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April 20, 2003
Easter |
"1 Peter" Series
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Pastor Brian Shimer
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"Peter, Whence Such Confidence?"
1 Peter 5:1-14
| I. | A dear friend in Southern California left his Presbyterian Church because the new |
| pastor did not want to talk about Jesus. "You couldn't get him to walk Jesus down the aisle," Mike told me.
Last month the 1st Methodist Church in Salem hit rocky waters when a Sunday School class and the pastor invited a controversial and I believe heretical Bishop of the Episcopal Church to speak on a Sunday morning. The Statesman Journal ran an article entitled "Church Radical Stirs up Debate." Joann Pedersen, one of the members of the Sunday School class that had sponsored Bishop John Spong said, "I don't necessarily believe in the resurrection of Christ or the virgin birth, and I don't want someone to say, 'you can't be a Christian because you don't believe like I do.' "
With this statement, JoAnn places herself outside of the Christian
faith. She may be nice and like church but she is not Christian, the Bible says so: "If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you shall be saved. For it is your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved." (Romans 10:9-10).
Spong sees himself as starting a new reformation of the church-- he believes he is a new Martin Luther. On his website Spong makes these points: it is nonsensical to talk about Jesus as the incarnation of God. The fall of man is a myth and nonsense. The miracle stories of the NT can no longer be interpreted in a post Newtonian world as supernatural events performed by an incarnate deity. Jesus was not raised bodily but into the meaning of God… I'll not waste any of your good hearing space with more of his nonsense. Heretic is a good name for him. He is far beyond the scope of Biblical faith.
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II. | Many at First Church disagreed with Spong. But others were duped into thinking his
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thoughts were still Christian. A retired professor of mine from Willamette University, who heard Spong speak that Sunday morning, wrote me saying: "I cannot remember when I have been made more forcefully aware of just how dangerous -- nay, demonic -- it is to preach the love of God apart from the Cross of Christ. It was not "love" at all, rather indulgence that Spong promoted."
Today, what Spong denies, we have been speaking and singing with a singular message: Jesus is alive! He did not rise into the meaning of God -- how would that have impressed the first disciples enough to die for him? No, Jesus rose bodily from the grave. This is the message the church needs to resurrect and every person needs as well.
Peter wrote in Chapter 5 of his first letter, that he was a "witness to Christ's sufferings." He would tell you:
1. Jesus really suffered and died!
a. Romans know how to kill people
b. No one ever got off a cross alive.
c. His blood had separated into red corpuscles and clear serum, a clear sign of death -- hence the flow that came out of his side looking like blood and water, when the soldier stuck his spear into him.
2. Jesus really came bodily to life -- Peter did not want that at first! He was scared to meet him after denying him. But Jesus rose anyway! "He lives Peter He lives!"
a. The tomb was empty -- only grave clothes were left and those still in the shape of the body that had departed from them!
b. The women saw him at the tomb first. Who would fabricate that when in that era the testimony of women bore less weight than that of a man's!
c. The Jewish leaders had to fabricate a story to cover the disappearance of his body, which would hardly have been necessary if the body had still been there. The story still told had holes in it: How could a 16 man guard know that someone had taken a body while they were sleeping if they were asleep? Why would any Roman regiment let a bunch of fisherman overpower them, when it normally would have meant their deaths?
d. Jesus appeared twice to those in the upper room
e. He appeared to more than 500 people at one time
f. He walked with Cleopas and his wife as they returned home to Emmaus, and appeared to them there.
g. He stayed 40 days with the disciples teaching them before ascending.
There is more evidence that Jesus rose from the dead than there is evidence that you ate breakfast today, or have worked at your job for this past decade. You could not amass as many witnesses to that, nor to the assassination of President Lincoln, as testify to the resurrection of Jesus.
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III.
| More than a "witness of Christ's sufferings" Peter was experiencing the suffering of the body
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of Christ as people "participated in his sufferings" (4:13) when enduring the painful trials, the sufferings inflicted by others.
The word witness is that from which we get our English word Martyr. Witness came to mean "someone who testifies to something unto death" because of how the Christians faced death.
Jesus' resurrection trampled death under foot, for all those early believers went from cowering to towering in Christ as the Holy Spirit came upon them. And all of them except John were martyred for their faith. John survived 2 attempts to kill him. Similar to Daniel's friends in the fiery furnace, he came out of being boiled alive in oil unscathed. Impossible? No miracle! Then he lived through his exile to Patmos and went on to lead the church until his death at a ripe old age.
Two centuries after Peter, Athanasius a 3rd Century church leader asks:
"If you see with your own eyes men and women and children, even, thus welcoming death for the sake of Christ's religion, how can you be so utterly silly and incredulous and maimed in your mind as not to realise that Christ, to Whom these all bear witness, Himself gives the victory to each, making death completely powerless for those who hold His faith and bear the sign of the cross?" (pp 59-60, On the Incarnation)
What was that? He asks: With such witnesses around you, how could you not believe that Jesus is alive and giving victory to those martyred for their faith? Peter would agree.
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IV. | Church, the resurrection has been testified to these 2000 years.
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In the most recent century, more have died for their faith in Jesus than in the past 1900 years. And still the truth that Jesus is alive lives on.
Look around you. How many do you know seated here who have testimony of what Jesus can do to heal, to mend, to raise up, to touch. Dead men don't do such works. My sister and brother in law are still serving a dead man and have not experienced anything akin to the miracles we have witnessed here.
Let's see I know of deliverances from drugs and alcohol for several;
Deliverance from sex addiction; deliverance from suicidal thoughts; deliverance from a 20 year wound of unforgiveness; healed marriages. I know of a couple who went to a marriage retreat hoping God would meet them there, and you know what: God did and their marriage was restored.
What about you? How has the living Jesus touched your life?
Peter says: "By his wounds you have been healed" and that is the truth of a living Jesus, the living Hope!
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V. | This Resurrection Day, then, Peter tells us since Jesus lives, how we can respond.
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He gives us two directives.
A. Humble yourselves under God's mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time. That's in verse 6
Humble Yourself, Peter says. Let your life be under God's
authority not your own. You are a man or woman "under authority" and to live that out means first to recognize whose authority. We are living either under our own authority, the way of death, or under God's, the way of life.
For those here who have never met Jesus it means saying: "I believe" and committing yourself to Him. I will give you opportunity to do so in a moment.
For those who are Christians it means to again say with Jeremiah (10:23) "I know O Lord that my life is not my own, it is not for me to direct my steps." It means to cast all our worries onto God. To live entrusting our lives to Him.
We take care of humbling ourselves, and God will take care of exalting us. The opposite is also true. If we insist on exalting ourselves, God will humble us. The best way to be lifted up is while still on our knees.
B. Peter also says that humility before God needs to be worn in
relationship to others. We think about dressing for events, God says dress for relationships. If you want to experience the grace or strength of God in your lives, "clothe yourselves with humility" in other words: serve one another. "God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble…"
*how easy it is to place ourselves as better than someone else.
Or while being kind to be inwardly naming them an idiot.
*At least I don't… She is so selfish… His car doesn't equal
mine… At least I'm not such a mess…
*Instead of putting another down, Peter says, lift them up.
*Touch a life. Offer a hand. Lend what is needed. Share hope.
Yesterday at the children's outreach, Trudey Cheney was sharing about a woman who lived nearby who took Trudey under her wing as she grew. To Trudey, Mabel, was like a mom to her. She was closer to Mabel than to her real mom. Mabel was a person who had humbled herself before God and toward others, for she was able to treat each child who came into her care as Trudey did as if they were each the perfect child. Trudey said when Mabel died it was like losing my real mom. That's wearing the cloak of humility.
If Peter were writing a manual on how to succeed in life, those basics would be there.
Jesus is alive so humble yourselves before God and in relationships to one another.
If you are here having never said yes yet to Jesus, perhaps today is your day. I would like to invite you into that step. It is a frightening step sometimes. But you will never regret Jesus. After my 25 years following Him, I can tell you, He makes all the difference. And the only difference between you and me at this point is that you are on a dead end street, and God is inviting you onto His highway. So if that's you this morning, bow, …
If you want to say, "Lord, I want to recommit to you this morning. I have been self led not Jesus led. I want to be led by you." Is that you? Let's pray…
Others, come and pray with Cecile or with me at the altar as we move into the time of offering and close of the service.
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