We want to thank you for listening to this week's sermon from Harvest Bible Chapel, Kansas City. We pray that you will be encouraged and challenged by God's Word today. If you would like more information about Harvest, please visit our website at www.harvestkansascity.org. And now, here's Pastor Jeff Terrell. I invite you to turn in your Bibles to 1 Peter. We're going to be looking at chapter 1 this morning. 1 Peter chapter 1. If you don't have a Bible, our ushers are going to be coming down the aisles. They would love to put one in your hands. If you don't have a Bible with you, please grab one of those. Let them know that you would like one. You can actually find 1 Peter chapter 1 on page 1014 in those Bibles so you can be following along. I wanna say as we get ready to start that this is an opportunity for us as a church to see discipleship take place. We have 13 men that are meeting every Wednesday morning at 6.15, that is early, at least for a lot of us. 6.15, we're gathering together, and what we're doing throughout the summer is we are equipping one another with what the process looks like to be able to open God's word, and then study it, and then effectively, hopefully effectively, preach it on a Sunday morning. And so we're doing that throughout the summer. We call it our Simeon Trust. It's named after an organization that actually is designed to do this type of training. And so we're doing that as a church this summer. And so different elders and men in the church are going to have an opportunity to preach throughout the summer along with me through this amazing book. And what we've discovered as we've been studying it is that the book actually tells us what the theme is. So if you've arrived at 1 Peter 1, flip over a couple chapters to chapter 5, and I want to show you in the text where we find the theme for this book. In 1 Peter 5, in verse 12, it says, by Silvanus, he was the amanuensis, or the one who was writing down what Peter was telling him. It says, Silvanus was a faithful brother, and I regard him. I have written briefly to you, exhorting and declaring that this is the true grace of God. Stand firm in it. And so that's where we get the theme. And I love the video because it gives us a picture of what's important. There's fire going on all around in that picture. And that's actually borrowed from 1 Peter. 1 Peter talks twice about the fiery trials that the Christians were experiencing. And I'll get into what that was in just a little bit. But the trials that we experience in life can be just like we saw in the video. They can be fires, and it can spread, and it can be uncontrolled, and it can pop up in places that we would have never expected it. And I know many of you last week heard me share with you, and hopefully you weren't offended by it, that I've been going through a time of a dark place. And I shared with you last week that if you're looking for a church where the pastor is perfect, this is not the church for you. So don't get up now, but afterwards you can do that and just know that this is not the place where the pastor is perfect. And it was in this dark place in my mind. It was a place where just, it was just weighty. And people have been asking me, what do you mean by dark place? Well, just weighty. You wake up in the morning, and you just have a weight on you. And you go to bed at night, and you have a weight on you. And all throughout the day, there's just this weight on me. And I appreciate your prayers and people reaching out to me to encourage me. And I will tell you, my circumstances have not changed, but my thinking has. And so the darkness is getting some light shed on it. But it's in those moments that I think we can all relate to where we realize how important it is to be able to stand firm. And so this book is incredibly practical. It provides theology as well as practical application for how we as Christians, when we experience trials in life, can in fact stand firm. And so do you think there's value in this this summer? And so that's what this book is going to be about. And so this morning we're gonna actually look at the first two verses of chapter one. And what Peter does in his opening to this book, this letter, is to be able to focus the readers on identity. And identity is important, isn't it? We care very deeply about the identities that we convey. We care very deeply about the identities you think of us. We care very deeply about what people we respect or people we consider authorities in our life tell us is our identity, don't we? In fact, listen to this. The apostle Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 6, he writes about identity. And constantly in the Bible, both in the Old and New Testament, the authors are challenging us to look beyond what others would say is our identity, look beyond what we would say is our identity, and to look at what God defines as our identity. Listen to 1 Corinthians 6 9. Paul says, or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? do not be deceived, neither sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, will inherit the kingdom of God." This is a very interesting list of people that are characterized by behavior. Both inwardly, as they actually participated in the behavior, as well as outwardly, as people were watching the behavior being performed, they said, you are this. And Paul says to his readers in 1 Corinthians 6, and such were some of you. This list, as it were, was an identity for these individuals. They were characterized by behavior. They were known by the people who watched them as these things, as these identities. But listen to what Paul says in verse 11. He says, but you were washed. You were sanctified. You were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of God. So what Peter is doing is what Paul was doing and what the other authors of scripture are doing and that is moving us beyond how we would identify ourselves and others would identify us beyond that to how God identifies us. And so before we can get into the practical application of how do we stand firm in the midst of the trials that we're experiencing, we must first start with understanding what our identity is. And after all, you can see the title of the message this morning, Identity is Everything. So let's equip ourselves this morning from God's word to better understand what our identity is and to remember, as you can see the big idea in your notes, to remember who you are as you walk on this journey. I think it's interesting, I'm reminded of the Lion King. You remember the Lion King movie years ago from the cartoon from Disney? And Simba, the son, is going through this whole identity crisis. Remember that? He met Pumbaa and Timbaa. And I won't distract you too much by that. But remember what his father said in the whole cloud scene. And he's like, remember who you are. That's pretty good, isn't it? That's my James Earl Jones, remember who you are. Listen, that's what Peter is telling us this morning. is remember as you walk out, as you celebrate Father's Day, as you start to grind on Monday, as you look at all the things you don't have and your neighbors have, remember who you are. So let's begin this morning as we remember our identity by remembering the ruler of your identity. Remember the ruler of your identity. 1 Peter 1, verse one says, Peter, and we'll stop right there. It's interesting, as we look at verse one and the first name, the first word in this letter, who would we say wrote the letter? It's Peter, it's right there in the text. And yet, isn't it interesting that modern scholars would debate, well, wasn't it Peter, or was it really Peter? It was Peter. And there's a lot of arguments for why they would say that it wasn't Peter who wrote it. Let me give you two that they wrestle with. First of all, is that in the original language, in the Greek, this was written in a more educated fashion. And so they would say, wait a minute, Peter the apostle was a fisherman. In fact, you can go back to Acts chapter four in verse 13, the Sanhedrin, the religious leaders of Jerusalem and of Israel said, how can these men be speaking with such authority because they are uneducated men? And the modern scholars would say, wait a minute, Peter was uneducated, how could he use educated Greek? Well, they don't understand the context of Acts chapter four. Those religious leaders were saying, these men didn't go to seminary, so how can they speak with authority on theological issues? You ever feel that way? Well, I didn't go to Bible college. I didn't go to seminary. How can I speak with authority on what God's Word says through the Holy Spirit? And so they weren't saying that these men were uneducated. Academically, they were saying that they don't know the finer points of the law, so how can they teach us? So we can check that one off the list. Another one is that the words and the concepts in 1 Peter are very Pauline. And what that means is that it sounds a lot like Paul. But what's interesting is as I read to you 1 Peter chapter five and verse 12, it says who was the amanuensis? Who was the scribe that was writing down what Peter was dictating? It was a man named Silvanus. And Silvanus is also known as Silas. And we know from Acts chapter 15 that who did Paul choose for his second missionary journey? He chose Silas. So this guy was writing down information that Paul was dictating, and now he's doing that for Peter. So it's, of course, as Silas is writing things down, is Peter saying, say this, well, you won't mean this? And he was writing down with kind of an angle or a flavor from Paul. So I could go on and on of all of the arguments that people would give for why, when it says Peter, they say it doesn't mean Peter, but I would just tell you, it does mean Peter. So who is Peter? And if you've been around the church or you've grown up in the church, maybe you're familiar with Peter, but let me bring us all to the same page. Peter was the brother of Andrew. You can see that in John chapter one. In fact, I'll give you some scriptures that you can write down if you want to follow this train of thought later on this afternoon. He's the brother of Andrew, John chapter one in verse 40. He was a fisherman. And it was interesting that his name originally was Simon, but Jesus changed his name to Cephas, or Peter. It meant stone, and there's a very interesting play of words in Matthew chapter 16, you can look at it later. But Jesus referred to him as rock, or as the sliver of a rock. And what he was doing is he was giving Peter a new name that would describe who he would be in his relationship with Christ and the other disciples. And if you've studied Peter, you know that Peter was a rock, wasn't he? I mean, he was the leader of the disciples. He was the first one to speak, the first one to act, and the first one to stick his foot in his mouth. Sounds like a lot of us, isn't it? And Peter was constantly a leader, but Peter was also somebody who would speak before thinking. And we see this so beautifully in the upper room. Remember the upper room beginning in John chapter 13 as Jesus is about to lead the disciples in his last Passover meal. Jesus takes off his robe and he takes out a bowl and he begins a very disgusting exercise of washing the feet of the disciples. And you remember he gets to Peter and what happens to Peter? Peter says, no, no, no, you're not gonna wash my feet because my feet are smelly and that's above your, that's below your pay grade. Jesus says, listen, if I don't wash your feet, you don't have any part of me. And so what does Peter do? He speaks without thinking. And he says, well, I'll just wash my feet, wash my hands, wash my head, I mean, baptize me. And Jesus says, no, you don't need that. And Peter wants to, once again, champion his loyalty. And what does he say at the end of John chapter 13? He says, even if everybody falls away from you, I will follow after you, even to the death. And you remember what Jesus says to him? He says, Peter, you will deny me three times. And in John chapter 18, he does, doesn't he? And he flees in shame. And then he sees in John chapter 20, the risen Christ in the locked room with the other disciples. And what does he end up doing in John chapter 21? He goes back to his old career. I mean, Peter is all over the map. And then there on the shores of the northern shore of the Sea of Galilee, he's restored to office. And then at the end of chapter 21 of John, he's still struggling. And then in Acts chapter two, he receives the Holy Spirit. And in chapters four through 15, he is the leader once again with boldness. And we're like, good job, Peter. And then you get to Galatians chapter two. And Paul had to withstand him to his face because he was not eating with Jews, or with Gentiles, and then he ate with Gentiles, and there was hypocrisy with him. So this is Peter. He was the most famous disciple, he was the most popular disciple, and it's interesting how he describes himself here in verse one. He could have just said Peter, couldn't he have? and everybody in that age would have known exactly who he was, but here he's dealing with identity. He says Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ. Now he could have just said apostle. Apostle was a sent messenger or an ambassador. It was somebody who was given authority by the sending party. In fact, the only authority that the sent one could actually have was the authority given him by the one that was sending. And what's interesting about this concept is that the authority only lasted so long as the apostle was carrying out the mission. Meaning that a person who was an apostle that was given the authority couldn't say, you know what, I'm just struggling with this. I'm going to give it to Sally. Although she's perfectly capable, you couldn't do that. Why? Because the authority that was given to me stops with me. That's interesting when you get to Matthew chapter 16 and the Catholics who would say, well, this is Peter, the first Pope. That kind of breaks down when you think of this concept of apostle, doesn't it? But he says, I'm an apostle, I have authority, but look at the last prepositional phrase here. The apostle of whom? Of Jesus Christ, and this was an official title. In fact, it's reserved only for the 12 disciples and Paul. It allowed people to know that this is not just a military or a political ambassador, this is an ambassador of one and only Jesus Christ. Do you see what he's doing here? Is he's taking his identity and he's deflecting it to whom? To Jesus Christ. Beloved, this is the model for how we should be handling our identity. And yet in our lives, we struggle with portraying a certain identity to other people, don't we? I mean, we want people to think a certain thing about ourselves. We do this in school. I remember you get to a new class in the school year, and everybody's vying for their identity, aren't they? The class clown, the popular ones, the smart ones. Everybody's trying those first few days to establish their identity. And what happens when the other people don't respond the way that they want them to perceive them? There's frustration, and there's manipulation. And it doesn't change, does it? You know, Facebook is a classroom just like that. Don't we make posts and upload pictures with an identity that we want people to think of us? And listen, it's not just social media. It's also going to the professionals and going to the authorities. If you go into a room where a person with a white robe and their name etched on their robe says that you are this or you have this, what do you do? You walk out as that with your identity, don't you? And listen, what I'm not saying is that there's no identity other than the Bible gives us. I'm not saying that. But what I am saying is that the Bible's identity of us trumps everything else. Did you get that? That's very important. Is that you may have an identity through your work or through a diagnosis, or you may have an identity that others have of you, and that may be a valid identity, but listen, the identity that Scripture gives you trumps all those identities. So when you have a diagnosis, and we talked about this last week, and I know some of you are wrestling with this, so each week we're trying to give you just a little bit more information so you can be educated. But when you get a diagnosis, that may be a valid diagnosis. But your diagnosis from Scripture trumps that diagnosis. Here's a measure that you can have in your life to evaluate your identity. Does it bring glory to Christ? Does your identity bring glory to Christ? In fact, write down 1 Corinthians chapter 10 and verse 31. Whether we eat or we drink or whatever we do, whether it's career, whether it's family, whether it's neighborhood, whether it's personality, whatever we do, we are supposed to do to the glory of whom? Of God. And so when Peter says here, I'm an apostle, I mean, that was his identity, but he points and deflects to the faith of Jesus Christ. So here's what I want you to do. I want you to look at whatever identity you have in your life, and I want you to add that prepositional phrase of Jesus Christ. So I'm a pastor of Jesus Christ. You're a manager of Jesus Christ. You're single of Jesus Christ. You're astute, I mean, you get the point, don't you? So whatever you find yourself as an identity, tack on of Jesus Christ because the objective of your identity is to bring glory and fame to Christ. So here's the practical application I want you to do as you go out today. The next Facebook post that you make, think about that prepositional phrase, and when you're putting it out there, when you're portraying an identity, are you bringing fame to Christ or to you? See, the fact of the matter is is that our identity is about the fame of Jesus Christ. He is the ruler of our identity. He is our Lord. If you've come to Jesus Christ as your Savior, it's not an either or. He's your Savior and your Lord. And so he is the ruler of our identity. So yes, we have identities in this life. We have roles that we play in this life, but it is always of Jesus Christ. That's where we must start. But then it continues, so let's look, second of all, at remembering the reality of your identity. Remember the reality of your identity, and it's interesting, the description that's used here to describe the readers. It says, to those who are elect exiles of the dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia. Now, how many of us, let's just be honest in a moment, how many of us, when we're reading 1 Peter for the first time, are just like, skip past that? I mean, aren't there some places on here that we don't recognize? Well, we just address that first. Those places are in what modern day Turkey is in the northern section. And the reason why these names are given in this order is this is the route of the messenger that was carrying the letter. And so that's why these places are given. It gives us a frame of reference for why they're given, where this thing is being sent out, where the messenger is to go, but there's three descriptors I want us to drill down into. The first one is right before the list of names. Do you see what that word is that describes it? What is it? Dispersion. That's interesting. Let's go back to John chapter seven. John chapter seven in the New Testament is the first, instance of this term dispersion. And the religious leaders are interacting with Jesus and they're obviously arguing with him, that's what the religious leaders did. It says in verse 32, the Pharisees heard the crowd muttering these things about him and the chief priests and Pharisees sent officers to arrest them. Verse 33, Jesus then said, I will be with you a little longer and then I am going to him who sent me. You will seek me and you will not find me. Where I am, you cannot come. The Jews said to one another, listen to this in verse 35, where does this man intend to go that we will not find him? Does he intend to go to the dispersion among the Greeks? Do you see it right there? It's interesting. The dispersion among the Greeks. Flip back over to 1 Peter and then back to the book right before that, the book of James. James chapter one is the second instance we see of this term. James chapter one, verse one, it says, James, guess who wrote James? James. A servant of God and of the Lord Jesus to the 12 tribes in the what? The dispersion. Now does anybody notice a difference between the way dispersion is in those two verses and how dispersion occurs in 1 Peter chapter one? Does anybody see a difference? You get to be Sherlock Holmes here. What's the difference? In the ESV, it's lowercase. Isn't that interesting? And what the translators are doing is trying to help us in the English understand what is being said here. In the first two times, there's an article before the Greek word that's translated dispersion, meaning it is the dispersion. It is a technical term for Jews who were scattered away from their homeland. It began back with the Babylonian exile and it continued all the way to this time during the Roman Empire where Jews were scattered away from their homeland. So when it was a Jew that was scattered from his homeland into the Gentile world, it was the dispersion. In this particular case, there is no article before it. It is just dispersion or scattering. And so what Peter is doing here is he's saying, you're familiar with the dispersion of the Jews, but you're living your own dispersion, your own scattering as followers of Christ. And you're not away from your physical homeland, you're away from your spiritual homeland. And we know that because the article's not there, but we also know that because of the other two descriptors that Peter uses in verse one. He says, to those who are, and what is that word? Elect. And this usually in Christian circles is like the dun dun dun. Here we go. We're gonna get controversial. But let me just explain to you what the word elect means. It means to be chosen. Now what I love about this is that there's a richer understanding from the original language. The chosen word that's used here in the original language actually means to choose without influence. Isn't that awesome? is to choose without influence. If I have an opportunity to choose a meal, and this is fascinating, my wife has said, you know, we have these conversations in marriage, that if you were given your last meal, which I don't know why it would be my last meal, but here we go. If you were given your last meal, what would you choose? And when we were first married, she would think I would say like lobster or filet mignon, and I would just be like pizza. I mean, that's it. But see, the influence is, I know the benefit I'm gonna get from pizza, which is nutrition, it's all the food groups, it's taste, it's texture. Lobster has a high price tag, it's gonna make me sick. So I am influenced by the results and the influence of that which I am choosing. With this type of choosing, with this election, there's no influence. It's solely the discretion of the one who is choosing for his own reasons. What a great reminder that is for us of salvation, isn't it? In fact, let me give you some scriptures. If you struggle with the concept of election, let me give you some scriptures that I would encourage you to study on your own. The first one is John chapter 15 and verse 16. Listen to what Jesus says to his disciples. He says, you did not choose me, but I chose you. Isn't that interesting? And when it comes to salvation, so oftentimes in our lives, because of the whole concept of free will, we wanna say, nope, nope, I chose God. The fact is, the same principle that is being communicated with the disciples here is the same principle with our salvation. We didn't choose God. He chose us. In fact, you can write down Romans 3 in verse 11. The word of God says no one seeks after God. I can't choose Him on my own. And so it's necessary that God the Father would elect us, would choose us. That's an awesome doctrine. In fact, you can write this one down, Romans chapter nine and verse 16. Paul says it is not about the human will. It is about the God who chooses to show mercy. And listen, we can either get angry as a result of this doctrine, or we can actually respond the way God intends, which is humility and comfort. That's what God intends. And we can struggle with, well, why didn't God choose somebody else? No, that's not the question to ask. Why did God choose anyone is the question to ask. And so if you find yourself a follower of Jesus Christ, listen, it's not because you have some amazing intellect. It's not because you grew up in a certain family or certain church. It is because God chose you. And so that is intended to produce comfort in our lives. It's intended to produce the proper identity of who we are. It's intended to produce in us humility. God chose me, not for anything I bring to the equation, but because of his rich mercy and his sovereign grace. That's comforting, isn't it? I pray that it is. So he says the elect. And then look what he also says. The elect, what's the next word? Exiles. The word means it's a person who for a period of time lives in a place which is not his normal residence. I love that. For a period of time, lives in a place which is not his normal residence. And listen, we live in a day and age where that is the norm. It was not 50 years ago. 50 years ago, people lived in a town and that's where they died, same town. In our community, most of us are living in a town or place different than where we were born. And so maybe for us, it's not as easy for us to understand the gravity of the communication of this word, but in those days, your homeland was everything. That's where your family was, that's where your provision was, that's where your safety was. And so for somebody to be in exile where they were away, that was a struggle. But what I love about this word is that it's for a temporary period of time. And so what is Peter doing is he's communicating to them a spiritual reality, but he's also reminding them of their physical reality. Their physical reality was that they were suffering persecution. Now a lot of people believe that the context that Peter was writing to was Christians being persecuted under the persecution of Emperor Nero. And actually, I believed that too until I started digging in. Here's why I believe that's not historically accurate. Nero actually became Emperor of Rome in AD 54 at 17 years old, and he was the product of a very ambitious and aggressive mother. We've seen movies about that, we've studied history where that's taken place. He became emperor at 17 of the entire Roman Empire. And what happened is he had a tutor named Seneca and a praetorian prefect by the name of Burrus. And why are those two individuals important? Because in the first few years, they actually led Rome. And they freed him up to have little to no responsibility. And as a 17-year-old who was given an unending bank account and told he can do whatever he wanted, what do you think he did? He studied scripture. No, he didn't. I mean, imagine what 17-year-olds in our context would do if you give them an unlimited bank account, credit cards they could spend on anything. There's no accountability. Go do whatever you want. How do you think that would go? Well, that's what happened to Nero. And for several years, while the other two were leading the nation and helping it along, he was bankrupting the nation. And then 8064 came around, and if you've studied history, you know what happened in 8064. Rome burned, and only four of the 14 districts avoided devastation. And even though Nero himself fought the fire, even though Nero used his own property to actually house people to keep them safe, and he almost died in his fighting of the fire, guess who was blamed? It was Nero. And so Nero thought to himself, I've got to put the blame on somebody else. And he looked around in society and he saw this rapidly growing group of people who were religious and very committed to worshiping somebody who in his mind was executed as a criminal years before named Christus. Called them Christians. And so he began accusing them of starting the fire. And there was a persecution that broke out in 8064. And we're familiar with some of the aspects of the persecution, how he would sew the Christians up in animal skin and put them in the middle of the Circus Maximus and let lions who were starved come out and eat the Christians. But that actually didn't accelerate until toward the end of Nero's life, which was AD 68. And so at this time, where most scholars believe that Peter was written between 62 and 64 AD, it was either right at the beginning when the fire had started and the persecution was just beginning, but listen, it was centralized to Rome. There's no historical evidence to show that this was an empire-wide persecution. So I don't think Peter's talking about an empire-wide Neronian persecution. I believe he was talking about normal persecution that Christians experience. And isn't that awesome? Because guess what? We can relate to that, can't we? In fact, let me just read for you some of the descriptions of what made Christians unique during the time of Rome. You can write these down or you can just listen. Both Jews and Gentiles despised Christians because of their exclusivity. See, Rome was all about just appreciating all different kinds of religions, agreeing to disagree. As long as there was harmony and there was peace, we can get along and we're fine. But as soon as you say that there's only one way, as soon as you say there's only one exclusive religion, now we've got problems. That doesn't sound like anything we're experiencing today, does it? Here's a second reason why Christians were persecuted and hated, is that there was unexplainable growth. I mean, there was not any strategy that was being generated by politicians, nobody with deep pockets that was funding this thing. There was no military power that was backing this religious movement, and yet Christianity was growing like wildfire. And so people didn't like that. So if you're in charge of another religion and you're seeing these Christians, you're like, what's their secret? They didn't like them. Isn't it interesting that in our culture, whenever we're oppressed, Christianity grows, doesn't it? True Christianity grows. So they were oppressed for that. Another one is that they had active and aggressive evangelism. What they were doing is they were using every opportunity they had to talk with somebody and point them to Christ. I've got a friend here who's in town that we're looking at potentially to be a church planter, and I've just enjoyed listening to him. As a chaplain, he has a difficult task. He's a hospital chaplain, and so he's dealing with families who are struggling or in difficult life consequences and context, and you know what he does is he loves on them, but he's always looking for an opportunity to point them to Christus, to Christ. Is that how we approach our Christianity? Listen, if we do, there will be persecution. People don't enjoy that. So are you seeing that there's similarities with the Roman persecution and the Roman Empire to what we experience today? Here's a fourth one. The fourth one is that they were uncompromising in their beliefs. Now, this one we cannot relate to, can we? Because all you have to do is throw up some threat of, well, you could get fired, and all of a sudden, ooh, right? All we have to do is have somebody just throw out some disparaging comment on our Christian post on Facebook, and we're like, ooh, take that down. Beloved, what a reminder this is that in the time of Rome, When there was persecution and people could be put in prison, they were uncompromising in their beliefs. The fifth one is that there was trade jealousy. And we see this today, trade jealousy in that Christians said there's no such thing as idols. So all the silversmiths are like, wait a minute, we don't like that. They're saying, no, you don't sacrifice animals to the pagan gods in the temple. So all the farmers are like, wait a minute, we don't like this. Because what was happening, it impacted their pocketbook. And Christianity does impact the pocketbook, doesn't it? And there's certain things that we can't do because Scripture forbids it. There's certain things that are expected of us that the world doesn't have to do that affects our pocketbook. And Christianity does affect the economy and our economy. And so there can be persecution as a result. The sixth one was family dissensions. Nobody in here can relate to that, can they? Family dissensions because of standing for Christ. See, back then, there was a lot of understanding in the Roman Empire, hey, guys could have mistresses. They could have multiple wives, and so now, all of a sudden, somebody becomes saved, and in the family, they're like, no, you know what, that's actually sin. Well, that doesn't work well for grandma number two, or mother-in-law number five. And so there was dissension that would be generated when somebody in the family that would stand for the standards of righteousness in Christ. And then number seven, this is the last one I'll give you, there's others. But it undermined the religion of the state. The state of Rome said that you can believe whatever you want to believe as long as you support the belief that the Roman emperor is a god. And the Christians are like, nope, no he's not. There's only one god and that's Jesus Christ. And that flew in the face of what the state religion is. What is our state religion? It's very similar to Rome, isn't it? Our state religion is believe whatever you want to believe, and there are multiple paths to get to karma or whatever. But the fact is, is that we say, no, there's not, and we love you, and that's why we're sharing this with you. There's only one way, and that's through Jesus Christ. And listen, if you live out these seven convictions in your life today in the 21st century, you're gonna get persecuted. And so this is something that we can relate to. It is timeless. It is relevant. It's an opportunity. This is counter-cultural. And there's a growing unpopularity with Christianity, isn't there? You know, I think we look at statistics and we say that it used to be that there was 80% of Americans were Christians. You remember those good old days, back in the 70s and 80s? And now they're like, oh, Christianity's declining because now it's down to 70%. Listen, no, no, no, I think that Christianity's actually increasing, true Christianity is. Because people are starting to understand that just because you say you're a Christian doesn't necessarily mean that you're a Christian. A Christian is not a religion. It's a relationship. And so what's happening is the numbers are coming down because I believe we're becoming more effective in putting the true gospel on display, amen? This is becoming counter-cultural. It's becoming unpopular. It's interesting that Christians these days in the time of Rome, or being in prison not for being a Christian. Do you realize that in the time of Nero, you couldn't be put in prison just for being a Christian? Here's what you could be put in prison for, hatred of humanity. Does that sound unfamiliar? Because when we proclaim the name of Christ, when we proclaim the gospel, when we stand up and say marriage should only be a man and a woman, when we say that whatever biology, whatever genetic gender you were born with, that is your gender, Whenever we stand up and say these things, what are we accused of? Hate speech. It's the same thing, beloved. It's just a different chapter. What is your identity? Your identity is what Christ says your identity is, and we don't compromise. And even though the world, even though the authorities would tell us that it's something different, we stick to the ruler, which is Jesus Christ, bringing fame to his name, understanding that when we hold to that identity, the reality is we will be persecuted. Stand firm. That's what Peter is saying. So remember the reality of your identity. You know what I think is interesting is that persecution is part of God's plan. Suffering is a part of God's plan. Listen, this is the part I don't like in this message. You know, this is one of those parts where you're like, oh no, you're an expositor, you have to share the truth. I'd like to skip this one because this is not popular. Suffering is designed by God. In fact, let me give you an illustration. I heard this last week. It's like this, say this afternoon you go to a Father's Day get together, and you go to wherever it's being hosted, and there's air condition, and it's nice and clean, there's no flies, and you have this amazing meal, and you even have dessert, and they even serve you coffee at the end of the dessert, and then the hostess comes out and puts a pitcher of ice cold water on the table. What will most of us do? We'll pour and we'll just sip, just to not offend the hostess, won't we? Because I don't need ice water. Just had an amazing meal, just had my coffee, just had dessert, which by the way, I don't know why anybody drinks coffee. That's a whole nother, you know, that could be a whole nother message. We'll do a series on no coffee, just kidding. But what happens now if for Father's Day, the whole experience is you're gonna work outside in the yard. And now with the 93 degrees and 105 degree heat index, you haven't had any drink throughout the day. and you've just been out there for hours and hours and hours, and then that same hostess comes and puts that same pitcher of ice cold water out on the porch. How are you gonna treat it? The whole thing, right? God gives us suffering so that we long for the true water. That's what it is. If life was perfect and life was air conditioned, why would we need Christ? Why would we long for our eternal home? Because we have it all here. We experience suffering in our lives to cause us to long for the true living water and our true eternal home. Ouch, right? So whatever you're experiencing right now, whatever weight, whatever dark place you're experiencing, remember, this is the reality of our identity because it's pointing us from Christ to him to remind us that we are exiles, elect of a dispersion. That's our reality. Finally, let's look at our resources. Remember the resources of your identity, and I love these. I wish we had a ton of time. We could probably spend a whole sermon on this verse alone. But look what it says. You are elect exiles of a dispersion according to the foreknowledge of God the Father. This is all part of his plan. And what Peter is doing is reminding the believers here of their identity in the gospel. And look what he's gonna do here. He's gonna use the three members of the Trinity, and I love that he gives a different aspect of them because they play different roles in salvation. The model is with that, so we talk about that there's different roles for men and women in the church. The model is the Trinity. Is the Trinity unequal because of their roles? Good answer. They are completely equal, they just play different roles. The same thing with men and women in the church. The same thing with men and women in the family. Equal, just different roles. Man, I am getting off on tangents, aren't I? Back to the text. According to, that means this is the purpose, this is the plan for being elect exiles of a dispersion. First of all, to the foreknowledge of God the Father. The God the Father is the one who planned this whole thing. And the word foreknowledge is actually in the Greek prognosis. That sounds familiar, doesn't it? And what this means, literally, in the original language, is to know beforehand. And so this is where a lot of people who struggle with Calvinism, Arminianism, are like, wait a minute, God just knows who will choose him. That's not what it means. Foreknowledge and predestination go together constantly. In fact, write down Acts 2 in verse 23. Jesus was delivered up according to the foreknowledge and the predetermined plan of the Father. That's interesting. Write down Romans 8 verse 29. Those who he foreknew, well, he just knew who would choose him. It says he also predestined. And I won't get really technical here, but those two words go together to make one complete thought. It's both. God's knowledge of future events is because he ordained them. But what I love is what Wayne Grudem says in his commentary on 1 Peter. Listen to this. According to God's fatherly care for you before the world was made. That's what this means. I love that. that God before the world was made in his plan, he could have planned everything just for his glory without us being involved. And yet before the world was even made, he foreknew he elected those who would be saved. I love that. That is comfort. It's fatherly. It's care. But it wasn't that he just chose, it wasn't just a passive reality. Look at what it says in the next phrase. In the sanctification of the Spirit. So the Holy Spirit, co-equal with God the Father, has a role to play in salvation. And what does he do? He sanctifies us. And what does the word sanctification mean? It's a big word, it means to dedicate to service of loyalty, service of and loyalty to a deity. When we are saved, what happens is the Holy Spirit sets us aside and equips us to be able to be loyal and serve God the Father. That's pretty cool, isn't it? He gives us gifts. He gives us now a new nature. Well, now I can be convicted of sin. Now I can grow in grace, I can grow in mercy, I can grow in patience, and he equips us through sanctification to be used to glorify God. Drudem also says this, I love this. He turns every hardship, every sorrow, every circumstance, listen to this, into a tool of his patient sanctifying work. That's awesome. Now listen, when we are in a dark place like I was last week and I'm still kind of coming out of, that's not easy to hear. It's easy when everything is roses and unicorns. My daughter loves it when I say that, that's for her. We love it, we were like, amen, glory. But when we're suffering, we're like, oh, I don't see it. Well listen, when we're suffering, we can't see it with our physical eyes, we have to see it with our spiritual eyes. And that's what Grudem is saying, is he is turning every sorrow, every circumstance of our lives, what you are experiencing right now, as a tool. But listen, you gotta use the tool, right? Every circumstance of your life is a tool that can be used to make you more like Christ, which brings us to the last phrase. It says for, that word means for purpose, for obedience to Jesus Christ. That's ultimately what this is all about. Is that when we obey, when we live differently from the world, people say, hey, well, why are you acting that way? Because of Jesus, that's why. How can I possibly love my wife as Christ loved the church when that's not in my nature, that's not in my flesh? My flesh is to sit down and watch sports all day and let her take care of the house. That's not usually what happens, is it? Please, amen, okay. I hope that's the case. That's my nature. So anytime I do something that's selfless, it's not because of Jeff, it's because of Christ in me. So I bring glory to him through my obedience by showing others that I've been transformed by, look what it says at the end, by the sprinkling of his blood. That's the only way. The sprinkling of his blood is a concept from the Old Testament. Three times in the Old Testament would a sacrifice's blood be sprinkled on people themselves. Exodus 24 is the first one. And that was the initiation of the Mosaic Covenant. Exodus 29 is the second one. That's when the sons of Aaron were ordained to the priesthood, which that doesn't relate to us today. And then the third one was that when lepers were cleansed, blood would be sprinkled on them. It's that first and third that are the points that Peter is driving home here. Is that we have been sprinkled by the blood, metaphorically speaking, of Jesus' sacrifice. And in so doing, he has initiated us into the new covenant and he is cleansing us repeatedly by the Holy Spirit through his word and our confession to cause us to be more like himself. Isn't that a beautiful word picture? This is our salvation. These are the resources that we draw from. They're intended to help us in our dark places that God cares for us through his foreknowledge. that he equips us through the Holy Spirit in his sanctification and that it's all through and for the gospel of Jesus Christ. So now how do we practically apply this? Well, he gives us a teaser at the end of verse two. May grace and peace be multiplied to you. That's what we have to live with. The grace of God, the peace defined by God, not by ourselves. We define peace as absence of conflict. That's not the peace he's talking about here. He's talking about a harmonious relationship between God and sinners, and he says it can be multiplied to you, and it is multiplied to you, and it will be practically played out in the rest of the letter of 1 Peter. Will you bow your heads and close your eyes? Beloved, I would be remiss if I did not say at the end of this message that all of this is offered to you, but only if you have surrendered your life to Jesus Christ. And so I just wanna ask, is there anyone here this morning who has never surrendered their life to Jesus Christ, never admitted that they are a sinner? That's who you are, it's not something you've done. Admitted that you are a sinner and you cannot save yourself. Believe that Jesus' life, his death, his resurrection, and his victorious place at the right hand of the Father is all that you need for salvation. Do you believe that? And then have you ever confessed your sin, said God forgive me of my sins and I commit my life to you as my Lord and my Savior. Have you ever done that? Because if not, you can do that right now. There's no ceremony you have to follow. There's no amount of works that you have to perform. It's simply an expression of your heart. And if you're there, call out to him. And then for the rest of us, who by God's grace have been elected and foreknown and washed by the blood of Christ and are being sanctified by the Holy Spirit, did you need this morning to be reminded that this is your identity? That this identity trumps any other real identity you have in your life. So may we all walk out this morning saying that whatever horizontal identity we have in our lives, it is of Jesus Christ to bring fame to his name. Lord Jesus, I thank you for this beginning of what I'm anticipating will be an amazing study of Christians who are going through similar circumstances as we are today. This is relatable, it is relevant. Lord Jesus, I pray that through your Holy Spirit, you would prepare our hearts for this study, that we would be humble, that we would be open, that we would be inviting you to expose areas of our lives that need to be corrected. I pray through this study that there would be some who have never surrendered their life to you, that they would do that. And would you use this study to better equip us to be able to stand firm in the trials that are part of your plan to cause us to long for the gospel, rely on the gospel, and long for home. That's a lot to ask, Lord, I know. But you are an infinite and holy God, and we know that you do the impossible. So accomplish it, I pray, in Jesus' name.