Hope: Every Believers Anti-Depressant - [1 Peter 1:1-2]

Well good morning everyone. I bring you greetings from Pastor Mike emailed earlier this week to just say how well things are going and how pleased he was to get a letter from the publisher or an acknowledgement from the publisher that they want more of the book and that they're excited about the project.

I told Mike before he left though I said you know I think some people still may be confused about whether you're coming back or not and he said he said well what am I supposed to do say you know unless I die I'm coming back and I go.

No you don't have to say that so I'm saying that to you this morning unless he dies he's coming back. So where's kids. Don't don't worry everything's fine. Well again good morning. Yeah you know I just want to say a word about the about the music.

I hope that when you sing those songs and I was doing this myself this morning so I don't I try not to say anything from the pulpit that I don't practice but I was reading it reading the lyrics this morning and I thought you know what I could.

So much of what I'm going to preach this morning comes right out of these songs. So much good doctrine. We need to be in tune and really praising God while we sing. Did a little research as is my want this week and some disturbing statistics in the United Kingdom that's England and Ireland Scotland Wales.

The use of antidepressants increased 234 percent in the 10 years from 1993 to 2002 in the United States a 2005 independent report stated that 11 percent of women and 5 of men in non institutionalized in the non institutionalized population meaning they weren't locked up with straitjackets on now take antidepressants.

That's one out of ten women more or less and one out of 20 men take antidepressants. One estimate in 2003 said that there were I get this 213 million prescriptions for antidepressants in the United States alone.

Now obviously a lot of people were doubling up. They were changing treatments tripling up quadrupling up. But that's no matter how you slice it that's a lot of medication. 2002 survey found that 3 .5 percent of all the people in France were being prescribed antidepressants.

That's up from 1 .7 percent 10 years earlier. And on and on and on it goes doubling everywhere increasing everywhere people are depressed. We live in an increasingly depressed and dare I say why do people.

Why are people depressed. Why are they depressed. They feel hopeless. We live in a hopeless world now. There's a saying that I learned in my pre-christian days and I think it probably became very popular in the army.

And I may have said at a time or two in my former career life is tough and then you die. And that is not just some trite saying. That's how most people view life. I'm slogging my way through and you know what at the end I don't have anything to look forward to.

Life is tough and then I die. It's not just unbelievers that struggle with life circumstances. Believers can have very difficult times. Why. Because life is hard. Life is hard. By the way this morning I'm not after people on antidepressants.

I'm not out here to inspect anybody's prescriptions. I don't want to know but I want you to understand that there are an increasing ever-increasing number of people out there who are looking for some hope.

What are we to do. How are we to think. How should we act. How should we respond to the difficulties of life. Now I could give you and I love the way John Piper does this. He gives missionary stories and he goes through them.

And by the time he's done I usually feel about I don't even think you'd measure my height. It's it's ridiculous. Or I could go to the Fox's Book of Martyrs and tell you how so many people died for the faith.

However this week I listened to you know a lot of times you get CDs and they're just floating around in your car or they're sitting on your desk forever. Well I took one of them out. It was the graduation testimonies from this last year at the Master Seminary and I listened to this first one four or five times because I found it so encouraging and I'm going to summarize it for you this morning.

This is a young man born into a Christian home but he was very sick very weak and he said he couldn't rationalize. He couldn't make the two go together. These two things that he was told all the time.

Number one that God loved him. Number two you're very sick. And he struggled and he wrestled and his mind could not comprehend these two things. Well one day at the age of 15 he got into a fight with his dad.

He didn't say what the fight was about but we know how teenagers are. Some teenagers are age of 15. He argued with his dad and he actually got to the point where he kicked his father. Later that same night his father died having nothing to do with being kicked but nevertheless his father died.

As you can imagine this young man was very upset and he pled to God for faith for understanding. He says he was not saved and he couldn't understand why he wanted to be saved. His family continued to work with him and point him toward the Bible and he began studying the Bible and eventually he was saved.

He enrolled at a secular college some years later and then he heard that the Masters College not the seminary but the college had a program where you could go over to Israel and study there. And he thought you know what I want to do that.

So he enrolled at the Masters College and he found out that before you could go to IBEX is what it's called the campus there in Israel. He had to get a doctor's note saying that he was physically fit to go.

So he goes and sees the doctor. The doctor says well you have about two weeks to live if you don't have open-heart surgery immediately. 19 years old he said before my world would have been shattered the circumstances would have just been beyond my ability to reconcile how God could love me and allow this to happen in my life.

He says though because of the theology that he had learned he praised God for this and he said quote open-heart surgery is the best thing that could have happened to me. After the surgery he had some what he calls minor strokes temporary blindness and even some paralysis.

His response the more I went through the more the Lord revealed himself to me. The more he revealed himself to me through his word the more I was conformed into the image of his son by the Holy Spirit.

The more like Christ I became the more of his joy that I had. He subsequently graduated from the Master Seminary. I'm really squishing it because he had like six or seven minutes and I have a couple subsequently graduated from the Master Seminary is married and he and his wife were expecting a baby anytime now.

And he hopes to be serving the Lord soon in Mexico as a missionary. Now what are we to do. How are we to respond to difficult circumstances. How do you respond to the trials of life. How do you respond to persecution to injustice inflicted upon you to just the pressures of everyday life.

Hope in the Midst of Suffering

The Apostle Peter in the book of first Peter. And I would invite you to turn there now the Apostle Peter and the Holy Spirit provide answers for us. And I pray that as we go through these first few chapters of first Peter we're not going to cover all the first two chapters of first Peter this morning that you will be encouraged and challenged to think rightly of the circumstances in your lives.

This is a timely letter. I as I study this letter I just thought this could be written today. This is what Christians need now. I saw the the latest what I'm sure will be a best-seller by by the pastor smile Joel Osteen.

And I don't know what you know. I can't do the mic thing. But his latest book is called becoming a better you. And I just read the title. I don't have to read the book. I just read the title and I thought what could be more opposite more antithetical to Christianity than worrying about self-improvement.

It's being conformed. I don't want to be a better me. I want to be more like Christ. I want to follow him. And this is a book that will conform you into the image of God's Son. If you will live it may I just say bluntly God does not promise us a life of ease that is nowhere in the Bible.

He doesn't promise a rose garden. He doesn't promise a life of health and wealth. And I would defy any health and wealth preacher to go through the book of first Peter and watch them move like they're walking through a minefield because they're not gonna be able to do it.

Life is hard and God knows that. And he has given us this letter to help us. Let's read. We're only going to read at the moment verses 1 2. Peter an apostle of Jesus Christ. To those who reside as aliens scattered throughout Pontus 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 be sprinkled with his blood.

May grace and peace be yours in the fullest measure. My purpose this morning is to give you a brief overview of this epistle. And we're going to focus in after we do that. We're gonna focus in on verses 1 2 and you will see three divine initiatives in the lives of believers so that you will not despair when times get tough and so that you will not live as the world lives.

No Christian should leave here this morning thinking that God has not provided a remedy for the desperation anxiety depression troubles and difficulties of life. Rather you should be filled with hope understanding the end result of God's work in you.

As I said first we'll see an overview of the book and then we will see these three divine initiatives in every believers life first. Let's look at Peter's purpose in writing the book. He wanted to encourage believers in the midst of a hostile world while keeping your finger there at first Peter one chapter 5 verse 12.

We're going to be flipping through a lot of pages here in first Peter. First Peter 512. Peter describes how this book is written through Sylvanus or Silas was a companion of Paul and then Peter our faithful brother for so I regard him.

I have written to you briefly written to these believers briefly exhorting and testifying that this is the true grace of God. Stand firm in it. Stand firm in the grace of God. That's his message. The circumstances of life will change.

They will get better. They will get worse. Stand firm in the grace of God. First Peter 1 3. Listen to these these key words that keep coming up. First Peter 1 3. His great mercy talking about God has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

First Peter 1 13. Therefore prepare your minds for action. Keeping sober in spirit. Fix your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. First Peter 121. Who threw him Jesus our believers in God who raised him from the dead and gave him glory so that your faith and hope are in God.

What else do we have. What other hope is there. What we possibly build our lives upon and trust ourselves to put all of our focus on. Where can we turn to for help. Reminds me of when Jesus asked the disciples are you going to leave me just like everybody else just did.

And Peter said what. Who else will we go to. Who else has the words of eternal life. We're not leaving. Our hope is in you first Peter 3 15. But sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts. Always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asked you to give an account for the hope that is in you.

Yet with gentleness and reverence as will become obvious Peter knew that his readers were going to suffer affliction. They were gonna have setbacks. They were gonna have difficulties. They were gonna be persecuted.

And he says you know what. In the midst of that let me tell you something. You are going to stand firm. And you need to be ready to give people a reason for that. They're gonna say what is wrong with you.

Don't you get it. You are being persecuted. You should be downcast. You should be upset. You give them the reason for your hope. Yet with gentleness and reverence Peter again has a message for you today believers have hope.

Stand firm in it now. This letter was likely written either right before the Neronian persecution or at its beginning stages. So Nero wasn't in full rage yet. For those of you don't know the history Nero was the Caesar of Rome.

Not a really nice guy killed everybody burned down Rome because he wanted you know in in Roman history the greatest way you could establish your legacy. Presidents like to talk about legacy. How about this for a legacy.

How about if presidents just burn down Washington DC. That's what Nero did. He wanted to establish his legacy. So he burned it down. And then he blamed the Christians and thus began the Christian persecution.

Because if you're going to blame them for destroying a good portion of Rome then you've got to persecute them. They're the bad guys. And that's what he did. But even before this historically we know for many documents that have been uncovered that suffering for Christ was commonplace.

It was called it was known as suffering for the name nothing else attached to it just suffering for the name. That name of course being Jesus Christ persecution of a different scale of a whole new level was coming.

And Peter through the Holy Spirit was preparing Christians to suffer. Well notice it's it's interesting what he doesn't say. Peter never encourages Christians these people that rights to wage a holy war.

Christianity has never been spread by spilling the blood of non-christians. What about the Crusades. Will a wasn't Christians who started it wasn't Christians who went and it wasn't a Christian cause that they were fighting for.

The church has grown historically on the blood of martyrs on the blood of Christians on the blood of believers not on the blood of unbelievers. Secondly Peter didn't say hey if there's an unjust law you engage in civil disobedience.

Far from that he told them to submit to the governing authorities. Thirdly Peter told them to keep their focus on their heavenly prize and recognize that they would according to first Peter 1 verses 4 to 6.

Listen to this obtain an inheritance which is listen to these words imperishable undefiled and will not fade away reserved in heaven for you who are protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.

In this you suffer miserably. You greatly rejoice even though now for a little while if necessary you have been distressed by various trials. Listen life is tough. Life is difficult and life is short.

Life is short. I said months ago I was talking to somebody who was describing how difficult his life had been. He said that he had come to faith in Christ. I said let me ask you something. He was 40 years old.

I said let me ask you something. If the next 40 years of your life let's say you live to be 80. If the next 40 years of your life were as difficult as the first 40 years do you think you could handle that if you knew that eternity was 40 years times infinity.

How do you measure eternity. You can't. Life is short. It's difficult but it's short. Eternity is forever. Our hope is not in this life. It is in the life to come. Difficulties were present and about to get worse.

But Peter says they last for a little while. Now does it seem like that when the world comes crashing in on you does it seem like oh you know what this is. This is gonna pass. This is just but a short period of time.

No seems like it goes on forever. But Peter exhorts his readers and you to think of this life and these periods of difficulty for what they are mere moments in light of eternity. Face-to-face with the risen Savior.

No one wants to suffer. But if you keep your eyes on the heavenly prize. In other words if you keep things in proper perspective it will help you get through the most difficult times. And they did have some difficult times first Peter 3 verses 16 and 17.

And keep a good conscience so that in the thing in which you are slandered those who revile your good behavior in Christ will be put to shame for it is better if God should will it. So that you suffer.

For what. For doing what is right rather than for what is for doing what is wrong. I read this and I am convinced that first Peter could have been written yesterday reviling good behavior. What are you.

Some kind of goody-two-shoes. Can't you have a little fun lighten up. People don't want to live among a holy people. Unsaved people don't like it suffering for doing what is right. Absolutely. And isn't that where we live our lives.

Isn't that how life is. People mocking us giving us difficulty because we don't want to live like they do. Can I tell you something else. Even in New England as godless and as dark as it is it seems to be sometimes.

I don't think we know much about persecution. Read this this week. It's a young Islamic man says my mother was irate when she found the Bible under my bed. She grabbed me by the shirt collar and shouted Allah Akbar God is greatest.

As she beat me with a black rubber garden hose. I couldn't sleep for five days because the welts on my back. Use of smother told him the Bible was a dirty book and Christians were devils. On another occasion she she threatened to slit use of throat with a knife.

There were other instances of violence including taking a frying pan to his head while he was praying. But eventually his mother came to faith in Islamic countries. In many of them your life can literally end if you convert to Islam or from Islam to Christianity.

And it may well be your family who kills you. It is considered a major disgrace. You are a heretic and you need to be killed. We don't have that. You can face persecution from other religions. I remember a few years ago a couple of missionaries over in India were burned to death.

A missionary and his son were burned to death in a car by Hindu fundamentalists. All these great religions of tolerance and they're completely tolerant until they're confronted with the truth. It's not just other religions.

Governmental persecution saw a Chinese church that was destroyed by the government. Why. Because they didn't have the permits. They owned the land. They put it up themselves didn't matter. They didn't have the authorization to do that.

Christianity and China is controlled by the state. They have a state-run church. Any other church is not authorized. They meet in their homes. They meet underground. There are countries around the world where it's still illegal to possess a Bible.

One of the most moving stories I can remember is when the Russian pastors started coming to the Shepherds Conference a few years ago several years ago and they would talk about what it was like under the Soviet Union.

There was an official church the Russian Orthodox Church and everything else was an outlaw renegade church. Well of course the Russian Orthodox Church didn't preach the gospel. So these Baptists would meet in homes.

They would preach the Bible and one by one the men in the churches would be hauled off. So then the question would come about to the congregation who's going to be the next pastor. And the next man would step up and the next man and the next man and the next man.

That is persecution. Peter wrote a timely and useful letter. This letter has doctrine but is well described as Hebert calls it a powerful appeal to courage purity and faithfulness to Christ amidst the sufferings which they were experiencing and we're going to experience.

There's plenty of truth plenty of doctrine in this book but also plenty of practicality. How do you live it out. How do we do what we are called to do. This letter of first Peter was an encyclical letter meaning it was going to go around to a number of churches much like Ephesians and Colossians were.

And this is obvious in that it was addressed to various groups in Asia Minor which is in Turkey what we call Turkey now first Peter 1 1. Again to those who those areas were in Pontus Galatia Asia and Bithynia and I just wanted to say you know when you read Asia you think Japan Korea China.

That's not it. Asia was actually a small political area in the Turkish area so don't get it confused with the whole continent when you read that. But in all likelihood these churches are mentioned in the order in which the messenger would have delivered the epistle.

In other words from one to another to another to another. Just a note about Cappadocia saw this months ago on the history channel I believe it and Cappadocia is a very mountainous area with unique rock formations and they still they've.

They could see some of the houses and they would have these grand staircases cut into the side of the mountain leading into the home and they're pretty spectacular looking you know not like caves or anything like that.

And they this area suffered so much persecution that they've now uncovered these caves underground these underground homes where they had air conditioning they had water systems they had churches these places could hold tens of thousands of people.

Why. Because they were under such persecution that they fled literally underground. And I thought it was interesting that in these churches they went in there and they you know they were panning the camera on everything and they did have a baptismal font for what that's worth for you.

Anybody here who's interested in infant baptism but do you think that these people in Cappadocia as they were undergoing decades of persecution do you think that they treasured these words that Peter wrote to them.

When we think about Peter the man you know we we get all these pictures of him. I would say they're almost caricatures. Because if you think about it if we read the the focus of the Gospels and even the book of Acts is not on Peters everyday life.

We don't see him all the time. We see his high points his low points. But here's the point Peter himself is a picture of hope what the Lord could do with an individual who had obvious flaws. God transformed him.

He was faithful. But some of his low points are horrendous. Peter though was faithful to what God called him to do in John 21 Jesus addresses Simon. And think about this in terms of writing this letter even John 21 verses 15 to 17.

So when they had finished breakfast Jesus said to Simon to Simon Peter Simon son of John do you love me more than these. He said to him yes Lord you know that I love you. He said to him tend my lambs.

He said to him again a second time Simon son of John do you love me. He said to him yes Lord you know that I love you. He said to him shepherd my sheep. He said to him the third time Simon son of John do you love me.

Peter was grieved because he said to him the third time do you love me. And he said to him Lord you know all things. You know that I love you. Jesus said to him tend my sheep. And here he was shepherding the flock of God tending the sheep of God.

Even people who were far away we have reason to believe. And I believe that Peter was in Rome when he wrote this letter. And he was writing to people hundreds of miles away shepherding the flock of God.

One writer says of Peter with regards to this letter he says he speaks with the authority of an apostle but with the gentleness of one who knew the power of temptation and the difficulty of steadfastness with the humility of one who will remembered how he himself had fallen.

He knew he knew there were ups and downs in the Christian life and that's one of the reasons he could write a letter like this. God did not make a mistake when he chose Peter he knew exactly who he was choosing.

The recipients of first Peter are described as aliens who are scattered. Now the picture is one that should be familiar to us. They these people that he is writing to like every Christian they were living as aliens.

Strangers rejects in a world system that is inherently anti-christian. The world is not your friend. This world is not my home. The Greek word translated aliens is meant to underscore the transitory nature of this life.

As in you're just passing through this area. Even if you have a house there you're just migrating through on your way to your true home which is heaven. Is that how you view this world. Are you unconcerned with the things of this world or the opinions of this world.

Is your focus on Christ and on sure his sure promise of eternity with him. If not why not think about heaven. No more sorrow sin tears bills arguments pain rejection fear hate poverty riches temptation politics.

What is it about this world that you treasure more than the next. It is no accident that Peter emphasizes the temporary nature of our time on earth. First Peter 1 verses 15 and 16. But like the Holy One who called you God the Father be holy yourselves also in all your behavior.

Because it is written you shall be holy. For I am holy after pastor Mike's series on the holiness of God. We should understand what holiness means. Yes it means transcendent. We can't be transcendent.

But when we talk about God's holiness we also talk about his otherliness that he is like no one else. And in that same sense we are to be holy. We are not to be like the world is we are not to be as Peter writes in first Peter 114 conformed to the former lust which were yours and ignorance.

We are to be different from the world not like they are. Our God-given purpose is to be different to be holy to be a people set apart for God's use first Peter 2 9. I told you we were gonna travel all the way through first Peter.

And we're doing it first Peter 2 9. But you are a chosen race a royal priesthood a holy nation a people for mark this God's own possession. Why. So that he can carry us around. No so that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who has called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.

Are you proclaiming the excellencies of God. When you do that what do you expect to get. I would guess you're probably going to ruffle a few feathers to make simple examples. You know I can remember at work after I got saved.

And somebody would say oh I gotta tell you this joke. And I would say I would just kind of go okay. Is it racial or sexual in nature. And they look at me like this. Well what do you think. What else is it gonna be.

What else is funny. And I just go well then I don't want to hear it. What is wrong with you. Try that at school. Try saying you know what I don't want to hear about that tried at the office walk away.

When those kind of conversations start see what happens. You won't be in the end. You won't be in the click. We are called to proclaim the excellencies of the God who saved us. We're called to be separate holy set apart from sin and not living according to the world standards.

And as Christians are very existence is not dependent upon our circumstances but on our future. Our hope is from God not from this world. And Peter stresses that constantly in this book. So now with that as introduction we get to our three elements of hope this morning the Trinity in action.

The Father's Election

The three divine initiatives. As we see Peters purpose here to encourage his readers to stand firm in the grace of God. We're going to look at that grace of God first the father's election of you. If you belong to Christ you are elect of God versus wanted to the end of one beginning of two who are chosen.

And this is true of every single person who is elect who are chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father. Some of you are thinking election again. Didn't we just have a 47 part series on that.

Well you know what I want to beat a dead horse. So I'm just gonna nudge it a little bit. Besides that I don't really think this horse is dead. The Word of God is filled with references to election. God's sovereignty and salvation.

It was vital in Peters time and it is vital now. You will never experience the fullness of the grace of God and his peace until you grasp what God has accomplished on your behalf and know that his purpose for you cannot be thwarted.

Frankly we can't hear often enough about the sovereignty of God and salvation. Why. Because without it if God is not sovereign salvation we don't have a gospel. We don't have good news. And we don't have any hope.

These aliens who were scattered spread out traveling through. They were elect. They were chosen. And the chosen is the Greek word for elect. It describes those who before the foundation of the world were marked out by God for salvation.

Also they were chosen according to the foreknowledge of God. Wait. Someone might say it says they were chosen according to God's foreknowledge. Is it possible that foreknowledge merely means that God knew ahead of time who would believe and he chose them according to that knowledge.

It's a reasonable question and I like to keep things in context. So let's look at first Peter 1 verse 20. For he talking about Jesus was foreknown before the foundation of the world but has appeared in these last times for the sake of you did God merely know ahead of time that Jesus was going to be the Savior.

That's not what acts 2 would tell us this was all his purpose and plan. He didn't merely know who would believe. Either same root word same context. And it means there is an intimate relationship an intimate pre-planned purpose of God that he carries out in his sovereignty.

Nowhere in the Bible. Nowhere in the Bible. Does God merely know as in being informed of some kind of fact. He's not some wage. A wise sage cloistered in the Himalayan mountains doesn't chant. Sit there and just say I know a lot.

Ask me our God is in the heavens. The psalmist writes. He does as he pleases. He's not an observer. He's not a watcher. He doesn't just kind of watch what's going on. He is the moving and sustaining agent of everything that takes place.

These to whom he wrote in you today if you knew the Lord were elected because of the foreknowledge of God. Now if this means that God simply knew ahead of time what did he know that you and I were dead in our sins and trespasses unable to seek after God as Romans 3 would tell us.

And that somehow we still chose him for knowledge. According to Kistemacher means that God predetermined to have a relationship with the elect just as Jesus came here with a purpose being intimately known by the father and commissioned by him to redeem those chosen by the father.

So our relationship with the father was ordained and purposed by the Godhead from all eternity. There's more. That's divine initiative number one the father's election of you. And it's necessarily followed by divine initiative number two the Spirit sanctifying of you.

The Spirit's Sanctifying Work

Verse 2. By the sanctifying work of the Spirit. Again this is all being done to the elect those chosen. The Holy Spirit sanctifies you makes you holy. Not completely in daily terms. You're still sin. Sanctification is an ongoing process.

But you have been set apart by him to be one of God's own. You have been called from the herd. I like that word called so I want to put in there. Called from the herd called out of the massive darkness into the magnificent light of God.

Now what is encompassed in the Spirit's work. How does the Spirit sanctify you. First by convicting you of sin. Secondly by giving you the gift of faith. Thirdly by causing you to repent to turn from your sinful life toward God.

Fourthly regeneration. These aren't in order by the way. Don't don't nail me on order. Salute us. You know afterwards pastor I thought regeneration and repentance were simultaneous. Don't just don't just tell you all the work that the Holy Spirit does regeneration.

Fifthly change of affections. If you belong to God you don't view the world the same way. Sixthly assurance of salvation. Our spirit is testified to by the Holy Spirit that we belong to God. The Holy Spirit works in you setting you apart making you positionally holy and working on you every single day to conform you into the image of Christ.

Christ's Redemption

Divine initiative number three the Sun's redemption of you. Again look at verse two to obey Jesus Christ and be sprinkled with his blood. Two blessings necessarily result from the work of the Father and the Spirit.

This happens in every single case. Number one obedience. Number two eternal security obedience. John MacArthur calls it the byproduct of divine election. The elect obey. That preposition to where it says to obey Jesus Christ is a Greek word that can also be into and indicates the goal the point to be reached.

In other words you don't get saved so that your life can continue the way it was. God does not leave us unchanged when he saves us he doesn't save us. And then just kind of shrug and say you know what.