I wonder if you've got the feel of 1 Peter yet. If you haven't been with us through the autumn, we've preached our way through this letter and have now reached the end. So let's just go back to chapter 1 verse 1 and take a glance the whole way through the letter, so that we end off in style today.
You'll see from verse 1 of the letter that Peter says right at the outset that he's writing to exiles. Christians are aliens on the earth, because of that new birth that's mentioned in 1:3. Christians have been 'born again', they've entered into a spiritual life: a life which surprisingly enough is a life of suffering: 'In this you rejoice, even if now for a little while you have had to suffer various trials' (1:6). And so he tells us that we have got to be self-controlled, sober, watchful, disciplined (which is the note that's picked up at the beginning of our reading from our last passage of all, as you saw): 'Prepare your minds for action; discipline yourselves; set all your hope on the grace that Jesus Christ will bring you when he is revealed' (1:13). Looking forward to what is not yet here, to what is yet to come.
And that means holiness says Peter (1:15,16). Being different; and in particular it means love (1:22), centred on Christ: 'Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God's sight.' And so Peter teaches us, as we reach 2:13, that we Christians have to submit.
I think at the end of this programme of sermons, we can lose sight of just how extraordinary that teaching is. It just is not 'Politically Correct'. We are to submit to unjust authority, according to Peter. Slaves are to submit to masters; wives are to submit to husbands; all of us are to submit to one another. It just isn't popular: it's not contemporary. We did not find it easy when we looked at those passages. Indeed, some came and spoke to the preachers, and said, "Look, we can't take that. It's really difficult to grasp." It is indeed! They understood the thrust of the letter.
And all the time Peter keeps the example of Christ before us: 'For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you should follow in his steps' (2:21).
These are the hallmarks of the Christian life, according to Peter: suffering, submission, and holiness — if you want another 's' sanctification (which is the process of being made holy).
And it is lived in the light of the End. Look on to chapter 4: ' The end of all things is near; therefore be serious and discipline yourselves for the sake of your prayers' (4:7). Be sober, be watchful — that same note again that we're going to pick up at the end of the letter. And it is lived in the footsteps of Jesus: 'But rejoice insofar as you are sharing Christ's sufferings, so that you may also be glad and shout for joy when his glory is revealed' (4:13).
Now as we go into chapter 5, the last chapter of the letter, Peter is still on the theme of submission. He talks about how leaders are to operate in the Christian fellowship, in the congregation; how all of us are to submit to one another and to be humble: 'Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that in due time he may exalt you' (5:6). That same hand that brings us down is going to bring us up, as we saw last week. 'Cast all your anxieties on him, for he cares about you' (v. 7).
Finally, Peter says again what he has said already, be sober, be watchful, be self-controlled and alert: 'Discipline yourselves, keep alert' (v. 8a).
(1) Be Watchful.
Be watchful, alert, awake (whatever the version you are looking at says there). It is to be spiritually vigilant. The opposite is that spiritual drowsiness which responds to the situations in life no differently from the non-Christian. That's what it is not to be alert — to go through this coming week so that if someone was watching you they would say, "There's no evidence that that person is a Christian. I didn't see anything this week that marks them out as being any different."
Perhaps there is a shock awaiting one of us this week. It may be a good shock, it may be a bad one. We're going to have a little bump in the car, or something like that. At that moment will our reaction be any different from the non-Christian? Will we take God into account, will we view it from His perspective? Or are we asleep spiritually? You are spiritually asleep if something happens to you this week and you act just as if you were a non-Christian. That's what Peter is on about here.
Some of us are very careful how we do our Christmas shopping. Oh, we're very alert about that! We compare prices and some of us have worn out our shoe leather going from shop to shop. Some of us are very alert with our cars, looking for the least spot of rust. We never miss a service on the car. Some of us are very alert with our homes. We're getting them all ready for the guests who are going to come at Christmas. We want that spare room just right when the in-laws arrive. Some of us are very alert about our children's education: we're monitoring it all the time. We're asking people what's the right school for them to go to next? Oh, there are many things — our own careers: we're very alert about them, very watchful, very vigilant. Our health; our economic situation; how we're keeping up with those exams that are going to be facing us next summer.
I suppose our health particularly. I'm finding I'm at that age that does a sort of checkup each morning to see if I'm all there, if anything has fallen off in the night. At my age you stoop down to tie your shoe-laces and while you're down there you just check to see if there's anything else you ought to be doing while you're there. Oh, we keep a close eye on those aspects of life, don't we?
But what about our faith? What about our souls? What vigilance is there there? Are we awake?
Perhaps for some of us it's the case today that if we had worked as we have worshipped this past year we'd be facing the sack before the year is out. Be spiritually awake, says Peter. Wake up! And he gives us a reason that's quite new in the letter. He's given us many reasons in the past why we should be disciplined and sober and self-controlled. Now he gives us a new one. For the first and only time in the letter he mentions the devil: 'Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour' (v. 8b).
(2) The Devil.
(i) His reality. We have an opponent, an enemy, an adversary. He is real and he is against us. Beware the ridicule and the caricatures. Do you remember those lines from the Ancient Mariner? 'Like one that on a lonesome road doeth walk in fear and dread, and having once turned round, walks on and turns no more his head — because he knows a frightful fiend doeth close behind him tread.' It is not that sort of spookiness that the New Testament teaches us. It is not the spookiness of the Omens films or of a Breughel picture. Can we not accept the reality of the devil as a spiritual enemy without attributing to him all the macabre extravagances of the Hammer horror films?
We know him by his activity, says Peter: 'Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.' He seeks to discredit God's word. Do you remember what he said in the Garden of Eden? "Did God really say . . . ?" He seeks to discredit God's word and he seeks to destroy God's work.
Am I tempted to disbelieve the Bible? Do I find it hard to go on as a Christian? I certainly am and I certainly do — every week of my life. And I take those facts as evidence of the devil's activity. We know him by his activity. He prowls around — not one of us is free from his attention. There is no home group he doesn't visit. There's no college prayer meeting he doesn't attend. There's no church staff meeting at which he is not active. We know him by his activity, whatever the sceptics may say. ' The devil was fairly voted out, and of course the devil's gone. But simple folk would like to know, who's carrying his business on? '
His intention is to devour. He poses as a friend, as an angel of light. He's the original travel agent, making the far country sound like the most attractive destination on earth for you and for me. But his purpose is to make our lives as petty, as self-centred, as materialistic and as futile as he can — and ultimately to sever us from God.
Well, what are we to do? We are, says Peter, to resist: 'Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same experience of suffering is required of your brotherhood throughout the world' (v. 9). We resist him first and foremost by being aware of his existence.
As a small boy, I remember being bitten by a sheepdog called Bob. It's not a name I'll ever forget. He's the sort of dog who sneaks up behind and he took a little nip out of my ankle (just to see, I expect, if I tasted like a sheep). He didn't believe in frontal assaults; and ever since then I've preferred to keep sheepdogs where I can see them.
Where the devil is concerned, we need to keep alert, to keep a look out for him. He has plans for us today. You may not have made any spiritual plans for today, but the devil's planned, and God has planned. We need to be aware that we have an enemy.
I remember an older Christian friend saying to me during my first year as a Christian, "You know where that idea came from — you can see the smoke!" It had never occurred to me at that stage that an idea might originate with the devil. We need to wake up, as Christians, to the fact that there are two supernatural beings interested in our behaviour. There is a will in conflict with God's will. And it's not just my will. It's not just a case of, "Shall I do what God wants?" in some particular matter. It's also a case of do I prefer to do what the devil wants? He always wants me to go my own way rather than to go God's. And the first step to resisting the devil is to realise his reality.
(ii) His defeat. He is real, but he is also defeated. Don't mistake what I am saying. I emphasized that first point as I think it is right to do. But do not miss the second, he is a defeated enemy. He is bluffing.
Those who know lions (and I am not among their number) say that a roaring lion is bluffing. A lion that is hunting in earnest is as silent as the night (not an experience that I wish to verify for myself!)
Now Satan is a baffled and defeated foe. We are to be vigilant but not fearful. We cannot ignore him, but we are not to be cowed by him or fascinated by him. We are to 'Resist him, firm in your faith.' You see faith is what the devil is out to destroy. It's the faculty by which we see the invisible: that faculty by which you and I know there is a God. Although we cannot see Him and no concrete tangible evidence that we can clutch hold of that tells us, "Yes, that's God". Faith is what allows us to see the invisible God. And that is what Satan is trying to destroy: our awareness of the Holy and Almighty God, and His love for us.
We resist evil by seeing what is invisible. It's not a case of putting more strength into believing (the Alice in Wonderland view of faith, that it's believing what you know isn't true — so you shut your eyes and try harder). That's not what it is to be firm in faith. It is to draw more strength from what we do believe: that there is a God who cares for us with His mighty hand (as we were seeing last week).
It is not easy. It is called suffering by Peter here in verse 9: 'Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same experience of suffering is required of your brotherhood throughout the world.' Not because there was a universal Imperial Edict to persecute the Christians at this time, but because there is a universally active devil at all times.
It is the devil who makes sure that the choice to prefer good to evil is always painful for human beings. When that choice to do what pleases me or what pleases God opens up before me today, it will always hurt to say no to self and yes to God. Do you know that in your experience? You certainly do if you're a Christian. You know it is always an experience of suffering to go God's way through life. Oh, great joy follows on from it — but in prospect the devil makes sure it never looks nice to say no to me and yes to others and to Jesus, to let Him reign in every part of our lives.
It's an experience of suffering and it's the same for all of us: 'Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same experience of suffering is required of your brotherhood throughout the world.' The devil is real, despite all his deceit that he is not; and he is to be resisted despite all his bluff that he is irresistible. We exercise our faith against him, but (and now we are going to end on a much, much nicer note) Peter does not leave us with the reality of the devil and the suffering entailed in resisting him. He leaves us with God, which is our third and final, and our last point on 1 Peter.
(3) The God of all Grace.
'After you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, establish, and strengthen you. To him be the dominion [the power] for ever and ever. Amen' (vv. 10, 11). They are lovely verses and they make a lovely end to the letter.
Notice what God will do: '. . . will himself restore, establish, and strengthen you.' Actually there's another verb in there as well, 'settle'. They mean pretty much the same thing, there is a string of four verbs at the end of the verse, quite similar to one another in meaning. And notice this: it's a promise. It's not a wish, or a prayer, but a promise. And it is not a promise of God's companionship in suffering. There are other bits of the New Testament that tell us about that. But this is not saying that God will be with us in suffering — it is a promise of God's restoration after suffering. Restore, support, strengthen and establish — whatever the ravages of sin and suffering there may be in our lives, God will make right all the loss.
There are times when we are knocked back in our Christian faith. Life, circumstances, failed relation-ships, disappointments, doubts; our own weakness in the face of sin, bereavement, physical illness, depression; whatever it may be, such things afflict us and they drag us down and they pressurize our faith. So that to go on believing is an intense struggle in the face of them. But if we are in Christ, then God will complete what He has begun. The One who has called us will restore us. The ravages of past defeat will not impair our capacity to withstand evil in future.
Let me say that again, because that is the nub of the verse: the ravages of past defeat will not impair our capacity to withstand evil in future.
How weak and feeble your Christian life is. You may look back on this last week and think it's been a disaster. That will not affect your ability to withstand evil in this coming week, because God Himself is restoring you. It's not you who are picking yourself up and saying, "I'm going to turn over a new leaf. Mark's preaching a good sermon, I'm going to turn over a new leaf this coming week." No, no, no. It is the God of all grace who is restoring you and bringing you back into relationship with Himself. Through the death of His Son (which we remember together this morning) he's saying, "Come back to me — it's a new day tomorrow."
We look back on a record of repeated failure to defeat our own sin in our own strength. But God tells us to look on to where we must arrive eventually. Because He guarantees it. It's like the tide coming in: 'For though the tired waves vainly breaking seem here no painful inch to gain, far back through creeks and inlets making comes flooding in the main.'
Notice when this will be. 'After you have suffered a little while,' says Peter. This firm foundation that God is building is built by the experience of suffering. That 'little while' is quite vague. It's not clear whether restoration will take place in this life or the life to come. But that little while is clearly contrasted with the eternal glory to which He has called us in Christ. Do you see that contrast in the verse? The 'little while' and the 'eternal glory' to which we have been called. That's the realm that really counts.
Paul commented in Romans 8, 'I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.' The restoration comes in God's perfect timing and it's directed at eternity, at what will last for ever.
Peter has told us what God will do and he's told us when he will do it. He also tells us why. Because He is 'the God of all grace'. Look at the verse again, it's such a lovely verse: 'After you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, establish, and strengthen you.' The God of all grace, of utter undeserved love and mercy. He is the One who has called you, if you are a Christian today.
That is why there is no other answer to the question, Why? Why has He called me? His grace. There's no other answer. That's what this Communion Service is all about. Why did Jesus die for my sins? Amazing grace. There's no other answer.
It is the whole topic of the letter. Peter says, 'I have written briefly to you, exhorting and declaring that this is the true grace of God; stand fast in it' (v. 12). This is the true grace of God — including suffering. I think that may be the point of that 'true grace'. Were there some, even then, who questioned whether God ever meant His people to suffer? Peter makes clear that the grace of God is a much greater thing than the provision of a pleasant life here on earth. It is the route to glory: an eternal glory beyond our imagining. Grace calls us. Grace allows us to suffer. Grace accompanies us in suffering. Grace restores us after suffering. Grace takes us all the way, until we see God face to face.
So, Peter says, trust that grace, rely on it, lean on it, 'stand fast in it.' That's how Peter ends his letter to us.
And we could not finish it better than with the Lord's Supper that we are going to celebrate now, which is an act of standing fast in God's grace. It's saying, "Nothing in my hand I bring. Simply to thy cross I cling." Amazing grace! 'I have written this short letter to encourage you and to testify that this is the true grace of God; stand fast in it.' Amen.
Let's pray:
Father God, we do indeed thank you for Peter's letter. We thank you for all that it contains: for its reality, for its severity, for its challenge, and for that wondrous grace that sent the Lord Jesus to die for us and to set us an example and to show us what your pattern of living is. Lord God, it is far beyond us; and we want today to stand fast in your grace, saying we have no other hope but to cling on to what you have done for us, on to your forgiveness for our sins, on to your grace to restore and establish and strengthen and hold us up in the Christian life — your strength to face tomorrow, for we have none of our own. Lord, we ask it in Jesus' name. Amen.