Please do open your Bibles to Peter's first letter and chapter four. We're gonna read verses one through 11. First Peter chapter four, verses one to 11. 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 is past suffices for doing what the Gentiles want to do, 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 an 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 and 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 as one who speaks oracles of God, whoever serves as 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. Thus far, the word of God. Gracious Heavenly Father, thank you once again for your word. Thank you that what we have before us are more than just words on a page. They are your very words. And so, Lord, we pray that as we consider these verses together now, that by your Holy Spirit, you would come and open our eyes and our hearts and our minds to take in what you have for us here in your word. Mold us and shape us, fashion us into the people you would have us to be. For we ask in Jesus' name. Amen. Please do be seated. What a privilege it is, again, to have this Elect Exiles Guide to the Christian Life open before us again. And our passage this morning really marks the end of what you could call the body of the letter, the section that runs from chapter 2 verse 11 all the way through to the end of verse 11. And so far, you remember in the book, we've been treated, haven't we, really, to glorious, glorious descriptions of our heavenly calling. Peter has laid out for us the tremendous benefits of knowing Christ, the blessings that come to us because we are in Christ. He's talked about the imperishable, undefiled, unfading inheritance that is kept safe for us by the power of God. He's talked about this great hope that we have, hope that is living and vibrant and growing. But we've seen along the way that our journey to this glorious future is going to be marked with suffering. and trial, that we are to follow in the footsteps of Jesus Christ. All the while, knowing that not one second of our suffering in this life is meaningless. Knowing that this is the way to die to sin and to live to righteousness. and sprinkled throughout all that we've seen. Peter has given us just incredibly practical instruction on how to live as Christians, how to live as elect exiles. So as we begin, look with me at words we find right at the end of the section that we read together. Here Peter really sums up the purpose of this passage and indeed he's summing up really the whole body of his letter. So in verse 11 Peter writes this, in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. This is Peter's great purpose, the end, the telos of all that he's saying. His great desire echoing really the heart of God is that all of life, all of life would be for God's glory. And he uses a little Greek word, a pass in here, or simply pass. And it means absolutely everything. All things, the whole, all manner of things. There's nothing that is to be left out. Every single part of our lives is to be given over to bringing God glory. And this of course is the great theme of scripture, isn't it? Think of Paul writing to the Philippians. He says this, at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. When he writes to the Corinthians, he says this, so whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. And that's that same word, pass, again. All things, everything, nothing left out, all to the glory of God. And so it's no surprise to us then that this great theme, this great purpose, this great end is reflected in all of the historic Christian creeds and confessions and catechisms of the church. Children, boys and girls, you know this one, don't you? What is the chief end of man? The chief end of man is what? to glorify God and to enjoy Him forever. Excellent, yeah. This one you might not know, but this is from the Geneva Confession. This has some beautiful lines, and here's just a sampling. The Geneva Confession states this, in order that all glory and praise be rendered to God, and then in brackets, as is His due, as is his due, and that we be able to have true peace and rest of conscience. We understand and confess that we receive all benefits from God by his clemency and pity without any consideration of our worthiness or the merit of our works. And the canons of Dort conclude with this great charge to ministers of the gospel. And it says that all they say may be to the glory of God. So this is the great aim. This is the great purpose. And with that in our minds, let's come and look at the verses before us here in chapter four. So Peter begins by reminding us again that Christ suffered. Since therefore, he says, Christ suffered in the flesh. And as we saw last time, this suffering was not aimless, was not meaningless. No, Christ's suffering was supercharged, supercharged with purpose. He suffered, remember, once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God. So his suffering was decisive. It needed only happen once. for it to achieve its intended purpose. His suffering was for our sin. His suffering was to pay the price that we could never ever hope to pay ourselves. His suffering was undeserved. He was the righteous one, the righteous one. He never ever sinned. He was the only man to have ever lived for which death had absolutely no claim on him. Yet he submitted to death for us, for us, the unrighteous ones, the ones who have forfeited our lives because of our rebellion and sin. And so his suffering then achieved something, something incredible. His suffering brings us to God. By his life and death and resurrection, we are reconciled to God. Once we were enemies and now we are friends. Once we were at enmity and now we are adopted as sons. And so Peter tells us then that we are to arm ourselves with the same way of thinking. The same way of thinking. The same way of thinking as what? What does he mean? He means the same way of thinking as Christ. Would it be armed then with the mind of Christ, we could say. And what was that mind? Well, let's think about how Jesus went to the cross, the place of his most extreme suffering. You remember the writer to the Hebrews tells us that Jesus, for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross. What was that joy? The joy of bringing countless, and I mean countless, men and women and boys and girls, bringing them to God. The joy of defeating their sin. The joy of setting them free, of cleansing them from the guilt and stain of sin. The joy of ascending to the highest place of honor in the entire universe. The joy of ruling and reigning until every single last enemy is put under his feet. The joy of being surrounded by millions and billions of saints glorifying God with their hearts set free and their tongues loosed with glorified bodies singing praises to Him forever and ever and ever. Or think of how Luke describes Jesus' journey to the cross. Well, to Jerusalem first, and then to the cross. Luke writes this in his gospel. He set his face to go to Jerusalem. He set his face to go to Jerusalem. So knowing all that was to come, the mocking, the beatings, the ridicule that he would have to endure, the agony of being forsaken by his father. Knowing all of that, what does he do? He doesn't shrink back, he sets his face to go to Jerusalem. And then as he prays in the garden, just hours before the cross, he makes clear the ultimate goal of his suffering. John 17 verse 1, Father, the hour has come. Glorify your Son that the Son may glorify you. See, the glory of God is what drove Christ. It's behind all of what God does. So this kind of joyful determination, Peter is saying, is to be our armor as we battle in all of life, even through suffering and pain, to bring glory to God. But there might be some questions forming in your mind now, because you know that our lives, no matter how conformed they might be, no matter how much we look like Jesus, we know that our lives don't have the power to bring anyone to God in and of themselves. And so what's Peter driving at? Well, I think that's what he makes clear in the next part of the verse. He writes these words, which might on the surface seem quite mysterious. He writes this, for whoever has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin. Whoever has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin. Now what's going on here? Is Peter lapsed into heresy once more? Nope. No, he doesn't do that. That's not what's going on. He's not teaching some sort of sinless perfection here. He's not teaching that by our suffering, our sin actually ceases. If that was the case, why would we have verse eight? where he says, above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins. If our suffering caused sin to cease altogether, he wouldn't need to write that love covers a multitude of sins. So that can't be what he's getting at. Well, is he referring to Christ? Well, possibly, but probably not, because think about it, was there ever a time that Christ was sinning that he could then cease from sinning? So that doesn't make sense, does it? Can't be talking directly about Jesus. Well, what about the idea that when we die, when we ourselves die, then we cease from sinning? We might be getting closer to what Peter is driving at. It's possible, I think, that what he could mean is that when we die, death becomes our ultimate servant, because through death we are completely delivered from the presence of sin entirely. That could be what he's driving at, but then you've got to deal with the next verse, because Peter then goes on to talk about the time So the same verse, verse two, for the rest of the time, he goes on to talk about, the rest of the time in the flesh. And even for Peter, I think that's probably jumping around a little bit too much. So what is he saying then? What is he saying? Well, I think what he's saying is that when we choose, when we choose the path of suffering, especially suffering for righteousness' sake, it is then that we prove our union with Christ. When we choose to suffer rather than take the path of compromise or comfort, then our union with Christ is established for all to see. We show then in that, that in Christ, we have triumphed over sin. So in a sense, sin has ceased. Sin has ceased to have dominion over us. There's a decisive break with sin. We can say with Paul, for one who has died has been set free from sin. Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with Him. We know that Christ being raised from the dead will never die again. Death no longer has dominion over Him. For the death He died, He died to sin once for all. But the life he lives, he lives to God. So, you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus. And I think this is what Peter is driving at here. We're united with Christ in his death. And so, because of that, sin is dead to us. The power of sin is ultimately death, and that power is broken decisively in the suffering and death of Christ. And it's proven to be broken once and for all by his resurrection. And we are united to Christ and we prove that union when we choose to suffer for righteousness' sake, rather than cop out and take the easy way out. I think this is what Peter is driving at here. So then we can have, we can have the mind of Christ, even though our lives, our suffering, even our deaths don't have the same glorious effect as Jesus' does. Listen to how Martin Luther puts it, he says this, we must also say, my master has suffered and spilt his blood for me and has died for my sake. Should I then be so base as not to suffer for him? Since my master runs upon the spears, points in the conflict, how much more should the servant advance with joy? See, Christ's attitude to suffering was not a mere spectacle to be observed and analyzed and pointed at and admired and appreciated. No, it was much more than that. Christ's suffering is a pattern for believers to participate in. He suffered for us, not to keep us from suffering, but to lead us safely through trials and suffering triumphantly. We are therefore armed to suffer for the glory of God when we see that all of our suffering is superintended, watched over by God himself with the purpose of producing good fruit in our lives. So our suffering is planned and purposeful, it's measured and meaningful. And so just as Christ's suffering produced the ultimate good fruit of countless souls reconciled to God, so our suffering, small as it may be in comparison to Christ, so our suffering produces the good fruit of sanctification, of closer conformity to our Savior. Well, Peter shows us what this mind of Christ looks like in verse 2. No longer are we dominated by human passions, he says. We're freed. Freed from the chains of sin. Freed to pursue the will of God. Now that our ransom price has been paid, this is what we live for. We live for the will of God. Why? But Peter answers simply and remarkably in verse 3. He says, for because the time that is past suffices for doing what the Gentiles want to do. So Peter is saying, arm yourselves, equip yourselves for this battle with this thought. Any amount of sin, any amount of sin is enough. Any amount of sin in the past, it's enough. If you sin for a little while before your conversion, that's enough. If you sinned a tremendous amount before your conversion, that is enough. No one, Peter is saying, no one can ever sin so little that they could say, I just need a little bit more time for my sinning. Just give me 10 more days of sinning. I just need that much. No one can ever say that. No one can ever sin so little that they could say that. Peter goes on to provide just a sampling of the sinful endeavors that believers have been delivered from. It's not an exhaustive list, but it does paint a picture for us, doesn't it, of utter abandonment to superficial and temporary pleasures. And all of these things are really baited hooks that contain the bitter barb of soul-destroying slavery. This is the great tragedy of sin. Whilst the temporary pleasure may deaden us to the pain of our guilt, it also deadens us to the reality of God's judgment of heaven and of hell. of damnation, and sadly, even of salvation. But believers, Peter is saying, have been delivered from such deadening distractions. And now they live in a way that not only prepares them for eternal joy, but provides real and lasting joy now, even in the midst of suffering. And Peter mentions one form that this suffering may take. When unbelievers see us no longer participating in the same flood of debauchery, Peter calls it, then they malign us, they slander us. The word that Peter uses is actually blaspheme. And this makes sense when you consider the list of sins that he mentions here. These are the kind of things that would have routinely accompanied Roman ritual idolatry. Even some civic ceremonies marked by drinking parties and drunkenness and passions. And so to not participate in those things would have been considered blasphemous. Blasphemous to the Roman gods. But though we may be maligned and slandered for living righteously, Peter reminds us that this doesn't mean we need to resort to sinful vengeance. We don't need to have the last word. God stands ready to settle all accounts. He is able to do it far better than we can. And Peter reminds us that not even death, not even death can rescue a person from God's judgment. God is the one who judges the living and the dead. Well, verse six is another puzzling verse. What does Peter mean by the gospel was preached even to those who are dead? Are we back in chapter three again in this mysterious preaching of Christ to the spirits in prison? Is that what Peter is referencing here? I don't think so. I don't think he means that the dead are given an opportunity to hear the gospel. As we saw last time, the time for responding to the gospel is between birth and death. I actually think the NIV helps us to get a handle on what Peter is saying here. The NIV inserts a word in verse 6 that isn't there in the original, but it really does help us to get the thrust of what Peter is saying. So the NIV has this verse as this. For this is the reason the gospel was preached, even to those who are now dead. That word now is not in the original Greek text, but I think it gets at what Peter is trying to say here. The gospel was preached, some believed, and now some of those who believed are dead. And so the point of this verse is to encourage us that even though there is a judgment coming beyond the grave, even though all of us die, nevertheless, those who hear and believe the gospel will live in the spirit the way God does. We're made alive, spiritually alive by the Holy Spirit. And so maybe one of the ways these Christians were being slandered and maligned was people were saying to them, you say that you've got such good news. You keep banging on about the gospel and how great it is. You say that you can escape judgment. You say that your God is great and he saves you and gives you joy. Well, all we've got to say is this, look, you are missing out on some good times right here and right now. and you're just gonna die the same way everybody else dies. So you might as well eat, drink and be merry because tomorrow all of us die. Maybe they were being ridiculed, something like that. And so Peter's armor against this kind of slander and his encouragement to embrace suffering like Jesus is simply this. The gospel was not preached to your dead friends in vain. The gospel was not preached to your dead friend, your dead Christian friends, in vain. The reason the gospel was preached to those who have died is so that even though it looks like they have been judged, just like everybody else, they haven't. They haven't. They are alive. They are alive in the Spirit. They are now with the Lord. And the sufferings that they experienced here on earth are not worthy to be compared to the glory that has been revealed to them now. That's what Peter is saying, I think. Well then, verse 7. Verse 7 is another verse that has provoked much debate over the years. I think there are basically three things that Peter could mean by the end of all things. The first and perhaps most obvious is a reference to the end of time, the second coming of Jesus Christ. Scholars point to Peter's second letter and his reference to a day being as a thousand years and a thousand years being as a day as justification for the apparent delay to the end of all things. So that could be the first option, a reference to the final coming of Christ. Second option is that Peter is referring to individual believers. He's reminding us that life is short and that all of us will soon be ushered into the judgment of God. The third option is that he could be referring to the end of the Jewish age. The destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70 was perhaps the most significant world event outside of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. And it would have certainly been viewed by those Jews at the time as the end of all things. It was that significant. Ultimately, I don't think it matters too much what Peter is driving at, because the idea that he's trying to press on us here is urgency. Urgency. He's saying it is urgent. It is urgent that we remain self-controlled and sober-minded, and particularly in the way that we pray. We're to be vigilant, watchful, earnest in prayer. And this is the call to the church in every age. Jesus' words to his disciples then come to us with fresh urgency this morning. Watch and pray. Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation. Well, verses 8 to 11, Peter gives us yet more practical guidance on arming ourselves with the mind of Christ. He calls us to live, to love, and to serve all for the glory of God. Earnest love for one another is to be the driving force of all of our reactions, since love covers a multitude of sins. What does he mean by that expression though? How does love cover a multitude of sins? Well let me suggest one way that this can work. One way that this works is by believing the gospel for one another. Believing the gospel for one another. We believe that Christ has paid not only for my sins, but for the sins of all of my brothers and sisters in Christ too. And so then the response to sin in one of our brothers or sisters is not the baseball bat of self-righteousness, but rather the balm of the gospel. We don't minimize the seriousness of the sin. That's the opposite of earnest love, isn't it? What we do is we clearly and boldly call them to repentance, call them back to the cross, back to the place of forgiveness and healing that we have in Christ. And as we do this for one another, as we love each other in this way, then we begin to see our sin even more clearly. And we begin to see clearer than that, our need of the gospel. day after day as we live with one another. Well, Peter reminds us that God gives varied gifts, varied gifts, and that we're to use these gifts, not for our own advancement, but to serve one another. This is what good stewardship looks like. and all of our service, whether it is powerfully declaring the very words of God, or whether it's just a small act of kindness or mercy, whatever it is, all of our service is powered, not by our own strength, thank God, but by the limitless strength of God himself, the strength that God supplies. And then verse 11, all of this, all of this is for the great purpose that in everything, in all things, God is glorified through Jesus Christ. Why? Well, because glory and dominion belong to him. So then what's the key? What's the key? How can we prevail in this battle to bring our whole life into the service of the glory of God? Because make no mistake, it is a battle, friends. It is a battle. It's a fight. We are by nature glory thieves. We wanna take for ourselves what belongs rightfully to God. Or if we don't take it for ourself, we give it to something that's not worthy of that kind of glory. We're distracted by lesser things and lesser people. We're so often tempted, aren't we, to give glory to anyone or anything other than God. So it is a battle, it's a fight. And I think Peter gives us the key to this, the answer to this in the first verse of our passage. He tells us to arm ourselves with something. So he's clearly, he's got a fight in mind here. He says, arm yourselves with the same way of thinking. We need armor for this fight. And the armor takes the form of a mindset, a way of thinking, even a way of feeling. Our emotions and affections, they're not left out here. The word that Peter uses is anoina, and it means our mind, our understanding, our will, a manner of feeling or thinking. We don't arm ourselves with the mind of Christ. And so this is our doctrine this morning. If we desire to prevail in the battle to live, love, and serve all for God's glory, We must arm ourselves with the mind of Christ. But what do we mean by the mind of Christ? What is this way of thinking that Christ has? Remember, this comes in the context of Peter's teaching of the powerful suffering of Christ. He's been teaching that real, eternal things happen because of the suffering of Christ. Chapter two, verse 24. He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree. His suffering bore away our sin. He suffered for the sin that was ours. And Peter points to Jesus Christ as our great example, the hupogramos. Of course, he's more than merely an example, but never less than that. And so to do all of this for us, he had to have a certain mindset, a certain way of thinking. It makes me think of Paul's words to the Philippians, where he writes this, among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of man, and being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. I think that first verse in Philippians 2.5, Have this mind among yourselves which is yours in Christ Jesus. I think a better translation of that actually is found in the footnote if you look in your Bibles. It's this, have this mind among yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus. And Paul is talking about the mind that Christ had. That little word also is key. Well, it's actually chi in the Greek, but it's key to us, key to our understanding. It's there in the Greek, but it's left out in the ESV's preferred translation. But what Paul and Peter are driving at here is that we're to have the same mind that Christ also had. The mind that Christ also had. So what does that look like? Well, it's not grasping. It's not reaching out for things. It's humble. I think Jesus consented to stoop down, to condescend to us, to be contracted to a span, as the old Carol puts it. He laid aside his heavenly glory and took on flesh, frail human flesh, weak flesh. And more than that, he humbled himself to the point of death, on a Roman cross. Think of it, the one who made every single tree in the universe, the one who spoke all of that into being, humbled himself to death on a tree. Paul talks about Christ being obedient. Christ was obedient. That's incredible, isn't it? Christ is the glorious one. He's the King of kings, the Lord of lords. He's the one to be obeyed. And yet he was obedient. Not only is this supremely humble, but it's also key to revealing his mind. You remember in the garden, he cries out, nevertheless, not my will, but yours be done. Though He knew the pain and the suffering that awaited Him, He submitted to the will of the Father. He was obedient to the will of the Father. He gave up His life for us. So the mind of Christ is humble, it's obedient, but it's also transformational. Remember what Paul says to the Romans in Romans chapter two. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect. Having the mind of Christ allows us to discern the will of God so that we can, as Peter says, live for the rest of the time in the flesh, no longer for human passions, but for the will of God. So we turn away, we turn away from the temporary pleasures and vices of the world and we run hard towards the will of God. As Paul puts it to the Ephesians, we're to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds and to put on the new self created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness. We put off the old way of life, the human passions, and we put on the new, a new way, a new manner of thinking that is after the likeness of God himself in true righteousness and holiness. And as we saw briefly earlier, the mind of Christ is joyful, isn't it? Christ could see beyond the suffering that he had to endure. He could see beyond that to the joyful, joyful end. And then in that same passage, in the letter to the Hebrews, the writer encourages us to consider him who endured from sin as such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or faint-hearted. And so the mind of Christ has within it a reviving power, an invigorating, a strength-giving power. So loved ones, arm yourself with this mind. Be humble and obedient. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Be transformed. Reckon your old man dead with Christ and live in his newness of life. Be filled with joy. Look at the joy that was set before Christ. See him ruling and reigning, subduing every enemy. See that God has exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow. in heaven and on earth and under the earth and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. Be renewed. Be renewed by Christ's strength. They who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, Isaiah tells us. They shall mount up with wings like eagles. They shall run and not be weary. They shall walk and not faint. And then know this. This kind of mind, this way of thinking, this attitude, these affections, they make no room for sin. Remember what Peter says, the time that is past suffices for doing what the Gentiles want to do. If we have this mind, we know that we are united to Christ in His death, and that sin no longer has any claim on us. We're not bound to live in the ways that we used to live. The mind of Christ brings freedom. Freedom from old habits, freedom from destructive thinking, freedom to live in obedience to God's will, and in doing so, live with meaning and purpose and fulfillment that can't be found by giving in to sensuality, passions, drunkenness, orgies, drinking parties, or lawless idolatry. With this mind, with the mind of Christ, we can love one another earnestly. We can serve one another. We can show hospitality to one another without grumbling, using the gifts that God has given us to build up, to strengthen, to serve, to equip, and all, all to the glory of God. Well, as we draw to a close, some brief words of application. The more that the mind of Christ is present in our lives, the more our way of thinking is conformed to His way of thinking, then the deeper our hatred of sin grows. And sooner or later, we're going to cry out with the Apostle Paul, Oh, wretched man that I am. Who will deliver me from this body of death? And this is a great prayer. This is a great place to start in humble dependence on God. That has to be our ground. That has to be where we start from. An earnest plea to God to be free, to be rid of the remaining sin in our lives. But the Bible doesn't leave us without strategies for defeating the remaining sin in our lives. Ways that we can be killing sin. And I think in our passage, Peter gives us at least five things we can remember. Five remembrances that help us put sin to death. The first one is in verse one. Remember what sin did to Christ. Remember what sin did to Christ. It was because of our sin that Christ suffered and died. Doesn't that drive home the seriousness of sin? That it took the death of the sinless Son of God to put away sin. And so when we're tempted to sin, Remember what your sin did to Christ. See that in your mind's eye. See his broken body, his pierced hands and feet, his riven side. But as well as the horror of the evil of sin, have that, but don't leave it there. See Christ's victory. By his death and resurrection, he brings you to God. He won. He's victorious. He triumphed over our great enemy. He triumphed over even death itself. And so in his victory, you can be victorious over the sin in your life. You can say to that temptation, you're dead to me. You have no power over me. I belong body and soul to Jesus Christ. See his victory over your sin. Second remembrance, remember what sin does to you. Remember what sin does to you. Sin blinds you. Sin desensitizes you. It deadens you to the will of God. And unforgiven sin will lead you to death and judgment. Oh friends, sin is not your friend. It wars against you. It wants to consume you. And so you need to be armed, armed with the mind of Christ to see sin for what it really is. Remember what sin does to you. Third, remember that sin violates the will of God. Verse two, sin violates the will of God. Peter calls us no longer to live for human passions, but for the will of God. And so we should hate, hate sin, because it keeps us from being what God intends us to be. How can we sin when we understand that sin violates the will of God? God who has been so gracious to us, so loving, so merciful, so kind to us. How can we live, to put it in Peter's words, the rest of our time in human passions rather than the will of God? Remember, sin violates the will of God. Fourth, remember what sin has done to lost humanity. Look at verses three through five. What a tragic picture that is. Outside of Christ, humanity is lost. It is deadened to the warnings of God, deadened to the warnings of conscience, and ultimately headed to the eternal devastating judgment of God. These people are gonna stand before the one who judges the living and the dead, but they're gonna stand there with no mediator. No one to speak on their behalf. No one to cover their sin. No one to intercede. And they will pay. They will pay their debts for eternity. Remember what sin has done to lost humanity. And then fifth, remember what God has promised you. Remember what God has promised you. that though you die, yet shall you live. The Spirit of God has made you alive. If you're in Christ, your future is secure. Your future is glorious. Your life now is packed, is supercharged too with meaning and purpose. And so hold on, hold on to that hope that Peter has been painting for us so beautifully in this letter. Know that one day, one day you will be free from sin entirely, from its presence altogether. There will be nothing but joy and peace and love as we behold our God face to face. And as we remember these things now, we are strengthened, strengthened in the battle against sin. We're empowered to live all for His glory. And then finally, where else can we go to strengthen the mind of Christ in us? Well, we're better than His word, the word of Christ. And so, beloved, immerse yourselves in Scripture. Meditate on it. Memorize it. Pray it back to God. You won't get a clearer picture of the mind of Christ anywhere else than in His Word. God has graciously revealed His mind to us in the words of Scripture, and so treasure those words. Hold them in your heart. Let them shape your thinking, your thoughts, your attitudes, your affections. The more that we're in Scripture, the more that we will know of Christ, and the more that we will be able to arm ourselves with His way of thinking. Reading His words allows us to think His thoughts after Him. And so our thoughts and actions and attitudes will be shaped by His, as they're revealed to us in His Word. So loved ones, arm yourselves. Arm yourselves with the mind of Christ because only with this mind are you able to live and love and serve for the glory of God. Amen. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, it is a high and seemingly impossible calling to live our whole lives, all of our lives, nothing left out for your glory. And so we pray that you would help us, please be merciful to us, be gracious to us, and equip us with the mind of Christ. Help us to be diligent in finding out what that mind is, in searching the scriptures, in reading and praying and seeking your face. Oh please, Lord God, transform us. We do want to be those people who live our whole lives with nothing held back for your glory. and so empower us by your Holy Spirit, we pray. Lord, we want to bring you glory in every aspect of our lives. Lord, for the students here who are about to head off to college or university, either for the first time or returning, Lord, we pray for them especially today. We lift them up to you. May they in their studies do everything for your glory. Oh God, please bless them. Bless them as they pursue those studies. Give them all that they need. Help them to stand firm on your truth. Equip them to fight the devil's lies. Anything that would come against your truth. Lord, cause this time of study and intense learning to be a real blessing for them. Equip them for the rest of their lives, we pray. Lord, for those of us who are not going away to university, but are just continuing to live in the lives and callings that you have placed on us, Lord, we pray the same thing. Equip us, strengthen us, Give us all that we need for this battle, and may our whole lives be lives lived to your glory. We ask in Christ's name, amen.