Welcome and good morning Trinity Bible Church, as well as any family or guests that are visiting. We're in a bit of an interesting place. We finished the Matthew series and then we went through Advent and now Advent has finished and we start Genesis one through three next Sunday. And so I found myself with one Sunday. And last week when I thought, well, I'll have like, take me a couple hours to just pick one sermon I might wanna preach. I just have like a free, like it's super easy. It wasn't easy. And so I did choose something that will actually be the first reading of the new year in terms of when we have the deacons read the scriptures, and that is from 1 Peter 4, 12 through 19. This is, you'll have a title more than likely in your scriptures about suffering, but the reason that I chose this passage after putting together the reading list this week, was simply that it kind of encompasses the entirety of the letter of first Peter. And so one of the things that's always interesting and challenging is how do you how do you preach an entire New Testament epistle and in one sermon? I'm not going to do that, but if you could, it would be, you could take these few verses from 1 Peter and it kind of encapsulates everything that Peter is trying to communicate to Christians in Asia Minor. And what this is, of course, is about how does a Christian deal with suffering. Suffering is something that is not a simple, hopefully that never happens to me, but rather it is a guarantee of the Christian life. And so as we're, it just so happens to be that it's here in what would be like the end of a year and maybe you're the type of person that takes stock on the previous year and different areas of your life. Maybe you do that as a parent or as a businessman or woman or even as a student or a child, right? Because most children go, how'd I do last year? Let me check off the ways that I just knocked it out of the park. Obedience through the roof. All right. But maybe you're someone who just kind of likes to take stock. And so one of the things I was thinking of through this, like going through these very few passages that encapsulate an entire book of the New Testament, one of my favorite books of the New Testament, as well as a thematic thing like suffering in the Christian life, which is a guarantee, just so everyone knows, like it's not a maybe it'll happen, it's supposed to and is going to happen. And what's great about these verses is that it's also going to kind of make a division between this is what Christian suffering looks like, and this is what deserved suffering looks like, and one you want to experience. which is counter to everything that we are in the flesh. I don't want to deal with hard things. The irony is that we generally don't even attempt to deal with this aspect of I'm suffering for the name of Christ, but deserved suffering for consequences of sin. That's the one we experience more often and we still seem in love with that one. But Peter's going to confront the church and say, hey, this is the suffering to pursue and to pursue Christ. And what's beautiful about all of this, and I'm giving it all away, is he's not focusing the church on suffering. He's focusing the church on future glory in Christ. What are we to do when we're in the midst of suffering for Christ, for living well the Christian life, whatever that may look like? We're supposed to not focus on the act of going through suffering, whatever that is. Rather, we're supposed to be reminded that as Christ suffered, In our union with Him, we are sharing in His suffering, and we're to look forward to the fact that we'll share in His, what Peter calls, His revealed glory. Meaning, as always, whatever we're going through as a good Christian, or an attempt of living a good life as a Christian, we're supposed to Take that and view it through the lens of, I can't believe I'm going, not through the lens of, I can't believe I'm going through this, but through the lens of, I will be there when Christ reveals himself in his future glory. And just as I'm sharing with him in suffering, it pales in comparison to what I will share with him in his glory. That's Peter's message. So, this morning I'll be reading, in our reading, all of chapter four, so it all makes sense, and then going through these few verses of 12 through 19. As always, I'll read through the entirety of the passage. Afterwards, giving you an opportunity to pray silently, asking God, the Holy Spirit, to illuminate your heart and your mind. And then after that, I will pray for us corporately. before we enter the time of the word. As a side note, unrelated. Something's making my eyes water really bad, so if I'm doing this, I'm not double winking at anyone, or Brandon, I'm not, I'm not. Something's in my eyes. Now, looking to 1 Peter chapter four, reading the entirety of the chapter. Since therefore Christ suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves with the same way of thinking. For whoever has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin, so as to live for the rest of the time in the flesh, no longer for human passions, but for the will of God. For the time that has passed suffices for doing what the Gentiles wanted you, living in sensuality, passions, drunkenness, orgies, drinking parties, and lawless idolatry. With respect to this, they are surprised when you do not join them in the same flood of debauchery, and they malign you. but they will give account to him who is ready to judge the living and the dead, for this is why the gospel was preached even to those who are dead, that though judged in the flesh the way people are, they might live in the spirit the way God does. The end of all things is at hand, therefore be self-controlled, sober-minded for the sake of your prayers. Above all, keep loving one another earnestly since love covers a multitude of sins, show hospitality to one another without grumbling, As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another as good stewards of God's varied grace. Whoever speaks is one who speaks oracles of God. Whoever serves is one who serves by the strength that God supplies in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. To Him belong glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you as though something strange were happening to you, but rejoice insofar as you share Christ's sufferings that you may also rejoice and be glad when His glory is revealed. If you are insulted for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the spirit of glory of God rests upon you. But let none of you suffer as a murderer, a thief, or an evildoer, or as a meddler. Yet if anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in that name. For it is time for judgment to begin at the household of God. It begins with us what will be the outcome for those who do not obey the gospel of God. And if the righteous is scarcely saved, what will become of the ungodly and the sinner? Therefore, let those who suffer according to God's will entrust their souls to a faithful creator while doing good. This is the word of God. Please take this time to pray. Heavenly Father, as the church gathers here on the Lord's Day, we come to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ, our Lord. God, as we come here and we celebrate our union with that same Christ through his blood, through the regeneration of God, the Holy Spirit, and the sealing and indwelling of the Spirit, and the saints of God, And we are joined together in community or in communion, one with the other, as adopted brothers and sisters in the household of God. And we citizens of this inaugurated kingdom of God, we await patiently for the return of our Lord. And until such a time, God, you have instructed us to live lives striving, fighting, working in discipline to be made more and more into the image of Christ. And yet, of our own, this is an impossible work. And yet, through God, the Holy Spirit, you have sanctified us. You continue to sanctify us. You draw us closer to Christ. Lord, may you convict us of our sin. May you draw us more and more into a repentant life, one which leads more and more to all of our hearts' desires, all of the thoughts of our minds, everything that we have to do in this life being filtered through this Christ-likeness. Lord, strengthen your church, not just this day, but in this coming year, to pursue Christ earnestly. to take stock of their own lives, whether great-grandparent to student. If we call ourselves Christian, Lord, let us take that confession seriously. And Lord, as we contend for the faith, May you give us opportunities to evangelize our family, our neighbor, our coworker, and even those who despise us. And Lord, may you strengthen this family of faith, this local fellowship. May you strengthen the church universal, the church gathering around the world. Lord, as we all proclaim that all this that we do may glory go to the name of Jesus Christ. We pray this in Jesus name. Amen. As you consider suffering, we are remiss if we don't think about the authors of these books of the New Testament. I was going to say, someone want to give me a blindfold? That might be better. Thank you. As the New Testament authors all as far as we can tell outside of the Gospel of John, historically are accounted to have been martyred for their faith in Christ. We see in the book of Acts and some of the other kind of, what we're hearing in some of the epistles as well, that there was multiple levels of persecution or suffering that the church would endure based on where they were. It could be all the way from ridicule, as Peter is going to use over and over again in this particular epistle, This was written to churches in Asia Minor, meaning that they were this new faith, mostly a Gentile churches, as they were converting to Christianity and changing, therefore, because of being indwelled by the Spirit and believing in the gospel and being a new creation, it meant that their ethical norms dramatically changed. so when we have this graphic list of things that we read through that they used to do that they no longer take part in to the culture at large to them it looked at the culture of large the unbelieving people who now were looking at these new saints and they were saying what weirdos what strangeness what this there was ridicule And then it would go all the way from something like ridicule to the taking of property to being physically beaten all the way to murder or being killed for the name of Christ. There's a spectrum, if you will, of persecution, suffering of the church that we see in the New Testament. And the authors like Peter, Paul, and others will eventually die for their faith and refusing to recant. That level of persecution for Christians in the West, we don't understand. Like it hasn't been a thing for forever in the United States. or even in Western Europe outside of the places that, I mean, a millennia ago were taken over by Muslims and then taken back. There's been very little in what's called Western civilization that can even recall in the church something like, to call on the name of Jesus in a public setting might mean my death. And so that particular type of suffering for Christ's namesake, we don't really comprehend. We do because we can read it and we can think about it and we can see it, but we haven't experienced it. Our parents haven't, our grandparents haven't, our great, great, great, great, great grandparents haven't, unless you've come from somewhere else where you lived where that was a thing. Now, for those of you that might not know, that type of Persecution is not lessening in the world. It's actually increasing. It's increasing in places that even consider themselves democracies. I mentioned a few weeks ago how persecution of Christians in India has suddenly escalated and was reading a report just yesterday. just trying to keep up with it. That now over a hundred Christians in one town in India have been kicked out of the town because they refused to recant. But what did that mean? That meant that tens of thousands recanted of their faith. And yet here is this thousand kicked out of town. There have been people in the last month who've been killed in India. for not recanting of their faith. There's a resurgence of traditional Hinduism and they've passed an anti-proselytizing law. That's a mouthful. All that means is that no other religious group can witness to a Hindu If they do so, they break the law. Now, you might not also know this about other religions, the major world religions like Islam, Judaism, Hinduism. These are not proselytizing religions. They're not interested in drawing anyone to their faith. Islam doesn't proselytize, it conquers. And Hinduism and Buddhism are simply kind of static. Judaism is the same way. There's no interest in proselytizing. But of course, Christianity is. So laws like this that we see passed for entire towns that are Christian, almost 50% Christian, these laws are passed specifically as anti-Christian laws. the government of India has come out with a statement just two days ago that all these are being overblown, they love the religious diversity, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Anyone who's a student of history knows we've seen all these arguments before. So this type of, this type of suffering is alive and well and if we go into places like northern Africa and in the Middle East and other places, it's been constant for a thousand years that to believe in Christ and name him publicly means certainly at worst your death. But we're removed from that. not just with our shared history, but also with our own experience. But this is why Peter's letter, his first letter is so good for those like us. Because what he's talking about is ridicule. What he's talking about is mockery. What he's talking about is this hanging malevolence towards anything that is against the cultural norms. And what the cultural norms of the time might be in a Roman, of the Roman age of here in Asia Minor, we can see from the things that the normal person tells the Christian or can't believe that they're not partaking in any longer. No longer with the sensuality, the passions, the drunkenness, the orgies, the drinking parties, and lawless idolatry. To the unbelieving culture at the time, those things are the norming norm. What that means is like that's what it is to be normal in Asia Minor in first century Rome. All these things just listed was what was Simply normal. Now, if you're reading this and you're thinking like, huh, I just don't know a culture that calls those things good. That's right, that's our culture. And the church in Western civilization has slowly retreated for well over 100 years. And now we've found ourselves where we find ourselves in this exact place where Peter's writing to these churches. So if there's ever something that you should understand, if I make a stand in the workplace, out in the public square, wherever it may be, for my faith, what's going to come my way will look like this. Ridicule, shame. mockery being pointed out publicly. And I have to ask, why is it that we're so afraid of that? Why is it there's so many times when the opportunities right there before you, this is when I should say something, and you don't, and we don't. See, if you're going to be able to face a time when you say, if I don't recant, I'm going to die. And if you haven't been here at these beginning parts of suffering, where you've made stands, how are you going to do it if that ever comes to you? And I think the key here is Peter's middle portion where he's like, where are we supposed to be looking? Are we supposed to be looking at our circumstance and our fear and all these things? Are we supposed to be looking to Christ who strengthens us? Christ endured suffering. If Christ, the God-man, the second person of the Trinity, is healing and teaching and everywhere he goes showing the work of God. If he is rejected by culture, well, of course we are. And if he rose again from the dead, then one day he will return for us again. That's where our eyes are supposed to be. So when Peter is ending this, really this whole, this whole book on suffering and the Christian life and living the Christian life well. He keeps going back and forth to this idea of, you're going to suffer, you're probably going to suffer, but Christ, you're going to suffer, but remember Christ. And in the midst of all this, what's the important thing? That you hold fast to what I'm calling the good Christian life, meaning the pursuit of holiness. I'm not talking about sinlessness. I'm talking about the actual pursuit of holiness. What that looks like is like, yes, you're going to fail and you're going to sin because you have forces arrayed against you and you are one of them. Not only do we live in a fallen world where everything around us is affected by sin, not only are we surrounded by fallen people who are sinful, and we often can feel the consequences or the pain of other people's sinful actions that affect us, not only is Satan and his forces arrayed against the church at all times, and not only at times are all those forces malevolently Seeking to destroy the church. Things we're talking about where it leads all the way to the physical attempt to kill Christians. But you also have a hidden enemy. Your probably greatest enemy if you're not paying attention to it. It's you. Your flesh. Which is not redeemed. and at all times is at enmity with the spirit, waging war against you. So if you're keeping count, that's five things. I don't know if you've ever been in a fight before. I'm sorry to bring it fight analogies. Or a wrestling match or thumb wrestling. I'm just making stuff. Or if you're playing like five games of chess at once. And everyone's as good as you are. Like, if you've ever been, if it's one-on-one, you're like, I got this. Two-on-one, eh, I probably am arrogant enough to think I got this. Three-on-one, I don't have this. Five-on-one, I'm getting beat up. There's no amount of training. There's no amount of preparation in any kind of physical contest or mental contest where you are going to succeed. And that's the point, we have all these forces arrayed against you that are drawing you to these exact things. What were they saying? Why aren't you doing these things anymore? Why don't you do the drunkenness? Why don't you do the parties? What about the sensuality? What about the idolatry? Wasn't that fun? Wasn't that good? And that's just one whisper. Now there's five. How do we fight against that on our own? We can't. And that's the whole point that Peter's driving. Where do you keep your eyes? Is it on your own ability? Is it on your own ability to do something? Is it on your own ability to fight? Well then that's all hubris. That's all arrogance. That's all forgetting who you are. Who are you? Am I Ken who is in Ken and Ken is in Ken and that's why I'm doing so great? No. I'm not that, I'm in Christ. Who are you? You are in Christ. What was Paul's argument to the church in Rome? It's no longer Gentiles. It's no longer Jews. It's no longer these dumb disputes over nationality. No, you're all in Christ. That's your identity. Why? Because he owns you. He's purchased you out of this other life. And he's now purchased you, you are blood-bought, and you are sealed by the Spirit. And God the Holy Spirit at all times is going, no. What does the scripture say? No longer. And then those temptations, some go away in an instant, others linger. But at the same time, the spirit is guiding you through God's word, through the fellowship of the saints. Pursue him, pursue him, pursue him. So when all of these things come forward towards you, you're prepared. And so we need to be prepared for this. It's not become Christian and all your problems go away. It's become a Christian and be introduced to all your problems. And so be prepared. You're in for a fight until the Lord takes you home or he returns. And so that's why he writes, don't be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you as though something strange was happening to you. But rejoice insofar as you share Christ's sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed. He's telling them, don't be shocked, don't be surprised when a fiery trial, it's a one Greek word, it just means like fire or a tribune by fire. It just means you're going through something. And when it comes upon to test you, as though something strange were happening, his two words he uses describe like, these are things Christians should expect. For the Christian who's pursuing Christ, they should expect opposition. They should expect fiery trial. They should expect all of that to be coming at all times. So what does that look like? Some of you, I know, and I love it, are prepared for almost anything, financial collapse, Civil War, end of the supply chain, the Russians finally come, you've already got your Wolverines sign. Others, you prepare others, some of them others, you have every possible scenario For all the years you have your child mapped out in any way they could possibly go and there's something there. You've got it all planned out with purpose. And so by nature, often we're preparing for things, whether it's in your business or whether it's in your home or whether it's in life in general. And this is Peter telling the church, plan for this. Be prepared for this. Don't be surprised if you've been drawn out of the darkness into the light, that the darkness is going to keep pursuing you. So don't be surprised when it comes on you and temptation and all of this. If you're surprised and you're like, oh, I didn't think that was gonna happen. Well, that's when failure happens. That's when sin happens. And what Peter is saying more than anything, be prepared, be ready, be alert, be on guard at all times. And how are we doing that? If I keep Christ before me, when this happens, not if it happens, when it comes upon me, well, then I just go, oh, it's just like Christ suffered. So when that person called me all these words I can't say out loud because I spoke up about something, I should just say, thank you. So if you are in the public square, the workplace, or your neighborhood, and someone is saying something, and you simply speak up and say, well, you know, actually, I don't think that's true. I believe that what Christ laid forth as an example is that we should love our neighbor as ourselves. And then what follows in their response, you can't repeat and you don't want your children to hear. So instead of arguing, just go, thank you. Thank you for affirming that I am with Christ. Now, the next response might be worse, but Peter wants people to be prepared, the church to be prepared and ready. This is the norm. and how do we do it? Insofar as you share Christ's sufferings, you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed. What is and how is the mechanism? I'm not trying to be frivolous in saying being mocked and being trivialized or being persecuted in the workplace for your faith or whatever it might be is something that's trivial. What I'm saying is that it is something that is supposed to be the norm. And if it's happening to you, it's not to focus on the act as it's happening. I can't believe this is happening to me, rather than saying like, this too happened to Christ. And in the midst of the hurt, the pain, the fear, and whatever it might be that you're feeling, you're to turn all that over to him. Christ too suffered. And just as he suffered, he was glorified and one day he will return and I will share in his glory. And you have to make that the truth of your life. Because as Peter continues, if you're insulted for the name of Christ, what does he say? You're blessed because the spirit of glory and of God rests upon you. He's saying like, if you're insulted for the Christ, it's actually affirmation that the spirit is on you. meaning that whatever this may be, whatever this may look like, and in Peter, it's often some type of cultural conflict, meaning this is what the culture said is using these phrases and kind of in classical education, what is good and true and beautiful. And then like, if you're saying like the culture says, well, what's good and true is beautiful is all of these perversions that scripture says are perversions and are evil. And then so you speak against it You're supposed to understand that what you receive from the culture by standing against it is affirmation of your faith, not a, man, I'm not gonna do that anymore. Like, look what happened. No, it's supposed to be like, oh, okay, okay. Like, this is what it is. Okay, well, then what that does is it strengthens the believer for the next time that that happens. It's no different than the fear of people have of sharing their faith. I'm not going to ask for hands to be raised, but how many people feel fear about sharing their faith? It's significant. But what happens if you suddenly go, you know what? I'm doing it. And you share your faith with a family member, a friend. You defend the faith against a co-worker, a family member, a friend, a non-friend, whoever it may be. Well then the next time you do it, it's not quite as bad. And the next time you do it, why? Because it's training you. It's training you and the spirit is strengthening you every time. And it's the same way dealing with persecution. If you stand up for Christ in the middle of something, like we'll face in Western culture, like the church in Asia Minor was facing at this time, not yet death, not yet, property being seized, not yet any of these things, but ridicule, mockery. When you stand up to it for the name of Christ, you will be strengthened in it in Christ. And then so the next time it happens, you do it again. And I have to say, there's a lot of things in the culture today that have been introduced in the last decade that are unimaginable that now the culture is trying to make it as the norm. Or the norming norm, the most normal norm you could think of. Yeah. And so the unfortunate thing is the way that we've been introduced to some of these things is purely political in nature. Yes, I have to talk about it. is that's where most of the church in the West has been introduced to these ideas is on a political level. One party says, this is true. No such thing as boys or girls. And the other party jumps up and says, yes, there are. And then that becomes the battleground. Rather than it being like, no, that's wrong because God created them male and female. And that's the ultimate, I'm using this word a lot, it's a goofy, ethical kind of phrase, but that's the ultimate norm, is God's created order. And then everything that comes after that argument, you've set your foundation then in God's word. You haven't set your foundation in a political stance. Your foundation is in God's word. So every argument that comes after that or from that, that branches out of that terrible unscriptural idea is fought only with scripture, is fought only with the revealed word of God, which is holy and true. And so then it becomes that which feeds you in all areas. And so while it is a political argument right now, it's by nature a theological argument. And that's how the church is supposed to approach it. It's not supposed to partake in meme culture. Everybody know what meme culture is? My son is hiding his face in the back. Everyone knows what memes are, right? Now I want to raise of hands. Everyone raise your hand, do push-ups. So what it is now is simply like it's someone's face from a movie or something or a thing and then it's altered with some print or whatever or it's a little video and there's a whole bunch of them that go around and it is basically mockery. It's mocking something for an illicit response, for a laughter. But the actual word meme comes from a Greek word which means to impersonate. And so the whole idea of what we call meme culture, what we were, well, I was introduced into the last couple of political or elective cycles, is simply mockery being answered with mockery. And so it's more of like, if the culture says there's no such thing as boys and girls, then I'm gonna draw a picture and write something mocking about the people that say that, and then I'll get laughs about it, and we all pass it around and go, ha ha, weirdos. Who laughed? Sorry. That's where we are, but that's embarrassing. That's not a theological argument. And we live and breathe the reality of God's revealed word. is it's not something to laugh at, whether it's funny or not, it's something to be aggrieved by, as God's Spirit is aggrieved by it. And so this is what Peter's telling the church. These things you used to partake in no longer should be looked at as I can't wait to do that. And they certainly shouldn't be looked at as well, let's have a joke about it. They're to be looked at and reviled. No, that way leads to death. And that's the argument. No such thing as boys and girls leads to death. That's an argument devoid of God. And so we're supposed to answer it with scripture. And there's a multitude of other things that we can talk about in terms of like cultural norms or the attempt to make something culturally normative that scripture's clearly condemning. And then through all of this, we share commonality with this first century church in Asia Minor, as he tells them, the spirit of glory and God rests upon you if you are living the good Christian life, pursuing Christ, and you are mocked and you are ridiculed, just like Christ. And here's the split in this particular text. And 15, but let none of you suffer as a murderer or a thief or an evildoer or as a meddler. Yet if anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in that name. So 15 and 16, he stops to say, like, don't suffer. And he uses kind of just general kind of ideas, murderer, evildoer, thief, meddler. You could say this probably analogous to some of the law of Israel, but also just general terms of what also typify behavior of unbelief. And so don't suffer consequences that you deserve for breaking the law and sinning. He's making a clear distinction. Suffering for the name of Christ by doing good versus suffering for sinful behavior and doing bad. And this isn't a legalistic argument of you must be universally good to be considered a Christian. No, what considers you Christian is that the Spirit of God resides in you and Christ has called you and you've repented and believed in his name. And while you will not live a perfect life, your life should look like someone who is pursuing perfection while never being able to attain it until united with Christ in fullness. And so this distinction is between belief and unbelief. And so, just like a time in history of the church, say the fourth century, we also live in a time in the West where Christianity is also cultural. It's cultural in the way that it's defined almost every system with which the West operates. And so people consider themselves Christian while rejecting all kinds of things that no Christian would ever deny. It's why the poll this past year, that Barna put out was one of the lowest ever in where they had to change the definitions, what I've mentioned before, which essentially is 10% of the population of the United States would be considered confessionally Christian. That's staggering. Yet, 40 more percent of the country considered themselves Christian in name, essentially. So what that leads to is people who confess Christianity have never come to faith and simply live as they always lived in all of these things, passions, drunkenness, orgies, drinking parties, lawless idolatry, and yet still call themselves Christian. We all know them. We all probably have some in our family, or we go to school with them, or whatever it may be. And in that, Peter's saying, like, this is belief and unbelief. This isn't immature Christianity. This is unbelief. And so he's warning the church who receives this letter, if you're suffering for this thing, for in this way, this isn't Christian suffering. This is suffering as sinful person making sinful choices. Yet if anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed. Let him glorify God in that name. For it is time for judgment to begin at the household of God, and it begins with us. What will be the outcome of those who do not obey the gospel of God? He's still continuing on the same argument. If the righteous is scarcely saved, what will become of the ungodly and the sinner? Therefore, let those who suffer according to God's will entrust their souls to a faithful creator while doing good. I mentioned the five forces opposing you are all Christians, a fallen world, fallen people all around you, Satan and all of his forces, as well as at times the kind of all of those or some of those, a malicious intent of murdering Christians, which we see around the world everywhere, and then finally, yourself, your own flesh. All of this in the simple things in this coming year, this is what I prayed for this week while preparing this. I was praying, Lord, send me trial. Send me ridicule, suffering, and not sorry, send all of the congregation of Trinity the same. Let us all be tested. Let all of our faith be proven true. Let all the church be strengthened in shared union with one another. If one of the men in the church makes a stand in the workplace based on his faith and gets fired, I know for a fact that the congregation will come around that family and take care of them. Because we've seen it before. If somebody in the church, one of the ladies, is meeting with friends or old friends or family members and she makes a stand and loses all those friends, she's going to have family here to surround her. to weep with her, to mourn with her, and to pray with her. For students, whether college, whether high school, middle school, whatever it may be, who make a stand at school, whether they go to a Christian school or not, don't be fooled, there are sinners abounding. And they lose friends, or they have troubles. The community of faith that we have here in this local assembly, that's what Peter is driving at. This is who we are. We are in Christ. We're all pursuing Christ. We'll all face suffering, although in different levels, for following Christ, and we all are strengthened through the same Holy Spirit, through the same fellowship of the saints, and we all have one thing in mind where our strength comes from, one day he will return and he will receive all the glory that is rightfully his and he will bestow on his people blessings unimaginable. Until such a time, leave this place and I pray hold fast to the truth that pursuing Christ in your life will bring suffering. So be prepared and be blessed and be joyful in sharing that with our Lord. Heavenly Father, We pray we look to passages like this, not as something to be feared, not as something to forget, not even something that sobers the mind, rather as Peter wrote it, may we, may we be blessed with the knowledge by the spirit of glory of God. to be counted worthy of sharing in the sufferings of Christ, because we know we will share in his glory. We pray your name would be glorified as we continue in our time of public worship. We pray this in Jesus' name, amen. Please stand as we conclude through praise. The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you. The Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace. Amen.