I Peter 2:18-25
Being Jesus-Like
Turn with me to I Peter 2 and we are going to pick up the reading at verse 18. Hear the word of God:
Amen. May God bless to us the reading of His holy and inerrant word. Let’s pray together.
Our Father in heaven we ask now for Your blessing. We pray that You would come and by Your Spirit open up Your word to us. We are a needy, hungry people; feed us we pray from Your word. Give us ears to hear, hearts that will respond in tune with Yours and we ask it in Jesus’ name, Amen.
It makes a difference being a Christian. That’s what Peter is saying in these verses. There ought to be about being a Christian, there ought to be something radical about it. There ought to be something that changes our perspective about everything because we are Christians. It ought to change the way we think, it ought to change the way we study, it ought to change our desires, our motives, our goals, our ambitions; it ought to change the way we do our work, the way we live our lives in our marriages, in our homes, the way we raise our children, the way we conduct ourselves in society; that’s what Peter is saying, that being a Christian ought to make a difference.
Now we have looked at chapter 2 verse 13 down to verse 17, and there Peter is telling us how we ought to live as citizens in a world that is less than ideal. Now in this section, from verse 18 to the end of verse 25, he’s going to tell us how we ought to live in the workplace environment that is less than ideal. In the first 7 verses of chapter 3 he’s going to tell us how we ought to live as wives and husbands in marriages that perhaps are less than ideal. And then in verses 8 to 12 of chapter 3 he is going to say a fourth thing: how we ought to live as members of churches, yes, that are less than ideal. In the states, in the workplace, in marriage, and in the church – in those four areas Peter is going to say it ought to make a difference that we are Christians. He has, of course, in the opening chapter and a little bit into chapter 2, expounded for us the riches and privileges of what it means to be a Christian, the enormous riches that are ours in Jesus Christ. We have been delivered from darkness into God’s marvelous light – that’s what has happened, that is what is true of us as the people of God. And he has begun to speak about the transformed life that flows as a consequence in these four different areas and we’ve already looked at the area of our submission to the state.
Now in the passage that’s before us this evening, beginning at verse 18, he wants us to think about the workplace. He wants to talk about the attitude of servants to their masters. Some of your translations may have “slaves to their masters.” There were something in the region of 60 million slaves in the Roman Empire, some of whom had become Christians, some of whom were now experiencing the liberty and freedom that comes in knowing Jesus Christ and Peter wants to say something to them when they find themselves in circumstances that are less than ideal.
Now you need to rid yourselves of all the notions or at least 95 percent of the notions that may be in your head when you think about slaves and 19th century slavery in this part of the country. I think it has almost no bearing on what Peter is saying here. It’s a very, very different context. These servants that Peter is talking about were very often paid, they were musicians, they were often in the medical profession, they were teachers, they were managers of domestic services, they were usually paid, as I said, and could buy their freedom. A very different context, I think, to the 19th century so let’s pass over that because I don’t think that has something to say to what I Peter 2 is speaking. This is more parallel to the relationship of an employee to an employer, and that’s probably most of us.
Peter has three things to say: he wants to say, first of all, that we are to be subject to our masters. Actually, Peter is using the same word here “Be submissive” in verse 18 that he’s already used in verse 13: “Submit yourselves for the Lord’s sake to every human institution.” And I imagine that you find yourselves asking even as I do, “What are the limits to this submission?” You go for the jugular, you don’t hear Peter saying “Submit,” you want to know what are the conditions? What are the ways-out? What are the sub-clauses? Especially you attorneys, you’re looking for the small print here, what’s the ‘get-out clause’ here? Well I’m asking that too. I know that some of you are asking that because we skated over a little of this last week in our ‘submission to the higher authorities’ here. We are thinking of submission to, perhaps lower authorities in the workplace, but last week we were hearing Peter say that we were to be submissive to the higher authorities, to the state. Well, are there limits to that? Is it ever right to engage in revolution? I think it’s ironic that Ligon should entrust me to speak about this. So let me speak about it a little: “Let fools rush in where angels fear to tread.”
I. Should Christians always be
submissive to their masters?
So let me rush in here because there have been traditions that
have answered in this way that it is never right to revolt against the state,
just as it is never right to disobey against an earthly employer. As was true,
for example, of the radical Reformation in the 16th century, the
so-called Anabaptists in all their various segments. And the Mennonites for
example, the Quakers, the United Brethren have heralded to that view.
Very often that view is also allied to something that is akin to it that because it’s never right to revolt against the state, they’ve often been allied to a pacifist view about war. The two seem to go together and likewise such people, such groups within the wider church have said it’s never ever right to revolt against one’s earthly employer; that it’s wrong to join a trade union; that it’s wrong to be part of the pressure group that seeks to right perceived wrongs in the sphere of employment. The problem is that as we read this passage, many of us are perhaps thinking of the man who cuts our grass. Well, I cut my own grass, but some of you might be thinking of the man who cuts your grass or cleans your pool and the last thing you want is somebody quoting Scripture in defense of them getting more pay out of you. But is Peter here giving a total ban? Is Peter here giving a total ban on any kind of work-related pressure, a go slow, a ban on overtime, a strike, industrial tribunals, and so on? Could the president of the AFL-CIO, what is it the American Federation of Labor, and something else, whatever – could that man be a Christian?
Let me make this a little more complicated: just as there have been those who have said there can be a just war and there are those who have said there can be a just revolution, there are also those who say there can be a just strike or withdrawal of labor. Now far be it from me to quote the Declaration of Independence, but the Declaration of Independence, let me remind you, cites governments of absolute despotism and adds that it is their right, it is their duty to throw off such governments. Well how do you square that with I Peter 2? That’s the issue, that’s the question.
Then within our own tradition there have been folk like Francis Schaeffer in 1980, I think it was, wrote the Christian Manifesto, arguing the very case that there could be a case for revolution, there could be a case for rebellion against both higher and lower authorities, that such scenarios do exist. Samuel Rutherford wrote his justly famous Lex Rex, arguing that very point in the hotbed of Scottish-English politics. But there have also been those, and I think of the teacher of apologetics at Dallas Theological Seminary, Norman Geisler, for example, who said that the American Revolution did not satisfy biblical criteria for a just revolution. Well my response to that is that King George III should have known better than to fill colonies with Scots and Ulster-Scots.
But be that as it may, to get back to the point of our text this evening, is it ever right to disobey one’s employer? Just as the question comes to the surface in the previous section, is it ever right to revolt against the state? Is this ban on a total ban on collective pressure? Is it wrong for workers to demand a minimum wage? Is the pursuit of what the Declaration of Independence calls “certain inalienable rights,” can that be achieved by resistance? Is that resistance to be active or passive? Can that resistance become violent when fundamental rights are being abused? These, I think, are the kind of questions that are forced by any reading of this text. And I think it is perfectly fair and reasonable to observe that Peter isn’t addressing the situation that you and I know today. Would trade unions and employee legislation governing minimum wage and so on… Pete isn’t addressing that context. He’s not addressing a group of people that could achieve anything by their revolution. Their freedoms were very, very limited in comparison to ours. Peter is, I think, addressing here a situation where organized resistance was not a possibility. So what is the principle that is before us? The question, I think, that is before us is how are we to relate to the kingdoms of this world? And the answer of Reformed Christians generally over the centuries has been that in personal issues, on a personal basis, we have no right to revolt against the states; that on a personal basis we have no right to revolt against our earthly employer. We have no right to take vengeance into our own hands; we have no right to retaliate. But what if a boss is unreasonable? Now I feel as though I should be addressing here employers, perhaps more than employees because the church has often been accused, particularly in the 20th century of supporting the status quo by such things as Peter is saying here; supporting the aristocracy rather than the proletariat which gave rise to the former Communism in the 20th century, blaming the church for supporting the bourgeoisie.
What if the boss is unreasonable? Peter talks here about those bosses that are harsh or crooked. Now if he is asking you to do something, if a boss is asking you to do something that is clearly in violation of the will of God, of the law of God, the answer is very clear: you must obey God rather than men. If a boss is asking you to lie for him on the telephone, you’ve got to obey God and not men. If the boss is saying to you, “You’ve got to cheat, you’ve got to cook the books, you’ve got to present a lie rather than the truth,” you’ve got no choice; you must for conscience sake obey God rather than men.
But that isn’t the case that many of us find ourselves in is it? That’s a very rare circumstance and I think Peter recognizes that. And that’s why the emphasis of Peter here is on obeying the powers that be.
Now for some of you tonight, perhaps not for many of you it has to be said, but for some of you tonight it’s not open for you to say when the boss is unreasonable, “Well thank you very much but you can stuff your job.” Can I say that? That’s ok to say, I mean it’s not open for you to say that because you need that job. You need that job because the bread and butter on your children’s table depends on it. You can’t say to your boss, you’re not in a position to say, “Well, you’re going to be hearing from my attorney” because you couldn’t afford an attorney. Peter then says, and it’s to that context I think that Peter is speaking, in that context where there’s no choice, the option isn’t open to you, that you must suffer for Jesus’ sake; that’s what he’s saying, you must suffer with patience and with fortitude, you must show that boss for the cod that he is by reflecting something of the love of Jesus Christ in response to his behavior.
You know what Peter has in mind here; it’s not a perpetuation of slavery and not a perpetuation of the social stability, No! What he has in mind is much more profound than that and you see it popping up again and again. You see it popping up in verse 13, “Submit yourselves for the Lord’s sake.” You’re not doing this for that boss; you’re not doing this for some earthly subject, you’re doing it for the Lord’s sake. And likewise now in our section in verse 19 it says, “For this finds favor for the sake of conscience toward God a man bears up under sorrows when suffering unjustly.” You’re doing this for the Lord’s sake; you’re doing this with an eye to the Lord, whatever it is that you are doing. Think of it, it’s as though Peter is saying, let me pull it away from its context just slightly and let me put it this way, it is as though Peter is saying, “Whatever you do, you’re ultimately doing it for the Lord.” You know if you’re preparing a meal, you’re doing it as though Jesus is coming to eat a meal with you that evening. When you are cleaning the house, you’re doing it as though Jesus was going to come into that house. When you are doing something that is mundane and humdrum and a little tedious, you’re doing it for Jesus’ sake.
May the mind of Christ my Savior
Dwell in me from day to day
By His love and power controlling
All I do and say
That’s what we sang at the beginning of our prayer meeting this evening. We obey even if it costs us dearly. So that in the second place, Peter is saying, not only are we to be obedient to our earthly masters when there’s absolutely no choice at our disposal, we are to be imitators of Christ.
II. Christians should be
imitators of Christ.
Peter is saying, not only are we to be obedient to our earthly
masters when there’s absolutely no choice at our disposal, we are to be
imitators of Christ, Peter says; we are called to imitate our Lord Jesus
Christ. “For you have been called for this purpose since Christ also suffered
for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in His steps.” Because the
pattern of our obedience has been laid down by Jesus who thought it not robbery
that He might be equal with God because He was God. He didn’t have to reach out
and grasp the deity because He was already deity. But He denied Himself; he
drew a veil over His native glory, He humbled Himself, he denied Himself His
rights. Jesus didn’t go about always protesting about His rights.
A little word for our age, you know most of the trouble that comes into the church comes because we bring the spirit of the world into the church and the spirit of the world today is, “I know my rights and I demand my rights. How dare you trample on my rights!” And the Bible turns that inside out: you’re not to be concerned about your rights, you’re to be concerned about the rights of other people. You’re to be concerned about the rights of the person sitting next to you and the person sitting in front of you and the person sitting behind you and when you are consumed about the rights of others rather than yourself, you have a spirit of Jesus within your breast because that’s the Jesus-like spirit, that’s the Jesus-like temperament.
That’s what Paul is saying to the church at Philippi: “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who thought it not robbery to be equal with God but He made Himself of no reputation.”
You know when I think about Jesus denying Himself His rights, Peter was there. Peter heard Jesus cry from the cross, “My God, my God, why have You forsaken Me?” He heard those words, he heard that cry and what were Jesus’ rights? He could have called upon 10 thousand legions of angels to come and consume His enemies. He could have done that; it was His right, He was the sovereign Lord. He could have crushed His enemies in a moment, but He denied Himself His rights. “When He was reviled, He did not revile again.”
You know when somebody reviles you, when somebody does something to you, it may not be your boss, it may just be a friend, it may just be a member of the church and they’ve trodden all over you and your feelings have got all hurt and bent out of shape and what are you doing? You’re plotting and scheming how you can get back at them. Peter is saying to take a grip of yourselves. Brothers and sisters take a grip of yourselves because this is not the Jesus way, because when He was reviled, when they spat on His face, when they pushed a crown of thorns down upon His head, when they mocked Him and jeered Him, He didn’t revile again. And those are the footprints that we are to place our feet in, do you see those footprints in the sand? Place your feet in those footprints and you’ll see all kinds of issues being solved and dealt with as a consequence. That’s what Peter is saying. Peter is going to site in the next chapter the beautiful Psalm 34 and you know that great verse that comes out of Psalm 34: “Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers them out of them all.” That’s what He has an eye to: “Be subject to your masters, be imitators of Christ.”
III. Remember that God has called
you to live for His glory.
Then in the third place, and briefly, remember who you are.
“Remember who you are for you have been called for this purpose,” Peter says,
“Since Christ also suffered for you leaving you an example” and so on.
“Remember who you are that you are those for whom Jesus Christ has come and
offered Himself” and Peter is using here, and I just think Peter loved Isaiah
53. Peter loved Isaiah 53 because the language that he’s using here is taken
out of that 53rd chapter of Isaiah: “He was lead as a lamb to the
slaughter and as a sheep before it’s shearers, was dumb so that he opened not
his mouth.” But he poured out his life unto death that when he was reviled, he
did not threaten, he didn’t lash out, he didn’t retaliate, he didn’t try to plot
and get even. And what is that? You know you can summarize all of that to what
Peter is saying here, you can summarize it all in one word, and it’s the one
word on a rare instance when Jesus speaks about his own character in Matthew
chapter 10: “For I am meek and lowly of heart.” What is it that
encapsulates the spirit of Jesus more than anything else? It is meekness.
“Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.”
And my friends, is that what characterizes us? With all of our different personalities, and all of our different gifts, and all of our different positions within this society of employers and employees, are we characterized Peter wants to know, by the spirit of meekness? For that is what we are called to. “We have returned to the Shepherd and Guardian of our souls,” he says at the end of this passage to walk, that is to say, in our earthly spheres in relation to the lower powers with an eye that transcends those powers and see Jesus as the Shepherd and Guardian of our souls. It may be, my friends, it may be that some of you here are in a sphere of employment out of which you cannot move for a variety of reasons, and it may just be that life this evening in that sphere of employment is particularly hard and difficult for you. And Peter wants you to know something, that there is nothing that happens to you in that sphere of employment that Jesus doesn’t see and when you live for His glory with an eye to pleasing Him no matter what the consequences may be to you personally, He sees that, He rewards that. His heart is gladdened by that, Peter seems to say, for this finds favor, if for the sake of conscience toward God a man bears up under sorrows when suffering unjustly. Peter is trying to minister to the people of God in circumstances that are less than ideal and he’s saying to them, “Have an eye toward the glory of God and that will be sufficient for you.” Now may God bless His word to us. Let’s pray together.
Our Father in heaven, as we examine this passage together this evening there are many, many issues concerning which we find ourselves a little puzzled, but one thing is clear to us of how greatly we ought to revere and love and treasure our Savior Jesus Christ. It’s when we take our eyes off Him that we find ourselves in greater peril and greater trouble. So help us to be focused we pray, and help those here tonight who find themselves in a particularly vexing situation in their spheres of employment and help them to see Jesus and Him only. For Jesus sake we ask it, Amen.