Hows and Whys of Strange Living, Part 2

Arm yourselves also with the same purpose, because he who has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin. What does that mean? Perfect tense verb has ceased from sin, mean or emphasizing a permanent condition that's free. From sin, mean this: when you die, you enter a conditional state absolutely free from s. Holy perfection. No more sin, no more effects of sin, and no influence from sin. So if you arm yourself with the same purpose that Christ had and you suffer so much that you die, guess what? The end result is.

You cease from sin. There is no more sin. You have holy perfection. You have found out what Jesus Christ Himself accomplished. For you, by looking back at verses 18 to 22 and realizing the one who suffered for you and died for you is now at the right hand of God the Father and has been the victorious warrior. Remember those verses we read in Mark 8, Mark 9, and Mark 10? They all concluded with the same phrase. And the same phrase was the victory of the cross. Yes, he talked about the centrality of the cross.

Yes, he talked about the necessity of the cross. Yes, he talked about the certainty of the cross. Yes, he spoke about the brutality of the cross, but he always ended with one phrase, the victory of the cross. And the Son of Man will rise again. That's the victory of the cross. There's no victory without the brutality. There's no victory without the centrality. There's no victory without the necessity and the certain All those things had to take place in order for him to gain the victory. So, you and I, once we suffer, once we die, we too will become victorious.

We too will cease from sin. We will reach. As Romans 8 talks about that glorified state, for we'll see him, and we'll be like him, for we'll see him as he is. Peter says, equip your minds with the same purpose, same attitude, same thought that Christ him had. Number two, in terms of the exhortation, en The will of God.

If you equip your mind with the same purpose as Christ, you will enjoy the will of God. Listen to what it says. Verse 2. So, as to live the rest of the time in the flesh, no longer for the lusts of men, but for the will of God. Because if you suffer to the point of death, Realize this. You will be in a glorified state. You will be home with your Lord because He has won the victory over sin, death, and Satan. Therefore, The rest of the time that you live in the flesh, you no longer live for the lusts of men, but you live how?

According to the will of God. You want to do the will of God. You want to honor God. You want to serve God. How many times did Christ say, I've come not to do my will, but the will of my Father who is in heaven? What did Christ say? Or what did the writer of Hebrews say about Christ in Hebrews 12? Who, for the joy set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame. He was able to endure the cross because there was a joy that was set before him. That's because his suffering would produce an offspring of tremendous growth, that is, of tremendous believers.

Who would experience eternal life with him? And that joy that was set before him caused him to endure the cross. You see, sin no longer has dominion over me. Therefore, I don't have to live the rest of my time in the flesh after the lusts of men, but according to the will of God. Isn't that what Paul said over in 2 Corinthians 5, verse number 9, when he said these words? He says, therefore, also we have as our ambition, whether at home or absent, to be pleasing to him. We have one ambition in life.

Know what that is? Whether we're home with the Lord or whether we're present with you, we want to please the Lord. We want to do the will of the Lord. Over in verse number 14. For the love of Christ controls us. Having concluded this, that one died for all, therefore all died, and he died for all, that they who live. Should no longer live for themselves, but for him who died and rose again on their behalf. You see, the reason we live now is not to live for ourselves. But to equip our minds with the purpose of Christ that we might enjoy the will of God because we love Him so.

And Paul says the love of Christ could Constrains us, it compels us, it moves me, it motivates me. It's caught me almost like in between two barriers. I can't get out of it. The love of Christ constrains me. Same word used of Christ when the soldiers came to get him in the garden. They constrained him, one on either side, so he could not escape. The love of Christ encompasses me so much that I cannot escape. It controls me. Because the one who died for me died. So, I would now live for him. See that?

So, you learn to enjoy the will of God. Think about it this way: listen, over and over again in the Bible, you can read about the Father's love for the Son. Remember Mark chapter 1 at the baptism of Christ when the voice came out of heaven, This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased. On the Mount of Transfiguration, when Christ unzipped his flesh and the voice came from heaven, This is my beloved Son, listen to him. Over in John chapter 17, Christ would pray in his Prayer there with his men in John 17, verse number 24.

These words, Father, I desire that they also whom thou hast given me Be with me where I am, in order that they may behold my glory which Thou hast given me. For Thou didst love me before the foundation of the world. Over and over again throughout the Gospels. You can find the Father expressing his love for the Son, but I challenge you to find the place in the Bible where it speaks of the Son's love for the Father. There's one place, just one, and that one place is all you need. To understand how much the Son loved the Father.

That's in John chapter 14, verse number 30. When Christ said this. I will not speak much more with you, for the ruler of the world is coming, and he has nothing in me, but that the world may know that I love the Father. There it is. That I love the Father, and as the Father gave me commandment, even so I do. Arise, let us go from here. That the whole world will know I love the Father, it is time for us to go, for the hour has now arrived. What hour? The hour of my death. The hour of my crucifixion, the hour of my mockings and my beatings and my scourging, that hour is now here.

And so the whole world will know that I love the Father. I'm going to be obedient to his will even unto death. Let me ask you a question: How much does the world know you love the Father?

Will they know you love the Father because you're obedient to Him even unto death? That's what's important. Peter referring back to Isaiah chapter 50. Where it says in verse number 6, I gave my back to those who strike me, and my cheeks to those who pluck out my beard. I did not cover my face from humiliation and spitting. For the Lord God helps me, therefore, I am not disgraced. Therefore, I have set my face like flint, and I know that I shall not be ashamed. That was the prophecy about the Son of Man suffering for the sins of the world.

And now in John 14, Christ says, everybody's going to know that I love the Father. How? Because I'm going to do exactly what his will was and is for me. How about you? Does the world know you love the Father because you're willing to do whatever the Father asks? To obey His commandments? So important. Do you enjoy the will of God? See, Christ enjoyed the will of God. My will, my food, is to do the will of him who sent me. He said, My life's sustenance is to do my Father's will. To be obedient to him.

To enjoy something doesn't mean you have to laugh about it. Doesn mean you have to. Feel good about it to enjoy something is to be content with God's plan for your life because God has a marvelous plan. And Christ knew the plan because the plan was before the foundation of the world. And he would enjoy doing what his father said because he wanted to please his father more than anything else in the world. The question is, who do you want to please? Your father or your? Do you ever ask yourself why it is we don't enjoy the will of God?

May you have another will. Your will. The Bible says in Romans 12, 1 and 2 that we to present our bodies a living sacrifice, wholly acceptable unto God.

See, I'll give myself to God, but I won't give myself to him as a living sacrifice. I'm not going to throw myself up on the altar and say, okay, God, just do whatever you want to do. See, the problem with the living sacrifice is that it can crawl off the altar anytime it wants. Right? Just gets right back off the altar again, well, that's a little bit too much of a living sacrifice. How about if I just do a just a partial sacrifice? I don't want to give it all away. I'm going to do it all for you.

I'm going to serve you with all that I have. I just want to serve you with a portion of what I have. I want to give you just a portion I want to do for you just a little bit, Lord, not a whole bunch. Because that's what my will wants to do. I don't enjoy the will of God because not only do I have another will, I have another way. We have another way, don't we? There's another way to do it, Lord. Lord, my way is a little bit better than your way is. And the Bible says, There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the ends thereof are the ways of what?

Death, not life. Remember, death is defined as separation. So there is a way which seems right into a man, but the end thereof is what? A separation from you, from who? From God. Because your way is going differently than his way is going. And we have another way. Surely God is not going to ask me to stay in this marriage. He must not understand my situation. He must want me to be happy. He must have a better way for me. He can't want me to stay in this marriage, can he? There must be another way.

And that way is based on what I want, my will, my desire. So I find another way out. The way out is always through, always through. Yet we think that somehow God's way and God's will isn't sufficient. So we don't enjoy his will because we enjoy our will. Well, you know how much you enjoy the will by understand point number two, that's the reaction of the world.

Verse number four in all this they are surprised That you do not run with them in the same excess of dissipation. They are bewildered. They are surprised. They're shocked. When was the last time somebody was shocked about your lifestyle? When was the last time somebody was so utterly taken back they were completely bewildered about what you do and why you do it? You see, we like to run in the same realm of dissipation. We like to be a part of what they're doing. Somehow, thinking that if we're just a part of what they're doing, then we can win them over to the Lord.

All the while becoming entrenched in who they are and what they do and how they live and how they act. Not understanding that the way to win them is to be completely and utterly different than they are. See, we forget that. And Peter says, when you equip your mind with the purpose of God and enjoy the will of God and no longer live your life according to the lust of the flesh, they are absolutely bewildered. They don't understand. They don't get it. If people get how you live, there's a problem. Right?

They shouldn't be able to comprehend it. They don't get it. They don't understand it. They need to be astonished. About what you do and why you do it. They look at you as being str, odd, different.

Peter has already talked about the fact that we are aliens and strangers in a foreign land. I think it's interesting when Paul said, if any man be in Christ, he is a new creation, right? Old things pass away, behold, all things become new. 1 Thessalonians 1:9 talks about those in Thessalonica how they turn to God from idols to serve the living and true God. They turned away from that lifestyle to engage in a whole new lifestyle. A lifestyle orchestrated by God Himself. So what's the reaction? The world is bewildered and the world will blaspheme you.

It says, and they malign you. It literally means they blaspheme you. They slander you. They speak against you. They speak evil about you. They def you. They defame your standard of morality. They can't stand what you're doing. And because you are demonstrating to them a holy and godly life, what they want to do is tear you down any way they apostle can, and they'll do that. With their words, with their actions. They will speak out against you. They will hate you. Isn't that what Christ said in the book of John, chapter 15?

When he said these words, if the world hates you, you know that it has hated me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own. But because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. Remember the world. Oh, excuse me, the word that I said to you: a slave is not greater than his master. If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will keep your also. Christ says, listen, this is the way it is.

If they hate me, they're going to hate you. Because you love me and you don't love the world. If they don't hate you, it's because you are demonstrating to them that you love the world as they love the world. See that? See, we unfortunately have been sold this bill of goods over the last 20 years in the church about friendship evangelism. And becoming friends of all these people of the world, trying to gather them around us so that we can give all this kind of good aroma about our lives. And we never really get down to the point of preaching the gospel and telling them they got to repent and be saved.

They got to give their lives to Christ. They got to turn from their sin and follow the Lord Jesus Christ. They've got to take up the cross, they've got to deny themselves, and they've got to follow the Lord. We don't want to say that because we'll lose our friends. And after all, it's about friendship evangelism. So we don't lose our friends, we can't evangelize them. Trying to somehow emphasize the fact that it's us who brings someone to saving faith because we have befriended them. Now, listen, I'm not against making friends with the unbelieving world.

But what I'm trying to emphasize is that We have taken that and swung that pendulum all the way to the other side where we no longer confront sin, we no longer talk to people about their sin. You tell people they're going to hell. They've got to get right with God or they'll perish in their sins. We don't tell people those things. Why? Because we might lose our friend. They might malign us. They might blaspheme us. They might speak against us. And Peter says, because you don't roam with them in the same excess of dissipation, they malign you.

They're against you. Number three, what's our motivation as to why or how? How are we going to do all this? What's going to motivate me to equip my mind with the purpose of Christ and enjoy the will of God? Peter says it this way: verse number 3. He says, For the time already past is sufficient for you to have carried out the desire of the Gentiles. Having pursued a course of sensuality, lust, drunkenness, car, drinking parties, and abominable idolatries. The time has already passed. You've done all that.

It's over. Here's the point. Remember, we told you on Sunday? When you remember the past, you're able to rejoice in the present and you're able to rest in the future. And Peter says, the time has passed. You've done all that. You've been there. You've been there? Some of you have. Some of you have been involved in the parties where you've awakened in an area you don't even know where you're at anymore. Trying to wonder whether or not you had sex with the other guy or the other girl that night, and if you going to wake up with another disease tomorrow or some disease the next day.

You've been there. Some of you have woken up in your own vomit, having been involved in the drunken revelries, and you've been there, you've done that. And the only thing you had to look forward to was the next drinking binge, was the next sexual origy, was a nickn opportunity. That's all you had to look forward to. Peter says, You've been there. And it never did anything for you, did it? Because it doesn't. It just accentuates your emptiness. And it accentuates your nothingness. Because you're nothing.

Except for Christ, we're nothing. And so Peter says, What motivates you? Where you were motivates you. You used to be there. Remember what Christ said in John 6:3, I am the bread life. He who comes to me shall not hunger, and he who believes in me shall never thirst. Christ fills the empty void of our lives with his person, saves us from hell, and satisfies us each and every day. Because you've been there. You've been saved from your past. Paul would say the same thing. Remember, over in 1 Corinthians.

Chapter 6, verse number 9. We said, Or do you not know that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived, neither fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, effeminate, or homosexuals? Thieves, covetous, drunkards, revilers, swindlers shall inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you, but you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and the Spirit of our God. Paul says any. You were there. That 's where you were.

Those people don't inherit the kingdom of God. They have nothing because they are nothing. But you have everything because of Jesus Christ. Because He washed you. He saved you. He sanctified you. He justified you. Now you are something because you know someone. The only one, Jesus Christ our Lord. And Peter says, You've been saved from your past. The lewdness, the lust, the drunkenness, the revelries, the carousing, the drinking parties, the abominable idolatries. And then he says, Not only have you been saved from your past, but you are secured.

In your future. He says, for the gospel has, for this purpose, been preached even to those. Who are dead? It says in verse number five. I skipped this verse, I'm sorry. But they shall give an account to him who is ready to judge the living and the dead. They're going to give an account. Those who malign you, those who ridicule you, those who make fun of you and laugh at you, they're going to give an account one day. It's coming. Judgment Day, Sunday. Payment is going to come. Those who condemn you will give an account.

For the gospel for this purpose, what purpose? Has been preached even to those who are dead. That though they are judged in the flesh as men, they may live in the spirit according to the will of God. That's the same phrase used back up in verse number 18 of Christ, where he died in the flesh but was made alive in the spirit. For this purpose, Peter says, you need to understand, the gospel was preached in times past to people who believed, gave their lives to Christ, and were saved. And they died because of their faith.

But they now li forever with Christ. There's a security about your future. And that security is wrapped up in the finished work of Jesus Christ our Lord. What motivates me? The way I used to live, it brought no satisfaction. It brought no relief. It just increased my guilt. It increased my shame. I was embarrassed. The things I used to do, the way I used to live, all those things brought me nothing. And God saved me from that and secured a free. Future in heaven with me, that even if these people who one day will give an account for their lives even kill me because of my faith, guess what?

I live with Jesus forever. And I guess when you think about it that way, you've got to think about it from this standpoint. That listen, the worst thing anybody can ever do is kill you. But all that does is usher you into glory. So is it really that bad? I don't think so. To live forever with Jesus Christ is our future.