Freedom Through Submission - Peter Series Part 4

I'm going to make a disclaimer here before I even start. The title is heavier than the message.

I didn't know what title to put on my message, and so I put that on there. That idea is behind this message, but I'm not just going to talk about submission today. I would like to put just a little mental word picture in our minds as we start about the word submission. It's a submission. We've talked about that many times. But the problem is, in our society, we get upset when somebody says something about submission because we feel like we're being put underneath somebody's thumb. But that's not the idea of submission. It means that you're putting your part in so the bigger mission can move on. And so, in that sense, we find freedom. And I hope that we can see that in this topic today.

We're continuing with our studies in the book of 1 Peter. We're going to go from verse 13 to 25. A couple of months ago, we had looked at the first part of this chapter, and a few of the key elements of our study last time were the call to be a part of a royal priesthood. And we were also called to our role; we also see that our role as living stones in this eternal building or this temple of God.

I believe the rest of this chapter is also in the same context. The chapter is rich. This chapter is rich with teaching and instruction on a Christian response to everyday challenges. I feel like our key theme today is that of a proper response to the authorities in our lives.

And I have chosen the title, Freedom Through Submission. So forgive me if you feel like more should have been said about submission. We can talk about it some more another time. 1 Peter 2:13-25. We're only going through 13 through 15 at this point. "Be subject for the Lord's sake to every human institution, whether it be to the emperor as supreme or to governors as sent by him to punish those who do evil, to praise those who do good. For this is the will of God, that by doing good, you should put to silence the ignorance of foolish people."

And just in conjunction with that, I'd like to read in Romans 13:1-3 to start with.

I like using Scripture as a commentary to itself. I feel like sometimes more gets said through that than just me trying to make comment on it. So this is what I'm trying to do here. "Let every person be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. Therefore, whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment. For rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad.

Would you have no fear of the one who is an authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval."

And then on again in Romans, "For he is God's servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain. For he is a servant of God, an avenger who carries out God's wrath on the wrongdoer. Therefore, one must be in subjection, not only to avoid God's wrath, but also for the sake of conscience. For because of this, you also pay taxes. For the authorities are ministers of God, attending to this very thing.

Pay to all what is owed to them, taxes to whom taxes are owed, revenue to whom revenue is owed, respect to whom respect is owed, honor to whom honor is owed. For because of this, you also pay taxes. For the authorities are ministers of God, attending to this very thing."

And then in Titus 3:1-3, "Remind them to be submissive to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready for every good work, to speak evil of no one, to avoid quarreling, to be gentle, to show perfect courtesy toward all people. For we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient, led astray, slaves to various passions and pleasures, passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating one another.

Remind them to be submissive to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready to every good work. Be subject for the Lord's sake." This isn't just Peter's call; it isn't just for us or just even for the authorities, but it is also for the Lord's sake. And I think that's important. I think that'll help us as we try to relate rightly to this.

Peter calls the believers to be examples of good citizens on all levels. For some reason, in so much of conservative radical Christianity today, so many pride themselves as being above the law of the land. They seem to think themselves so valuable to their country that there's really no need for them to come under any law of any sort.

But Peter is calling God's people to submit to the authorities at all levels. He talks about governors, emperors, and we also know that we are supposed to be in submission and subjection to one another. So it does it on all levels. We have a role to play in all of this.

What is the reason Peter gives for submitting to the authorities? First of all, we submit for the Lord's sake, which I said that before.

And the second thing he says is that the authorities were ordained by God. And we also read that in Romans and in Titus, how these authorities were ordained by God for their particular position. It seems like sometimes this whole thing is—it seems like it's out of control. We look at the political scene today, and it looks like everything is just wacky and the way people act and stuff.

But God is in control of those things. He knows what's happening. He knows what He's doing. He knows what He's allowing.

For what purpose did God ordain these authorities? First of all, Peter says, "For the punishment of evildoers," and then secondly, "For the praise of them who do well." I'm sorry, my spelling program went and switched all my of's around to f-o. I'm not sure why it did that, and I missed a few. I tried to correct it, but it didn't. So my spelling isn't that bad.

Whom shall we obey? I know we talked about this before, but just to rivet it in our minds. Be subject to every human institution, whether it be to the emperor as supreme or to governors. Governors covers the state and local levels and every authority that we might encounter as we work in this world.

Moving on to the next part of this chapter, 1 Peter 2:16-17, "Live as people who are free, not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil, but living as servants of God. Honor everyone. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honor the emperor.

Servants be subject to your masters with all respect, not only to the good and gentle, but also to the unjust. For this is a gracious thing. When mindful of God, one endures sorrows while suffering unjustly.

For what credit is it if, when you sin and are beaten for it, you endure? But if when you do good and suffer for it, you endure, this is a gracious thing in the sight of God."

I'd just like to look at this first phrase here, "Live as people who are free, not using your freedom for a cover-up for evil."

Here we have this call to live as people who are free. How do we do this in a land where there are so many laws and limiters or regulations? I'd like to just pause and say here, we have it pretty easy still, because if you go into any of the European countries and try to do anything there, like Germany or Switzerland, they have even more laws and limiters than what you can imagine.

But yeah, we feel like sometimes when we want to do something, we run into these laws and these inconveniences, as I call them. And we wonder, how can I feel like a free person encountering these things? And what does Peter mean when he says, "We should not use the freedom as a cover-up for evil"?

I'd like to, first of all, say I believe to understand this kind of freedom, we need to understand and have a clear concept of the two kingdoms. If we don't understand the concept of the two kingdoms, we're going to struggle with this thing all of our lives.

I really do not have the time to delve into the subject too deeply. But very briefly, if we have our mind set on things above and not on things on the earth, we will not feel quite so hampered by the details of life. We'll accept it as a part of life and move on.

But on the other hand, if our mind and heart is set on the things here below, we will soon become agitated by the things that agitate all the rest of society around us.

There is a sense of true freedom that comes from knowing that all of creation, what's created by God our Father, and so much of it that we see here today is for our enjoyment. There's a freedom in that, knowing that I can look out there and enjoy these mountains. I don't have to feel like I have to own them. They were created by my Father in heaven. I can enjoy them. I can appreciate that. I'm free.

And yet we must not use that freedom or our relationship to God the Father as a pretext to live as a rebel in regard to the authorities of our land.

I'd just like to rivet this in our mind. Freedom is a state of mind more than a liberty to do as I please. When we begin to start thinking that we are in bondage somehow because we have to do these things or we don't want to do these things, but we should, then we lose that freedom. But freedom is in our minds. If I'm constantly chafing at the limiters and the laws put in place by the country where I reside or where I live, I am not free. In fact, this is a sign that I'm already too involved in the kingdom of this world. On the other hand, if I obey the laws cheerfully, putting forth an effort to understand the reason for those laws, I become a free man in my mind.

I just think about what King David said in the Psalms. He said, "How I delight in thy laws, O Lord." We look at the Old Testament and what he would have called Scripture in his day. We say, how can he say he delights himself in the law of the Lord? Well, he was free because he was wanting to understand what God was trying to teach. He was finding freedom in that law and in that word that God had spoken because he wanted to understand what the Creator had for him. And that's what we're called to do today. We're supposed to try to understand and try to cooperate, work on cooperating with what's there so that we can be in submission, be on a mission along with the government in a sense to help keep order and decency in this land.

How can I show forth goodness and kindness and selflessness of our king in this world that is driven by trivial pursuits and selfish ambitions? That's a question I think that we need to ask ourselves every day as we embark on a new day, is to see what can I do today to exemplify our king and what he's ordained in this life.

Honor everyone. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honor the emperor. How do we honor someone? We give them value. First of all, in our minds, then also in our actions. It all starts up here, whether we value somebody in our minds.

And then it comes out in our actions and our words towards them. If I honor my parents, I show them I show them I care about them by calling them, visiting them. Yes, even as a married man today, I try to make sure that I don't do things that go against them, that actually agitate them.

That's my way of honoring my parents. I try to make sure I don't do things that are offensive to them. Well, Peter calls us to honor everyone. To me, that means I give value to that person first in my mind, and then in my words, and in my actions towards them. He says, "Honor everyone." The second thing he says here is, "Love the brotherhood." How do I love? How do we love? Isn't honor enough?

Truly loving someone means I pour out my life for them. I sacrifice for them. I share with them. I spend lots of time with them. I promote them. There's people that I honor, want to honor because of their position, because they're ordained by God. But I can't necessarily promote them because they may stand for things that I can't stand behind. But my brothers, they're in a different class altogether in my mind. I love them. I'm pouring my life into them. I honor them and I promote them. I point them out to people who said, "Hang on to that guy. Just watch him. He's a good example of this or that trait of Christlikeness."

I think true and full love goes beyond honor. Loving someone doesn't only mean I say a kind word about them here and there. It means I promote them, prefer them above myself.

Jason talked about this this morning. Fear God. What does it mean to fear God? I believe fear and obedience must come before love or what we call love.

Let's just look at what Jesus said in John 14:15-16, "If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another helper to be with you forever." Then on to John 15:10-14, "If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love. For as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love, these things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be full." That's the only way to experience full love and full joy is in obedience to Christ.

This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no man than this, than that someone lay down his life for his friends. That's the true kind of love. You are my friends if you do what I command you. There's that thing again.

If you do what I command you, you are a true friend.

And we're moving on. Servants be subject to your masters with all respect. In our day, especially in this country, we need to be reminded of the importance of our relationships with those in authority, and our place of employment is no exception.

We are called to be examples of respect and faithful service, and this not only to the bosses that we like or to the employers we like who give us lots of perks and bonuses. Peter says, "Not only to the good and gentle, but also to the unjust." That's something for us that's hard to grasp because we can voluntarily go to work for somebody, and if we don't like it, we can move on.

I don't want to get ahead of myself, but there's just something that sticks in my mind. I feel like every time I've ended up working for an employer that wasn't nice, which it didn't happen very often, it was good for me. And I wish sometimes that looking back when I was younger, I wish I would have learned how to deal with that a little better at that time because it was a good experience for me.

So what if my boss is a complete and absolute jerk and a tightwad? I think sometimes people get this thing in their mind. They think that their boss is a jerk or isn't nice.

Serve him with all respect. See what you can do to help him be successful. See what you can do to alleviate his stress. We don't know what's going on underneath. Years ago, when I was at Bible school, Joe Rudolph taught one of the classes, and he related a story. He said about how there was a young man who was unhappy with his wages, and this will show you what kind of era this came from. But he said, "As long as he pays me 5.50 an hour, I'm not going to work any more than 5.50 an hour. As soon as he pays me 6 or 6.50 an hour, I'm going to work according to 6.50 an hour, but I'm not going to work any harder than that until he pays me better."

And Joe Rudolph's comment was, which is what stuck with me and has been—I've tried to keep this in my mind—is he said, "I submit to you, young people," and he always adjusted his glasses, "that that man did not work any, didn't even work 5.50 an hour's worth of work because of his attitude."

And I think what I learned from that is our core attitude taints our performance. It taints the way we relate in our jobs and wherever we go. We are called to render our best no matter what. And that's what Peter's calling us to in relation to our masters, to our employers. And Justin and Kevin and other guys at Breckville Trailers can talk to me about this down the road.

Okay. "For this is a gracious thing. When mindful of God, one endures sorrows while suffering unjustly."

The true earmark of a child of God is not one who knows how to stand up for his rights, but rather a person who takes unjust treatment graciously. I think sometimes we think of God as the Heavenly Father who loves us, but is also very willing and ready to judge and punish us. I think sometimes the way we relate to life and other people has something to do with how we think about God. I hope I can bring this together so you understand it. If you don't, you might have to ask me later.

But we think of him also as a God that's just waiting to judge and to punish us. But if we really think over history how men have snubbed God, mistreated his children, and continued to destroy parts of his creation, we have to conclude that he's a very patient God and a very loving Father.

Otherwise, he would have destroyed all of mankind years ago. And if we think about the flood, we tend to think about God's judgment, but we must also think about what God was really doing when he created that flood. He was protecting and preserving the last few righteous people on earth.

That was eight people. He knew there was no chance for those people to survive in the kind of world they were living in, and he wanted to preserve them. God is a God of redemption. And so this is why he allows us to be in these kinds of situations and why we need to learn how to relate to them. "For this is a gracious thing. When mindful of God, one endures sorrows while suffering unjustly."

John 14:6-7, "Jesus said to him, 'I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you had known me, you would have known my Father also. For now from now on, you do know him and have seen him.'" He's talking to his disciples.

And in 14:8-9, "Philip said to him, 'Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us.'" And Jesus said to him, "Have I been with you so long, and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, 'Show us the Father'?"

And in John 14:10-12, "Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father in me? The words that I say to you, I do not speak on my own authority, but the Father who dwells in me does his works.

Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father in me, or else believe on account of the works themselves. Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do, and greater works than these will he do because I am going to the Father."

1 Peter, back to 1 Peter again, chapter 2, verse 21-25.

"For to this you have been called because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example so that you might follow in his steps. He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth. When he was reviled, he did not revile in return. When he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly.

He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed, for you were straying like sheep, but now returned, but have now returned to the shepherd and overseers of your souls."

I would like to briefly set down one by one these beautiful living examples that Jesus left for us. These Peter sets forth as examples of how we should respond to the authorities in our life today. In fact, these should be our spiritual posture for life. These we should strive to make a reality today.

The first one he talks about, he's committed no sin. This is really important. If we in some way harbor sin in our lives, it will affect our ability to respond properly, and it will taint our very reasoning powers. Strive to free ourselves from sin. We must strive.

Secondly, no deceit was found in his mouth. He left no false or murky impression with his speech. He spoke the truth, or he didn't speak at all.

Thirdly, when he was reviled, he reviled not in return. If someone spoke to him in a degrading way, he did not come back with a verbal slap in the face of his own.

Fourthly, when he suffered, he did not threaten. When someone gave him a verbal or actual physical blow, he left no impression of ever coming back at them in some way.

Hopefully, none of us do that, but I know there's a temptation there when someone has said something to us and it's kind of stung a little bit. You feel like coming back at him with something, just leaving a hint of something, just a little bit of malice, just so they catch on later on when they move down the road.

He didn't do that. He didn't threaten.

Five, he continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly. He left all vengeance or any future reprisal in the hand of his Father, no matter how unjust. He said, "Father, forgive them. They don't know what they're doing."

Sixth point, he himself bore our sins in his body on the tree that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds, you have been healed.

This last point is the epitome of Christlikeness, the ability to practice, to absorb the wrongs done to him by others. I don't know if I can get this in words. I think I heard Bill just recently say this, and I think I heard it other places too, but it's to be that idea of being the last point of conflict or anger, to be that point where all violence and evil stops. It stops with me. You can bombard me, but I'm just going to soak it in and let it do its work.

He took it all in. He forgave, said that those very same people who injured him might come to life and light. By his wounds, you have been healed.

"For you were straying like sheep, but are now returned to the shepherd and overseer of your souls." I know that's not the most exciting picture of a shepherd and sheep because everything's brown there, but I think what I like about that picture is the sheep are all different colors. They're all clustered together there at the feet of the shepherd, and the shepherd is lovingly looking down on them and watching them feed.

And that's the picture, I think, of the Church of Christ. We have a mixture of all kinds of different, a lot of variety in the body of Christ. And that's the bottom line. That's what God wants. That's what he wants to see in his body. He wants to gather all the sheep in. There's a whole bunch of sheep out there who are longing for a shepherd to lead them. They don't know what it is, but they are longing for a shepherd to lead them.

And that's what we're supposed to be doing in our response in everything we do, is drawing people into this fold so they can return to the shepherd and overseer of our souls.