Sermon Tone Analysis

Peter continues his theme of suffering in today’s passage.

There are new things for us to grasp in this passage, surprising things about how we should respond, so let us look at what it says here.

Suffering is common, that is, trials come to us generally as part of being in the human race so there should be no surprise.

Sin has left its mark on the world and we will suffer because of others, because of ourselves and because of a curse upon the earth pronounced with the ejection of Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden.

How we respond to such times is key, and first and foremost we suffer unto the Lord.

There are going to be times when we lack power over a situation and things will feel volatile but Whom do we trust through it all?

We are brought back to the cross and Jesus’ own sufferings.

And when the hour arrived He did not refuse what was coming upon Him but committed Himself to His Father.

In this case He suffered at the hands of others and He did not think it strange.

But it was at the worst moment of history, the death of Jesus, that victory was won and glory achieved.

The suffering of Jesus brought us eternal life and He had to lose His life for it to happen.

We, also, are called to suffering and when we suffer it will lead to glory in the end.

Peter is not saying that any of them are suffering at this time but is forewarning them that it is probably on the way.

As you have heard me over several weeks this is what I am warning us about.

Should we think it strange that we should go through any trials here in the UK? Suffering is probably on the way and we should not be taken by surprise when it does come.

And if it happens we are fellowshipping with Christ in His sufferings.

And in this we should rejoice.

If you should become recipients of verbal or physical persecutions that arise on account of the Word then the Spirit of glory rests upon us in such situations and this, in the words of Fanny Crosby is a foretaste of glory divine.

And that is what this is about – the sufferings endured here in this life cannot be compared with the glory that will be experienced in the next life.

And there, of course, you will not be able to lose your life as it says in:

Suffering for the gospel is never to be thought of as strange.

Many of us struggle with God during times of trials.

We wonder where he has gone.

We wonder if he still cares for us.

We feel abandoned in our hour of need.

Our feeling need to find comfort in the fact that God’s glory and approval is especially upon us at such times.

Indeed if we are shunned, if we are abused verbally or physically because we hold onto the name of Christ then we are automatically blessed and God is glorified when we hold fast the name of Christ.

Helen Roseveare was a Christian British doctor who served more than twenty years in Zaire (now DR Congo), Africa.

In 1964 a revolution overwhelmed the country.

She and her coworkers were thrown into five and a half months of unbelievable brutality and torture.

For a moment she thought that God had forsaken her, but then she was overwhelmed with a sense of his presence, and she records that it was as if God was saying to her:

Twenty years ago you asked me for the privilege of being a missionary, the privilege of being identified with me.

This is it.

Don’t you want it?

This is what it means: These are not your sufferings, they are mine.

All I ask of you is the loan of your body.

And Christians have died or been tortured in their thousands for Christ ever since.

George Matheson was born in Glasgow, Scotland, in March 1842.

At birth Matheson’s eyesight was poor.

By age eighteen he had nearly lost it completely.

Robbed of physical sight, he nevertheless recognised spiritual truths with penetrating clarity and insight.

Take the role of suffering in the life of a believer, for example.

It never caught him by surprise.

He never thought suffering for his Christian faith strange.

And when, according to God’s will, he was asked to enter into it, he was never ashamed.

He writes:

There is a time coming in which your glory shall consist in the very thing which now constitutes your pain.

Nothing could be more sad to Jacob than the ground on which he was lying, a stone for his pillow.

It was the hour of his poverty.

It was the season of his night.

It was the seeming absence of his God.

The Lord was in the place and he knew it not.

Awakened from his sleep he found that the day of his trial was the dawn of his triumph.

Ask the great ones of the past what has been the spot of their prosperity and they will say, “It was the cold ground on which I was lying.”

Ask Abraham; he will point to the sacrifice on Mount Moriah.

Ask Joseph; he will direct you to his prison.

Ask Moses; he will date his fortune from his danger in the Nile.

Ask David; he will tell you that his songs came in the night.

Ask Job; he will remind you that God answered him out of the whirlwind.

Ask John; he will give the path to Patmos.

Ask Paul; he will attribute his inspiration to the light which struck him blind.

Ask one more!—the

Son of God.

Ask Him whence has come His rule over the world; he will answer, “From the cold ground on which I was lying—the Gethsemane ground—I received my sceptre there.”

Peter then goes onto say let us not suffer for anything other than being Christians – let us not be found guilty of anything that will defame us or God by stealing, by doing evil, by interfering in other people’s lives in things that have nothing to do with us.

It is easy in a moment of madness to ruin our witness and close the door on opportunities.

We have to fend off the prowling attacks of Satan.

But should we suffer for good or for the sins that we do God can and will be there through it and we can entrust ourselves to Him.

This same George Mattheson wrote that on June 6, 1882, the day of his sister’s marriage, and his family was staying overnight in Glasgow, Scotland.

Something happened to him as he sat alone there in the darkness of his blindness, something known only to himself, something that caused him severe mental suffering.

He never confided to anyone what the problem was, and yet his heart cried out to Christ.

As his heart moaned, words welled up in his mind, words of comfort.

“I had the impression of having it dictated to me by some inward voice rather than of working it out myself,” he said.

And I am sure that these words are familiar to you:

O Joy that seekest me through pain,

I cannot close my heart to thee;

I trace the rainbow through the rain,

And feel the promise is not vain,

That morn shall tearless be.

Suffering is the lot for Christians but through it glory will come.

And here is the shocking news that judgment begins with us, His people – and we will get away from eternal punishment by the skin of our teeth.

Peter is linking suffering and God’s judgement.

Until now suffering has come at the hands of others but now it would appear we could suffer at the hands of God for our own behaviour.

What is this but none other than God’s discipline.

And sometimes this will feel very severe and we may not recognise it for what it is.

It is what John 15 speaks of when we are to be pruned so that we can bear worthy fruit.

C. H. Spurgeon told a story about the results of pruning.

The apricot tree at home was trimmed back so much I wondered if the branches and leaves would ever grow back, let alone the leaves.

We ended up that next year having apricots coming out of our ears; Mom made apricot pie, jam, and we had it as fresh fruit, and there was still an abundance left for the birds.

Sometimes seasons of suffering come to us but this will bring glory to God and fruit for Him and an overwhelming reward from Him in the future.

Not only that but God punishes us now so that we will not go through the same judgement as the world will go through.

Indeed Jesus tells us in:

We can only be counted worthy if we are covered in the blood of the lamb.

We’ll not be condemned with the world for our sins have already been dealt with at the cross by the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

The judgement we receive, the suffering that we go through, the pain that we acutely feel is because we are being moulded to be more like Jesus and to a greater fellowship with the Father.

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But if we are to be judged so severely it will be nothing like it will be for those who have rejected Jesus Christ for their names shall not be found in the Book of Life and will be cast into the lake of fire to be tormented for ever and ever and ever.

The ungodly and the sinner have no chance of escape.

This makes me wonder for such people and whether we could have done something to help them avoid such a destiny.

And indeed we do lack a concern for those around us.

We need a new Pentecost and be refilled with the Holy Spirit who will give us the boldness to speak and witness.