JICF 1 Peter #8 Sermon Notes
1 Peter 5:6-14
December 18, 2016
We’ve come to the end of Peter’s first letter. He wrote ‘briefly.’ (5:11) More could have
been said, but by the Spirit’s inspiration we’ve received from God what we must know:
Suffering leads to glory, so keep faith when under ‘fire’. (1:5) ‘Beware of lazily giving up.
Instead, put up a glorious fight and you will find yourself empowered with His strength.’
(Oswald Chambers) Look back! God chose you to be his child (1:2). Look forward to the glorious
future God has prepared (1:4). Then look around and live by faith amidst fiery trials (1:6).
Peter sums up all that he has said with words that are the key to living Christianly!
‘And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have
suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast.’
By his free, unmerited grace God calls us out of sin to ‘eternal glory in Christ’. Being in
his family involves us in inevitable persecution as we follow Jesus. ‘Don’t be surprised!’
(4:12) and don’t adopt a stoical, ‘grin and bear it’ attitude. We’ve experienced ‘the true
grace of God…Stand fast in it.’ (5:12) How do we hold our ground amidst great grief?
We have trials but we also have God on whom we rely and to whom we must respond!
What is a right response to suffering? One posture characterizes the followers of Jesus.
‘Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time.’ (5:6)
Just as we humble ourselves before the state (2:13) and our spouse (3:1), so before God.
We’re not naturally submissive. We don’t like our plans being at the mercy of someone
else’s control. Pride and power together are twin sins. Peter urges that the safest place
to be in tough times is under God’s hand because ‘God gives grace to the humble.’ (5:5)
Put yourself under God’s hand who said, ‘I will stretch out my hand and strike the
Egyptians…After that he will let you go.’ (Exodus 3:20) At the right time and in the right
way, God who rescued Israel and who raised Jesus, will exalt you too! The antidote to
resentment and bitterness about life’ seeming injustices is to make sure that we are
under God’s mighty hand. Don’t fight for your rights; for your own way! Trust in God!
Having placed ourselves under God’s hand we must release something from our hand.
‘Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.’ (5:7) Anxiety is the opposite of
humility! When our head hits the pillow, whatever we are hanging on to is our worry!
And the real reason we worry is because we want to have control over our whole life.
Just as God said to Pharaoh, ‘Let my people go’, Peter says, ‘Let your problems go!’
And not just anywhere. To God! ‘Cast’ means to throw, to cast forth. It was used in
Greece of any rapid movement, as in the throwing of a javelin or the rush of the wind.
Javelin throwers often groan as they let the javelin go! Do you groan? Let the groan go!
This is a command. Throw your troubles to God, ‘for he cares for you.’ There is nothing
too small or too big for God! ‘…do not worry about your life… Can you by worrying add
a single hour to your life? (Matt 6:25-27). Be careful! God’s care shouldn’t make us careless!
‘Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion,
lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith………’(5:8-9)
As Peter was writing did he remember back to when he wasn’t alert and did not resist?
On that bitter night Peter boasted in pride, ‘Jesus, I’ll die for you’, only to betray him.
Later he could not stay awake in the hour of Jesus’ Gethsemane agony. To Peter Jesus
said, “Simon, Simon…Satan has asked to sift all of you as wheat. But I have prayed for
you, Simon, that your faith may not fail.” (Luke 22:22;42) We have an enemy who wants to
stop us trusting in God. Satan roars with human voices, just as he did to Jesus: ‘When
they hurled their insults at him, he did not retaliate; when he suffered, he made no threats.’
(1 Peter 2:23) His roar is intimidating, but the lion is on a leash, because the Lord died for
our sins to free us from all of the lying accusations of our evil enemy. (1 Peter 2:24)
‘The roaring of the devil is the crazed anger of the defeated enemy.’ (Thomas Shreiner)
So ‘resist him’! In Jesus we ‘stand firm in the faith’. Don’t ever think you are alone!
Suffering is the experience of all Christians. ‘believers throughout the world undergo
the same kind of suffering.’ Don’t resist alone! Join hands with believers in hardship.
Resist your enemy in community, and ‘the God of all grace, who called you to his
eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you
and make you strong, firm and steadfast.’ (1 Peter 5:10) Suffering may seem long, but God
says it’s for ‘a little while.’ In the movie, ‘Titanic’, as women and children are lowered
into lifeboats while husbands and fathers remain on board, a sailor says to a child,
‘It’s goodbye for a little while, only for a little while.’ However, for many – most – their
separation would be forever. They would never see the men again after the ship sank!
Your suffering might seem endless, but God who chose, called and who cares for you has given you his word – just ‘a little while’. What will never end is our enjoyment of
‘his eternal glory in Christ.’ With that promise we can persevere, knowing God Himself
is with us, and for us, today. What God did for Peter he did for Dr. Helen Roseveare.
Helen was a medical student in England who declared, "I'll go anywhere God wants me to, whatever
the cost”…..Afterwards, I had it out with God. "God, today I mean it. Go ahead and make me more
like Jesus, whatever the cost. But please, when I feel I can't stand anymore and cry out, 'Stop!' will
you ignore my 'stop' and remember that today I said 'Go ahead!'?" She went to northeast Congo as
a missionary doctor. During those years she became irritable, resentful and was in conflict with her
African colleagues. A pastor invited her to spend a week in prayer at his home. God broke through.
She said, “Slowly the Spirit of God reached through into my heart and broke down the barriers of
pride. He helped me to unburden my heart, to reveal all the sense of failure, the fears and criticisms,
the pride and selfishness. The pastor led me to look away from myself to the Christ of Calvary. He
dealt with the need of restitution and of apologizing and asking forgiveness…and great calm came.”
This was the calm before the storm! When Congo declared its independence from Belgium, civil
war broke out. Simba rebels took over the hospital. Helen was a virtual prisoner for five months,
was severely beaten, and raped. After the army defeated the rebels, she was rescued and flown
back to England. Yet her attitude was not one of anger or self-pity, but of how the Holy Spirit had
enabled her to thank God for trusting her with that trial. Helen recalls: “I was beyond praying…but
there was God. I just knew God was actually there in all his majesty and power. He stretched out his
arms to me. He surrounded me with his love and he whispered, ‘Twenty years ago, you asked me for
the privilege of being a missionary. This is it. Don't you want it?’ It was as though he said, ‘These
are not your sufferings. They're not beating you. These are mine.’ And relief swept through me.”
‘great calm...relief.’
Helen’s testimony is one of humility and of casting anxiety on God amidst suffering!
‘Peace to all of you who are in Christ.’
(1 Peter 5:14)
The Peace of humility without anxiety.
The Peace of an enemy who will not have the victory.
The Peace of future glory in the midst of difficulty.
The Peace of Christ.
Helen Roseveare died on December 7, 2016
She is now enjoying ‘eternal glory in Christ.’