I’ll say up front that I don’t like the chapter break from 1 Peter 1 to 1 Peter 2.  We know that the chapter breaks were not part of the original texts, and here it seems to break up the flow of what God is wanting us to see.  Specifically, God is giving us a full picture of what it looks like for someone who is a Christian, honestly pursuing God, and growing in their faith.  Like most scripture, God speaks most clearly when we slow down, so that is what we’re going to do today.

1 Peter 1:22-25 – “Having purified your souls by your obedience to the truth for a sincere brotherly love, love one another earnestly from a pure heart, ²³ since you have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God; ²⁴ for

And this word is the good news that was preached to you.”

Our faith, our trust in God and belief in the gospel of Jesus comes from the Word.  Romans 10:17 tells us that “faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of Christ.”

The overflow of a heart that has felt the weight of the gospel of Jesus, and is believing on Jesus alone for salvation, is a sincere brotherly love.  Why is that?  How is that tied into your own salvation?  When you have Jesus, you have everything you need.   Believing that in Christ you have been forgiven of all your sin, past, present, and future, should lead you to be eager to extend forgiveness to others in love.  As you grow in that love towards others, you are simultaneously growing in your own faith and trust that Christ is enough.

1 Corinthians 1:23-24 – “we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, ²⁴ but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.”

One of the most difficult doctrines of Christianity is grace.  We bring nothing to the table to God, we can offer nothing, we simply receive the gift of grace and mercy through Jesus.  When we talk about living out the Christian life, our default is to try to “be good” as if it were possible within our own power.  If it were, Jesus died needlessly.  As it is, when the Bible speaks of our call to be perfect, holy, and righteous, that is only possible through Jesus.  The righteousness is not our own, but we are clothed in the righteousness of God.

Isaiah 61:10 – “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord; my soul shall exult in my God, for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation; he has covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself like a priest with a beautiful headdress, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.”

Philippians 3:8-9 – “I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ ⁹ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith”

With that in mind, 1 Peter encourages to walk in a manner of life according to who you are in Christ.

1 Peter 1:13-16 – “Therefore, preparing your minds for action, and being sober-minded, set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.  As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance,  but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, since it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.”

Brothers and Sisters, Jesus Christ is Lord.  We have been adopted as sons and daughters of God, and we are righteous in Christ.  He blood has ransomed us from sin; we are His.  The total cost of our sin past, present, and future, has been atoned for by Jesus.  These are the things, the gospel Truths that we are to have in our mind as we live our life.  There is a way in which even adopted sons and daughters of God can backslide and be conformed to passions over time, which is not in line with the Truth of the gospel, and the Truth of who we are in Christ.  This type of manner of life is referred to as ignorance, because it forgets that we are no longer bound by sin – we are no longer destined for life apart from God, but we belong to a righteous family.  God is saying to us, stop living a lie, believe the gospel, set your hope on the grace of God in Jesus daily, and live out who God has said you are – a holy, righteous, adopted son or daughter.  Each day is a new day for the mercies of God, and so we trust in Him.

Grace and Peace,

Adam

Brothers and Sisters, our hope as Christians is not in an idea, but a person.  Jesus is alive.  He intercedes for us, and anyone whose hope rests in Him alone has nothing to fear in this life or the next.  My hope is that each of us can find our rest in God from the gospel of Jesus, and a joy in knowing that if you are in Christ by God’s grace through faith, everything in life is drawing us closer to Him.

1 Peter 1:3-9 – “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, ⁴ to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, ⁵ who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. ⁶ In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, ⁷ so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. ⁸ Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, ⁹ obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls.”

All that we have is from Christ.  All that we need is found in Christ.  All that we could ever hope for is secure in Christ.  In the passage above, we are told that we will be grieved by “various trials”.  What kind of trials would this comprise?  Being in need?  Yes.  Being betrayed?  Yes.  Sickness?  Yes.  Loss? Yes.  Abandonment? Yes.  Abuse?  Yes.  We are not given a list of trials, but we know that what is meant is that it will be more than one and more than one type.

Is our faith genuine?  The passage above tells us two things; One, true faith is a gift of God’s power, who guards our faith our entire lives (verse 5).  It is not up to us to muster faith on our own.  Second, genuine faith will emerge from trials rejoicing in the gospel and in the sufficiency and supremacy of Jesus.

If you are in Christ, there is always a purpose in pain.  God will use your trial to draw you nearer to Him, and in eternity it will be a source of praise and glory and honor of Jesus.  If you are not in Christ, then the pain you feel now is nothing compared to the feeling of eternity apart from God.

My encouragement is to rest in Jesus.  Rest in His finished work, and know that in Him we have all that we need.  Lay everything at the feet of God, and ask for whatever you need, and God will meet you there.  Jesus died to make an end of all your sin and reconcile you to God.  His blood covers all of your sin, past, present, and future.  It is because He lives, He is risen from the grave, that we know our salvation and future hope is secure.  Jesus is alive!  He will never leave or forsake you, His desire is for your joy in Him.  He may see us with idols in our lives or hearts and use trials to draw us closer to Him, but ultimately these things are done in love.  We know this because it was the love of God that overcame our sin, when Jesus willingly died in our place.

Are you burdened by your sin?  Pray to the God of grace and ask Him to continually change your heart and glorify His name through holiness in your life.  Are you burdened by outside circumstances?  Lay every anxious thought at the feet of God, knowing that He is in control and cares for you.  Above all, be encouraged and bold in both proclaiming the gospel and seeking the grace of God – Jesus conquered sin and the grave.  He is our living hope, and our hope in Him is more than enough.

Grace and Peace,

Adam

My hope for us all is that God would provide a hedge of protection around each of our hearts; that we would always be eager to press on to know the Lord and follow Him in joy.  God could do that, I pray for that, and yearn for that to be each of our stories when we arrive in Heaven to see Jesus face to face.

Knowing the brokenness of the world, and the brokenness of my own heart, I know that story is the exception rather than the rule.  I’ve been open to share that I neglected disciplines in my pursuit of God.  In my own life there has been more than one time when my heart became far from God.  It is the mercy and grace of God that calls us back to Himself, and the means God uses to accomplish this are His people.

It’s because of this truth, that I plead with those who claim to be Christ followers apart from the Church to find a church to belong to, and to find a group of people within that they can go through life with, both as an encourager to them, and as someone who can be encouraged by them in the Truth of God’s Word.

James 5:19-20 – “My brothers, if anyone among you wanders from the truth and someone brings him back, let him know that whoever brings back a sinner from his wandering will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins.”

None of us is immune to the sin in the world or our own hearts.  1 Corinthians 10:12 – “Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall.”  If we are not vigilant in our pursuit of God, we will drift from Him, and we will soon find ourselves in places we never thought we would be.  In those times, a voice of a brother or sister in Christ preaching the Truth of God to us, to bring repentance and renewed faith, praying for us, being with us, loving us, is the means by which God saves us.  Ecclesiastes 4:10 – “Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil.  For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up!”

If you were to fall away from God today (and any of us could), who would be the persons in your life who would call you back?  Are you that person to others in your life?  The biggest lie of cultural Christianity is that faith is private and personal.  It is neither, and any faith that may exist in that manner will not withstand a lifetime of trials in a broken world.

The people of God are a gift from God to us.  We are meant to be the hands and feet of God to others.  As our culture is turning against Christianity more and more, the trials will increase, and it will be even more imperative that we have each other.  1 John 4:10-12 – “In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.  Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.  No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.”  Stay encouraged, keep running the race God has given you, and treasure those faithful brothers and sisters in Christ God has gifted to you, by putting them in your life.  

Grace and Peace,

Adam

You will only be able to know true peace, true freedom, true love for others, when you find in God all that you desire.  Jesus tells a parable in Matthew 13 – “The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.”

This was a joyful decision.  The result was the man had everything he wanted and needed in the treasure.  Jesus is our treasure.  We have in Him and through Him all that we could ever want or need.  God is calling us to believe Him, and to live out that truth in our lives.  God is loving and He yearns for those whom He loves, to be near to them and to draw them away from those things that would keep them from Him.  It is with that heart that God gives us the message below through James –

James 4:1-10 – “What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you?  You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel. You do not have, because you do not ask.  You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions.  You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Or do you suppose it is to no purpose that the Scripture says, “He yearns jealously over the spirit that he has made to dwell in us”?  But he gives more grace. Therefore it says, “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.”  Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.  Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.  Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom.  Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you.”

Our flesh is always going to tell us to try to find comfort in things and people apart from God.  There is no life to be had apart from God.  Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life – there is no other way to God, there is no other Truth apart from God, and there is no Life apart from the blood of Jesus.  What things in your life are you looking to for comfort and satisfaction apart from God?  Look above and take hold of God’s promise to you – humbly come before Him, submit your life to Him again today, and each morning, each moment, and He will draw near to you.  There is greater peace and joy found in Christ than is found in the world – believe God and find your rest in Him.

Grace and Peace,

Adam

What is the difference between someone who knows about God and someone who knows God?  What is the difference between someone who believes God exists and someone who is putting all their hope in life in believing on Jesus Christ for salvation?

I want to bring a couple things to the forefront of this conversation for our consideration.  First, is that satan, who is called the ruler of this world, knows more about God than you or I do.  satan has spoken with God in person, satan was present with Jesus, and throughout the ages has been in the presence of God.  Second is that satan probably knows more scripture and more of what Jesus has said than you do.  satan used scripture to attempt to tempt Jesus in the wilderness (Matt 4:6).

In James 2:19, we are told – “You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe—and shudder!”  

In Jewish culture in Biblical times, the Shema was a daily prayer commanded to be made in the morning and evening.  It followed Deuteronomy 4:6-9 and begins “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one”.  James above is referencing that common Jewish religious prayer saying that even the demons believe this.  Right belief alone then, means nothing by itself.

What separates us from the demons?  1 Peter 1:8-9 – “Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, ⁹ obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls.  The demons know truth about God, but they do not submit themselves willingly to Him, nor do they love Him for who He is.  It is only the grace of God, extended to us through the blood of Jesus, that separates us.  Jesus redeemed us, and has given us a new heart that finds a joy inexpressible in knowing Him.  In knowing Him in joy, the overflow of our lives is worship and a passionate desire for others to know Him as well. 

My exhortation is to move your knowledge from your head to your heart.  Cover this in prayer, knowing that this is only possible by God working in you, but that it is God’s desire to do so.  Our lives are busy, our lives are messy, and if we do not stop and set our hearts affections on God, we can very quickly move from Him, or worse become deceived to think we know Him, when we just know about Him.  Stay encouraged where God has you today, and know that He is able and wanting to meet you wherever you are.

Grace and Peace,

Adam

James 2:14-17 – “What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him? If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that? So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.”

As I’m sitting under the weight of God’s word above in James, I’m convicted of the many ways and times in which I have stopped at words, rather than being the hands and feet of God as an overflow of faith.  So if today’s message convicts you, and God uses it to move your heart closer to His, that is a good thing, and you have a great deal of company with you.

Some people have said if you want to know what someone truly believes look at their actions not their words.  I would say in our current society, we could better say, if you want to know what someone truly believes, look at how they spend their money.  A credit card bill/bank statement, can tell you a lot about what you value in life.

Christians often hear of problems in others’ lives, and in the city they belong to, and “pray about it”.  Prayer is a good thing, but often we are meant to be God’s answer to prayer, and we are not because we do not have the faith to enter into His plans.  If a brother or sister in Christ comes to you with a need that you have the financial means to meet, what is holding you back?  You belong to a church that staffs pastors who serve you and your community with the gospel – do you support your own church financially?  Who are the weak, marginalized persons, the orphans and the widows among you?  Are they cared for by you?

We are the redeemed, the chosen of God through Jesus, to be ministers of reconciliation.  Our God is making all things new, and we are called to bring His Kingdom into the world as light among darkness.  This is not of us, but God in us, working through us by faith.  Nothing that we treasure today will endure 1,000 years from now, but every act of faith will bear fruit into eternity, both in strengthening our own faith and the faith of those around us.

This message is not about money.  Money is only a barometer of your heart.  God desires your heart to be fully His, for your joy to be rooted in Him, and for your joy to be full.  His desire is for you to stop giving yourself to things that will never satisfy you, and instead give your heart to Him, and find rest in Him.  My hope for my own heart and for all of you, everyone I care about, is that we would find in God all that we desire, and thereby be free to give up all that we have not out of duty, but delight in knowing that we have a greater treasure in Heaven.  The call is not to be a monk and give away all your material possessions, but to put your heart in line with Gods and move beyond words into actions as God gives you opportunity.  Ask God to give you a heart that would move beyond words and prayers to action as He leads.  Ask Him for boldness to move beyond comfort in possessions and find rest in Him.  He loves us, and desires our hearts to be happy in Him.

For your joy,

Adam

In daily life, we will be confronted with things that will not go the way we wanted them to do, and we have a choice – we can respond in our flesh in anger, or we can look to Christ.  God does not want our outward obedience merely – he desires our hearts to be His.  How do we fight for a heart that is soft and loving, as a result of the gospel?

James 1:19-21 – “Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger; ²⁰ for the anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God. ²¹ Therefore put away all filthiness and rampant wickedness and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls.

Often times we consider what it means to be “doers of the word” and what it is to be “a good Christian” and think about specific things – like don’t lie, don’t cheat, don’t steal, etc.  These are all true of course, we ought not to do those things, but God here talks about a condition of the heart, anger, immediately before talking about being “doers of the word”.  Why is that?  Why choose anger?  Whether or not our heart is prone to anger is a good barometer of where our heart is with God.  Consider that God saved his harshest rebukes for the self-righteous pharisees who probably lived a better life than any of us outwardly, but Jesus called them “whitewashed tombs” (Matt 23:27).  They looked good on the outside, but were dead on the inside.

What is required for someone to be angry?  Two things:  Unmet expectations and a lack of faith in God’s sovereign goodness.  We have the hope of Heaven and eternity with Christ, secured by Jesus’s death, burial, and resurrection.  With this in view, how does that change our perspective?  What loss have we actually incurred by an unmet expectation?  Further, God has promised to use all things for good, for those who love God and have been called according to His purpose.  Do you believe that?  Do you believe that God wants to use our trials to allow us to love others sacrificially and supernaturally to display the gospel?  Do you believe that God wants to use you and your trials to grow your own faith, and strength for ministry?  Sustained anger is a  heart denies these truths and focuses in on self rather than God.  Put another way, sustained anger is evidence of idolatry and unbelief.

We’re told plainly that anger does not produce the righteousness of God – so what does? Meekly receiving the implanted word of God.  What does that look like?  For one to be meek, they must acknowledge their own weakness.  For us as Christians, this looks like our coming to God daily, continually, and acknowledging that in our flesh we have no hope, and so we look to Christ, and desire for our lives to be transformed by Him through receiving and submitting to His Word.

Sustained meekness before God, produces a soft heart, that is able to forgive and love in ways the world cannot understand.  A heart that has received the implanted Word of God, finds in God Himself joy, and is therefore freed from expectations of anything beyond Himself.  To illustrate, if someone told you, you would receive $50,000,000 dollars later today – would you care if you lost a penny on the way to receive it?  Of course not, but that is essentially what anger in our heart reveals.  Jesus is our treasure – greater than we can possibly imagine, and we have the Holy Spirit in us by faith, a guarantee of our inheritance for eternity.  Our battleground as Christians is to find in Jesus our heart’s satisfaction.  This is what we strive for when we go to God in His Word.  This is what God promises us when we seek Him there.

I hope this finds each of you well, and God richly blesses His time with you in His Word.  Taste and see that the Lord is good, and He is greater than anything else the world could offer.

Grace and Peace,

Adam

James 1:2-4 – “Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”

If you have heard this verse preached before, you no doubt have struggled with it as much as I have.  God doesn’t tell us merely to endure trials and hard times, he tells us to count it all joy.  How are we to look at circumstances and pain with a heart of joy?  It isn’t easy.  If it is a struggle for you, you are not alone.  I would go so far as to say if you do not have the hope of the gospel in your heart, it is impossible.

We live in a world stained by sin; others’ sin, my sin, and your sin.  It is because of this that we are not surprised at all when trials come.  When they do, as Christians we are able to look beyond what is seen to what is unseen and find hope.  We know that Jesus is the answer for the things we see that are wrong.  We see others as broken, and in need of prayer and encouragement rather than an object of our anger.  We see disease and death as evidence of what is wrong in the world and remember that once and for all Jesus has made things right on the cross – this is not our home – our home is with God, where there will be no more sickness, no more pain, and no tears.  This is how we find joy amidst any circumstance.  If not immediately, then soon through prayer and refreshment from God’s Word to us – because the mercies of God are new each morning, reminding us that we are His, and our future is secure in Him.

2 Corinthians 4:6-11  “For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.  ⁷ But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us. ⁸ We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; ⁹ persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; ¹⁰ always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies. ¹¹ For we who live are always being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh.”

Christian, be encouraged.  You will always be in a hard time, coming out of a hard time, or about to be in a hard time.  That is a constant in life.  What we have, that the world does not understand, and what can be a powerful means of declaring the hope that is within us, is peace and joy in Jesus amidst any trial.  We eagerly forgive others, we bless those who persecute us, we pray for those who sin against us, we endure difficulties knowing that Jesus endured as we have, and these 70, 80, 90 years we have on Earth are a blink of an eye in comparison to eternity, in a fullness of joy with God in Heaven.  Every hard time is an opportunity to grow your faith in Jesus, to build a steadfast immovable faith that makes the world ask, who is your God?  Keep running strong, and know that every saint before you has walked a similar path.

Grace and Peace,

Adam

Hebrews 12: 1-3 – “Since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, ² looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.  ³ Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted.”

Hebrews 11 lays out a list of Christians who trusted God, and obeyed His calling on their lives.  These people were no different than you or I, and God used them in amazing ways simply because they trusted and followed Him.

It with that in sight, God in the passage above calls us individually to live our lives with the same purpose.  What is weighing you down?  Keeping you from pursuing and serving God as you ought to?  Maybe it is something from your past that you are holding on to.  Maybe it’s your current life circumstances.  Maybe it is sin you are currently struggling with, and you’re trying to clean up your life before you come to God.  The gospel, the good news of Jesus, is that your past has been paid for, your sin has been defeated, and the righteousness of God has been given to you by the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus.  Jesus died for your past and your sin.

We often feel such a burden to “do” something, when all we’re called to do is look to Jesus and trust in what he has done.

A life lived by faith will not look pretty.  You can look at the people listed in Hebrews 11 and find that the people included were broken, flawed people.  Likewise, they encountered struggles and trials from the world and even those they cared about.  David alone was an adulterer, murderer, liar, and guilty of unbelief in God’s ability to save multiple times in his life.  Even in his sin, David was unrepentant, until finally being confronted by the prophet Nathan – yet he was called a “man after God’s own heart”.  David also encountered family members who rose up against him, and sought to kill him.  So David was acquainted of the sorrows and trials of this life well.

How can we live our life with endurance?  By looking to Christ and the joy that awaits us in Him for eternity.  In Numbers 21, the people of Israel prayed that God would take away the serpents that were killing them.  What did God do?  He did not remove the serpents – people were still bitten.  Numbers 21:8 – “the Lord said to Moses, “Make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole, and everyone who is bitten, when he sees it, shall live.”  God does not promise us an easy life, but He has shown us the Way of life in Jesus.  Taste and see that the Lord Jesus is good, that in Him we have redemption from sin and righteousness in Christ, and that in knowing Him intimately and His love for you are pleasures forevermore.  Like a runner who is running a race to win – cast off those things that weigh you down and keep you from Christ, continually entrusting yourself to the founder and perfecter of your faith.

Grace and Peace,

Adam