Introduction of 1 Peter

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.gov. That's pollworker .nj .gov. Today on The Wrap Report, I have for you a special Bible study we've done.

We started at Striving Fraternity having a Bible study on 1 Peter, dealing with the issue of suffering.

Now, what we're going to do throughout the year, hopefully, is give you different episodes that will include the

Bible study we're doing. Or you can go to the YouTube channel for Striving Fraternity and watch them there.

Now, this is the introduction to 1 Peter. We're going to deal with issues that deal with suffering, but a lot of it's going to also deal with an introduction to the book, who

Peter is, and, well, we're going to get into some cultural issues as well.

So I hope you enjoy this episode, which will be an introduction to the book of 1

Peter. This will be very, very helpful, I think, for many Christians as the coming persecution that I believe is happening for Christians in America.

And so this is something to help prepare you for what is, unfortunately, probably to come.

Welcome to The Wrap Report with your host, Andrew Rappaport, where we provide biblical interpretation and application.

This is a ministry of Striving for Eternity and the Christian Podcast Community. For more content or to request a speaker for your church, go to strivingforeternity .org.

All right, so we are in 1 Peter. Tonight I'll actually do a little bit of an overview of 1

Peter to get started. And I only expect that we're going to get maybe to verse 2.

There's enough there in the first two verses that it'll be a bit.

But with the Bible study, it's good to have interaction. I don't want to just be teaching.

But let's at least read the first two verses. We won't get far. And I know that I will probably not pronounce all the cities properly.

Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ to those who reside as aliens scattered throughout

Pontius, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, who were chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the

Father, by the sanctifying work of the Spirit, to obey Jesus Christ and to be sprinkled with his blood.

May grace and peace be yours in the fullest measure. So when we think about this book,

I mean, first off, it's an easy question. I've always got to give an easy question so you guys actually get used to answering.

Who do you think wrote Peter? Hey, good. See, that one's easy. I said it'd be – actually, the liberals try to debate it.

But there's a whole bunch that you can read where they try to say this was actually written about 250

AD. It couldn't have been written by Peter. They try to say, well, it couldn't have been written by Peter because he's a fisherman.

And, you know, it's got a more educated Greek. One of the things you see there is the assumption that, well, if you're a fisherman, you can't be educated.

So that usually comes from scholars who think very highly of themselves and their education.

And they think less of anybody else who's not educated. So that tends to be what we end up seeing.

He's written this, as he says, to those who are scattered in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia.

So these are areas that are all around. They're spread all the way up to modern -day

Turkey. And so the fact that he calls them aliens scattered, we know that James used similar language.

If you look at James 1 real quick, James 1 .1, and it's only a few books over.

But James 1 .1 says, James, a bondservant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ to the 12 tribes who were dispersed of rod.

Greetings. So a very similar opening. But what you have is that they're both writing to people that were scattered.

Why were they scattered? Well, James is writing specifically to those who were scattered of the tribes of Israel.

Peter's not making that specific, but he is writing to areas that are not

Jewish areas. So when there was the persecution in Jerusalem, what do people do when there's persecution?

They flee. They flee to somewhere that's a little bit safer. Right. Many people would scatter to the

U .S. to find somewhere safer to live. And we want to scatter, but there is nowhere safer. This is the problem.

But this is the thing is that this is what people do when persecution comes. There will be a segment of the population that scatters and a population that stays.

The overall, this book, we're going to see this. With James, he was writing to the people that scattered.

And he's writing to them because I think they're questioning what genuine faith is. I mean, keep in mind that the

Jewish mindset back then, and it's no different than with many professing Christians today, is the idea that if you're doing

God's will, God's going to bless you with what you want. Right. That's very prevalent in word of faith.

I remember I had one church I was at and there was a pastor and he got this car from a

Jewish guy. And he said he got this great deal. He was just praising this. And the guy was fixing this on it and doing this all for free.

And he was like, oh, you know, God just blessed me because I've been so, so good. And I said, you know,

God would have blessed you even if it was a lemon. Turned out it was a lemon. All the work the guy was doing was to cover up the failure of the car.

And about a month later, everything was falling apart. So, you know, but the reality is, is that even when things don't go our way, that's still

God's blessing. We don't think of it that way, but it is. And so the thing that we end up realizing is that we have to always look that it's

God's blessing because that's doing what God has willed to happen. And so in the book of James, there's a lot of thought because in the

Jewish mindset, and you see this in the book of Job, you're going to get stuff from God, riches and things like this if you're obedient.

And when Job wasn't, when Job had everything taken away, what were they accusing him of? There must be sin in your life.

It's a similar thing here. James is writing to them and they're starting to question, you know, do we actually have genuine faith?

Because look at everything that's happening in our life. So James has written really to encourage people in what genuine faith is.

But Peter has a little bit of a different take on it. He's also writing to the people who scattered all over. But instead of trying to encourage them in what genuine faith looks like, he's trying to encourage them basically the overall theme of this book, right?

And how to suffer and deal with the persecution and how to move forward.

You're going to see throughout he's going to deal with false teachers. This is very similar. First Peter, you're going to see a lot of similarity here in the book of Job.

I'm sorry, the book of Jude. So Jude is one chapter where first Peter's five. But, you know,

Jude also is going to deal a lot with false teachers. But there's a whole lot here that we end up seeing that, you know, just as a kind of overview, the first chapter and a half is going to deal with the suffering that, you know,

Christians should remember their salvation. We're going to get into that a little bit tonight. But why to remember our salvation?

How does that help us in suffering? And then chapter two, midway through chapter two to beginning of chapter four, it's going to deal with, you know, remembering the example of men before us.

So it's suffering Christians should remember the examples that came before us. And then the rest of the book, chapter four and five, is going to deal with that, you know, the

Christian suffering and remembering the Lord's will return. And so if you see the overall thing, it starts with here's our salvation.

Here's the people that went before us and were faithful. Right. And then here's, we've got to remember where we're headed.

And if we think about it, like, so why, you know, this is one of the questions I have for us to start is why might that kind of outline help when suffering?

The idea of remembering our salvation, remembering the other godly examples of men and then remembering where we're headed.

How does that help when suffering? Like it reminds you of the communion of the saints before you.

And just the reality that this is kind of a format of being a

Christian. Yeah. This is what to expect. Yeah. More or less. And that's don't think it's comforting until you want something else.

I mean, should should Christians expect to suffer? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's it's inevitable. Scripture doesn't say if you suffer as a

Christian, it says when you suffer. Right. And so that's the reality. We will suffer.

And there's you know, we think about there's not many books that deal with suffering. Right. There's there's Job from a personal perspective.

But really, First Peter is the main book that we would turn to. And you're right. It's it gives us the idea of this is we're not unique in suffering.

God's people have always suffered. You know, it's amazing to think this is just a side note. But it's always amazed me that you look at Islam and atheism.

I was thinking of doing a video, a short video on Islam and atheism, because you think like you look in America right now, both

Islam and atheism, like are targeted at wiping out Christianity, which on the atheist side, if you think about it, they should be a little bit concerned with that.

Bill Maher has figured it out. And all the atheists now don't like him. Right. He was he was their favorite for a while.

Now, all of a sudden, when he like goes, hey, guys, I'm like, if you think about this, we're all trying to get rid of Christianity.

But you get rid of Christianity. What's left is Islam. And they want to just blow everyone up. That doesn't agree with them.

You know, Christians want you to believe what they believe. But the Muslims will kill you. You know, you think about it.

Atheism and Islam. Who wins? Well, the Muslims, because they have something to live on beyond this life. The atheists are going to try to preserve their life.

Right. So, you know, but it's amazing to me that you'd think that like the atheists would be against Islam because they have a much stronger view on the things that the atheists seem to want to hold dear.

Right. All the liberal views. You'd think they'd be against that. Because like what do we do when it comes to homosexuality?

What do we do? Share the gospel. What do they do? Throw them off buildings. Right. You would think they would say, well, the

Christians are not as bad when it comes to homosexuality. No, they all say we're the worst. And you look at it and go, how do they get along?

Ultimately, because they're on the same side. They're different strands of the enemy. But they're all inside of darkness.

Right. And so it's always Christianity that is that light. And that's the reason we should expect that we're going to suffer.

And we stand out different than the rest of the world. And so, you know, this is the thing. I mean, you see

Christians that stood up, you know, at different periods of time, whether it's during the Holocaust or the

Boxer Rebellion in China and these different times where when the persecution came, they, you know, they recognized they needed to stand up.

That's not everyone did. Right. But those that did become easily identifiable. I almost kind of wonder if this whole mask mandate stuff is just to be able to identify the

Christians who are like, no, we're going to stand up for truth. Right. Because you kind of have with the masks, you have three different categories of people, those that are in fear, those that are compliant and those that are going to rebel.

Right. And get rid of all those that rebel. And guess what? Now you have just the compliant or fearful and then the

Marxists get to win in that case. Right. So but as Christians, when we stand up, we stand out against the world.

Right. We don't go with the flow. I was just watching a video before you guys came over where there was an atheist doing a video because there's a

Christian that had a moral failure and he's out of ministry. And the guy's going, well, you would never see this with an atheist having to put a statement out saying,

I'm not doing it. I'm not going to be speaking anymore because I had a moral failure. And I'm like, of course not, because you think immorality is moral.

You don't have a problem with, you know, having sex outside of marriage or having homosexual relationships or some having sex with kids.

I mean, they don't think there's a problem with that. So, of course, you're not going to have that because your standard of morality is yourself.

But when we stand up in a culture like that and say there is right and wrong, that becomes a problem.

Right. That all of a sudden stands in the face of everything that they that they're going to promote. So we see this in light of that, that we have to expect persecution is going to come.

Right. We're going to suffer. I think I think none of us here are deluded to think that we're not going to be going under a stricter time of suffering in the next year, months.

The more we desire to walk godly in Christ Jesus, the more we stand out.

That's right, because the more we desire to walk godly in Christ, the more we stand out in the world. And I think that's why what we're seeing now is so many churches that there's churches that are still closed a year.

Now, I don't mind Joel Osteen's church being closed for a year. I wouldn't mind if he closed for good, you know.

But the reality is that you're starting to see what the real churches are or not. I mean, I talk to pastors across the country and and after, you know, when they started to open, there's so many churches that have been flooded with new people that because because their churches close.

I have a friend in California, a pastor in California, who was telling me his his church, when they opened, they got a couple that came into the church, brand new first time visitors.

And they said, Pastor, we don't we don't want you to think we're rude, but we're going to leave exactly at 1145 because they are they're in a liberal church.

But they get paid to teach Sunday school. And so they have to be home in time to get to Zoom to teach

Sunday school. But they they believe that church kind of by definition. Right. Ekklesia is is a gathering.

It's kind of the name of what church stands for. Right. And so they wanted to gather. So they're going to his church.

Liberal is all get out. And yet he's like, but I'm going to teach him God's sovereignty. I mean, they're going to hear from the pulpit. And if they if they learn the truth, they learn the truth.

Right. But he's been having a lot of people that would never come in his church that are starting to come.

Why? Because they want to be in a church. They want to gather. And those churches that are gathering are starting to get targeted.

So it's like you said, the more we stand for Christ and say, no, we're going to take a stand, the more suffering we're going to have.

Do you think there's a just thinking of human nature? Is there you know, are there going to be people who are not going to want to suffer and just try to comply with culture?

Yeah. Isn't that easier? Right. An interesting thing of church history was then when the

Romans came in, the Romans came in to take anyone's Bibles and Bibles are hard to come by.

It's not like us who, you know, I have downstairs in my bookshelf downstairs.

I have three shelves, three feet long of just Bibles. OK, so you can do the math and figure out how many shelves space and they're not just all lined up because some are kind of stacked up.

OK. And it was funny because Jim and I had a friend who comes over, looks at, looks at my shelf. And that's when I didn't have as many

Bibles. And he looks at him and goes, you know, with all those Bibles, you should be the holiest man I know. And Jim goes, only if he's reading them.

Right. Yeah. Brush that dust off. But we have a lot of Bibles.

Back in the in the first century, a Bible was very expensive. So Romans came to people's homes to take whatever scriptures they had.

And you had two groups of people, those that basically said, no, I'm not giving you the scriptures.

And they just took those people, threw them in jail and went and found the scriptures anyway. Just went through their house or those that figured, well, you're just going to take the scriptures out of my house after you take me to jail anyway.

So I'll give them to you. And at least I can continue sharing the gospel and ministering just without a Bible. Well, when

Constantine legalized Christianity, you have all these people that have been in jail because they wouldn't allow their

Bibles to be confiscated. And then you had those that compromise.

They were called the compromisers. And so it actually turned when those people that were in jail got out. They looked at those that didn't give up their

Bible and said, well, you don't really you're not really Christian now. Was that right to say? Right. It's hard to judge.

Yeah, it's hard to judge. Right. You know, the thing is, you know, is it right to then say, oh, well, you're not really

Christian again. You know, it's easy for someone to just to put themselves in a position to walk.

I went through the suffering. And if you weren't willing to, then you're not really Christian. That's easy to say after the fact.

But, you know, none of us really know what it's going to be like until we end up suffering those things.

Wasn't there a story of, you would probably know it, but I don't know if my church will see it real well. I think it was before Luther was in prison.

Who was the one that was set on fire and killed?

Oh, no, I think that's going to be after Luther. You're thinking in London, in England, I mean.

I'm just going to come to this, Jason. There was a friend of his, he denied the fact, he couldn't accept whatever the verdict was on his life because he was afraid of it afterwards.

He changed. Yeah. Yeah. That's why. Mortimer and Whitley are the two friends.

And so I'm trying to remember the archbishop. I think it was the archbishop. So I was actually at the spot where they burned him.

I was doing some evangelism out in England. We got to go up to Oxford and we had a professor there that actually walked us where these events happened.

So he brought us to where Mortimer and Whitley were burned.

And he showed us right. They burned him right outside of this bishop's room where he was in prison.

And so that he could watch his friends burn. Now, the bishop was the one that I guess it was

Mary before she came in. He's the one that removed all the Bibles that were in the Latin and replaced them with English Bibles that the reformers want.

And he just transformed everything into the whole church of England before into a reformed church.

And then when Mary came in, she goes back to Catholic. So it kept going back and forth really until King James.

And so this guy was like the leader. And so they wanted him. They wanted to break up.

What they did was they actually burned these two guys right outside of the. And like, you know, it's just he was in the second floor and the guards made him watch.

And he had to watch his friends. And this is where the famous quote comes where I forget which one. I think it was

Mortimer. No, I think it was Mortimer that was burning with Whitley. And I think it was

Mortimer that said to Whitley, you know, today we'll light a match that, you know, how it goes like no flame can put out.

And so he watched his friend, his friends burn. And at the sight of that, he got he got scared.

And actually he he signed the confession. And so part of what they wanted to do is they had him in the church there at Oxford.

And we walked over to that church and sitting in a church right where he would have been. And then a guy explains a story that here he would have been with Queen Mary right there.

She's like in the in the front row. And he had to part of what he had to do is read this statement of of confession that he, you know, if he was wrong.

And what he ends up doing is realizing like he was wrong to have signed that statement.

And so what he ends up doing is he ended up getting up there and instead of reading the statement, he ends up confessing that it was a sin for him to have done that.

And and that he basically preaches the gospel. The only way to to, you know, come to true and saving knowledge is through Christ.

And so he preaches that to the queen. Of course, the guards grab him and we actually walk from that church right from that pulpit.

We walked all the way down to the same spot where his friends burned. They dragged him all the way back there to burn him there.

And he had one request. He did not want to be tied. So the first thing that would burn would be the right hand that signed his confession.

And so when they lit the fire, he leaned down. His two friends were, I think, singing a song when they were burning.

And so he leaned down into the fire, letting his hand burn first, singing a hymn. And so when we were all there, we we got a picture, all of us, the whole team, we all at that spot and put our right hand down.

Of course, I had I was standing up so I could take the picture if someone had to. So so I have this picture of all of us.

I did an episode of my podcast on the Rappaport podcast with Andrew Smith, who does a podcast called

Today and His Story. And he dealt with that in detail. So we talked about church history.

And and we he he knew because I forget some of the names. He remembered all the names and the details.

I guess if you have a podcast on church history, you better remember the names. I do it on theology, so I don't have to remember.

I can say that because we all know. Yeah, it's crucial during this time for God to allow the persecution.

So when people would gather to go to church, just because Abbot Victor is here, you have to decide.

So spreading the message out of the church more. And that's what we do see, that whenever there is persecution, it spreads the gospel.

You know, some of the early church fathers said that, you know, the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church.

Right. The more that people were willing to die for the sake of Christ, the more people ended up believing.

I remember reading, I don't know if any of you ever read Voice of the Martyrs. It's a free magazine you can get to.

I think it's either persecutedchurch .org or persecutionpersecuted .org. Just type

Voice of the Martyrs. But there was a magazine, I remember reading one of the articles of a

North Korean prison guard that escaped North Korea into South Korea. And so he was part of the church and he shared how he got saved.

A gentleman had escaped North Korea, came into South Korea. And once he escaped, he eventually heard the gospel and he got saved.

And realized that in his belief escaping North Korea, there was no one there in North Korea to share the gospel.

So he went back in to North Korea to share the gospel. And so he was arrested.

And so as they would beat this guy every day, all he would do is pray for his beaters, pray for the guards.

He would pray for them. He would share the gospel with them. And this guard got saved because of it.

Because of the testimony of this guy that wasn't reacting in anger. He expected it.

And instead of being angry with them or trying to fight them, he just prayed for them. And this guy had said that as a guard that was so hard to deal with.

It was such an unusual, you know, because he said that this guy would often pray for his forgiveness.

You know, pray to forgive him as he's beating him. I can't fathom if I would actually do something. Like I just don't know.

I'd like to think so, right? We don't like to think like we would do that. Someone's like, oh, we're going to cut your hands off if you don't deny

Christ. You know, we'd all like to say, you say, oh, sure, bring it on. But I don't think right in that moment, like you could have a weak moment.

And I've heard teaching on that doesn't necessarily mean you're not saved. But we could all sin. We all have a weak moment and fall away.

You know, the disciples did. You know, I don't know. So it's hard to say if you would just say yes. Cut them off.

Actually, I just took a look. And sure enough, someone who's watching on Facebook, Laura Anderson, said VOM .org.

Oh, OK. Yeah, that makes sense. VOM .org. I figured someone who's watching might pop up the answer.

Yeah, yeah. So what you end up seeing, though, is that, you know, when we stand up, like you said, when we stand up in light of the way they expect us to behave, the light of the gospel shines even brighter.

Right. Which is really why I think this book that, you know, First Peter becomes so essential for us as we look at it.

Because I do think that we're coming into a time of suffering. Right. And I think that just as, you know, the gospel needs to spread around.

Right. So when you think about Jerusalem, where they all wanted to stay together, that persecution from Rome forced the gospel to go to the other outer parts of the

Roman Empire. What actually it seemed was many of the Christians that got saved coming in for the holidays and stayed.

There's three Jewish holidays where you're supposed to return to, you know, stay and come back to Jerusalem. And here they come to Jerusalem.

They get saved and they don't want to go back. And we can understand that, I think, because you go back.

Who's a Christian when you go back? Right. Now, all of a sudden, you're, you know, especially as Christianity started separating from Judaism, it becomes like a traitor to the faith.

So now you go back and you lose everything. They would they bury empty caskets and you'd be dead to the family.

And in a culture where your job is tied to your, you know, I mean, you think about a village where most people, everyone knows each other in the village.

We don't have this concept. Think about how many thousands of people live in our in each of our towns.

But you'd have a couple hundred people, you know, everybody, you have the business there. So if someone buries an empty casket, they treat you like you're dead.

The whole village does. That forces you almost have to move out. And so you had things like that going on.

You have things where, you know, people are having to just deal with the fact that they don't want to go back to that.

I mean, my own testimony, for those who know, when I got saved at 16, I knew that if I said anything to my parents, they were going to bury an empty casket.

So I didn't say anything for two years. Actually, I probably wouldn't have said anything for even longer. But by God's providence, it was really weird because my first year of college, they put this letter out to all of the students, at least in my dorm, that we all had to take all of our belongings home during Christmas break.

And it's the only time that they've ever did that. They didn't do it any other year. I don't know why. Maybe I do know why. Because what ended up happening was when

I brought all my stuff home, when I was away at college, I was starting to collect Christian material. And when

I came home, I had I put it away and I went down for to visit some friends during, you know, for Christmas Eve, Christmas.

And, you know, I spent a couple of days down there at a friend's house. And my parents went through all my stuff.

And they saw well, they saw I had chick tracks. I don't know if you guys have ever seen the chick tracks, the cartoons. And I used to have the magazine ones.

And if you don't know a chick track, the chick tracks are. How could

I explain? They're there. They're a little bit harsh, especially toward Catholicism and things like this.

KJV only. But what really got it was they were blasting Hitler. But you see, in a

Jewish mindset, Hitler is the Catholic supported Hitler. So Hitler represents, you know,

Jesus represents Hitler's God. Right. So you don't have love for Jesus. So the mention of Hitler would

Jack trick chick was trying to do. And the thing was to bash the Catholic church. My parents saw with that.

I was I was Catholic in their mind because Jewish people don't understand. Like, you know, Gentiles, all

Jewish people are the same. You all believe the same thing. Well, Jewish people have the same view of you guys. Right.

You know, growing up Jewish, I thought everyone was just Catholic. I didn't understand the differences. Everyone's just Catholic.

So my parents freaked out. They went casket shopping. And because it's something that happened in our family, they decided not to not to bury an empty casket.

But they were planning to. And then they they confronted me when

I came home. Made sure everyone was out of the house. My my sisters were not home.

Told my brothers to, I guess, take off. The housekeeper was given the night off and it was a surprise.

But I probably wouldn't have said anything. You know, part of it being I knew what their reaction would be.

And part of it, I didn't feel strong enough. I mean, I became a Christian. Had no one else. No one to guide.

It was just me and a Bible. That's all I had. And so that's what I was trying to, you know, trying to just study and learn.

And so, you know, we do have to be careful not to fault people. Right. If when when they expect suffering.

Because, you know, you think of you think of like a Muslim and an Arab is in a

Muslim country. It doesn't want to get baptized because they know it. When you do a public baptism, it's a death sentence.

Right. Does that mean they're not a Christian? Yeah. But just like in the case with the bishop, you may cave, but then realize you did wrong.

Right. Who else in scripture can you think of that did that, that that caved and, you know, denied

Christ? But then later Peter. Peter. Oh, OK. That's who it is. Like the author of this book.

Right. I mean, you see with with this as a background, you see why Peter may be one of the better men to write a book on suffering.

It's probably something that not only did he struggle with. He knew his denial of Christ. He knew was prophesied by Christ.

He would deny. Then he denied. You know, we all still struggle with guilt, probably of things we wish we didn't do.

I think Peter probably still struggled with the fact of, you know, he always, especially when it was recorded in the

Gospels. Right. This was written during his time. He's alive to see these recordings. Yep.

That was me. I I'm the one that did that. You know, I'm the one standing up to Christ over and over again. No, Lord.

No, Lord. I would never do that. Right. Well, that's what you end up saying. I think that's why

Peter becomes apostle, uniquely gifted at this. Does that sound make sense?

Yeah. All right. Well, let's actually start into the we'll see how far we get, because I think the first part of verse one, or actually the end part of verse one may may cause us to hold over till next week.

Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ. So we'll start there and just look at, you know, what does an apostle mean?

Go ahead. Well, one, he's seen the risen Christ. Correct. What does it mean? Oh, sent one.

Sent one. It means a sent one. I mean, someone who is who's sent out for a mission. Right. So what you what you brought up is one that saw the risen

Christ. You're thinking back to an axe. OK, OK. And so I have a little bit of a different take on that.

OK, sure. So since you brought it up, I'll give you my take. What acts is recording is what did happen when when they when

Judas had hung himself. He went out from the twelve and they said there we need to replace

Judas. And what scripture records is what actually happened. What actually happened is that they got together and they cast lots and said, let's find someone to replace

Judas. And they chose, you know, Matthias. So fine. That's actually what happened.

The question is, should it have happened? Nowhere in the scripture do you see that God commended that behavior.

You also don't see anywhere where he condemned it. Right. Whenever we do hermeneutics, how to interpret the

Bible, we always want to remember that there's there's different rules for different genres or types of literature. In a historical narrative, it doesn't always teach you what should happen, but what did happen.

OK, so my personal belief is that Paul was the twelfth apostle. Paul was the replacement that God had chosen.

And people say, but did Paul see the risen Lord? Was he alive during his you know, did he see him during the ministry?

And people will try to say, well, Paul was around for his mission. We have no record of Paul being at the same place as Jesus.

We do know that Jesus showed himself visibly to Jesus, to Paul. But remember that it's the apostles that came up with that rule.

So this is now this causes like problems, you know, for me, at least, when people try to argue that we can't have apostles today because they can't fit that threefold qualification.

That's true. You know, it makes it harder for me to say, well, we can't have apostles for that reason.

I would have a very different reason. I would say that we don't need apostles anymore, because what did the apostles do before we had the

New Testament? They were the ones providing the truth of God's word. They were the ones sent out. And almost every book of the

New Testament is somehow tied to an apostle. Right. So even when you look at, you know,

Luke and Mark, they're they're thought to be gospels in one from Peter.

The thought is that, you know, they got most of their information from Peter. That's in the case of Mark and that Luke was one that talked to a lot of the apostles and got his information there as a historian.

And so what you end up seeing, though, is that the apostles, I believe, were there for a purpose of Scripture. So if we if we have a closed canon, we don't need apostles, in my opinion.

Can I prove that biblically? Sorry. No. OK, so that that becomes the thing that we we end up seeing.

I think that we see Paul as the twelfth apostle. It's a question. I didn't get a chance to look it up, but was there a time when

I think it's somewhere in Acts where Paul was in the wilderness? Is that attributed to a time when he was with the risen

Christ? So he was being disciple at that time to be so. So that is in Galatians. OK, that was it.

And in Galatians, he's going to defend his ministry. I'm trying to look for where I couldn't remember exactly.

Yeah, I think it's the end of Galatians one. Arabia. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. I was trying to think of reference there. So he talks about he defends his ministry in Galatians one, starting in eleven.

For I would have, you know, brethren, that the gospel which was preached by me is not according to man.

For I have neither received it from men, nor was I taught it, but received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ.

For you have heard that in my former manner, my life in Judaism, how I used to persecute the church of God beyond measure and tried to and tried to destroy it and was advancing in my

Judaism beyond many of my contemporaries among my countrymen, being more extremely zealous for my ancestral traditions.

So when God, who set me apart even from my mother's womb and called me through his grace, was pleased to reveal his son to me in me so that I might preach him among the

Gentiles. I did not immediately consult with flesh and blood, nor did I go up to Jerusalem to those who were apostles before me.

But I went away to Arabia and returned once more to Damascus. Then three years later,

I went up to Jerusalem to become acquainted with Cephas and stayed with him 15 days.

And so you see, he did that three years. He went away and just studied the scriptures. Yeah, there's some speculation. That's when he was with the risen

Christ, but I don't know. That is the speculation. He claims he gets revelation right from Christ.

So we see that. And so there is this notion that in this, that the people that hold to that three -part qualification of an apostle, they will use that to say, well, see, he saw the risen

Christ. But what we know is that they made their decision. And so this is where sometimes we have to remember when we study the scriptures.

In historical narrative, that's what actually happened. The Bible's accurate. Should it have happened?

Well, there you've got to look to see if somewhere in scripture it says this should have happened. I mean, you know,

David and Solomon had a lot of wives. Should we go have lots of wives? Right? No. Right. Because that was against God's word.

How do we know it? Because there's scripture that says that God created one man for one woman. Right. And so therefore we see that that's the proper way of doing things.

So scripture outside of that would condemn his behavior. David and Solomon. Right. So now there is this idea that there's what people call capital

A apostles and lowercase apostles. Right. Capital A apostles, they refer to the 12th.

Right. Which would be once Judas was removed, I would end up saying Paul. Some will say there's 13 apostles.

Right. Now that might throw some people's, you know, throw some people into theological problems in end times.

Because in Revelation, everyone thinks that the 12, there's 24 elders. So they think it's the 12 tribes of Israel and the 12 apostles.

But if there's 13 apostles, it throws it off. But so, so we see that they, we already talked about the fact that, well, actually

I should start. So this is an apostle though, a son that all of us are. We're sent ones. We all in a sense are apostles.

We're not apostles the way Paul and Peter were apostles. Not that we're going to be giving scripture.

Right. It's one of the things that is kind of funny. You have all the churches that they all, these churches like the NAR churches,

New Apostolic Reformation churches, where they all have apostles and prophets and yet none of them are writing scripture. I mean, if they're, shouldn't they be doing what the apostles and prophets did?

If they're apostles and prophets and write scripture like the apostles and prophets. Right. My theory is the reason they don't write it down.

They just talk about it on videos is because they're hoping they can always take down the video when, you know,

Trump doesn't get elected and they all predicted it. Every one of them. Like if there was any good thing that came out of Trump not getting reelected, it's that every single one of these apostles and prophets have been proven false.

And like in, in great ways. Right. It's not like they were, I mean, some of them doubled down, you know?

And so in that sense, it's like, yes, you know, it's, it's, it should be something where you see that we're all apostles, but not in the sense that we're going to be writing scripture.

Okay. And so continuing verse one, any questions with that? People don't really, but we wouldn't say like,

Oh, Hey, I'm also Kevin, by the way. Like you probably wouldn't do that. Right. It's probably not just come off. I get misunderstood.

I wouldn't do it because yeah. If you call yourself, yeah. If I said, I'm a possible Andrew, well, people think of it the way

NAR thinks of it. That's some office. Right. And they mean of it. They mean when they use it, they do mean it as an office.

But this is not, it is an office, but it's an office. And an action, right?

We're apostles because we go out, but we're not apostles as, as a position, right?

We're disciples because we learn from others, but we're not the disciples of the 12. Right. So there's a distinction that gets made there.

Right. We can, you know, we could shepherd other people that doesn't make us a pastor.

Right. So there's, there's, that's a position we can serve people. That's what Deacon Deaconess means.

We can serve other people that doesn't make us a Deacon. Right. That's a, that, you know, so there's a servant and then there's a servant in the church.

One is what we do. One is the title that we hold. And so I think the same is here. That makes sense.

Yep. So we, we see that they're called at least in the NASB aliens.

Now this is going to come up again in first Timothy two 11. Let me just, let's just go there real quick.

And what we'll see in, um, in first Timothy two 11 beloved,

I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain from the fleshly lusts, which war against the soul.

So he's, he's, he's actually going to the context here and we'll eventually get there this rate. It might be next year, but no one laughed at that.

Since we're only like a few words in the chapter. But what you see is what, when we get here, we're going to talk about the fact that what, uh, first Timothy, uh, first Peter two 11 down to 17, the emphasis here is going to be on submitting to your government, the very government that's persecuting you and making you suffer.

But he's going to start off with this idea of reminding your aliens and strangers in this world.

This is not our home guys. This is just where we are. And this is the thing that Paul, uh,

Peter starts off with here is he starts by calling them aliens. Well, this is two notions here.

One notion is because we see it's, it says that they were scattered throughout Pontius, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, right?

So they're not natural citizens then, by the way, it doesn't say illegal aliens just for the record right now.

Okay. You meant Peter two 11, right? Yeah. Okay. First Peter two 11. Oh, that's not a double check.

Yep. Sorry. First Peter two 11. Okay. Um, so what you see is that Peter's kind of setting the stage.

He's going to set it stronger in chapter two. When he talks about the fact of submitting to government, he's going to talk us as being aliens.

But in that sense, he's going to cause pilgrims in this world. In other words, we don't belong here. The focuses are heavenly home.

This is what Peter's going to start off by doing. He's speaking to them as aliens, like literal aliens, right?

Because they're in these areas, but they don't, they didn't grow up there. They move there. That's the definition of an alien, right?

Not some little space creature with oblong heads and right there. They've moved to a new area and they're, they're taking on a new country as, as their own.

But they're also, as we see the way Peter ends up using this in the next chapter, he uses to also refer to us as being aliens in this world.

Okay. This is not our home. So why do you think to start off with this?

Why would it be important for him to remind us that this earth is not our home, that this is not where we're, that we're aliens in this world?

How do you think that could help with laying a groundwork for suffering? exactly.

Having, having eternity in mind. It's actually the, the, the, that's actually the purpose, the reason we, the name striving for eternity.

So, so the way that we got the name, actually, it's kind of weird how, how that happened. What had happened was

I had the idea for the name and I went to a, I went to a conference and the name, the name was going to be eternal perspectives.

And I went out to this conference and met a guy named Randy Alcorn. He introduced himself to me and he introduced himself as from his ministry, eternal perspectives.

I had all the paperwork filled out. I was going to come home that Monday and send it in. And I'm like, what do

I do now? And I had, I had been signing my emails, striving for eternity with the, with that idea in mind, keeping our mind fixated on that.

And, and really where it comes from is Colossians three. Let me read the first three verses of Colossians three.

Therefore, if you have been raised up with Christ, keep seeking the things above where Christ is seated at the right hand of God.

Set your mind on the things above and not the things that are on earth for you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God.

That's, that's what's really behind the name is seeking the things above what I know Jonathan Edwards is credited with it, but I've actually been able to find that he got it from someone earlier, but he was known for the quote of having eternity stamped on the inside of your eyelids.

When you close your eyes at night, it's eternity that you, you see. And, and this is the idea of setting our things on the things above and not on the things of earth.

And the reason that's so important is because I, I just, in years of counseling found that like you, you have people that are so fixated and worried about the things of earth that they, they actually stunt their

Christian growth. And when we have a fixation on, on the attorney, like think, think about this. How many of you guys have gone to like, well, great adventures, not too far from here, right?

You've gone to, you know, a amusement park as a child. Did you care about how long the lines were?

You did not as much then. Yeah. Not as much then as now. Right. I remember waiting it when free fall had come out.

And, you know, and I had actually anticipated it longer because we, you know, for some, you know,

I grew up on a, on a boat. And so one of the guys in the Marina, he actually was the engineer at great adventure.

So we would, I would find out about the new rides coming out like a year ahead of time, because he'd be working on them.

That summer for the next summer. And so I knew about free fall. So when free fall came out, it was like an hour and a half line for a 30 second ride.

I mean, you get on the ride and it's like, right. You just fall down and it's done. And I mean, what did

I do right afterwards? I ran to get back online. The line was like, I didn't even think about it because of the anticipation of the ride that, because I had so much anticipation in the ride, the line, no big deal.

However, when I had kids and went to great adventure, now that's a different story, right?

Because I didn't like going on the rides anymore. The only thing I remember is the lines. And I was less likely to take my kids the next time they wanted to go to great adventure, because I was like,

Oh, the lines are so long. You can, you go with someone else. I have someone else. Thank you. Right. I didn't want to do it because that is, you know, that's what you end up seeing.

I'm just looking at some comments online from people that are watching. And someone said regarding aliens in this world, he was preparing them mentally in case they were going to die.

Well, they were going to die. They actually, you know, a lot of them were going to suffer and die. And, and that's true.

It, this is, this whole book is going to be a preparation for martyrdom, you know, but ultimately martyrdom, but, but even suffering first century, by the way,

I had it in my, for years. I don't know if it's still in my doctrinal statement. Maybe when I was applying for churches for candidating as a pastor, one of the things

I had in my doctrinal statement was that I believe certain gifts have, have ceased after the first century gift of healing gift of tongues, gift of martyrdom.

In the first century, they actually believe the early believers believe there was a gift of martyrdom. And I admit,

I put it in there just to see who reads the doctoral statement. I mean, it was 12 pages long.

You know, I wanted to see only once. Did I have a guy that actually said, what is the gift of martyrdom?

And I said, he read it. I figured any church that actually picked up on that, is there, they're going to be a little bit, they're scrutinizing a little bit more and that's going to be the church.

I'm going to be more wanting to, to be, but only once did, did anyone challenge me on it, but that is, that's what it is.

It's preparing me. We're, we're not scattering yet. I say yet, because I've, I freely admit the first state that secedes from the union.

Yeah. Texas. Here I come. I'm hoping it's Texas, not Idaho. It probably will be Idaho, but you know, it's cold there, but I've said,

I'll take freedom over cold any day. Um, at least I know a good church there, but, but, uh, you know, that's the thing that would happen, right?

I mean, I could easily see if you have, if you have a couple of the state, the states here secede from the union,

I could see a lot of Christians moving to those states to avoid the persecution. But you know, I can also see a lot of Christians that are going to say, you know what?

I'm not, I'm not picking up my family and go, I'm going to stay and share the gospel. And if it's God's will for persecution,

I'm going to be persecuted. I think of the pastor James coats up in Canada, you know, I'm going to preach the gospel because I believe that we, as a church were commanded to gather and for me to shepherd.

And therefore I'm going to do that. And when they said, well, you know, going to be heading to, to jail then he said, okay.

I mean, he, he didn't wait for him to turn himself in, you know? Okay. You got an arrest warrant for me. Okay. I'll, I'll, I'll come down.

It's kind of weird that he turned himself in and they have them all shackled hands and legs and everything.

You know, they're freeing, you know, murderers and child rapists because of COVID, but they're going to keep him in solitary.

And like, right. He's the real dangerous one. He preaches the gospel. Oh, the example.

Hey, you guys look and see what happens if you guys do the same thing, but you got released. So he did.

And I think what it is is you look at what happened. There was, there was outrage because it's in such stark contrast.

And, and there were so many people coming to his defense and arguing that this is ridiculous. You're letting her, you know, some, a child predator go and you're, you're locking up a guy that just wants to help people.

Like, you're, you crazy. Right. That's the thing that's going to end up happening though.

And, and what, what is the outcome of that? You saw a whole lot of churches that were encouraged to say, you know, we're going to step forward.

Yeah. This is, this is similar. If you, if you want to turn to Philippians chapter one, you see this with Paul, you know,

Paul in, at the time of Philippians, he's, he's arrested. He's in the imprisonment where he's chained to, to the, to guards.

Okay. And look what he says in verse 12, Philippians one 12. Now, I want you to know brethren that my circumstances have turned out for the greater progress of the gospel so that my imprisonment has caused, has that my imprisonment in the cause of Christ has become well known throughout the whole

Pretorium guard and to everyone else. And that most of the brethren trusting in the Lord, because of my imprisonment have far more courage to speak the word of God out of, without fear.

You see what happened? Paul's imprisonment. There were people that were like, Oh, look, Paul's like, you know, in prison. He's God's got them in a shelf, you know, on the shelf.

When I preached through Philippians, there was an interesting note that I had seen that said that one of the things that they saw in the historical documents was that when

Paul was in prison, what they were doing was they kept changing the guards. They had like, they'd have two guards chained to him and they kept changing the guards out.

And there was no record of why they were doing that. It was an unusual behavior. The thought of the reason why is because the guards kept getting saved.

Cause you think about it, like, you know, they want these guards to make sure, you know, he's, he's properly punished and in line and they keep getting saved.

I just picture Paul going, Hey, this is great. I got a captive audience, right?

He's not looking at this and going, this is a problem. He's looking at this and saying, this is an opportunity for the gospel.

And so he lets the gospel go forth. And so this becomes something that we end up seeing with Paul that he sees the whole guard is, is hearing the gospel and other people, the believers outside are being encouraged to share the gospel without fear because they're seeing here's

Paul, not only being in prison, but he's sharing the gospel in prison. And everyone's hearing it. And even to Kings, Timothy with the same in his letter to Timothy, he says, you know, understand where I am in chains, take my place.

Yeah. Basically like encouraging him in that. Encouraging Timothy to, even though he, Paul was in chains.

Yeah. Don't, don't, don't be timid. Yeah. Was, I think the word he wants to use of Timothy, you know, it's, it's a thing where, you know, when we see someone who is willing to stand up, even in suffering, that does help us.

Right. It does encourage us. I've, I've had many friends who have been imprisoned for sharing the gospel in, in different, different places around the world.

You know, I've had some friends who I had one friend who literally preached the night before he was arrested about standing up and standing for Christ, no matter what happens.

And then he got arrested and, you know, prison wasn't very good in the country he was in.

And he, he got, he kind of broke down and they, they basically said, well, we'll release you from prison as long as you promise to leave and never come back.

And he agreed. And a lot of people criticized him for that saying, well, he just, he, you know, he carried, there's a lot, unfortunately of the evangelist friends that, that I was friends with back then that wouldn't evangelize with him anymore because they saw him as a compromise, you know?

And, you know, he, he just, he went through a lot in there that he just, it was, you know, it was a lot for him to deal with.

And he, he didn't see like, he's not, it wasn't like he's a missionary to that country. He was just there for one mission, you know, and in his mind, he could spend the entire time in prison, wait for a court date and then go home or, or, or stay in prison, you know, if they sentenced him or he could go home and do evangelism.

And so, you know, it's easy to criticize some, some people sometimes, but we also have to be cautious that we're not too critical because we're not in their shoes.

Okay. And so we see that these people here scattered, you don't see Peter and you don't see in the book of James going, what is wrong with you?

People you're running from, you know, are you afraid? Right. You know, one of the things that gets me is, you know, whenever there's not saying, this is always the case when you see people that are wearing a mask and you see some

Christians, I'll be like, Oh, are you afraid? You're like, if you're wearing a mask, you must be afraid. And there's a lot of reasons where I don't think anyone will accuse me of being soft on mask wearing.

Okay. I've done what? Three podcasts against wearing a mask. It was funny because it was in an airport and there was a guy that actually recognized me in the airport as I was walking through and he had a mascot and he, but he recognized me and he walked right up to me.

And as he did, he pulled his mask down and he said, you know, I can't believe like you're, you actually don't do walk around. It was like, yeah,

I heard your podcast and it emboldened me. And he goes, you know, I've been trying it. But after that, he's like, and he, I run into him again one time.

Cause he ended up coming to a conference. I was saying, he's like, that's it. I don't wear masks anymore. But there are times where I, you know, we, you know, we were just at the lawyer's office today.

Read, you know, now I moved. I have to redo my trust because it's a new state and stuff. And so met with the attorney, they're going to require a mask, you know?

Okay. You know, now I clearly have my little face shield that just clips on here. And I, you can see me smiling, laughing and everything else.

But I'll tell you, it's, it's kind of freaky. I'm doing business with someone. I don't know what he looks like. I don't like that. You know, I can't see the expressions on his face.

But I understand that they have the rules. Okay. You know, I'm not going to sit there and, and fight with you over it.

You know? I mean, the choice is that I could, and then they could say, well, we're not going to do business. And I go, okay. You know? Right.

So it's not that it's, you know, we have to make it an issue all the time, but but there's some people that think like, well, if you're, if you're wearing a mask, you're in fear.

The same thing could be, you could see here. Peter doesn't say this to them. Peter doesn't go, oh, you guys ran away.

You're, you're in fear. I mean, were they in fear? Well, if they scattered, I'm guessing they, they were right. You don't see

James saying that you don't see either James or Peter criticizing them for scattering. I just say that to say that we might want to consider the fact that we should not be too hard on people.

I mean, a big thing that we see right now in, in the, at least the American church is criticism on, you know, if you wear a mask, you must be afraid.

Or if you don't go to church, you must be afraid. I just would say, we have to be more sensitive like Peter and James, you know, to, to consider, you know, that, that we, we all have, are dealing with different things.

And, you know, you know, in my case, I have real clear reasons why I don't want to wear a mask. I like breathing.

It's something, you know, you know, when you have asthma. Yeah, I know it is. It is. Yeah. I find it amazing that everyone gets, it says that, yeah, like you're saying that you want to kill it.

Or people get upset. Cause I, if I'm not wearing a mask, because it's like, well, you're going to put my health at risk, but I have asthma wearing the mask, puts me at my health at risk.

So, so like think about this, like, you know, about half an hour into wearing a mask and I start to faint, you know, so, you know, can you go like half an hour?

Maybe you could just back up. Like, I always do find it funny that everyone that wants to complain about me wearing a mask or within a foot of me, it's, it's the funniest thing.

Like, can you please back up in the six feet of space, please? You know, I mean, if you, if your mask is working, then it shouldn't be a problem.

If you could keep the six feet distance, you should really be fine. And you shouldn't worry that I'm not wearing a mask for my own health.

Right. But I have to actually talk to a couple of her friends of mine who have asthma and have the same, same problems.

And, and yeah, it's, it's really interesting walking in stores. So basically I don't go to stores very much anymore. I'm pretty much a homebody work out of the house.

Live out of the house. And then everywhere. I like, we, we actually, we're going to go see the kids. And we were gonna take the train.

I was, I literally was just about to purchase the tickets. And then I went, wait a minute. And I read their mask policy.

I went, I got to wear a mask for six hours. I can't do that. And I'm like, I'm like chatting with them.

Like, do you have an exemption policy? And they're like, there are no exemptions that, you know, under Biden's new mask mandate, all travel is covered.

And I'm like, well, okay, I guess I'm driving. I don't want to drive, but I guess I will. So, so yeah.

So any, any questions with any of that? Cause we won't get to the, the, the real fun part. We'll stop at who, who were chosen.

Yeah. Well, you know, I'm sure I'm trying to respect people's time to keep it to an hour.

And I'm think if we got into who were chosen, we might be here for another hour. But, you know, we're not in a rush to get there.

I think that as long as we're, we're all getting value out of it, if I'm going too slow, then let me know.

But, I'm hoping that we all get a lot out of, out of it. So, so we'll stop there.

Okay. And, you know, and we'll just, we'll just close in prayer.

All right. Heavenly father, we're so grateful and thankful for all that you provide that does.

Peter is laying out right from the beginning as, as we're going to see next week, that, that he lays out for us really the importance of having our minds fixated upon you and that, which is eternal.

And that's what gets us through these temporal life and suffering in this world, that if our mind is fixed on you, then the things of this earth, as the hymnist says, grow fadely, dim Lord, we, we want to be seeing everything in light of eternity.

We ask that you help us to do that in Christ's name. Amen. At Novavax, we want to make sure you have all the facts.

And the fact is there are different types of COVID -19 vaccines available. So if you're thinking about getting an updated vaccine, ask your doctor or pharmacist about the options available to you.

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