You'll turn your Bibles to 1 Peter chapter 3. Let's read verses 1 through 5. In the same way, you wives, be submissive to your own husbands, so that even if any of them are disobedient to the word, they may be won without a word by the behavior of their wives, as they observe your chaste and respectful behavior. Your adornment must not be merely external, braiding the hair and wearing gold jewelry or putting on dresses, but let it be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable quality of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is precious in the sight of God. For in this way, in former times, the holy women also who hoped in God used to adorn themselves being submissive to their own husbands. Last week we dealt with the definitions, looking at chaste and respectful behavior. The idea of chaste being more holistic, as pure, respectful in the context of reverence. And then this is a true conduct. There's activity going on. As one is to be submissive, they are to be submissive to God's commands. Submissiveness and meekness go hand-in-hand. Submissiveness and meekness go hand-in-hand with the whole of Scripture. Even this morning in reading of the birth of Christ, do we not recognize that there is an element and an understanding of meekness and even a strength of meekness? That the very Son of God would be born in human flesh. In some sense you would say well that's to take on weakness. But this was the meekness of our Lord that he would be born in human flesh. As we talk about these things this morning there's going to be ideas certainly that are specifically once again toward wives but once again There will be things across the board that all of us can gain. If we want to look at the birth of Christ and the recognition of His meekness, if we want to look at the death of Christ and His meekness, the strength of that meekness, if we want to look at what Christ did in being one who was questioned by the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and one who was questioned by Pilate himself, and he showed genuine meekness. We have to recognize that translates for us as believers there ought to be a desire for meekness in our own souls. Specifically Peter here looking to wives because of the context. Yet every one of us ought to have some sense a desiring that the Lord would work in us meekness. And hopefully you'll see some of that this morning. As we described it last week, meekness is evidence of a regenerate soul. The person who is changed in Christ Jesus by the power of the Spirit submits to God's authority. The person that is changed submits to God's commands. If you love me, you'll keep my commandments. The person that has changed who loves God through Christ is to submit to God's providence. And this can be very difficult. If you read what I wrote this week concerning Luke chapter 2, we all live in difficult times throughout all the ages. But all times are in the hands of God. all times are of the providence of God. And we are to be those who submit even to the providence of God. Specifically, wives, sometimes you are to submit to God in dealing with a difficult or even a disobedient husband in providence. But even a wife that doesn't deal with a difficult husband still has to submit to the providence of God. Every Christian must submit to the providence of God. And eventually, whether all of humanity realizes it or not, they will submit to the providence of God. For His Son will come again. This morning we want to look at a third question. from definitions to methods to foundation. What is the foundation of pure and respectful behavior? Now remember, this is in the context of wives in that sense, and yet we all can gain something from it. What is the foundation of pure and respectful behavior? Well, Peter here notes very carefully that there's something about those things which are hidden in our hearts which are more important than that which is outward. Even the external clothes we wear or how we have our hair or the putting on of certain dresses and things of that nature. He says, but let your behavior, let it come from the hidden person of the heart. which is an imperishable quality of a gentle or meek and quiet spirit. And this is precious in the sight of God. What are the foundations of this pure and respectful behavior? Number one, a hidden soul armed with meekness, not with consistent anger. A hidden soul armed with meekness, not with consistent anger. Deep down in the depths of our soul, what is arming us? Wife who may be in a difficult marriage, what is arming you? The defense mechanisms of anger? The person who is dealing with the ideas that Peter is espousing here recognizes that their anger will not bring meekness. We have to think about where that anger comes from. And once again, we're brought to sometimes we're angry at God's providence in our lives. I want to reiterate this from a different perspective than even we did last week. Because we have to recognize that sometimes really the frustrations we have in life are anger inside of us about what God has brought about in providence in our lives. What we don't like. What we didn't want. What we didn't want to happen. It's really a conflict between two wills. One is our will and the way we want things to go and what we think we deserve and what we want. And the other is the very will of God in providence. And when those two things collide, they sometimes, and a lot of times, conflict. And in that conflicting frustration, there is anger. For the flesh, anger is a usual reaction to dark providence. Matthew Henry encourages us to trust in meekness even in those dark circumstances. He says when the methods of providence are dark and intricate and we are quiet at a loss what God is about to do with us, a meek and quiet spirit acquiesces in assurance that all things work together to the good of those who love God. He goes on to show an illustration of that in Abraham himself. That Abraham, in his faithfulness, walked his son to that mountain. Can you imagine having to think about that dark providence? It hadn't even happened yet. That which he was commanded to do, and he faithfully walked. He had no idea what God was about to do, but what it seemed like God was about to do was very dark. We have to make sure that we understand that usually our anger at God is more than often about the providence God has brought in our life. I think if we all raised our hands, we would all say, we all want a perfect life. If I asked you, do you want a perfect life? You'd say, yes. The problem is we don't even know what a perfect life is. We don't even know what normal is. Normal seems to get redefined all the time, doesn't it? Chaste or pure and respectful behavior means that we will submit to God's providence. We will seek to put that anger aside of what providence brings and trust in him. I was speaking with one of our people last week, and I thought they made a very good observation. Oftentimes, one of the struggles we have in meekness is not recognizing the reason that we're not walking or striving in meekness is because of discontentment. When I'm angry at the providence of God, really, I'm discontent. I'm discontent with what God has brought in my life. When a spouse is angry with a spouse, what are we often angry with? We would say we're angry with that action or their words. But after a while, really the anger is about the very providence itself, the providence that God has brought about, that God would choose to use in our lives. Even if someone lives with a spouse, that is disobedient to the word of God. We should not have anger toward God in the providence, but should seek striving toward understanding what meekness is in the life of the believer. Because ultimately our anger toward God and his providence is our discontentment toward God. I think for all of us, there's been times when we've looked at Providence in our life and we've just been discontent with them. We've said things like, why me? Why my family? Why us? You realize when we ask questions like that, although they might be said in terms that seem somewhat benign in the moment, in the hidden part, and that's what Peter's talking about here, this hidden person of the heart, in the hidden person of the heart when we're questioning God this way, ultimately at times it comes from a place of discontentment. And discontentment never breeds meekness. Meekness is that submissiveness to the authority the commands and the providence of God. And discontentment never breeds meekness. Discontentment brings frustration. It breeds frustration. That frustration often breeds anger. When you think of Job dealing with the providences of God, wouldn't he have a reason to be angry? I mean, he lost everything. He lost everything. I mean, even his wife told him to hate God and die, basically. And yet by the end of the book of Job, being taught through the whirlwind of providence, Job is stating very clearly that God is sovereign, that His will cannot be thwarted. He even says, I have heard of you by the hearing of the year, but now my eye sees you, therefore I retract and I repent in dust and ashes. What is Job doing there? Job is in meekness, submitting to the very providences of God throughout all his life and saying, I don't understand all these things. He's not saying he can't understand the revelation that God has given him. He's saying, I can't understand the working of God in my life and all things. It's too great for me. Some people take Job and act as if somehow He's giving us carte blanche to say, well, I don't really know what that means, so I don't have to look at it. No. No. Job is simply saying, I'm submitting to the providence of God. We have to ask ourselves if we have souls that are in turmoil and anger with the providence of God of our lives. Well, if we're going to consider another portion of this foundation in dealing with anger, we don't want a soul armed with consistent anger. We want it to be armed with meekness, but we have to recognize that sometimes our anger is not just at God, it's anger at the world and our neighbor. Now, some of our anger at the world can be just. I don't want to take away from that. biblically minded anger that can be there in certain things, but we have to even be careful with that because we're not just and righteous enough to carry out even what we would consider to be righteous anger. Sometimes it's our anger at the world and our neighbor for the hassles against us. What kind of hassles do we have with the world and the people around us, our neighbors? The aggravations, the incitements, the goading of other discontented people. Sometimes we get so wrapped up in the frustrations of the world and what's going on around us that we're taking on the very goading of the discontented world and we're putting it on our shoulders and our souls. We can't take everything on ourselves and act as if somehow as an individual, we will solve all the world's problems. To do that over time, if we consistently do that, it'll cause our peace to wane and we will develop anger in that hidden person of the heart. But what does meatness do? Well, meekness, according to Matthew Henry, preserves the mind from being ruffled and discomposed. In the very definition of the Word, it gives us the idea that there is an inner peace, there is an inner strength, one that from his very soul, in Christ Jesus, by the power of the Holy Spirit, through the working of the Spirit and the Word together, that one has an inner peace that is gained. They're not ruffled and discomposed in completeness. The whole of their life is not lived in this unhinged anger and vanity and vexation, as Matthew Henry says, of this lower world. Sometimes we want the world to change not simply for moralistic reasons. We want the world to change because we want it to be our way. And sometimes our way has more to do with our selfishness than it has to do with God's purposes. There are moments that God by the spirit and through his word gives us lucid consciences enough to have real desire for our world or our country to change for the right reasons. But many times what we desire has some basis in our own inner anger at the world and our neighbor. We need to strive toward meekness that our minds would be preserved so that we wouldn't be unhinged people on the inside. I'm just not talking about the outside. I'm not, once again, talking about you being able to not show your anger on your face. Some of us, whatever we're thinking just kind of comes to our face, even when we don't want it to. And we try our best for it not to, and we're still showing it on our face. Even when we start contorting our faces not to show it. But really all of that struggle to keep my face from showing the thing that's going on, where is that coming from? It's from the inside. It's from my very soul. It's from the struggle that's within me as a person. The spirit of the flesh still battling against that which is the spirit of God in the believer. This once again reminds us that anger is first from the soul of a person and not simply an outward reaction. The spirit of a person asking and seeking for meekness and quietness of spirit desires for the anger on the inside to be extinguished in order to deal with the outward reactions of anger in right motive. I want to have the right reactions on the outside, but I want those right reactions on the outside to have first been motivated from a change in the inside. Well, what is another foundation of this pure and respectful behavior? Secondly, a hidden soul armed with meekness not an impassioned, unbridled tongue. A hidden soul armed with meekness, not an impassioned, unbridled tongue. Here we see one of the outworkings of anger is the unbridled tongue. Now what was once only known in the heart has burst forth in the heated words of the tongue and lips. Matthew Henry indicates this anger brings forth words of fury and indecency. And you know what's interesting? He noted something I thought was very interesting. In looking at this passage, he noticed that this fury and indecency, once meekness is forfeited and we're not striving in it, the tongue will be unbridled, not just toward rebellious people, but toward decent people. and even against God Himself. See, this would be a struggle for a wife living with a disobedient husband or a difficult husband, to the Word of God. Then on the inside, She begins to struggle with all that which is taking place around her, the providences, the anger on the inside toward what the husband may be doing, even to his own family. To the point that her words. Not just become words of fury to her husband. but they become words of fury, maybe to her children, or her coworkers, or her family members. And Peter says that they may be one without a word by the behavior of their wives. It's specific to wives. And yet at the same time, it gives us a context to understand how we deal with the world. I dare say if you go look at the picture of the Lord Jesus and how he dealt with the world, you would say that the Lord Jesus was an angry man, that he ripped and stomped at the world at all times. Not to say that he didn't show emotion, he did. He showed it toward the religious leaders of his day, for he knew they were heretics, they were false religious leaders, and he wanted to put a stop and an end to their work. Yet when he was questioned by the world, he had a certain meekness about him, that he could sit and be questioned by Pilate who thought he knew everything. And the Lord Jesus simply gave an answer of, it is as you say, it is as you say. The Lord Jesus shows us that the tongue can be used rightly. But what we often see, especially in the world, And often, in our own souls, is that the tongue becomes a place that that which is on the inside comes out. James tells us it's a small little part of the body, isn't it? But boy, a spark from the tongue is like a spark that sets the forest aflame. Meekness. Doesn't arm us with an unbridled tongue. Meekness arms us with God's grace. To keep our mouths closed. It arms us with God's grace to instead of uttering anger on the inside to pray and ask for God's mercy. That we would keep our mouths closed. And at other times, when appropriate, we would say words of truth from the scripture and not words of anger. I don't think our Lord was some weak, sissified man in his humanity. He was strong, and yet he showed us what it was like to have meekness in a bridled tongue. We'll deal with this a little bit more at the very end, but we have to ask a question. What restrains us from such words in the mind and speaking from the mouth? Well, in general, we would have to say the reading and praying of the word and asking for the work of the spirit to enable our striving in meekness. Have you ever stopped and prayed? Have you made it a focus of prayer to ask that the Lord, by the power of his spirit, would give you the meekness of the hidden person of the heart, to dispel your anger on the inside, and the meekness that your tongue would be bridled. It's not often a prayer, probably, that we pray. But we need to. We need to. It'll aid against this disease of an unbridled tongue. That's what Matthew Henry calls it, a disease. And it is. I mean, if you know, over the years, some of you have known me for more than 20, 25 years. There's been moments where I said things. I opened my mouth when I shouldn't have. I could have just been quiet. But I thought it was important that I had to say it at that time and that moment. And in the end, I didn't help anybody. Certainly didn't help myself. I didn't help anyone else around me. It's a true weakness. It's not just a weakness of supposed gregarious, loud people like myself. It's a weakness of all personalities, because every personality has, in their own soul, the tendency to have that anger worked up in them, even if they don't show it outwardly. Meekness not only deals with the unbridled tongue, it deals with the inside of us from which comes those things rolling off the tongue. Well, thirdly, what is the foundation of pure and respectful behavior? A hidden soul armed with meekness, not the flaming fires of an unforgiving spirit. A lot of our not striving and meekness with one another is really from unforgiveness. Do you realize for a wife to live the kind of husband that Peter is speaking about here, that there's got to be a meekness or a forgiving spirit? Unforgiveness in this type of situation is not going to go well. A husband that lives with a wife who struggles to submit, that husband, if he has an unforgiving spirit, it won't go well. And two people with an unforgiving spirit toward one another, it will not go well. It doesn't mean that sin is not called sin, but it means that when sin is called out, it's called out. in a biblically minded way. If you scream at your spouse and tell them what they need to do, then that goes against everything that the scripture is teaching about the spirit being submissive to God's word, his commands. The Lord Jesus says, love your neighbor as yourself. When have you loved getting screamed at? You just enjoy it. When someone angrily screams at you, is that what you enjoy? None of us. There are some people, they don't angrily scream on the outside, but the facial expressions or the huffing and the puffing or the way they walk about the house when they're angry lets you know that they want to scream at you even though they're not doing it. This comes over time from an unforgiving spirit. Meekness engenders us to forgive one another. Did God not show his meekness toward us and sinners through sending his son the Lord Jesus Christ to die for us? Forgiveness is a lasting mark of the gospel to sinners and it ought to fill our marriages. How many times has a spouse And so inwardly frustrated, maybe even just pure angry. And they harbor it. Not just hours, sometimes, but days or weeks. Sometimes it's so awful it's for weeks or months. Or maybe they put it in that little file cabinet they have. And years down the road, they throw it in the face of their spouse. Forgiveness is a lasting mark of the Gospel and it ought to be in our marriages. True forgiveness comes from understanding a meek and quiet spirit. If you've submitted to the very commands of God, then what you've submitted to is that you are a sinner before a holy God and you have bowed before Him through His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, and you have admitted, you have repented of your very sin. This type of meekness comes from understanding real gospel forgiveness. If you've been forgiven, are you not willing to forgive your spouse? If you've been forgiven, are you not willing to forgive your sibling, your brother or sister? Are you not willing to forgive your child? If you've been forgiven, some of you young people, are you not willing to forgive your parents? Parents, are you not willing to ask forgiveness? when you've sinned against your children. It takes a meek person to ask for forgiveness. And that meekness doesn't come from the flesh of the person. That meekness comes from the inward work of the Holy Spirit in the individual. That they would see their action against another person and be willing to go to that person in genuine, genuine desire. to ask their forgiveness. I sinned against you. I did it. I did it. I have asked God to forgive me. I ask you to forgive me. The reason we don't often do this is because we really haven't gone in repentance to God. We haven't really repented of that sin. We just said to God, hey God can you put it over here, forgive it please. Boom, boom, bang, bang and off we go. Sinners who have been brought to the end of themselves repent. Those who repent and believe will be those who repent in their relationships with their neighbors, their spouses, their children, their friends, their fellow church members. This is an attitude of meekness. Forgiveness for sinners was established by the strong meekness of Christ Jesus. It's a lasting mark of the gospel and it's established in the very person and work of the Lord Jesus. And forgiveness through meekness will be paramount for living with your neighbor. and especially a wife living with a difficult, disobedient, or unbelieving husband. And Peter tells us meekness is beloved in the sight of God. Some of your versions translate the word there in the end of verse four as precious. Now sadly today that word, like other words, has gotten mixed in with our just common vernacular and you see the word precious and you think about some cute puppy or some love story or some little baby, oh it's so precious, all those kinds of things. But here the word precious gives us a context of something that is beloved. God looks upon it in delight. Haven't we been saved to delight in God and to bring delight unto Him? If we are people that walk around with anger and unbridled tongues and spirits of unforgiveness, we are not bringing glory to our God and Savior. If our life is lived with anger boiling on the inside, even though others don't see it, we are not bringing glory to our God through his son, the Lord Jesus. I don't preach to you as one who has attained all these things, and you know I haven't. I'm preaching to you as one who has had to preach to himself for weeks on end. I wish I had shown you times of meekness. I don't even know if I've ever even shown it. But we are in need of it in our hearts and our souls, and especially in this world we live in today. What a wretched, wretched time. And are we going to show these people the gospel by ranting on Facebook in anger and frustration at everything they do and say? Instagram and TikTok and social media, this and that, the other. The Lord Jesus taught that the meek will inherit the earth, not the weak, not pansies, not people who have no substance, The people who have submitted to God and His authority and His providence, they've submitted to His Word and His commands. They are submitting to Him in every way in life by His grace. I want to leave you with these three things. Observe, striving in meekness requires intake of God's Word. One of the things that the word reminds us of is this world is not our home. I live in it. I have to deal with it. I'm in it. I know the Lord says I'm supposed to be in it, but I'm not supposed to be of it. And many times we become so much a part of the world that we're not listening to the Word of God teach us this world is not our home. To have the same exasperation that a sinful world has all of the time is not proper. It's not appropriate. If we're going to have even righteous anger towards something, it needs to be Word-based, Biblically-based. But even in reading that, it will remind us this world's not our home. Meekness requires intake of God's Word to remind us this is not our home. Meekness requires intake of God's Word to remind us of the strong meekness of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, even in His death on the cross. Keep the cross before yourselves. What will it do? Keeping the cross before yourselves will remind you of your need to repent of your and remind you how to live with your neighbor. And that you would not live a life, not just of outward anger or unbridled anger of the tongue, but that on the inside you won't be a person that's just seething all of the time with the wounds and pus and sores of the world that it causes. We need this intake of the word. It encourages and reminds us to avoid those matters and maybe even certain people which provoke us towards sin and anger. There's just sometimes you need to avoid things. There's certain things you avoid because you know it leads to other sins. And the same is true here. Sometimes there are things you need to avoid so that you're not angry on the inside and you don't have an unbridled tongue toward things and you'll have a forgiving spirit. I mean, there's just been things I've had to decide I'm not going to pay attention to and not look at. Not because I'm any better than anybody else in the room, but because I know I'm not any better than you are, I just need to avoid it. Because if I don't, I will be angry all of the time. Some things just need to be put aside and the Word of God put in. I won't get off on this too much, but I've just heard so many people over the years, well, I don't have time to read the Word. Okay, fair enough. But you make time and I make time for a lot of other things. I bet there's a few of those things you could cut out or do away with and you'd have some time to read the word. Fair enough. Number two, striving in meekness requires prayer. Prayer and repentance of sin and prayer for grace and meekness. You just need to take the Word of God and apply it in prayer. And we need to ask, Lord, I'm about to go into this meeting with these people, with this person, with this coworker. Lord, this could be problematic, not just because of them, but because of me. Lord, will you help me to strive in meekness so I don't have an unbridled tongue? Or on the inside, I don't picture myself knocking that person out. Lord, will you give me meekness in dealing with my child who's provoking me to anger? Lord, will you give me meekness in dealing with my spouse who's provoking me to anger? Thirdly, Striving in meekness requires letting loose of this world. This world is just not our home. It's just not. It doesn't mean we shouldn't strive in ways to make this world a place where we live in it as Christians, but it's just not our home. And a lot of people will be talking about Christmas and birth of Jesus and all these kinds of things, but Jesus didn't come so that you and I could make this place our home. He came to save a people for himself, to take them to his home, a new heaven and a new earth, no more sin, no more tears, no more anger, But while we're here, we are told to strive in the strength of meekness through the word of God, by the power of his spirit. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, you've been merciful once again to give us this day in your word. May we glory in you alone through your son, the Lord Jesus. It's in his name we pray. Amen.