Peculiar Or Wierd?

Peculiar or Weird?

TEXT: 1 Peter 2:9

INTRODUCTION:

1. Remember how college students dressed during the hippie days of Haight Ashbury?

2. Suddenly after decades of short hair and no beards, the hair was long, greasy and the beards were scraggly and unkept, bell bottoms, tie died shirts, braless babes

3. What was going on?

4. It was the counter culture. Non conformity was the cry of the day.

5. But..... the irony of it was that they were all conforming to the non-conformist model

6. Have you ever set outside a junior high school, waiting to pick up your children and watched the children that come out the door?

7. have you ever attended a junior high or high school football game and watched the way the kids dress?

8. I remember the spiked hair, girl with the purple hair, the skin heads, the boy with half of his head shaved and the other half shoulder length.a) At least two things are going on. They want to show they are different.

9. But the reason they want to be different is because their friends are all different.

10. In other words they are conforming to a non conformists mode.

11. All of this non conformity goes on in a misguided search for freedom (usually from parents, school and state).

DISCUSSION:I. The irony of this is that the truly free non conformist should be the Christian. And he should be proud of his non conformity.

1 Peter 2:9 But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light;

A. The phrase "Special People" was unfortunately translated "peculiar people" in the KJV.

B. Webster = "Only one, special 3. Strange. Today we think of it as meaning strange or weird.

C. "Ye are a weird people."

D. PERI-POI/-ESIN = "Possession, ones on property.

E. Ye are God’s special possession or creation.

F. It’s no wonder Christians sometimes feel weird when we consider whats happened to the world. But the problems is not with us it is with the worlds skewed world view.

G. The Christians to whom Peter wrote suffered from this inferiority complex.

H. They were living in an area characterized by every kind of philosophical, spiritual, moral and religious perversion.

I. 1 Pet 1:1-2; 4:2-4.

J. Peter wanted them to know they were special and should not become discouraged.

K. The Christian is special.

L. He is one of the chosen.

M. Colossians 3:12 Therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, put on tender mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, longsuffering; 1 Timothy 5:21 I charge you before God and the Lord Jesus Christ and the elect angels that you observe these things without prejudice, doing nothing with partiality.

N. In fact what they had was so special that some were beginning to ask about their hope.

1 Peter 3:15 But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts, and always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you, with meekness and fear;

O. Many Christians are afraid of being different but we should not feel that way.

P. Consider the mess the world is in.

II. Something has gone wrong in America.

A. We seem to be on a course to self destruction.

B. The "Land of the free of the home of the brave" which at one time was proud of her national motto, "In God We Trust," is now so bent on separating "church and state," that the voice of religious people can barely be heard without a court battle ensuing.

C. Few people are aware that Secular Humanists are at war with Christianity, determined to choke out its influence.

D. Hedonism of the rankest kind dominates our airwaves and night life.

E. "It happened so subtly that few people noticed at first. Little by little, morality and freedom started to crumble. It came first in government, in education, in the media--and finally it began to shake our families and our own lives. Something fundamental has changed. Law and government no longer provide a foundation of justice and morality but have become the means of licensing moral perversions of all kinds. Education has become the enemy of religious truth and values. And the media have provided the means for propagating the change. Dr. Francis A Schaeffer, A Christian Manifesto (p.i).

F. Anyone who is educated in the lessons of history is surely aware that the survival of any nation hinges on the restoration of the righteous principles that once made our country great.

G. The words of the song are true, "Jesus really is the answer, the only hope" of turning it all around.