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Well, hello there. Yeah. Welcome. Welcome. Those of you online joining us, awesome to be here. But I figured, you know, since Ian led worship and he did the announcements, I should just bring him out here for the hat trick and let him go ahead and preach also. Right?
Oh, you're actually cheering for it? Alright. Ian. Alright. See you guys next week. Later. No. Two services cheered, two didn't. So now I know who I don't like anymore.
You guys were my favorite, but we'll we'll see. No. I have to preach this week. You know why? Because we're gonna talk about humility, and I am the humblest person I know.
And so I'm gonna preach a sermon on humility that no one's ever preached before. It's gonna be fantastic. Best sermon on humility ever coming right now. Actually, it's quite the opposite. I it it this is this is one of those things that, guys, I'm with you on this. This is hard. It's it's it's hard
cause, you know, Lord, it's hard to be humble when you're perfect in every way. There's that's an old song. But no. I I I I think there's moments when we talk about what humility is, and it's interesting that Peter is writing this because that's what he struggled with as a as a young follower of Christ.
Was he he had skills, he had strengths, and God wanted to use them, but, man, it was he got in his own way.
And so he's gonna end this book talking about this, and we're gonna talk about humility, and I know I've just, you know and and and and not being humble will cause you to just see things different and and make choices different. I know I I I struggle with that even when I was a kid. If I thought I was right,
it didn't matter what you said. I would argue with my dad. And back then, today, if you argue about something and you can look it up, everyone just pulls out their phones and starts googling it. And the person that was so adamant they're right, if they don't say anything within five minutes, that means they're discovering they're wrong. But if you stay on the Internet long enough,
you'll find somebody that agrees with you. And then you end up in this weird argument. Well, back in my day, you only had one answer, and it wasn't the Internet. We had world book encyclopedias.
So if you fought well, I I get an argument with my dad, and I was so dumb. I once got in an argument with him about the battle of Iwo Jima. And here's the problem. My dad was there, and I'm 10.
And I'm like, you're wrong, dad. He's like, I was there. I mean, wait. I was literally right there. And I go, wow. You're just too close to it. You don't understand.
We have more information now. We've studied it more. You know, like, how younger people get all arrogant, like, know more than you. We have more revelation. He goes, how could you have any more understanding than actually being there? And so then he go go get the and I was saying that something can have, something can be, and and so, like, so I go and I, you know,
alright. You're gonna be so wrong. You go get the the the o. And I'm like, oh, I went to Okinawa. I need the I. You guys didn't catch that. I said the wrong letter, didn't you? I fought with him about the battle of Okinawa too, by the way. So I'm like, Iwo Jima, you know, looking it up. I'm like, see, they
can't blah, blah, blah, blah. It actually said exactly what my dad said. Only I was so full of pride in this moment, so convinced I am right that as I read the words that contradicted me, I read it and saw it confirming what I said.
That sounds stupid, but if you just get on social media or you get in arguments, how many times that someone, if you are full of pride and and you will not be humble, you will literally still see the facts the way you see the facts. It just doesn't matter. And I'd be like, si, and my dad go, Son, read that again,
only you actually listen to what you just read. Alright. It says you can. Now
you have a choice. If you really have a problem with humility, like me, sometimes I'd double down, and I'd go, world book's just as wrong as you.
Because dad, I've had ten years of experience in this world. I know what you don't know. And and and and and get in these fights, and it's it's interesting that I think we all struggle with this.
And what we're gonna learn when it comes to what humility is and what pride is, some of us that think we're really humble in this room because of how you're viewing life, like especially the content of what we've been talking about in this series is what do you do when you suffer for doing the right thing?
And and and you think you've been suffering, you've been struggling, you've been and and and and and you just think, I'm not prideful. I feel defeated. But part of the struggle could be pride is the problem, And you don't even realize it because pride and humble mean something different in scripture.
So here's the big idea we're gonna look at in the last chapter of first Peter, and it's simply this, don't grumble, be humble.
If you've been in this church very long, I've used this big idea before. Although I got creative and reversed the order, used to be be humble, don't grumble, but I kinda, you know, gotta get creative with it, you know. So I turn it around, and you go, the reason I just stuck with this, it's easy to remember, and the reason it's coming up again is this is a very common theme all through scripture.
A lot of times we get into trouble, even if we're following God, is because when things don't make sense, and especially suffering when you're doing right, to us, doesn't seem to make sense. Because we always have this idea that says, if I do the right thing, God's gonna give me the Scooby snack.
And so we have this almost this what they call in this today's world, a prosperity gospel mentality. That means if if I do the things God wants me to do, I get what I want from God.
And and that's not what scripture says. But yet if you're if you're prideful, you keep reading what you think you want to see into there, and it doesn't say that. And and so what happens is when life doesn't make sense, we can grumble. That's the whole story of God's people in the Old Testament.
They they kept thinking we're special because God said we're chosen, and that became prideful because they thought they're special because of who they were. They didn't understand that you're special because I decided it, and I'm gonna use you. And it's about me, not you. They kept making it about themselves. Then they would suffer. They would struggle, and God was trying to get them to humble themselves,
and they would grumble instead. And when you grumble and you're not humble, you're gonna miss what God's trying to do. Because a lot of times what we grumble about is we want God to change our circumstances.
And if we learn anything from this letter that Peter wrote to a bunch of Christians who are not only suffering for their faith, they're losing their lives for it now. We learned that God often does not wanna change the circumstances. He wants to change us to meet our circumstances,
and that we're gonna miss that if we're not humble. So where we're gonna be is in in in in first Peter chapter five, and what we're gonna learn about this is that that's
that's how suffering fits into a significant life. We can learn to actually experience the significance that God wants for us even through suffering, but that happens only with humility if I if I don't grumble, but I choose to be humble.
So in first Peter chapter five, the first four verses is he's talking to leaders, elders, the older, the more experienced, the teachers, and he's basically following up on what we looked at last week to to to turn into the skid. That's Christian. And and do not walk away from God's asking you to do, especially when you're suffering. Serve others. Love others. All these things that you will never do if you're not humble.
And he tells leaders, hey, you need to lead from a position of humility. Meaning, hey, as you lead and you teach guys, there's gonna be people that gonna grumble, and you have to not do it
angrily. You gotta not do it. You and you gotta not lead just to get a platform. It's not about you. You're doing what God called you to do. So that preached to me all week, but I wanna jump in when it starts to transition to the summary of the whole letter that speaks to all of us. And that's starting in verse five. He says this, in the same way, you who are younger must accept the authority of the elders. Now he's saying, younger people, the elders, the authority, what he's talking about is biblical authority teaching God's word. So if they're teaching truth, you should accept it instead of saying like I did. You know what? I don't care what you said about the battle of Iwo Jima. I want it to be my way. So I'm gonna look at the bible different than you. That's a huge mistake.
And you know what that means? You gotta be humble. So he says, be humble, younger people. And all of you, which we learned in studying scripture in the bible, all means all, and that's all all means. All of us
dress yourselves in humility as you relate to one another. Humble again. And this, he compares it to how we treat each other. Just like in the middle of this letter, he's talking about how to handle the suffering for doing us right, and he stops and talks about relationships
because he knows that one of the key things that's gonna affect you that that's gonna be affected when you start to struggle, when life gets stressful, when it gets hard, when you start to suffer, when it starts to get tough, when it starts to make sense, the first people you usually hurt are the ones around you.
And he goes, the only way to make those relationships work is stay humble. So be humble. Be humble.
And then he says, God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble. So he goes, if you act prideful, even if you know God's word, even you know it, if you do it in a proud way, you are now fighting against God. But he will give his grace, his strength, his power to those who are humble. So what did he say? Be humble, be humble, be humble.
And then the very next verse six, so humble yourselves under the mighty power of God, and at the right time, he will lift you up in honor. So four times in two verses, in four different ways, hey, be humble.
Guess what? You know how you get along? If you're young, be humble. Listen to God's word. If if if in all of your relationships, you know what's gonna help? Be humble.
And he goes, and you know what? When it comes to following and having significance in life and having the grace of God to work in your life in a powerful way, you know how that's gonna work? Knock knock. No. It's who's there. I say be humble. Knock knock. Be humble. There. That's how they work. Alright. Knock knock.
Impatient cow. Moo. See, that's how those jokes work. Stay with me, folks. Be humble. And then finally, be humble.
Four times. And here's what he says. If you do it at the right time, he'll lift you up in honor. So at the right time, there'll be significance. At the right time, you're gonna make at the right time, there's victory. At the right time. Here's the problem. When we read the right time, if we read it as consumer Christians, like I said at the beginning of this series, if you don't get it, you won't get it. Get it? If your approach to church is I come to be a better person, then I get all the better things I want, and you come to church thinking that the church is an organization that serves my spiritual needs instead of we are a church and we choose to be the body of Christ together and we serve one another and love one another, if I come with that it's all about me mentality, when you hear the right time, what does a customer think when they hear right time? You're booking an appointment. Hey, what time works for you?
Customer mentality, consumer mentality when you hear right time means what's the most convenient time for me? That's not what it's saying. It's saying in God's timing. He knows the plan.
Our timing is always always quicker. I I I I got to stage, I had to get a colonoscopy on Friday. Now don't worry, I'm not gonna be captain TMI here.
The procedure is fine. You're asleep. The prep is the hard part, but not the prep you think I'm thinking of. That didn't bother me either. The worst part was I couldn't eat after I went to bed the night and day and a half before, and by time I did the procedure and got done, I didn't get to eat for forty hours.
That was the hard part. I was like forty hours without food. I literally felt like Jesus on the cross.
My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? I
live in a world that forty hours was like death, and a lot of us live in a world that when God says the right time, that time might be a long time. And what he's talking about is he's talking to these people that the honor might come when they are killed for their faith.
You see, you gotta have the right perspective, and it's gonna take humility to understand that. So the next few verses, I'm gonna give us three things that happen if I choose humility.
I can also walk through these things, which in the end are a blessing. But before we get there, I wanna define a few terms. Humility, pride, and significance according to what the world says and scripture says. So first, what is humility?
According to the bible, humility is honestly assessing myself in light of God's holiness and my sinfulness. So I gotta look at myself. That's why we need to be confessors of sin. A lot of Christianity wants to take a piece of what God is. God is love, so I don't judge, I don't challenge, and we don't look at any of our sin. We just say, oh, he loves us. Well, the problem is that makes his love pretty cheap if I think I've done nothing wrong.
When I see what Jesus did compared to me, there should be a humility there. Yeah. Because now I know and I embrace the grace of Christ, and I know that in his holiness, my sinfulness. This also allows me to embrace in confidence what he's done for me and given me. There could be a confidence.
See, a lot of people think humility is not having confidence, thinking badly of yourself. No. It's thinking correctly of yourself, both good and bad. So when you know your strengths, know how to use your gifts. When you know your weakness, you know you know how to honor that. You know how to give God praise for all of that because he's the one that empowers you. And the difference you know what the difference between confidence and arrogance is?
Humility. Because when people are arrogant, they think they're good at everything, and they won't admit anything wrong.
To be humble is not to be looked down. It's to embrace the grace of God and embrace the strength he's given to you and be happy for the grace you have for all the in between where you fail. And that's biblical humility. So then now let's look at pride.
Pride in scripture is aspiring to the status of God and refusing to acknowledge my dependence on God. So, basically, we're gonna see in the next series all about this. This is what Satan did. This is his trick to get us is to say, hey. You know what? When it comes to certain moments,
God's word says go this way, but that makes no sense to me. And the voice of the enemy and our own voices can sometimes say, well, I wanna I believe in it, but you know what? I gotta go around them on this one. You know, God says this is this is what a marriage should be. I'm gonna do it this way.
God says this is what I should do with my money, but you know what? I'm kinda stressed out. I'm not gonna listen to them. I'm gonna do it this way. God says do this. I'm gonna do it that way. That's pride
because you're trusting in yourself. You're saying, I believe me, and I believe I know me better than God, and I know the answer better than God. I know Iwo Jima better than my father, and he was there. And that's kind of pride. So what and in the end, what we really want is a significant life.
God built us to aspire for significance. But what does significance mean from a worldly point of view? Culturally, it means individuals motivated by self interest, self indulgence, and a false sense of self sufficiency pursuing selfish ambition for the purpose of self glorification.
Did you catch a word that keeps popping up, just kind of stands out? And. No. Self.
This is pride. And here's what's funny. Think about your approach to church, why you're here, why you follow God. I have to think about this. This happens to a lot of preachers. It's a tough thing because if you stand up in front of a crowd and people start listening, and and and it's easy to be motivated by self interest.
I can come to church because it's all about what I'm gonna get. I want a kids ministry this, I want that way, I wanna teach, it's it's it's about what I'm interested in.
And I'm self indulgence when I pray, and my talk to God is all about everything's about I want this job, I want that car, I want that house, pray about this thing. It's usually we can turn into a very self indulgence in what we're looking for from the Lord.
And then we have a false sense of self sufficiency, which means I'm gonna go do the things God told me. I'm gonna be legalistically applying others because I can make this work, and I'm a good person. And usually when you have that self sufficiency, when you look at the world out there and people that are sinners, you think you're better than them, and we look down upon them, and we act afraid of them, we fight with them, and we don't want our kids around them, and we just we act like a holier than thou
when we're all holy as in full of holes. And and and but we get this self sufficiency because we think we're better because we're better, and that leads to a selfish ambition for the purpose of self glorification.
And that's why if you have that problem, when you have problems, you're not gonna get in communion, you're not gonna reveal your struggle, and you don't want anyone to see it. In matter of time, you won't even show up at church because you're like, uh-oh, I'm not the perfect per I'm not doing it, so I'll just hide out.
We can be followers of God and completely embracing that in the way we approach everything. What does the word say significance really is? Serving others for the glory of God. See how much simpler of an answer that is? That's what we saw last week when he said turn into this kid.
Jesus pointed this out with even though he was heading towards the cross, gonna die for us even though we sinned against him, he took time to wash the disciples' feet. And he said, if you wanna be first, you need to be last. Significance in your life will come from taking your life, your strengths, your gifts,
and pointing other people to Jesus and loving them. A lot of us try to do that because God says to do it because you're like, if I do that, then he'll give me what I really think is significant. That is the significant act of life. When Jesus says, I came to serve, not to be served,
and that's why the disciples had a problem with him trying to wash their feet at first. You know why? Pride. Because they're like, wow, if him, Lord of all, is washing our feet, what does that mean we gotta do? He means you gotta wash feet.
And they were still arguing, you know, James and John, the mom came, hey, can they sit on your right and left? They were all put jockeying for position all the time. And God says, you really wanna be in a good position? Wash some feet.
And that's significance. And we will not ever chase this if we're not humble. We will grumble about this. You'll find reasons not to serve in church. You'll find reasons not to go after the mission God's given you. You grumble about it. And that's pride. That's the definition of pride in scripture. So
what if I choose to be humble? What what can that do for me? What does that help unlock? Well, let's look at verse seven.
Verse seven says, give all your worries and cares to God for he cares about you. You'll only be able to give your worries to God if you trust that God really does care about you, if you choose to be humble. In other words, he's saying right here, through humility, we can walk away from worry.
You can walk away from everybody's trying to figure out, I'm worrying. I'm worrying. I'm worrying. I'm worrying. Why am I worrying? I'm so worried. And this is problem. This is where you can be filled with pride not even knowing. If you're overwhelmed with worries, it's usually because life's not going the way you thought. You're losing, and you think, you know, pride is usually I'm cocky because I keep winning, and someone needs to take me down a peg. Well, life is taking you down a peg and you're consumed with worry, so you don't think of yourself as prideful. But think about it. If you do what God's asked you to do, you don't have to worry.
So if I am always filled with worry, I have a pride, because you know why? People who are worried about things they don't need to worry about that they can't control, you're worrying because you think you can control. You have a control issue. You wanna hold on to your worries.
The bible there says give them away to God. Now in in in the Greek, that means to dump them upon someone. Some of the older translations uses the fishing term cast, which in the in the New Testament, the Greek, it does mean to cast, but not the way we fish today. So the problem is we cast our cares the way we fish today,
and that is you take the problem, and you go,
and you sit there for a while, kinda twitches. Oh.
And you reel it back in, and what are you hoping happens when you reel it back in? You hope you have a prize. You hope you have a fish. You hope you have something you're really looking for.
I'm gonna throw my worry out, and then I'm gonna own it again. I'm gonna bring it back in, and this time, I hope it turns out different. This time, because I cast it out and then reeled it in again, I controlled it, I want the fish because you know, I want a fish story at the end. Yeah. It was this big. And
you want this prize. You're never gonna get the prize. You're not supposed to reel it back in. And the reason we reel it back in is control. Do I really trust God cares? Can I handle the suffering that he actually called me to
for the sake of his grace and his mission as we'll see? And will I trust to stay faithful to what he's asked me to do even when I'm fearful? And if I have a control issue, I will worry, and I will control it, and worry and worry is a form of pride
even though you don't feel prideful because you feel you're worrying because you feel like a loser. And the truth is you are being one if you won't surrender. You can walk away.
How do I do that? How do I how do I embrace the humility and understand and and understand God's care and understand his clarity and and to be able to embrace this and have that peace that surpasses all understanding
as I walk is if because if I can drop this and walk away, that's a blessing. Because what you're doing at that point is saying, god, I'm gonna do what you asked me to do even though it makes no sense.
I'm gonna serve others even though I feel like my time is stretched into oblivion. I'm gonna give even though I feel like going on fight. I'm gonna do I'm gonna share the faith even though I'm gonna I'm gonna continue to stay faithful in a world that makes me worse and worse and looks at me worse and worse and makes me feel bad if I share the faith. And you understand, it's share the faith. Some of you act like you're being persecuted of your faith because you argue your politics.
Your politics is not your faith. Your faith should speak into your politics, but they're not the same thing. You might be being persecuted because you're just a jerk in the way you talk about it.
I'm talking about getting pushed back because you were honestly pointing people to Jesus by loving them like Jesus and trusting God.
And and as you do that, if you can say, God, I'm gonna do it, you dump it on him. As it says, drop it on him, and he says, test me. Drop it on him, walk away, say, alright. I have the faith. I'm gonna humbly say, I can't control this. I can't fix this. I can't do this. I'm gonna do what you said, and now I know it's on you now.
It is all on you. I can walk away from this worry and give it up. How do I do that? Well, I wanna read two verses to you. First Philippians four six. Don't worry about anything. Instead, try to control it. Try everything you know how to do, and once all that backfires, then maybe say, hey, god. I I I whatever. No.
Don't worry about anything. Instead, pray about everything. Tell god what you need, and thank him for all he has done, all he has done and need. Now here's the problem. Like I said, if you come here with a consumer mentality, you say, okay. So I tell God all about what I want. There's
a difference between needs and wants, And what you need is very clarified all through scripture.
What you need is the strength to do what God's asked you to do. So when you're praying to him, you should be praying about the courage and the clarity to do what he asked you to do and go, if you ask me to do this, then I'm gonna need some strength. I'm gonna need some clarity. I'm gonna need this, and then you do it. It's not talking about, oh, god. Here's your honey do list. Here's what I want, and I want this, and I want that. It's actually talking about what you need to accomplish the mission he's given you.
And so if you look at Colossians three two, I'm only gonna read this little part of it, but it's in the context, it's saying how do you get to that point? How do you know how to pray that? He goes, think about things of heaven, not things of earth. So what I was saying is is and where do you find the things of heaven? Where do you find the things of eternal value instead of the earthly value things that we always put ahead of everything else? Right here. In
other words, the way you learn to walk away from worry by being humble is taking the time to read God's word, let it read you, and then talk to God about it. In other words, I listen to God, I talk to God. I talk to God, I listen to God.
And you're not ever gonna know the things of heaven that outweigh the things of earth. You're gonna get stuck with the everyday worries. You're gonna worry about what you're gonna eat, what you're gonna say, all these things that Jesus said, don't worry about. God knows about those.
Seek ye first the kingdom and his righteousness and what he's asked you to do, and he'll take care of the rest. But you're not gonna do that if you're not humble. Because you know what you're gonna do? The number one excuse and guys, we're the worst. The number one excuse to not take time to read the bible and pray is time.
I don't have enough time to do that. Let me ask you this. Do you have enough time to do all the things you're doing when you're worrying? Do you have enough time to stare at the ceiling at night and not get enough sleep so now you're tired?
Do you have enough time for that stress to cause that fight with your spouse that last up to a couple days? That's taking a lot of time. Do you have enough time to run down those are ideas that you think you're gonna ignore God on and just try to fix the problem yourself and then create more problems?
How much time is all the worrying taking? I guarantee it's taking more than taking twenty minutes a day. Start there. Read the bible for ten minutes, and then pray. Let God talk to you. Meditate and let and talk to him about what did it just say and what does that mean for me?
And grab on to the encourage, the things of above. Focus on the eternal things. Focus on what he's asking you to do. And through that prayer and through the word of God, watch and see what happens to that worry.
But you're not gonna do that if you don't humble yourself. Because think about it. If you think you don't have enough time to talk to God and listen to his word, do you realize Jesus, who was God the son, did that on the regular,
got away even from his own disciples and said, I gotta spend time doing this. Otherwise, I can't do my job, and he's God. So if you're like, I don't have enough time to do this thing to spend time with God, what are you really saying? I am better than Jesus, I am smarter than God, and I am stronger than God.
You have a pride problem, people, because doing it that way will free up way more time. But you can't see it because the pride makes you control, And then the worry starts controlling you, and you try to control the worry. And now you're in a wrestling match because you won't surrender to God.
Take the time and see what happens. See what happens when you let yourself go that word when you say and then a lot of reasons why we also won't do that is because you've already decided, I already know what God's word is saying and I just don't wanna do it.
So you just don't wanna be reminded over and over again that you're just like, I'm not gonna listen to you, God, which once again is back to not being humble.
And then you had a response. Here I am as the elder, as he said in the beginning, teaching it, saying it clearly. Here's what you need to do. It's from God's word, and you got a decision. Be humble or you're gonna grumble. You're gonna act like, well, you don't understand my story, Bill. You're a jerk.
Alright. Go ahead. If it makes you feel better to make about me, go ahead. But when you're staring at the ceiling at night still worrying about all your problems, hear my voice say, I told you so.
You can decide. You can decide. Because look what he he says. So if I can walk away from the worry, he says you can do that. Look at verse eight and nine. This allows me to then do what's next, spend time in the word. I can stay alert as it says in verse eight. Watch out for your great enemy, the Seattle Seahawks.
No. It's not that bad. It's the devil.
I haven't done that in a while. I'm sorry. Now watch out for your great enemy, the devil. He prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.
Stand firm against him and be strong in your faith. And remember, here's the key thing, remember that your family of believers all over the world is going through the same kind of suffering you are. So he goes, hey, if you choose to be humble,
you can walk away from worry because you'll choose to spend time listening to God and talking to God, listening to God, talking to God. I can walk away from worry and walk in what he's asked me to do despite the suffering, despite because I have confidence. And when I do that, I can not be deceived. I can be alert. I can understand God's word. I can see the deception.
And there is an enemy that tries to deceive us, and what his main thing to do, as I've already said, is is try to get you to say, you can't trust God's word.
Well, if you're not spending time with God, it's easy to start getting untrustworthy. When you don't spend time with people and things starts to not make sense, you start to not trusting them.
And so he wants to do that. Isolate you, get you away from that, get you to not understand. And when you do the first thing, you can start to watch out, and that's the second point. You walk away from worry, you watch out for deception.
That's why our next series is called the devil's playbook. Give you a little commercial here. That's what we're gonna be talking about. How does it work? What's his plan? And a lot of us fall for it. The number one thing is pride. Don't be humble. Don't listen.
And you know what? Right in there, he gives you the number one way he does it.
When he says, remember your family of believers, all of the world has gone through the same kind of suffering you are. So if you are trying to follow God and it's not working right, the easiest thing to do is God the the the voice to whisper. You know what this isn't working? You gotta not listen to God to truly be happy. You want significance? You gotta not you gotta hold on to that. You gotta not trust him in that. You gotta not do that. You need this. You gotta have this. He's gonna whisper those lies. And the number one lie he's gonna get you is to isolate you. When he says, remember, all the believers in the world are having the same problem.
That can be encouraging or an incredible throw punch. Because the number one lie that some of you are like, I just can't do this. I don't have the time. I don't know what he's saying, and the humility. You are buying in the lie that the whisperer is saying, you're the exception to this. Bill just doesn't know your story.
You have a reason why you can't do what God wants you to do.
And then if he can get you to get really angry at what I'm saying, you're not gonna listen to the elders. You're not gonna listen to the truth of God's word. He wants to isolate you and think you're alone. He said when you suffer for doing what's right, that's a common thing for those who follow Christ.
So he's saying be encouraged by the fact that you're not in this alone, but also be challenged in the fact that you're not an exception.
You're just deceived. And if you are sitting here still acting like I am not gonna do what God's word says, you are prideful. You are gonna can try to control all your worries, and you're gonna keep being deceived. And the loser you think you are is self fulfilling prophecy. You will lose in the end. You will not win. God
opposes the proud. And I don't care if you're sitting in church, If you have a proudness about listening to God, he is against you. And you know what he'll try to do? He'll try harder to humble you. It's the whole story of the Old Testament. People wouldn't listen, proud, all this, they worried, but they wouldn't listen.
Bring on a Babylon. Bring on bring on something that will humble you. You can either choose to be humble or God will continue to try to force you to be humble, because the only way you win is by surrendering.
The only way you find significance is to embrace those things that scare you and walk away from what the world says significance is. It's the only way. You can't mix them both.
So don't be deceived because the cool thing is what he says next. If I choose to be humble, I can walk away from worry, watch out for deception. And finally, verse 10 through 12, he says, in his kindness,
God called you to share in his eternal glory by means of Jesus Christ. With the relationship with Christ and what Jesus did, we can share an eternal glory, which means we win. So but then he goes, so after you suffered for a little while after you suffered for a little while, you will suffer following the Lord,
but it'll be for significance. And after a little while, like I already said, a little while in God's mind, some of them this means the rest of their lives.
For some of them it means it's gonna cost them their life. So what he means by several little eyes is like, alright. You're gonna have a few bad weeks, and then God's gonna give you all those things you really, really, really wanted, the worldly things. No.
You're gonna suffer for however long it means to accomplish his mission, but what you're gonna have is this eternal glory, something what you really want. What all those things that you ignore God on to chase after will never give you, you will get. Because what he says is he will restore, support,
strengthen you, and he will place you on a firm foundation, all powered in forever and ever. And then he I have written and sent you this short letter to help, to you with the help of Silas, who I commend to you as a faithful brother. My purpose in writing is to encourage you.
And how is he gonna encourage us? And assure you that what you are experiencing is truly a part of God's grace for you. Stand firm in his grace. So if you struggle doing the right thing, that's part of the plan. That's part of his grace because it helps you identify with Jesus. And when you realize what Jesus did for you and you did this, you go about what he wanted to be. You become more like Jesus. You refine. It's a refiner's fire that makes us more like Christ. And then we serve the mission he really had for us that everything in this worldly way in our selfishness says don't do, we do, and we find real significance from that.
And then in the end, even if it's on in the next life but think about it. What's longer? Say you live to be a 120. What's longer? A 120 or eternity?
So you could run away from God, and maybe you do avoid some of that suffering, and you find and you get all the happiness, you get the wealth and all of that, and yet you still die, and now you have hopelessness. Or you can suffer for a little while doing what God asked you to do, and it could be hard.
See, this is the real truth of what scripture says. It doesn't say follow me and everything's perfect for you. He says follow me because this is where life is really found.
This is where significance is really found, and in the end, there's a victory beyond all victories. You will actually get everything that you thought you were gonna get running after all this other stuff.
You get to be used. In other words, we walk away from worry. We watch out for deception, and then he says, we get to watch the grace of God include us in the victory. Like Roman says, we will be more than conquerors.
Who can stand against us if God is for us? It means in the end, we're still standing because we stood behind Jesus. We get to stand with him in victory. And that is for all eternity. That is a victory beyond victories. Matter of fact, look what he says next.
This is kind of the part of a letter where most of us, if you've read the bible, you kind of skip because it's like the credits.
When he says say these say hi, they said hi. It's kinda like it's like it's like in a movie. Oh, these are the credits. You know? They might have been a part of making this, but I'm out of here. And then Marvel came along and said, we got a way to make you stay.
After credit scene, that usually is an important next step in what's happening. Well, Marvel didn't invent it. God did. Because look what he says next in verse 13. Your sister church here in Babylon sends you greetings. Right there, he just planted an exclamation point on what it means we win.
You may suffer through this life, but if you stay faithful, there is a great victory, and the people that look like they're winning because you're they're like, well, why are they having it good? They're Babylon. Why did he say Babylon? He wasn't in Babylon.
At this point, the Babylonian empire didn't exist anymore, and the town, the city of Babylon, once great was a podunk little nothing town because the Babylonian empire had been wiped out a long time ago. But who were the Babylonians? They came along, and in the Old Testament, go read the book of Bakkuk
if if if if if you want. It's he was a prophet that was called by God. God's people were grumbling and not being humble. They thought they were great, and God says, I'm gonna humble you, and I'm gonna use the Babylonians. He told Habakkuk, he's like, how dare you use them? They're evil. They're horrible. They're terrible.
And he goes, nope. I'm gonna use them. And he goes, why would you do that? And he wanted an explanation. God only gave him a revelation.
Half the time when you want an explanation from god, he's gonna give you a revelation because a revelation of who he is is way better than explanation of what he's doing because you'll never understand what he's doing. But if you see who he is
so then he was like, great. I'm in. And and and they didn't like it because they thought they were more wicked. They're terrible. Now suddenly came over. They dominated. They caused great suffering to God's people. They they sent them and dispersed them all over the place. They killed a lot of them, and all of that stuff. And what he's saying is,
you know what? Now we have Rome. And Rome, they started using Babylon as the keyword for Rome. So when he said Babylon, he's writing from Rome. So he's saying, and by the way, the church that's still here in Rome, the one who started the persecution,
it's the Roman the Christians in Rome are dying first. He's talking to those who've been scattered, and they're starting to be persecuted, but they're not being killed. But the ones in Rome are being killed, and he says, by the way, we're still here.
And he uses Babylon to say, you know what? All Rome is is another Babylon. And guess what? I'm talking about Babylon, and they don't exist, and we're still standing. And he goes, now we have this Rome problem. And guess what? We're standing here. Is there still a Roman empire? No. Babylon,
gone. Christians still standing with Christ.
Rome, gone. We're still standing. What's the Rome out there that we're all paranoid of if we don't win this battle, if we don't get this political thing, if we don't get this happen, if we don't protect these laws, if we don't do this, we're all gonna suffer, we're all gonna die. Who cares? In the end, that whole system doesn't matter because if you stay faithful and embrace Christ and trust in his grace,
we will still be standing when all of that is gone.
And I think in the end, God planted in our hearts the desire to win. It's the worldly connection that makes it bad. When we want to win in the world's way, we get selfish, we run away from God, We try to win the win because in the world's way, we'll never win in the end. We
gotta win by embracing the humility of just fully trusting God. No matter what, it's by his grace. Let me let me summarize it this way. When I was in middle school, I had this PE teacher, and PE teachers used to be just the meanest people on the planet.
I think they like humiliation as their number one teaching technique. You know, dodgeball? If you never had one of those balls to the face, you didn't experience PE the way God intended it.
They didn't care about hurting your feelings. And I had a PE teacher that he was near the he's about to retire. So back when I had it in middle school, this guy had started his teaching career in 1938,
and now he's at the end. And so he was really old school. And so what he would do is, you know, we would go into a phase. We had these sports we'd learn. Alright. We're gonna learn this. We're gonna learn that. And what he'd do is he'd take the best person at it, pull out someone, and then he'd start picking on the guys that he knew were wimpy at it and get humiliated, so then he goes, see, you're gonna listen to me, I'll teach you how to do this. You know, he basically would humble you to death, and it was terrible. It's to the point that if you were one of the guys that knew that he was gonna pick on, you'd like didn't want eye contact.
You thought he's not gonna pick you out. And so we had to do wrestling, which was bad enough. Because in middle school, maybe a third of us decided deodorant was a good idea at this point. And then this wrestling mats, they smelled I think they were his original wrestling mats from the thirties.
They smelled of death and fear,
and and it was disgusting. And and then you'd get sweaty, and I didn't wanna be rolling around with sweaty guys in middle school, but, you know, we had to do it. So he grabs this one kid. Obviously, he's gonna grade the strongest kid. He was on the wrestling team. And, you know, every one of us, you had at least one of these guys in your in your middle school. You know, he, like, was, you know, already had been shaving since fourth grade.
Had a receding hairline already. Looked like one of the teachers, only bigger. Guy weighed over two hundred pounds. He was a seventh grader. He's just like, alright. Get out here, Mark. And then he ticks the picks the next strongest guy first, and this guy, Mark, destroys him in, a minute.
And then he starts picking the wimpier guys, picks a couple of them. And all three of these guys, they tried their hardest to actually wrestle.
And every time they played it his way and fought his way, they just got destroyed quicker because he was too strong in that. And then I knew he was coming. I'm looking around because I'm always I'm right in the middle of that pack. He's like, alright. I'm like,
Billy Bush, get up here. I'm like, oh, man. This is the worst because now he's actually broken a sweat. This is gonna be disgusting.
So I have to go over there, get on their knees, and he comes over the top. It's that style of wrestling. So I got this sweaty armpit right onto my shoulder. He's, like, dripping off his forehead onto me. And as I walked up, I go, I have no chance. The easy way out would just be quit and die right away. Just give in.
But I knew if I tried to wrestle back like him, that would just go poorly. But I didn't wanna quit. And so I go I walked up and I go, I only have one strategy. I can't fight his way. But you know what I can do? I'm just gonna try to not lose. I'm gonna fight to not lose.
And so what I decide is I'm not gonna waste energy trying to do any moves because that's just gonna put me in a worse position and waste more I'm gonna save all my energy to just not let them pin me.
All my inner strength is just gonna be your not I'm not fighting your way. I'm not fighting you. I'm just gonna resist you. And that's what I did. He planted, and as he got over the top of me, he's like, his weight, his disgustingness,
his all this, and he started whispering in my ear, you're a loser. You're a wimp. I'm gonna break you in half. Just totally being totally mean and all that. And and, know, he's like, Ivan Drago, I must break you. You know?
And I'm like, yeah. Yeah. Go for it. You know? I'm all Rocky Balboa down there. But he's like doing anything else. He's yelling at me, taunting me, scaring me, and then he blows the whistle, and this guy's given every every he almost, bam, throws me at him. Like, this is the slowest quickest match ever. But when I went down, I went down on one side, and I wouldn't let him pin me. He'd give me this close to be
I did, I lose all the inner strength I had to not fight him his way. Just resist him and go, you're not gonna pull me into your fight. I'm not gonna lose to you.
I'm just gonna fight this way, and I kept doing it. All of sudden, a minute clicks by. Two minutes click by. He's getting sweatier. It's like I'm getting rained on. It's like a tropical rainforest of salty water.
And at one point, he's trying so hard that he I did to the suburb, but he took his armpit and went right into my face.
Chalky. And I mean, I was suffering. This was disgusting. It was exhausting. It wasn't pleasant. I'm getting yelled at. I'm I'm I'm I'm eating things that you're not supposed to eat. I'm smelling things that I don't think any human should smell,
and and I'm sitting here going, god, but I wouldn't quit. And all of sudden, goes four minutes, five minutes, and the fact that he couldn't beat me, all of a sudden, the crowd started to go basically cheer for me, But what they're cheering is don't quit. It wasn't you're gonna win, you got them. It was just don't quit. Don't quit. They were watching me just not lose. They're like, yeah, he's not losing as fast.
And then he's pinning me, he's trying to give me trying. And and as he was whispering in my ear and taunting me like, you're a loser. You're a wuss. It started to sound like this. You're a loser.
I can't believe I'm gonna beat you. You why don't you just quit? Quit. Quit. It got slower, more belabored, and then he stopped talking. And then all I heard is I was getting poured on more and more sweat was, and I started to realize the pressure of him pushing down to try to pin me got weaker and weaker and weaker.
I'm like, he's running out of gas. I'm not losing myself to victory. Because as I sat there, I realized at one moment, he wasn't talking, he was breathing hard, and I realized he's not even trying, he's just deadweighting me.
He's basically trying to rest, and he just 200 pounds. That was still heavy because I had two hundred pounds on me, but it was only 200 pounds on me. So as I sat there, finally, just like this, just holding on, and I realized he doesn't have any pressure. I have a chance,
And all I did was wrap my arm around and just do this. And he flopped over on his back. And I was like, ugh. I just put my arm over him. And my teacher went tapped him out. He grabbed my arm. I stood up. Whole class. I won, and I never actually wrestled him. I
didn't wrestle one ass. I looked at the teacher. Yeah. You thought he would lose because he was stronger and knew how to wrestle. And guess what? I won. But how did I win? By just not losing, by not fighting his way, by not fearing his voice.
Because I knew if I just stuck to it and I stuck to that inner strength and just stuck to that hanging on to that faith, that I would outlast him because he would run out of gas. That's what's gonna happen. And when Jesus went to the cross,
the enemy got the wind knocked out of him. He is sweating. He's exhausted. He's tired. He's not as strong as he has thinks he is, and all he's gonna do is lean his dead weight on you and whisper in your ear to quit and fight a different way. But if you just don't lose,
just embrace the grace of Christ and go, God, what do you want me to do? This doesn't seem like it's fighting. This doesn't seem like it's solving my problem. It doesn't seem like I'm doing anything except the wrong thing. That's how you win. That's how you have eternity. That's what Peter is saying.
Because just like Babylon and Rome and whatever else is next, the enemy's gassed. You just gotta surrender. It takes humility to fight that fight of faith, and you're gonna get sweated on. You're gonna get salt in your mouth. You're gonna smell things in your life that are gross, but you're going to stand up next to Jesus,
victorious man. And that's where significance is. Amen? So
I want to pray, and then we're going to just sing a song talking about being broken vessels because I have to own that. But before I pray, what I want to do is if you already know the Lord, let God talk to you right now and start talking to him about where have you chosen not to be humble.
And you're owning your worries and just say, God, I'm gonna humbly surrender to your will. And then have the courage to do it because you don't have to have the strength to make it happen.
Just don't lose.
But I do wanna pray with some specific people in this room and online. And those of you that like maybe even come to church, but you have never ever humbly surrendered your life to Christ. You've never actually turned from your sin and humbly admitted your brokenness.
You may be coming here trying to be a better person, trying to serve God, but you've never actually said, I'm gonna put my faith in what Jesus did, the grace of Christ, that he died on the cross for you. And it's through faith in what he did by dying for you, taking your sin, and then resurrecting.
So he beat death. And it's only from that we try to follow him. When I'm talking about being faithful to him, not losing, it's like I'm doing that from his love, from his power, from his salvation, not for it. And some of you need to accept it. That's what it means to become a Christian, to be born again.
It means I cry out to God and say, I turn from my sin. I confess that, and I profess my faith in you, Jesus. You are the way and the only way. And so what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna pray with you guys if you wanna pray and turn to Christ right now. But I'm asking you to do something scary.
Over 40 people have already done this, including some people online. I'm gonna ask you to do something because I I want you to experience the cheering like I did wrestling as you step onto this match. I want you to hear because people will be for you in this room.
And that is if you have never prayed and and turned your life to Christ, I'm gonna ask you if you wanna pray with me to stand up right here. People looking around, just stand like like so many other people already have done it. It always takes the first one. You have the courage to do it. There you go.
Look at all these people.
Stay standing because, you know, you're in a good family here. Step one, humbly humbly surrender. That's it. You can stand. It's an awesome thing. Victory comes through that scary moment. This is the first scary step. And I wanna tell you guys something. Thank you.
Because I struggle with this, and I had to listen to my own sermon. When I was gonna end and talk about it, I was just gonna pray with everyone's eyes closed and heads bowed. And I thought, you know and a lot of times, I think we do that to try to make it less scary to you. But the reality is it makes it less scary for me.
Because if I say stand up and no one stands up, I feel like I failed. But then my sermon and my preaching is about me, not the Holy Spirit. I felt like God told me to ask people to stand with me to pray. And if no one stands, oh, well, that's on God. Holy Spirit didn't do his job. Or y'all so stubborn, no one will listen.
But we're over 50 people have stood. If you're online and you're with us, just write. If you can type in the comments, I'm standing. I bet several people do that. Because this is what it's about. It's about the victory that comes through grace, and it only happens if you're humble.
So I wanna pray with you guys. You can pray with me. But, you know, make the words of this prayer your own words. Just between you and God, just say something like, dear Jesus, thank you. Thank you that you gave me the courage to be humble enough to stand right now.
Thank you that I realize that it's by you, not me, that I'm saved. And right now, in the best way I know how, I turn to you and what you did on the cross to forgive me, to put together the broken vessel that I am in the way you want it to be, to restore me, to heal me, to give me that honor and that victory in the end.
I put my faith in you and not me. So thank you. Help me to go from this moment and learn to walk in that realization of your love and your grace each and every day. And I can embrace your word in a way that I will not worry, in a way that I will not be saved, in a way that I just won't lose
because you've already gassed the enemy. Thank you. I pray this in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen. Let's stand to sing.
See
God, we thank you that you find the lost, that you search for the broken hearted Jesus,
and you bring love and you bring peace and grace. God, and it washes over us undeserved.
Jesus, we love you. Amen. Thank you for joining us online today. If you need prayer, connect with us on rockpoint.io under the Need to Talk tab. Be sure to follow us on social media to stay up to date with what's happening here at Rock Point.