You Can Resist A Lion Series

[N.B. Earlier in the service we had a short presentation on Rosa Parks.]

Today we’re continuing our series of ‘Great Messages of Encouragement’. We’ve had four talks so far. We’ve remembered that God will be with us. That he will strengthen those who wait on him. That there’s a glory to come that far outweighs any present sufferings.

Today, we’re going to look at a short passage in 1 Peter.

BACKGROUND

Peter (as I’m sure you know!) was one of Jesus’ disciples. When he wrote this letter he was probably in Rome. He’s writing to Christians living in various provinces in Asia Minor, an area that is now Turkey.

Very early in his letter, Peter talks about suffering. He writes, ‘In all this’ – our new birth, our inheritance – ‘you greatly rejoice, THOUGH NOW FOR A LITTLE WHILE YOU MAY HAVE HAD TO SUFFER GRIEF IN ALL KINDS OF TRIALS.’

Christians in Peter’s time were experiencing a lot of trials.

We think that Peter wrote this letter in about 64 A.D., plus or minus a few years. At that time, Nero was the Roman emperor. He was, by all accounts, savage, cruel and very possibly mad.

In 64 A.D., there was a great fire which destroyed two-thirds of Rome. According to a historian called Tacitus, many people believed that Emperor Nero had himself ordered the burning of Rome! ‘Consequently’, he wrote, ‘to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted THE MOST EXQUISITE TORTURES on a class hated for their abominations, called “Chrestians” by the populace.’

So, Christians in Rome were having a really hard time. But it’s clear that the people Peter was writing to were also suffering. Peter wrote to encourage them, believers in his day. But his message encourages us too.

THE LETTER SO FAR

We’re going to take a look at a passage in 1 Peter 5. That’s the last chapter in 1 Peter. Before we look at that, we should have at least an idea of what Peter has been talking about up to this point.

There are three words in Peter’s letter which come up repeatedly. They are love, suffering and glory.

Peter really emphasizes love! Let’s take 1 Peter 1:22 as an example. Peter writes:

“Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth SO THAT YOU HAVE SINCERE LOVE for each other, LOVE ONE ANOTHER DEEPLY, FROM THE HEART.”

Peter is calling us to an extraordinary level of love. If we’ve been going to church for some time, we’ve probably heard sermons where the speaker has told us that in Greek there are three main words for love. There’s ‘philia’, brotherly love. It could be sisterly love, of course, or we could say friendship. There’s ‘eros’, which is romantic love. And there’s ‘agape’ which is unconditional love.

Peter is saying, ‘YOU HAVE SINCERE LOVE’. That’s philia, ‘brotherly love’. But Peter wants more.

Next, Peter says, ‘LOVE ONE ANOTHER DEEPLY’. Now, Peter is talking about agape love. When John wrote ‘GOD SO LOVED THE WORLD’ [John 3:16] he was talking about agape love. When Jesus said, ‘YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’ [Luke 10:27] he was talking about agape-love.

Peter wants us to progress from philia-love to agape-love for one another.

This is challenging. But Peter hasn’t finished! Finally, he adds, ‘FROM THE HEART.’ ‘From the heart’ comes from the word ‘ektenos’. It means ‘fully-stretched … extended out’.

So Peter is calling on believers to show agape-love, fully extended. Wow! A big ask! What might that look like? I’d like to give you one very small and simple example.

Do you remember Jesus’ parable about a king commending his servants? [Matthew 25.] The king tells them: ‘I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was ill and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

Jesus said, ‘I was a stranger and you invited me in.’ How can we apply that? Suppose someone new comes along to Rosebery Park. After the service, you go for your coffee. You see this new person. What do you have to do? [pause] What you have to say is, ‘Hi! Would you like to come and join us?’ The person was a stranger and you invited them in. You did what the king asked you to do.

I met someone who said that she prayed before a service that God would guide her to people to talk to. Unfortunately, things don’t always work as well as we’d like.