It was a bit of a discouraging moment for a young seminary student. I was reading my first Dutch theologian ... Dutch syntax doesn't always translate well into English. I knew what I was reading was important, but I was struggling to grasp the concepts and hold the ideas together. An older student told me that, happily, another theologian had written an annotated outline of the work of the theologian I was reading - I was very excited. I worked quickly to get my hands on that outline, only to discover that it was longer than the book that I was reading.
Overcomplicating a Simple Faith
I think it's very possible for us to overcomplicate the stunningly simple faith to which we've been called. And for that, I love Peter. I love the way he is so eloquently able to talk about the deepest truths of our faith in ways that are beautifully simple. If you had to summarize your Christianity in three sentences, what would you write? If you had to summarize what makes the lifestyle of a Christian different in three perspectives or three directives, what would you write? We come to what, I think, is the epicenter passage of First Peter.
There's a way in which it summarizes everything that Peter has said so far and lays the foundation for what Peter is going to say next. Let me have you turn to First Peter, Chapter 2, verse 11 and 12 again, and I want to read for you. "Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul. Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation."
(ESV) Very, very significant words, a wonderful summary of the life that God has called us to. I'll give it to you in three statements: Live like an alien. Fight like a soldier. Behave like a representative. Live like an alien. Fight like a soldier. Behave like a representative. "Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles." This is not a new theme in First Peter, this exile, cross-cultural, alien identity is something that's familiar in First Peter, but it needs to be revisited for us again. What is an alien?
An alien is somebody in exile, somebody who's living in a place that's not his home. What is a sojourner? A sojourner is one who is on a journey, on a pilgrimage, moving toward a destination. Those two words really do capture the way you and I are meant to understand who we are and what we're doing in this present world. And each one of these three things that I've already mentioned is rooted in the significant points of the theology of our faith. Hear this: it makes no sense to talk about being an exile, it makes no sense to talk about being a journeyer, a sojourner, unless you embrace the truth of the reality of eternity.
If you believe that there is such a thing as "Forever" - if we are marching toward a destiny - if this is not our final home, then everything in life changes. I think that the materialism and pleasure-orientation and comfort-drivenness of Western culture makes perfect sense, because if you cut off eternity, if this is all there is, then what is life about? Is it not about getting all the pleasure and all the comfort that you can possibly enjoy in this moment because this is all there is? But we do not believe that.
We do not believe that today is a destination. We believe this moment is a preparation for a final destination. And so you live like an exile. You live like a stranger. You live that pared down, minimalist existence. You understand that God is moving you toward your final home, and He is using the difficulties of today to prepare you for that final place where you will be. Now that is cross-cultural living; that's not Western culture values. We measure success by the square footage of your house, the number of options you were able to afford on your luxury vehicle, the size of your retirement, the quality of your cuisine, the fashionableness of your wardrobe, the human power that you've been able to acquire.
All those things are alien to a Biblical view of life that says everything that exists now, everything that's going on now, everything I'm going through now, is but a journey toward, a preparation for, what is to come. I don't live with a destination mentality. I don't expect that ultimate joy and ultimate peace and ultimate comfort and ultimate satisfaction will be found today; I know that's coming. And so I would ask you: do you live like an exile? What's the goal of your living? What was your goal last week?
What Makes a Good Day?
What do you look back on a day and say, 'That was a good day,' or 'That was a good week'? Why was it a good day? Why was it a good week? What is it that you're wanting from your job, from your friendships, from your finances? Could it be that we've bought into a Western culture view of life, and we've tried to amalgamate Christianity into that, and somehow, someway, it just doesn't work? This is a journey. This is a passage. This isn't home; home is coming. "Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul."
Fight like soldiers. I love the words here: "Abstain from the passions of the flesh." What's a passion? A passion is a powerfully motivating, emotionally laden desire. Abstain from those powerful desires of the flesh doesn't so much mean the body; he means the sinful nature. Now again, the theology here is very important. Yes, the power of sin has been broken, but the presence of sin still remains. Notice what he says, "...which wage war against your soul." There is a war of desire that is fought on the turf of your heart; it's fought for control of your soul.
That war is fought in every situation, and every location, and every circumstance, and every relationship of our lives this side of eternity. We must not identify and define sin as only behavior. Sin results in behavior, but the war of sin is really a war that's being fought on the turf of our hearts. Now, hear this: what is the purpose of war? War only has one purpose - winning - and winning only has one purpose - control. And so you and I need to live with the sober awareness that there still is being fought on the turf of our hearts a war for the very control of our souls, and what controls your soul will control your words and your behavior.
We cannot live with a peacetime mentality because the war still goes on. And we live in a world of seduction, in a world of temptation where those seductive voices and those temptations still greet us all. And brothers and sisters, we need to humbly affirm that as long as sin still lives inside of us, we are susceptible to those temptations. We are weak often to the seductive call of those desires. Now that war is fought on two fronts, this war of desire, this war of passions that Peter is talking about here.
First is evil desire. That's desire for things that are clearly outside of God's will for me, things that God has prohibited. That's when I'm tempted to lie about something at work in order to gain favor with my boss so that I can perhaps get a promotion and make more money. The temptation to present myself as something that I'm not; that's an evil desire. It's a self-conscious moment where I'm stepping outside of God's call for me. That's a moment at the mall where my eyes go to a woman, and it's more than just recognizing her beauty; but I begin to take that in; and what is a recognition of beauty becomes a moment of lust, and I allow my mind to go there, and I allow myself to consider things that I should not be considering.
That's evil desire; that's spiritual warfare. And I'm very concerned that often our definition of spiritual warfare isn't mundane enough. That spiritual war takes place at the mall; it takes place in the van; it takes place in the family room; it takes place in the normal domains of everyday life where you are faced with all kinds of temptations. Maybe that means I gossip to a friend about another friend because there's something titillating about sharing a tale like that. I know I shouldn't be doing it, but I do it; that's giving way to evil desire.
Maybe that's being willing to fight a war with the neighbor over property boundaries and where I know I'm not reflecting the grace the Lord Jesus Christ; I'm not following His commands to me to love my neighbor as myself, but I give way to that; that's evil desire. Maybe it's refusing to push myself away from the plate when I know I've eaten enough, because I enjoy the pleasure of food, and I know that my relationship to food is sinful, I know I'm eating too much, and I shouldn't do it; that's spiritual warfare.
Are You a Soldier?
Are you a soldier? Are you aware of the temptations that greet you? Maybe that's you as a parent, and you're walking down the hallway; it's 10 o'clock at night; your children are fighting in their beds, and you're winding up what you're going to say, and you're getting more wound up as you go down the hallway. You know you're not about to be an ambassador of the Lord Jesus Christ, but there's something that feels good about going into the room and screaming at them and telling them how hard they are making your day to be; that's evil desire.
Listen, Peter is saying to us: we had better join the resistance. There are crucial places in all of our lives where we must say - in the power of the risen Lord Christ - "No, I will not go there!" There are times, husbands, when you are tempted to do whatever is necessary to win that argument with your wife, and you know you're not opting for the unity, and love, and understanding, and nurture, and care that your Lord has called you to, but there's something exciting about winning. And that lady never walks away after you have verbally pinned her to the wall and says, "How thankful I am that this man is in my life.
How thankful I am that God has given him to me." No! That's an evil situation, and it's giving way to evil desire. When you get out your credit card, and you know you're about to make a purchase that you cannot afford that will limit your ability to participate in the needs and the work of the expansive and glorious Kingdom of God; that's evil desire. You must say, "No!" When you're about to watch something on television, and you know it will not nurture your soul, you know it's not necessary for you to watch, you know it will take your mind in places where your mind should not go; you must say, "No!"
That's giving way to evil desire. Yes, I could keep giving you examples. These truths must live; these calls must live where we live. Listen, the battle for the heart is not fought in three or four grand moments of life. The battle for the heart is fought in 10,000 little moments of life. Say "No!" Say "No!" Say "No!" But there's a second front, and this is a front of inordinate desire. Desires have this tendency to morph in our hearts. What was yesterday's desire now becomes today's demand. And what was today's demand will be tomorrow's need; that's the battle of inordinate desire - that even good desires cannot rule our hearts.
I've given you this principle before: that a desire for even a good thing becomes a bad thing when that desire becomes a ruling thing. Because our hearts must only be ruled by King Christ. If you're a woman and you get comfort out of a clean and orderly house, that's a good thing, but that desire must not rule you. If you're a man and you want to be successful in the workplace or a woman, you want to be successful in the workplace, that's a good desire, but that desire must not become your functional god.
If you're a student and you're after academic success, you should be; that's what it means to be a student. But that desire must not rule your heart. Good desires become bad gods when they control the heart. I think I have shared this before here that I spent a lot of my time at the Christian Counseling Educational Foundation counseling third-year Westminster seminary students who had damaged their marriages and their parenting in the pursuit of theological knowledge. Is theological knowledge a good thing?
Oh, it absolutely is a good thing. I love, I adore the theology of Scripture. I am deeply, deeply thankful for the Word of God. There's life in God's Book; but the desire for theological understanding, the desire for theological knowledge, the desire for theological prowess, must not rule your heart. And so it's not just our struggle with evil desire; it's our struggle with inordinate desire that we have as sinners, the capacity to turn anything into a God-replacement. But the catalog is literally endless, that we have the capability of literally worshiping anything that exists.
Street-Level Worship
And by worship, I mean street-level worship, not formal religious worship, but street-level worship where now I've attached my identity, and my meaning, and purpose, my inner peace, to something in the creation. I'm looking to that thing in the creation to provide for me what only God could ever provide. And all that will ever leave you is addicted and disappointed because creation will never be your Messiah; only the Messiah will be your Messiah. Now, I would ask you, if you are a student, a husband, a wife, a worker, a friend, an older person, a younger person, a man, a woman, a boy, a girl: what are the desires that tend to rule your heart?
What are your functional God-replacements? Maybe you expect the respect and appreciation of a certain person and it has become too important to you, and you ride the roller coaster of their responses to you. Maybe physical possessions have become too important to you. Even ministry can function as a God-replacement. What does Peter say? "Abstain from the passions of the flesh which will wage war against your soul." Are you fighting? Do you live with a wartime mentality? And then the third thing: Behave like a representative.
"Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation." "Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable" - honorable before whom? Before God. Live in a way that pleases God, that honors God, that brings glory to God. Live with an understanding that your life no longer belongs to you. Live with an understanding that God's grace has been given to you not to make your little personal kingdom of your wants and your needs and your feelings work, but God has given you His grace so that you could be part of the glorious expanse of work of His Kingdom.
He has invited you to the plans, and purposes, and motivations, and desires, and accomplishments of a greater Kingdom. Now this is ministry as mundane and as normal and as every day as you can ever get. Listen: there is never a place where you will be - whether it's in a moment of vacation, or leisure, or work, or neighbor, or community, or shopping, or whatever - where you aren't called to live with a ministry mentality. Your life no longer belongs to you, you are placed by the sovereign work of God in particular places to live as His representative.
Wow! All of us have been called to ministry. Now, what's the nature of the ministry here? The nature of the ministry, the apologetic for the truthfulness of Christianity, is your life. The argument here is not an argument of an ideology or not an argument of theology; it's an argument of a transformed life. Your life is so carefully lived in a willing submission to God's plans and purposes, that when you are criticized and when you're attacked, that evil spoken against you would be proved to be false because of the purity of your living.
Oh Lord, may that be true of each one of us. And so, yes, I understand that my work is important, it's an important means by which God will provide for me, but my work also has a higher calling because there, at that workplace, I work as God's representative. I'm a Gospel plumber. I'm a Gospel teacher. I'm a Gospel lawyer. I'm a Gospel doctor. I'm a Gospel musician. I'm a Gospel salesman. I'm a Gospel mom, or a Gospel dad, or a Gospel neighbor, a Gospel citizen. I am motivated somehow, some way, that my life would accurately depict the truth of the Gospel.
Now notice what it says here: "So that when they speak against you as evil doers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation." Wow! This is amazing. I don't know if you've caught the twist that takes place in that phrase, but when a mocker and an accuser becomes a person who now glorifies God, what has happened? Their hearts have been transformed by the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ because mockers don't glorify God. What a calling - that people would actually come to believe in the truths of the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ because of the exemplary way you have lived before them.
Everything for a Higher Purpose
I don't just work honorably so I can make more money. I don't just live neighborly so my neighbors will like me. Everything I do in all the places where God has called me is done for a deeper, higher purpose--the purpose of the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now I love this summary: live with a destination mentality; live with a wartime mentality live with a Gospel mentality. We believe in eternity, and so that structures the way we approach life in the here and now. We believe in the ravages of sin, and that makes us serious about the war that is still being fought in our own hearts - we're serious about evil desire; we're serious about idolatrous desire.
We believe in the glorious work of the Redeemer, and so we live in any way we can to be part of His work to depict the power of His transforming grace. Peter will later talk about people who come to you and ask you about the hope that you have; it's sort of reverse evangelism. It's the person needing to be evangelized coming to the person who is the evangelist because they've been hooked; they've been intrigued; they've been attracted by the nature of your living, and they're now coming to you, and they're saying, "I don't understand what makes you tick.
You're loving, and kind, and faithful, and forgiving; you're hopeful and courageous; what's going on?" That's this passage. Live like a soldier; live like an alien; fight like a soldier; behave like a representative. Well, I couldn't possibly leave this passage without again noting that this passage, in every way, points to the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. He was the ultimate exile. Scripture says that birds have nests and foxes have holes, but the Son of Man didn't have a place to lay His head.
He was willing to be a reject. He was willing to not have a place to call His home. He was willing to face injustice and betrayal because He had the final goal of eternal redemption in His eyes. He was the ultimate soldier. He gave His life to conquer sin and death. Paul says in Colossians 2, "He made a public spectacle over the enemies, triumphing over them by the cross." Jesus is the soldier of soldiers. And He lived every way as a representative of the Father who had sent Him. Jesus would say again and again: "If you have seen me, you have seen the Father.
I have come to do one thing. I only have one thing that I've come to do. I have come to do the Father's will." Brothers and sisters, I want you to hear what I'm going to say next: Jesus didn't just do that as your example; He did that as your substitute because you will never be able to stand before God and say, "I have in every way lived as an exile. I have in every way been a good soldier. I have in every way been a representative." No, we all fall short of God's call. And so Jesus the exile, Jesus the soldier, Jesus the representative, is the only place you and I will ever find hope.
Perhaps you are here this evening, and you've never trusted this Jesus. I would say this to you, "There is no life; there is no satisfaction; there is no sturdy and lasting hope to be found outside of Jesus." Seek Him: He will not turn you away. Let's pray: Lord, what an incredible summary of the Gospel life to which You have called us to, a reminder of the home that You have prepared for us. A warning of the war that still rages in our hearts and a call once again to live as Your representatives.
And Lord, we would say to You that we have failed on all three accounts, and so we cast ourselves upon our fellow exile and our fellow soldier and our fellow representative, the Lamb, the Savior, the King, Emmanuel Jesus. And we would ask You to forgive us, and we would ask You to empower us that we might live as You have called for us to live. Thank you for Jesus, who has gone before us, who paid the price for us. We rest in Him. We look to Him. In Jesus's name, Amen.
