“Seeing Beyond Troubles” – “Living for God’s Will” – 1 Peter 4:1-6

This is the time of year when football season begins to ramp up. All over the state of Texas, teams in high school, college and the NFL have begun their training camps. Players are gathering together after some time off and are getting themselves into playing shape.

One of the memories I have of pre-season training is the muscle soreness that stayed with me for three or four days. After the first practice, the pain would such that I really didn’t want to move. And yet, we had to move, because we still had practices.

The coaches assured us that the soreness would disappear as we continued to work our muscles that hadn’t been worked for a few months. The coaches were right. The soreness gave way as we continued to work on our plans and schemes in the hopes of winning some football games and making people proud of us.

The same idea is present in what Peter wrote in today’s passage. He reminds the readers and us that there may be suffering in this life, but we can follow Christ’s example to endure to the reward that awaits us in Him.

Background

We are about two-thirds of the way through Peter’s first letter, written to encourage the believers as they faced the threat of persecution and suffering for their faith. Jesus had told His disciples we should expect this from the world when He taught them in the last night before the crucifixion. “Remember the words I spoke to you: ‘No servant is greater than his master.’ If they persecuted Me, they will persecute you also. If they obeyed My teaching, they will obey yours also. They will treat you this way because of My name, for they do not know the One who sent me” (John 15:20-21).

Jesus’ words proved true as Peter and John were ministering and preaching in the Temple after they had been filled with the Holy Spirit. Having been ordered previously to stop their ministry, they were arrested a second time and flogged for their refusal to do as the Sanhedrin ordered. The Bible tells us, “The apostles left the Sanhedrin, rejoicing because they had been counted worthy to suffering disgrace for the Name” (Acts 5:41). Paul wrote the Corinthians of the suffering he had endured for his faith (cf. 2 Corinthians 11:23-29).

Through it all, the apostles never lost sight of the big picture. They knew that they belonged to Christ and that the suffering they endured today was only temporary. Regardless of the amount of pain and suffering they endured, they knew it was nothing compared to the promises God had given them in Christ.

It was because of this that Peter wrote his letter. In this text, he spoke more directly to the example shown us in Christ as we try to overcome trying circumstances.

Central Truth: Enduring trials allows us to focus on living for God’s will.

Living for God’s will:

1. can include suffering (1-2)

Therefore, since Christ suffered in His body, arm yourselves also with the same attitude, because he who has suffered in his body is done with sin. As a result, he does not live the rest of his earthly life for evil human desires, but rather for the will of God.

Sometimes a passage of Scripture seems to be saying something that seems odd at best. These two verses are an example. On the surface, it would appear that Peter was writing that after a time of suffering, we emerge free of temptation and sin. It’s that endurance for a time that rids us of the things that kept us from God and sets us firmly on doing God’s will. But let’s look at this more deeply and see what Peter was really saying.

What Peter was saying was that just as Jesus was our example in the previous verses (“For Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God”—3:18), so is He the example of how we deal with suffering. Jesus endured the suffering that preceded the cross and lasted through it in order to bring us to the Father.

In the same way, when we arm ourselves with the same attitude Jesus had, then we also are willing to suffer for our faith. The mindset that determines to live for Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit is the one that has turned from evil and toward God. That’s why we do not live for earthly life of human desires, but rather for God’s will.

In other words, Peter is not saying that once we suffer for our faith we never sin again. He is saying that by setting our minds on Christ, by taking the same mindset that says we will endure suffering for God’s sake, we decrease the likelihood that we will succumb to temptation and that we will instead walk more closely in keeping with God’s will.

2. contrasts with our old way of living (3-5)

For you have spent enough time in the past doing what pagans choose to do—living in debauchery, lust, drunkenness, orgies, carousing and detestable idolatry. They think it strange that you do not plunge with them into the same flood of dissipation, and they heap abuse on you. But they will have to give account to Him who is ready to judge the living and the dead.

Have you ever noticed how things change when we walk away from one way of living to face a new, better way? When we give up soft drinks for the hope of better health, we get out of the habit eventually. If we then decided to try one again, we recoil from the sugar rush, somewhat surprised that we once had to have that every day of the week.

The same is true of the life of sin. Peter is writing to a predominantly Gentile audience, and he took the time here to remind them of the life they used to live. “You’ve spent enough time in the past doing what pagans do.” In other words, they can remember their lifestyle before coming to Christ. It was one they willingly walked away from, and now those ways of acting seem alien to them.

Not so their former friends and colleagues. They are still all about indulging in the pagan lifestyle, and they’re genuinely puzzled by our refusal to join with them. Some walk away bewildered and saddened that we aren’t as fun as we used to be. Still others become hostile, accusing us of becoming narrow-minded or self-righteous. They resent the “holier-than-thou” attitude and look down their noses at us. Peter wrote such people “heap abuse at you.” They don’t understand what it means to walk in obedience to the Spirit, and rather than seeking to understand, they bring insults and persecution upon those who do follow Christ.

Peter’s reminder is that we will all stand before the judgment seat of Christ, and at that time we will all have to give account of what we said and did. For those who are in Christ, we will be forgiven since our names are written in the book of life, but the remainder will have to explain to the Father why they failed to accept the free gift of salvation when it was offered them.

It’s amazing how people seem to look forward to the second coming of Christ, thinking it will be a wondrous and glorious time. It will be, but it will also be a time of anguish and intense sorrow for those who do not know Christ.

Living for God’s will sets us free from judgment and allows us to endure and overcome the temporary discomfort of persecution.

3. involves the Spirit and not the body (6)

For this is the reason the gospel was preached even to those who are now dead, so that they might be judged according to men in regard to the body, but live according to God in regard to the spirit.

Peter returns to the idea he first introduced in the previous verses of 3:19-20, that of Jesus preaching in Hades to those who had preceded Him in death. Wanting to assure the readers that God would not condemn someone for failure to accept Christ simply because they had died before He had come, Peter here stated that Christ preached to those who had died before His crucifixion in order that no one—past, present or future—could claim exemption simply because they had never heard. Judgment is coming, and it will come when Christ returns.

Those who will be condemned at those who chose to live in the body. These are the people who walked in the ways of the world, apart from Christ, dead to the Spirit in their sins. The choices made to ignore the gospel and to follow their own way, no matter how noble or good it appeared to other men and women, will come back to haunt them in the end.

Not so with those who have been brought to life in the spirit by walking in faith obedience to Christ. By professing Christ as Savior and by arming ourselves with the same attitude of Christ—by practicing the self-control that comes from the Spirit—we are promised the gift of eternal life—to know the Father and the Son, and to spend all eternity in fellowship with them and fellow believers.

Living for God’s will means we live lives prompted by the Holy Spirit. We enter into the new covenant that was sealed by the blood of Christ and we are set free to follow Him as He directs us.

Conclusion

Muscles that haven’t been used in a while will be incredibly sore once we start putting them to work again. The body will scream that we should stop, but we have to persevere if we want to develop those muscles and bring them into shape. It’s hard going at the outset, but the reward is worth the suffering in the end.

Let’s hope that God allows us to live at peace with one another, but if we have to suffer for our faith, we have the example of the righteous Jesus who suffered for us and opened the door for us to walk in eternal fellowship with Him.