Until He Returns - [1 Peter 4:7-11]

You know, lately, I know this might surprise you, but I've been thinking about weddings quite a bit. We've had a few around here, some very close to me. But I want you to imagine this scenario. It's the wedding day.

The bride wakes up. She's excited. She gets up. She goes out to breakfast. She's sitting there, having about her third course. And the cell phone rings. It's her maid of honor. What are you doing? Where are you?

You're supposed to be getting ready for the wedding. The bride-to-be yawns and says, Oh, I forgot. I'm in the middle of breakfast. She then sleepwalks through the ceremony, goes right through the reception, and goes on her own separate way, leaving her groom to wonder what he's gotten himself into.

You think that's absurd. That's crazy. How could that ever happen? Now, what if I told you the bride is the church and the groom is Christ himself? Certainly, we'd have to make some changes to our story.

But I wonder if the bride would come off much better these days. Maybe she'd be more excited about the wedding, which is really a picture of salvation and a future culmination of that salvation. But what about day-to-day living?

What about living in anticipation of the return of the bridegroom, of the return of Christ, His second coming? Are you excited about Jesus coming again? I can tell you this. Scripture's excited about it.

God's excited about it. Christ is excited about it. If the apostles were excited about it, you should be excited about it. But what are you doing about it? In between messages about the Sermon on the Mount, we've been at 1 Peter, and we are currently in 1 Peter 4, and I would invite you to open your Bibles to 1 Peter 4, verse 7.

1 Peter 4, verse 7. And I'm going to be reading 7 to 11. You know, this book, again, just to kind of bring us up to speed on where we are, this book, and I don't have a 15-minute recap, but this book was written to a church universal.

Suffering. Living in difficult times. First century Roman Empire. Difficult times and times that were going to get worse. Peter wrote this to scattered Christians who were in local churches in difficult times.

And he wrote not to tell them, look, you're not going to suffer. He said, you are suffering, and guess what? Greater suffering is coming, and I want to prepare you for it. And he gives them great theological lessons, and we've walked through some of those.

Even how do I deal with a difficult marriage? I'm married to an unbeliever. What do I do? All these issues. And he's just gone through and given us Christ, our example of a suffering servant, the one whom we ought to try to emulate.

And now we come to chapter 4, verse 7. A lot of theological things along the way, but we're in chapter 4, verse 7. Peter writes, The end of all things is near. Therefore, be of sound judgment and sober spirit for the purpose of prayer.

Above all, keep fervent in your love for one another, because love covers a multitude of sins. Be hospitable to one another without complaint. As each one has received a special gift, employ it in serving one another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.

Whoever speaks is to do so as one who is speaking the utterances of God. Whoever serves is to do so as one who is serving by the strength which God supplies, so that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom belongs the glory and dominion forever and ever.

Amen. Now, this morning, as we walk through this text, I want you to see four eschatological exigencies. I couldn't even say it. I wanted to say it so bad. Eschatological exigencies from our text so that you will live with a genuine sense of urgency in the here and now.

And I wrote that to just be absolutely mind-boggling so I could restate it more simply. I've got four commands from Peter that should mark your life from now until the Lord returns. That's easier, isn't it?

What's all that eschatological exigency stuff? Four commands from Peter that should mark your life from now until the Lord returns. But first, we have to give you what Peter gives you, which is the motivation.

What's my motivation? It's right here in verse 7. The end of all things is near. Peter wants us to understand in the midst of suffering, he says to these people, look, the end of all things is near. What is the end?

We might think of it as something like the end of time or the end of the world. But Peter writes it is the end of all things. What does he mean? Well, the Greek word is telos, as any beginning Greek student could tell you.

But it means the terminal point of something. It is the end or the purpose for which everything is moving. In some ways, it does mark the end of time as we know it. I don't think we'll keep the same calendar and all those kind of things, but it is the purpose to which everything is now directed.

And that purpose is the return of our Lord and Savior. Still in this context, it means more. It is the fulfillment, the purpose for all things. Everything. The culmination of everything. And the verb is near gives us an even clearer picture.

It is a perfect tense verb. And some of you say, I don't really care about perfect tense. Well, when we talk about salvation, you care because that means you're once saved, always saved. And here the idea with a perfect tense is this is something that has happened in the past and it has ongoing results.

And you say, well, that's weird because it says it is near. Well, that's right. It is near, and I'm going to describe that a little bit. How near is it? The New Testament warns us that we are very near the end, very near the purpose for which all events are heading and that we need to be prepared for it at all times.

I'm going to read a few verses. You don't have to turn there. Jesus in Mark 13, verses 35 to 37 says, therefore, be on the alert, for you do not know when the master of the house is coming, whether in the evening at midnight or when the rooster crows or in the morning in case he should come suddenly and find you asleep.

What I say to you all is be on the alert. Be ready. Paul writes in Titus, chapter two, verses 11 to 13, for the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men, instructing us to deny ungodliness and worldly desires and to live sensibly, righteously and godly in the present age, looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus.

It says we are to be looking for it. We are to be anticipating his return. James, the half-brother of Jesus, writes, you too, in chapter five, verses eight and nine, you too be patient. Strengthen your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is near.

Do not complain, brethren, against one another, so that you yourselves may not be judged. Behold, the judge is standing right at the door. Revelation 1, 3, and the promise for those who read the book says, blessed is he who reads and those who hear the words of the prophecy and heed the things which are written in it, for the time is near.

One writer put it this way, up to Christ's coming in the flesh, his incarnation, his first arrival, the course of things ran straight towards that end. Everything in the Old Testament, all the Old Testament prophecies, everything that occurred was pointing towards the birth of Christ, nearing it by every step.

But now, under the gospel in the church age, that course has altered its direction. It's no longer pointed towards his birth, but towards his second coming, and runs towards the end, or he says not towards the end, but along it, almost parallel to it, on the brink of it, so that it can't get any closer, and is at all times near that great event, which did it run towards it.

In other words, if it even moved towards the end, it would at once run into it. Christ, then, is ever at our door. But a moment away. And that's how we need to view it. That's how you, as believers, are commanded to live, as if Christ could literally enter your life physically, at any moment, returning for you his bride.

That's your motivation. That's how you need to view things. It is so close, and that perfect tense says, look, from the time that Jesus was born until now, there has been a nearness of his second coming.

That it's so close that there are no intervening events that have to take place. It's been getting closer. When the temple was destroyed in 70 AD, it got closer, but now it is closer. And every moment it gets closer still, and if we could look at it as two lines, we probably couldn't see the gap.

It's close. So Peter gives us these four commands. First, verse seven, prepare for prayer. Therefore, be of sound judgment and sober spirit for the purpose of prayer. I'm going to talk about the purpose of prayer first, the priority of prayer.

Then we're going to backtrack to those, the sound judgment aspects of it and sober spirit. Peter says, the end of all things is near. And then he gives the first priority as prayer. MacArthur notes that prayer is the access to all spiritual resources, and that's the point.

You're in difficulty. You need to keep in mind that the end is near, and you need to pray. This is logical. If the Lord is this close, that close, I mean, you know, how little kids can just kind of pinch their fingers together and go, that close, that's it.

If he's that close, should we not be in constant communion with God, who has made us anticipate his second coming with joy? We look forward to it, we long for it. We want to be in contact with him. And Peter tells us that there are two aspects of life that we need to work on in order to pray effectively, to keep that communication open.

First, we need to exercise sound judgment. Again, look at verse 70, he says, be of sound judgment. And that idea of sound judgment, that phrasing there in the Greek, the classic example is in Mark 5 .15.

Jesus has just cast the demon named Legion out of a man and into a herd of swine. And the herdsmen reported it to the people who wanted to see it for themselves. So the people come out. And verse 15 says, they came to Jesus and observed the man, the one who had been demon-possessed, who had been demon-possessed, sitting down, clothed, and here's the phrase, in his right mind.

The very man who had the Legion, and they became frightened. And that's what it means. He'd been in his wrong mind, he'd been out of his mind, and now he was in his right mind. He was in possession, full possession of his faculties.

Dictionary defines it this way, to be prudent with focus on self-control. To be reasonable, sensible, serious. To keep one's head. To have one's wits about him or her. And Peter is simply commanding his readers, and you by extension, to think things through carefully and sensibly.

To not be carried away with emotion. This isn't a command not to be demon-possessed, by the way. Just not to be carried away with emotion. It is to keep a solid focus on the things that matter. Don't be carried away by every wind of doctrine.

Keep focused on the things that matter. He also commands that you should have a sober spirit. Again, verse 7. Be of sound judgment and sober spirit. And the idea here is to be free of any form of mental or spiritual drunkenness.

We know from Scripture that you're not to be drunk with wine. But the idea here is that you are to avoid everything that hinders, inhibits, hurts, or reduces your ability to think and act wisely. What sorts of things are we talking about?

Well, obviously, like I said, alcohol, drugs, that sort of thing. Not so obvious. Any form of self-indulgence that would be typical of an unbeliever. What does that mean? Obsession with a person. Obsession with a thing, with an activity.

Something that takes you away, that occupies your time and your mind and your focus from what it should be. Anything that consistently invades and clouds your thinking. Think about this. You're trying to pray, and all you can think about is what you just watched on TV.

This person that you really like at school. Whatever the situation is, that is your focus. And Peter says, you know what? All these things, some of them might be good things, but you can overdo anything.

This is a call to a balanced life. Balanced thinking. You want to enter into prayer, you have to clear your mind of the things outside. Focus on what you're doing. Don't be in the habit of swinging wildly into this thing or that thing.

Don't be obsessed with other things. Focus on Christ. Our first one is the priority of prayer. You must pray. It is a commandment. It is an obvious priority, as in our daily lives, how much more as we consider the idea that the Lord himself, the one who has redeemed us, is returning.

Secondly, Peter writes that you must love the church. Look at verse 8. Above all, keep fervent in your love for one another. Now, some of you might be out there thinking, is Steve trying to trick us? It doesn't say church in there.

You got me. Remember to whom this letter is written. It's always important to look at things in context. And in context doesn't just mean the verse above it and below that. It means what is the purpose of Peter writing.

And way back in the beginning of this book, verse 1, Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who reside as aliens scattered through Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, Bithynia, who are chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father by the sanctifying work of the Spirit to obey Jesus Christ and be sprinkled with his blood.

By the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, Peter wrote these first century saints. They were believers scattered and commanded them to love one another. They were not disjointed. Lone Ranger Christians, you know, there's Bill up in the hills and there's John over there in the valley.

They gathered together. They met in various cities and collectively formed local churches. The church is the local manifestation of the body of Christ. And he's saying, love your fellow saints. And for you, love your fellow saints at Bethlehem Bible Church.

When you do that, you are reflecting the love the Lord Jesus Christ has for his bride. And I think it's important to say, notice he says above all. Well, why would he have to write that? Why would he have to write that if it's just easy to love everybody?

Well, because he was faithfully teaching what the Lord himself had taught him, Peter. In John 13, Jesus speaking to his disciples. A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another. Now note this, remember Peter said above all.

Now look what Jesus says, even as I have loved you. How did Jesus love them? He gave up his life for them. Above all. Even as I have loved you. And he says that you also love one another. By this, all men will know that you are my disciples, my followers.

Those who desire to fall after me. Those who will be called Christians. Those are his disciples. If you have love for one another. And I've said this on many occasions. I don't think Peter was especially innovative.

I don't think he was called to be innovative. I don't think he was coming up with new programs. He didn't make things up. But he was a very careful teacher. Of what he'd been taught. He was reiterating what the Lord himself had taught him.

Now why is love so important? Not only because we're commanded to love each other by the Lord. But also as he said there in John. As Jesus did in John. It is our identification as it were. It is how the world identifies Christians.

I don't know much about them. But I know they love each other. I know they sacrificially give of themselves to each other. And Peter gives us three elements of our love for the church. Three elements of our love for the church.

In case you're wondering. That means these are sub points of you must love the church. Love demands effort. Look what he says here. Keep fervent in your love. Keep fervent. He commands them to remain fervent in their love.

What does that mean? If you have to be commanded to do something. It is not a feeling. He's not saying feel good about everyone at the church. The commentator Cranfield says this. Fervent denotes stretching or straining.

And pictures a person running with taut muscles. Exerting maximum effort. Ancient Greek literature used the word to describe a horse stretching out. And running at full speed. That's what it means to be fervent.

To stretch out as far as you can. To exercise maximum effort. He never says. When you consider the conditions of the person that you might need to love. Or that might need some help. That's how you should figure it out.

If you feel particularly disposed towards somebody. That's the person that you should exercise your efforts toward. Love is work. Love is a verb. Love is effort. And that's why he commands it. He doesn't just commend it.

He doesn't say. It would really be good if you would love one another. He commands it. A couple of questions here. Did Jesus love the unlovable? I think the obvious answer is yes. Are we to love only those in the body that are easy to love?

Only those who treat us well. Only those who root for the Celtics. I hope not. Love demands effort. Secondly, love is particularly. That's an easy word for me to say. Particularly directed. It says keep fervent in your love for one another.

This is a call for effort and sacrifice. Specifically for the brethren. For those in the body. Now does this mean that we are free from loving? You don't have to worry about anybody outside these four walls.

It's us four and no more. No. But he is commanding a love for one another. And there's a special effort that is commanded here. Why? Because it's just like a big family. Families. Close quarters. We bump into each other.

We step on one another. It is hard to always get along. But just as God has shed his love on each of you. And Christ has faithfully worked to bring us together. To build us into a local body. So Peter here writes that we need to work.

At loving one another. To build the body of Christ in love. We are all equal at the foot of the cross. Equally needy. And equally accountable to love our brothers and sisters in Christ. Now why else is this love so important?

Because if there's one thing. If we study the New Testament. And we look at what the Bible says about the church. We would note one thing. That is really prized highly. Whether it's Paul. Whether it's Peter writing.

Whoever it is that's addressing these issues. It's unity. And without love for one another. There will be no unity in the body of Christ. And unity is the church's calling. Paul derided the Corinthians for their divisions.

Paul warned Titus to reject those who sought to divide the church. We are called in Ephesians 4 to seek a unity of the faith. Unity is vital to the church. Not just in daily operations. Not in just Sunday morning meetings.

But if we're going to do what God has called us to. If we are going to fulfill the great commission. We cannot have a missions program. Where the body of Christ can't even get along with one another. Imagine our team going to Mozambique.

And all the way over there. And all the way back. They're fighting. And while they're in the jungle. They're fighting. That is not going to work. We need to have love. Because love leads to unity. Thirdly, love results in the covering of sin.

Again, look at verse 8. Because love covers a multitude of sins. We need to remain fervent. Because love covers a multitude of sins. Now this is an amazing. And sometimes misunderstood or misapplied statement.

Love, a true self-sacrificing biblical love, covers or hides a multitude, a large number of sins. Now just for a minute, let me say what this does not mean. This does not mean somehow that we can hide someone else's sins from God.

God, all things are laid plain and bare to him with whom we have to do, right? This does not mean that we simply ignore sin. We don't just kind of go, ah, sin, move on. That's not what covering means.

That's not what love is. We cannot fail to exercise church discipline under the guise of love covers a multitude of sin. Now, certainly, we have to see, we have to observe sin in order to cover it, right?

If you don't know anybody has sin in their life, if they've never sinned against you or you've never seen them sin, then you can't cover it. So it is not a matter of simply ignoring it or not seeing it.

You must actively choose to cover it. In love, you must determine to cover it. And if you are to cover it, you must know of the sin and you must refuse to expose it to others. Let me say that again. To cover it, you must know about it and you must refuse to expose it to others.

Some implications of that. Rules out gossip, right? Even so much as to say, well, you know what, Steve, so-and-so is involved in this sin. Do you think I should cover that? You just uncovered it. Covering is to hide, conceal, keep secrets.

You're not keeping anything secret if you go and tell somebody else that is gossip. You're not covering it or overlooking it. If you're simply going to file it away for future use, that's not covering.

I covered that sin. Well, no, you didn't. You put it on their credit plan. You're going to charge interest and present it at a later date. That's not love and that's not covering. You're not covering a sin if you want the other person to make it right.

And sometimes this is okay. I'm not saying this is wrong. But you're not covering a sin if you then expect that person to make restitution. Covering a sin is seeing the sin, judging the action to be sinful.

Yes, you are making a judgment, but that's okay because you judge it by the word of God, the same standard by which you will be judged. But deciding that this sin, whatever it is, is something that you can overlook, something that you can live with.

That is love. You are wronged and you cover it, conceal it, and refuse to expose it. That should sound pretty familiar. Listen what Psalm 103 verse 12 says. As far as the east is from the west, so far he has removed our transgressions from us.

God looks and sees our sin. He accounts it to Christ. And if we can do that same thing, then we ought to. If we can love someone enough to say, you know what, that's under the blood and I don't need to deal with it.

Fine. But what about bigger issues? When should you not cover a sin? What about church discipline? Well, let me just talk about church discipline here for a minute. There is nothing here that says all sin must be covered.

It says a multitude of sins, many sins, but not all sins. There are some sins, even in light of selfless sacrificial love, that must be confronted. First, I mean, I just have a few examples. I'm sure somebody can come up with more.

But first, any sin that challenges the unity of the body cannot be covered. Again, Paul forbids that in Titus 310. He says a factious man or woman, someone who wants to divide the body of Christ, is to be confronted or warned once or twice, and then they are removed.

The unity of the body of Christ cannot be assaulted, or it can be assaulted, but that assault cannot be ignored. We can't shrug it off. We can't cover it. Yes, it must be dealt with head-on. Second, any sin that is likely to form a pattern in that person's life ought to be covered.

Why? If you see something and you go, I bet they really struggle with that, you probably need to come alongside them. And it's not because it's not a gotcha moment. It's because you love them and you want what is best for them.

It's easy to ignore sin and just go, Love covers the multitude of sins. It's hard to recognize the fact that love demands that I go to that brother or sister in Christ to help them. They have a pattern and they need to repent.

Love does not mean letting someone destroy themselves. True love, a love that is concerned with the glory of God and the welfare of others, will cause you to do things that are not comfortable. You'll think, I don't want to confront this person.

Who wants to do that? You know, if you have the ministry of confrontation, I agree for you. That is not something we ought to seek. Sometimes things just are dumped on you. Listen to what Jesus says. You know, when you consider the weight of this, Jesus says, Matthew 18, and we know it well.

But listen, if your brother sins, go and show him his fault in private again. Even when you uncover a sin, you don't make a spectacle out of it. You don't say, you know, it's my sad duty to inform you.

And you've never even talked to the guy. But here's the part. If he listens to you, this ought to just thrill you. You have won your brother. The word won means to acquire by effort or investment to gain.

You have gone, as it were, to battle. And you have won, not a victory for yourself, but a victory for them. The investment was what? Your fear, your pride, your desire to ignore it. The discomfort you felt in having to go confront it.

And the gain was your brother's good. That is love. Confronting sin is never to be done in self-righteousness or for self in any sense. It is done for the love of the person and for the glory of God.

How is God glorified when one of his own, one of his children continues on in a pattern of sin? Is it possible, and dare I say it is possible, that God brought that to your attention so that you might come alongside that brother or sister in Christ to help shepherd them through this time?

And you say, well, pastor, I thought that was your job. That's what we're doing here this morning, folks. I am equipping you for the work of ministry. It is everyone, every single saint has this responsibility to come alongside, to help one another.

We are in this together. When he talks about love, it is sacrifice. It is a denial of self. It is a willingness to put yourself in uncomfortable positions, to suffer and even wrestle with issues, and to go to that person in love, knowing that you are the one God has placed in that situation to help them.

Now ask yourself this. Is God glorified when his children, when his sons and daughters repent of their sins? Absolutely. Absolutely. Beloved, please don't ever buy into the idea that confrontation or church discipline is somehow unloving.

Oh, it can be. It can be. But its purpose is restoration. Its purpose is repentance. Its purpose is a desire to win your brother. Even so, confrontation aside, we want, by the Spirit's enabling, to overlook sin, to cover it, when to do so, to do otherwise, to expose it, would serve no great purpose.

What happens when it is a sin against you, but it just hurts too much to cover it? Well, then you need to confront it. You need to deal with it immediately. Don't let the sun go down in your anger. Resolve this right away so that there's no break between you, no break in fellowship.

But if it's something that you can overlook, that you have enough love for that person, you judge for yourself that that is not an ongoing issue with them, or something that they really need to deal with.

Maybe it's the first time you've ever seen it, or the first time they've dealt with you that way. Then overlook it. Cover it if you can. But don't think to yourself, I'm going to cover it. Maybe go home that night, think about it all night long, and say, you know, one of these days I'm going to cover it, but not yet.

Deal with it, or be prepared to cover it. So now we've seen that we must prepare for prayer. We must love the church. And now, number three, third command, extend hospitality to the church. Peter writes in verse nine, be hospitable to one another without complaint.

Again, this is specifically addressed to believers. And the command is to be hospitable to other believers, the body of Christ, the church. Now, is it wrong to be hospitable to unbelievers? And I keep asking this question because the obvious answer is no.

But there is a time when it would be wrong. If their purpose would be distinctly anti-gospel, against the church, against the truth. For example, I would have great difficulty housing missionaries of a false religion, even under the best of circumstances.

But I definitely could not do this when they were in town to sow the seeds of destruction in my neighborhood. You know, the Watchtower has a couple of guys from Philadelphia, and they need a place to stay for the night.

They can't stay at my house. I don't care if we have a room. John wrote in 2 John 1 10, or verse 10, that you should not even receive him into your house and do not give him a greeting. How can you receive him when his purpose is to undermine the gospel?

Now, here's the biblical view of hospitality. It is commended. It is one of the qualifications to be an elder. You must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, temperate, prudent, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, etc., etc., etc.

Hospitality is not simply entertaining friends and family. You can't have a Super Bowl party once a year and say, I'm hospitable. That's not the point. The verb strictly interpreted means to be kind to strangers, not to friends and family.

And overall, I think as a body, we have, if I may commend you, you have excelled in this area. I think of all the things, all the times that we've had these kind of activities, like when we had Majesty here, and we had, like, what, 60 people stay over in various homes, and everybody did a great job.

But if we think back again to the time where this was written, the first century A .D., Peter was likely thinking of Christians who were traveling through various areas on their way to somewhere else, and so they needed a place to stay.

But that principle is one that holds up well today. Is your home open to visits? Somebody drives from church for a long way. Are you willing to have them over for lunch? Would you host a Christian for a time who was traveling?

Now, this next phrase is a killer, and it's one that Mike took great delight in talking about last week. Without complaint. And what is the Greek word? You know it. Yeah, all that. But you're not obeying from the heart.

You're not taking this commandment seriously. You're not doing it rightly if you're complaining about it. You can't just say, well, I grumbled the whole time, but then in the end, you know, I hosted him.

I did a good thing. I was hospitable. No, you weren't. Or, you know, I was very gracious to him. But I sent out an email to my entire email list saying, I really hated having the guy in my house. He was a big, you know, he was really big trouble.

He snored. Now, when we travel, when we go to various churches, we like to be well-received. And that's nice on Sunday morning. It's good to be hospitable here. But the command, as I said, is far more reaching.

It has to do with having people in your home. That's the idea. So we've seen, first, prepare for prayer. Secondly, love the church. Third, extend hospitality to the church. And fourth, serve the church.

Look at verse 10. As each one has received a special gift, employ it, use it in serving one another. How do you serve the church? First, you have to remember the source of your gift. Another way of phrasing that would be, you have received a special gift from God.

Where did you receive it from? It was from God. Now, we get natural talents. We have talents that we're just born with, things that are genetic or things that are environmental. And that's not what a spiritual gift is.

You receive your talents by virtue of your genetics. So the next time you see mom and dad, thank them. However, when you get saved, something unique, I believe, happens to you. 1 Corinthians 12, 11 says, but one and the same spirit, talking about the Holy Spirit, works all these things, distributing to each one individually just as he wills.

The Holy Spirit gives gifts. Those gifts are from God. You also serve the church by remembering the stewardship of your gift. Again, look at verse 10, employ it in serving one another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.