LIVING FOR THE LORD

1 Peter 4:1-11

October 14, 2007 Pastor Harpold

Peter makes it clear when life is easy there is danger of drifting into a state of mind which accepts blessing in life as if it were owed to us. We come to the place where we do not prize or value life as we should. As a Christian, what value do you put upon life?

Too many people are looking in all the wrong places to find direction for life. Suffering will give you a new direction for life. God permits his children to suffer in order to keep us from sin and to give us a proper value of life. David discovered this and wrote in Psalm 66:10, “For You, O God, have tested us: You have refined us as silver is refined.” God puts us through the test that it might draw us to himself and give us new direction and drive for life.

The latter part of verse one refers us back to the earlier statement in 3:18, For Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but made alive by the Spirit. We are reminded that in His human body Christ not only endured pain but he was put to death in the flesh.

Christ brought an end to His relation to the sins of man when he died on the cross because He bore the penalty for sin in his body. 1 Peter 2:24 says, “Who Himself bore our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live for righteousness: by whose stripes you were healed.” Christ paid the penalty for man’s sin. He took my place, He took your place, and He paid the penalty for our sin.

Peter tells us to arm yourselves also with the same mind. This is the same as Paul’s instruction, Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus (Phil 2:5).

Now as Jesus suffered and therefore has conquered sin, even so, in him we also have conquered sin. We want to live for Jesus. God has made adequate provision for you and me to live the Christian life. One scholar said that in this verse Peter puts Romans 6 into a nutshell in just one verse. Romans 6 tells of the provision God has made for you and for me to live the Christian life.

Peter makes it clear that we have been born again by the Word of God. The Spirit of God uses the Word of God to produce a son of God. The son of God now has a new nature, a nature that is not going to live in sin.

A good illustration is in the story of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11-32). The prodigal got into the pigpen, but he wasn’t a pig. He had the nature of His father back in that wonderful mansion. Because he had the nature of the father, he didn’t like eating out of a trough. He didn’t like eating the swill that the swine ate. He preferred sitting at a table with a linen tablecloth, eating with a knife and fork. He liked having a nice steak or prime rib before him, with all the delicacies, topped off with ice cream. The boy didn’t care for the pigpen for he had the nature of the father.

Peter said we are now identified with Christ. When you came to Jesus and were born again, the Spirit of God baptized you, identified you with Christ. Now let that mind, that thought, be in you which is in Christ. Christ is totally devoted to the service of God.

Do you think, friend, if you are really born again, if you are really a child of God with a new nature, that you can go on living in sin? My friend, you cannot be a child of God and go out and live in the pigpen. Pigs live in the pigpen and pigs love it, but sons do not love the pigpen.

Peter says God has made every provision for you: you are born again, indwelt by the Holy Spirit, baptized by the Spirit, identified with Christ, and you can now live life by the power of the Spirit of God. In Romans 7 Paul shows how the Christian is defeated when he lives in the flesh; in Romans 8 he tells how God has provided the Holy Spirit that we might live by the power of the Spirit. God has made every arrangement for you and me not to live in sin today. It should be impossible for the child of God to live in sin. Oh, the son might go to the pigpen, but you can put this down for sure, he will not stay in the pigpen. One day he has to say, “I will arise and go to my father…” (Luke 15:18).

If you are living in sin today and comfortable with it, is your salvation secure. If the Christian lives in sin there is something radically wrong. A child of God longs to please Christ in all things. We need the total Word of God – not just a few verses to draw out some little legalistic system by which to live the Christian life. We cannot live the Christian life by following rules. You can live the Christian life only by having the mind of Christ, by having the Spirit of God moving in you to please God and to refrain from those things which bring disgrace to Him.

(Note verse 2). Paul speaks very strongly in this connection in Romans 8: For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit. For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace (Ro. 8:5-6). What does Paul mean when he says “to be carnally minded is death”? Do you lose your salvation? No, it means you are dead to any fellowship with God. John said, “If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie and do not the truth” (1 John 1:6). You cannot sin and have fellowship with God. Sin is what is keeping people away from the Word of God today. A great many people are trying to find a shortcut to living the Christian life, and there is no shortcut. God says He will use suffering in your life in order to keep you from sin.

After our conversion we would be foolish to spend our lives doing what we did before. We cannot do that. We are now joined to Christ; we are united to Him, and we cannot run with the world. We must live today for God. Life is short; time is fleeting, and we must recognize we are going to come before Him for judgment before long.

Peter spells it out in verse 3, speaking of the vices of the world which control us apart from Christ. These are the worldly vices that controlled us before coming to Christ. These things take us away from God, and Peter clearly spells them out.

Either you will live to please God or to please men. Verse 4 reminds us the world will think it strange that you don’t run in the same excesses they do. If you are pleasing men you will not please God. Jesus said, “If the world hate you, you know that it hated me before it hated you.” If the world does not hate you, there is something wrong.

You cannot go on in sin as a child of God. You have the nature of Christ. The Holy Spirit indwells those who are His own. We have been baptized into the body of believers, and now, being filled with the Holy Spirit, we can live for God. We cannot do it in our own strength but in His strength.

Peter reminds us that some day Jesus Christ will judge the quick and the dead. The whole world, the living and the dead, are going to be judged by the Lord Jesus someday. Will he judge believers also? He sure will. Not for salvation, which was assured when they became children of God, but he will not let the believer get by with sin since He is judging the world for sin.

Because God does judge Christians in the world – He chastens His children – the unbeliever had better beware. He is warned he will come up someday for judgment.

God wants the gospel preached to all men. If they don’t hear the gospel or respond to the gospel, he makes it very clear that they are already dead in trespasses and sins, and they will be judged as men in the flesh.

At one time we were dead in trespasses and sins. We were spiritually dead. But we have been made alive in Christ Jesus. And we ought to walk that way.

The gospel is being preached and when the gospel is preached, two things happen. Some accept it and if they accept it, they will live for God and live throughout eternity. Others reject it, and those who reject the gospel are the men who are dead in sins and are dead to God throughout eternity; that is, they have no relation to Him whatsoever.

As the end of this age approaches we need to be sober-minded. He actually means to be intelligent. Be an intelligent Christian. An intelligent Christian is one who knows the Bible, that is, he will know it the best he can. An intelligent, sober-minded Christian is going to know all he can about the Word of God. Watch unto prayer means our praying should have anticipation, the expectation of the coming of the Lord.

Above all… have fervent charity (love). The writer of Proverbs said, “hatred stirs up strife; but love covers all sins.” There is no room in the church for hatred and strife.

We need to be hospitable to all people without any complaints.

Now finally Peter comes around to remind us that our gifts – that is our spiritual gifts – should be put to good use in the body of Christ. Whatever gift God has given you ought to be used to the glory of God.

The ultimate purpose, of course, is “That God in all things may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom be praise and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.” We are to teach the Word of God in such a way that God may get glory through Jesus Christ.