firm in it. The devil will scrutinize your life with one goal in mind. He wants to ridicule your Christianity. The accusing adversary wants to shut you up, and shut you down. The accusing adversary wants to see you defeated, and then he wants to accuse you in your defeat, and he wants to revel in your defeat. He wants to see you fail. In all of it, He does not want you to trust in God. In fact, he will accuse you of believing in a false God. He'll accuse you of being in a false religion. He'll accuse you of being a fanatic. What else? He will accuse you of being a hypocrite. He will even accuse you of being rejected by your Lord. But, he is a liar. I remember someone saying once that the devil is defeated already; so, because the devil is defeated, all he is really doing is roaring like a dog that is all bark but no bite. I have actually heard this from more than one source. They say that the devil (the anti-Christ accusing adversary) is making a show, but in reality, he has no teeth. How many of you have heard a preacher, or someone else say that? It's an interesting opinion, but unfortunately for that cute "sugar stick preaching hook" Peter disagrees. The devil in all his manifestations, seeks to devour you--Christian. You better make no mistake about it. God says to be sober. Devour means that he has teeth that sink in and chew you up. The scheme of our accusing adversaries is not to gum us to death. The Christians of the first century were stoned for their faith. They were led away to executions. They were burned alive, screaming in horrifying agony. Their own people rejected them. It's happening today. Getting rejected by peers, friends, and family members leaves teeth marks. But it gets even more personal in respect to what the Spirit is urging here. Why? Because you are not going to be very effective at resisting the accusing adversaries unless you realize the fact that they are real. You are not going to be very effective at resisting the accusing adversaries unless you realize the accusations are real. You are not going to be very effective at resisting the accusing adversaries unless you realize the teeth really do hurt. Be sober.
/3/
This leads to the last principle that we can glean in respect to the fact that God wants me to trust Him in the midst of anxiety and suffering because He really does care for me. The Spirit promises us that,
"10 After you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ, will Himself perfect, confirm, strengthen and establish you. ... I have written to you briefly, exhorting and testifying that this is the true grace of God. Stand firm in it!" 1 Peter 5:10
@3 After you have suffered for a little while, our God of all grace, who called you out to His eternal glory in eternal salvation, will perfect, confirm, _______________________________ and establish you. 1 Peter 5:10
The point is that our graceful God is the God of all grace which means every kind of grace. So He wants you to know that the trials that you go through each day as a Christian, are not that you are experiencing His wrath. Rather, you are experiencing the true grace of God as His everlasting child in Christ in the midst of it all. His grace really is upon you as His set apart national according to the royal priesthood; but His grace is on you according to how He defines what His favor actually is, whether you thoroughly understand it all, or not. So the final point is that the true grace of God is not so much that He is going to prosper you and make you financially rich. He may do this, but He may not. The true grace of God is that you will suffer for manifesting Christ out of yourself as a royal priesthood, a set apart nation, and a temple of God on this earth, and through the suffering, where we humble ourselves under the mighty sovereign hand of God, the God of all grace will perfect us in our Christianity. He will confirm us by showing forth our true spiritual state as His children. He will strengthen us in mature growth. He will establish us as the victors in Christ. This is what we are patiently awaiting in our humility where we will finally be exalted. It is in line with the true grace of God who is the God of all grace. Remember Peter said
"10 As to this salvation, the prophets who prophesied of the grace that would come to you made careful searches and inquiries," 1 Peter 1:10
Speaking of Christ coming again, Peter said to
"fix your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ." 1:13
In 3:7 he exhorted husbands to live with their wives as fellow heirs of the grace of life in Christ. He said, to use your gifts in serving one another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God, in 4:10. Then Peter speaks of God giving grace to the humble. Now he punctuates it with the fact that after you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who called you to eternal glory in Christ, will Himself perfect, confirm, strengthen and establish you. All of this is true grace of the God of all grace that we must stand firm in on a day to day basis.
Let's briefly recap: Remember that God demands humility from us. God makes this demand even though the consequence for disobedience might seem like He does not care for us. In actuality, the demand demonstrates that God cares for us immensely. When we clothe ourselves with humility, great blessing results. Remember the second principle: God wants us to trust Him in the midst of anxiety and suffering because He really does care for us. We will be with Christ forever in our future, so we need to be remembering this. Right now, we are in a spiritual war. We must be ready for both the Fight and the suffering that comes in the battle. Finally, God is the God of all grace. After you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ, will Himself perfect, confirm, strengthen and establish you. This is the true grace of God. Stand firm in it! Amen
@1 God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace which is favor to the __________________________. James 4:6
@2 When I, as a Christian, do what is right and suffer for it, and patiently endure it, this finds __________________ with God. 1 Peter 2:19-20
@3 After you have suffered for a little while, our God of all grace, who called you out to His eternal glory in eternal salvation, will perfect, confirm, _______________________________ and establish you. 1 Peter 5:10
