“Sick
Sheep and Healed Lives”
1 Peter
2:21-25
December
10, 2006
Dr. Jerry
Nelson
I’ve been
a Christian for at least 45 years.
For all of those years, with varying degrees of doubt and assurance, I have known that I belong to God by his grace, not by my merit.
But for all of those years, with varying degrees of victory or defeat, there has also been an on-going battle with sin.
I have
been in the battle long enough to realize that living as a Christian is not
simply a matter of deciding and trying harder to
obey God.
Yes, I must decide; my determination to follow Jesus
matters.
Yes, I must try: my engagement in the battle matters.
But when I read God’s instructions about holy living, I realize that will and effort alone will not bring the increasing victory over sin in my life that I desire.
I’m realistic enough to not expect perfection
from myself, but I love God enough to want to exhibit a growing
Christ likeness.
And so I come to the Scriptures that we are currently studying from 1
Peter and I ask, “Can I do what God asks?
In the texts we have studied the past couple of weeks and
will look at again this week and two more weeks, we find the following high
standard to which God calls his followers:
I Peter 2:11- 3:8 “Dear friends, I urge you, as aliens and strangers in the world, to abstain from sinful desires, which war against your soul. Live such good lives among the pagans that, though they accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day he visits us.
Then Peter declares the necessary attitude for such godly living; submissiveness. Submissive:
toward governing authorities, v13ff
toward masters/bosses and v18ff
toward one’s spouse.3:1ff
toward everyone 3:8ff
It seems
to me the whole section then is summarized with these words from verse 12,
“Live such good lives among the pagans that, though they accuse you of
doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day he
visits us.”
The way that is
done, God says, is by having and living a submissive, non-retalitatory
lifestyle as stated in verses 13 and following: “Submit
yourselves for the Lord's sake to every authority instituted among men…”
I understand what it is I’m supposed to do and
even the attitude with which I’m to do it BUT can I actually
do it; for that matter can that become the way I naturally act and
react?
Let me give you another embarrassing, “how-not-to”
illustration:
Last Wednesday I was driving in the third of three cars following a
school bus about 7 a.m. right here by the church.
The bus pulled over to the curb and stopped.
All three of us following, slowed to a stop but the bus didn’t turn on
its lights.
So we all three cautiously pulled alongside the bus to pass.
The two cars ahead of me were past but as I pulled alongside, the
yellow lights went on and the stop sign swung out from the side of the bus.
I immediately stopped, right alongside the bus, knowing I shouldn’t go past the front of the bus nor back up.
One of the drivers jumped out of the bus, ran to my car and yelled at
me about not heeding the warning lights and threatening me with a $75 ticket
for not stopping.
“Though they accuse you of doing wrong…”
I rolled my window down and over the noise of the bus; I yelled back about how they lured me into the situation and that in fact I had obviously stopped because I was talking to him.
He got back on the bus, the lights were turned off and I drove away.
I was immediately struck with what I had just done;
thinking, “Where did that reaction come from?”
I prayed, “Lord Jesus, forgive me.”
I know I should have caught up to
the bus and apologized to the drivers as well; but I honestly didn’t think of
that until later.
But I continued to ponder the situation and my reaction.
How can I get to the place in life where my natural reactions and
actions are what God is describing here in 1 Peter?
As I said already, though deciding and trying are important
they don’t seem to be enough.
I sometimes feel very much like the Apostle Paul in Romans
7:21-24
“When I
want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight
in God's law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging
war against the law of my mind… What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me
from this body of death?”
Right in the middle of our 1 Peter text, the
Apostle answers this question.
Remember, Peter is giving
instruction about submissive living in all situations of life.
As we saw last week, when Peter describes a
submissive attitude toward masters he uses Jesus as the ultimate illustration
of patient, non-retaliation even when abused.
1 Peter 2:21-23 “To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you,
leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps. "He committed
no sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth." When they hurled their
insults at him, he did not retaliate; when he suffered, he made no threats.
Instead, he entrusted himself to him who judges justly.”
To be sure, Jesus is the supreme example of how we ought to
behave toward others, even those who mistreat us.
And as Christ-followers we want to emulate him.
But that only compounds my problem.
I know what Jesus wants me to do.
And then seeing how he acted, I
feel even worse that I can’t seem to act that way.
But Peter doesn’t end with calling Jesus an example that we
must pattern our lives after.
In verses 24-25 Peter spells
out the foundation and power for such Christ-like living.
1 Peter 2:24-25 “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that we might die
to sins and live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed. 25 For you were like sheep going
astray, but now you have returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.
How is it possible for us to pattern our lives after Jesus?
Peter says it is possible because of what Jesus did in his death and
resurrection.
Yes, Jesus
was the greatest example ever of patient suffering and the most dramatic
demonstration ever of his love, but his death was not only an example and a
demonstration.
Most fundamentally Jesus’ death was a sacrifice of his life for our lives.
Peter introduces this idea back in verse 21 “To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps.”
Christ
didn’t just suffer; he suffered “for you,” for us!
So now in verses
24-25 he moves beyond the idea of Jesus as an example.
Now he adds that when Jesus died, he bore our sins.
He develops
this more fundamental idea of sacrifice; a sacrifice made necessary because of
our sinfulness and sin.
Now this
may begin to sound like common ground to many of you who know that Jesus died
for our sins.
But I am convinced that most of us don’t go
far enough in our understanding and application of this idea.
We think of
Jesus’ death in terms of only half of its results:
·
We
rightly say that Jesus died paying the penalty of death that was
due to us for our sin. 1 John 2:2 “He is the atoning sacrifice for our
sins…”
·
We also rightly
say that Jesus died removing the guilt of our sin so that we can
have a right relationship with God. Romans 5:10 “We were reconciled to
him (the Father) through the death of his Son.”
I want you
to see that while all that is certainly implied in what Peter writes, those
ideas are not the focus of his thoughts.
Remember he’s writing about us living like Jesus.
So he remind us that Jesus died
for us:
·
So “that we might die to sins and live for righteousness
·
So
that “you have
been healed.
·
So
that even
though “you were like sheep going astray, you have now returned to the Shepherd
and Overseer of your souls.
What are
these other results of Christ’s death?
They are righteousness, healing, and returning.
Again I emphasize these ideas are not only about being saved and
certain of going to heaven when we die; these are about how we live and act now
as a Christ-follower.
Peter anchors, not just our conversion but our daily Christ-like living
in the death and resurrection of Jesus.
Again,
repetitiously I add, too many who call themselves Christians think that
Christianity is about having their guilt and penalty removed and waiting for
heaven.
That’s why there are literally millions of Americans who call
themselves “born again,” “saved,” or “Christian” who have no thought of
actually following Jesus in this life.
How many call themselves Christians thinking, because
they prayed a prayer or went forward in some evangelistic meeting or because
they mentally agree that God exists and that Jesus was a real person who died
and rose again, that they are now Christians.
Because some don’t believe in God, we think we, who do believe in God, are fundamentally different from those who don’t and that we are acceptable to God because we do believe in him.
But Peter, along with every other New
Testament writer, forcefully reminds us that true Christianity is not only
about the past forgiveness and a future heaven but also about the present.
Hebrews 12:14 “Make every effort to live in peace with all
men and to be holy; without holiness no one will see
the Lord.”
“Let us remember,” Alexander McLaren wrote, “that our
religion is meant to work, that we have nothing in our creed that should not be
in our character, that all our credenda (doctrines) are to be our agenda;
everything believed is to be something done; and that if we content ourselves
with the simple acceptance of the teaching, and make no effort to translate
that teaching into life, we are hypocrites or self-deceivers.” (Alexander
MacLaren in Barnhouse, Romans, 166)
So again,
notice how pointedly Peter says it, “He himself bore our sins in his body on
the tree, so that we might …”
live righteously;
live as spiritually healthy people,
live as people who have returned to follow the
Shepherd of our lives.
What happened on the cross? What happened
that empowers us to be able to live, as Christ wants us to live?
Peter
writes, “by his wounds you have been healed.”
Both verses 24 and 25 are anchored in Isaiah 53.
Isaiah 53:5-6 “But he was pierced for our
transgressions,
he was
crushed for our iniquities;
the
punishment that brought us peace was upon him,
and by his
wounds we are healed.
ISA 53:6 We all,
like sheep, have gone astray,
each of us has turned to his own way;
and the LORD has laid on him
the iniquity of us all.
Again, how
does Jesus’ death heal us, enabling us to live differently?
The Apostle
Paul speaks more extensively to the same issue:
Romans
6:3-14 “Don't you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ
Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through
baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead
through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. If we have been
united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with
him in his resurrection. For we know that our old self was crucified with him
so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be
slaves to sin… Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live
with him. For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die
again; death no longer has mastery over him.” In the same way, count yourselves
dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. Therefore do not let sin reign in
your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires…for sin shall not be your
master, because you are not under law, but under grace.
When we trusted in Jesus as saving Lord, we were by, God's
doing, placed into Christ so that what was true of him became true of us.
John Stott wrote, "A
Christian is not merely a justified believer.
He is someone who has entered into a vital personal union with Jesus
Christ." (Stott in Men Made New p34)
When we were placed into Jesus (as evidenced
by our water baptism) we were also placed or baptized into his actions.
·
What he had done, we had done.
·
What happened to him, happened to us
And so Paul says there are two things that
are true of us who are Christians.
Please notice he does not say these things OUGHT to be true but that
they ARE true of us.
In Christ Jesus we died to sin and
in Christ Jesus we rose to a new
life.
The logic of the passage goes like this:
CHRIST died to sin.
WE died in Christ because WE are
in him.
Therefore WE died to sin. (Moo, Romans, p354)
So to understand in what way we have “died to
sin” we must understand in what way Christ died to sin.
Verse 9 explains it: “death no longer has mastery over him.”
Death once had authority over Christ because he took our sin on
himself. Sin leads unalterably to
death.
But once Christ died (and rose again) he broke that linkage between sin and death.
Christ broke the rule of sin that was operating in him (because of our
sin) and he was freed from its control that led to death.
He broke the power of sin to control and kill.
Sin is not just something we do that is wrong, sin becomes a
master - it rules us. (Cf
Romans 6:15ff)
Christ took our very real sin on himself and it ruled him
(now I understand that Jesus put himself in that position willingly but
having done so - having taken our sin on himself - it took him to death).
But when Jesus rose from the
grave, he broke sin’s power.
Jesus was no longer controlled by sin.
Again, what is Paul’s point?
When we trust in Jesus Christ as Saving-Lord we are placed
“in Christ”, we are connected to him in a way that what has happened to him has
happened to us.
Look at V6 “For we know that our old self, our old way of
life, was crucified with Christ, so that the body of sin, (our old sin-prone
way of thinking and acting) would be done away with - no longer able to
control us. - “That we should no longer
be slaves to sin.”
Before you became a Christian, while it was possible for you
to do certain things that we would call “good” -
it was impossible for you to anything that God would call “good” or
“righteous” or deserving of God’s favor.
God said it this way “Even our so-called righteousnesses are as filthy rags”.
We were controlled by sin and unable not
to sin.
We could do nothing right by God’s standards because every action was
corrupted in some way either by our actions themselves or by our motives.
It was impossible for us NOT
to sin by God’s definition of sin.
But here is what happened - when we died “in
Christ” that power of sin to control us was broken.
Christ broke it and WE are “in
Christ”.
It is now possible for us NOT
to sin.
It is now possible for us to do
real “good” by God’s definition.
It doesn’t mean it’s impossible
for us to sin but that it is now possible for us NOT to
sin - sin’s power to control has been broken.
So when Paul says we have died to sin,
It is not that I CANNOT sin but that I can now NOT sin.
By God’s grace and his Spirit within us it is now
possible for us, for the first time, to actually live in a righteous way - to
please our God.
Peter uses the OT words, “by his wounds we are healed.”
By his death we are made healthy; we are now capable, by his grace, to
say “no” to sin and “yes” to following Jesus’ example.
It is not just that I must work up the will and energy to be
better, I have been healed; by God’s grace I have the ability to do it right.
Yes, it will be a struggle; the old sinful
habits die hard.
But as we reject the old ways and trust Jesus, stepping out to do what
is right, God’s Spirit enables us.
Yes, sin sometimes even sneaks up on us and plays on our old
attitudes and ways so quickly that we sometimes sin but “If we confess our sins, he is
faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all
unrighteousness.”
Then
again, with the knowledge of my new freedom from the controlling power of
sin I desire and act as God instructs in
Romans 6:12-14 “Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that
you obey its evil desires. Do not offer the parts of your body to sin, as
instruments of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God, as those who
have been brought from death to life; and offer the parts of your body to him
as instruments of righteousness. For sin shall not be your master, because you
are not under law, but under grace.
I want to give you another picture of what
happened at the cross that now empowers us to obey Jesus.
I want to read to you Walter Wangerin’s poignant poem, “The Ragman.”
As I said, Peter uses Isaiah’s language to
describe our spiritual condition, “by Jesus wounds, we are healed.”
Think of our sins as diseases or as debilitating injuries – which is
what Isaiah does.
Our sinfulness and sins have left us fatally ill and incapable of following Christ.
Now listen to what Jesus does for us as he comes, dies and
rises again.
I saw a strange sight.
I stumbled upon a story most strange like nothing my life,
my street sense, my sly tongue had even prepared me for.
Even before the dawn one Friday morning I
noticed a young man,
handsome and strong, walking the alleys of our city.
He was pulling an old cart filled with clothes both bright
and new,
and he was calling in a clear, tenor voice: "Rags!"
Ah, the air was foul and the first light gray, to be crossed by such
sweet music.
"Rags! New rags
for old! I take your tired rags! Rags!"
"Now, this is a wonder," I thought
to myself,
for the man stood six- feet-four,
and his arms were like tree limbs, hard and muscular,
and his eyes flashed intelligence.
Could he find no better job than this, to be a ragman in the
inner city?
So I followed him. My curiosity drove me. And I wasn't disappointed.
Soon the Ragman saw a woman sitting on her back porch.
She was sobbing into a handkerchief,
sighing, and shedding a thousand tears.
Her knees and elbows made a sad X.
Her shoulders shook. Her heart was breaking.
The Ragman stopped his cart.
Quietly, he walked to the woman,
stepping round tin cans, dead toys and Pampers.
"Give me your rag," he said so gently,
"and I'll give you another."
He slipped the handkerchief from
her eyes.
She looked up and he laid across her palm
a linen cloth so clean and new that it shined.
She blinked from the gift to the giver.
Then, as he began to pull his cart again,
the Ragman did a strange thing:
he put her stained handkerchief to his own face;
and then he began to weep, to sob as grievously as she had done,
his shoulders shaking.
Yet she was left without a tear.
"This is a wonder," I breathed to myself,
and I followed the sobbing Ragman
like a child who cannot turn away a mystery.
"Rags! Rags! New rags for old!"
In a little while,
when the sky showed grey behind the rooftops
and I could see the shredded curtains hanging out black windows,
the Ragman came upon a girl whose head was wrapped in a bandage, eyes were
empty.
Blood soaked her bandage.
A single line of blood ran down her cheek.
Now the tall Ragman looked upon this child with pity,
and he drew a lovely yellow bonnet from his cart.
"Give me your rag," he said,
tracing his own line on her cheek,
"and I'll give you mine."
The child could only gaze at him
while he loosened the bandage, removed it, and tied it to his own head.
The bonnet he set on hers.
And I gasped at what I saw:
for with bandage went the wound!
Against his brow it ran a darker,
more substantial blood-his own!
"Rag! Rags! I take old rags!" cried the sobbing,
bleeding, strong, intelligent Ragman.
The sun hurt both the sky now, and my eyes;
the Ragman seemed more and more to hurry.
"Are you going to work?" he asked a man leaned
against a telephone pole.
The man shook his head.
The Ragman pressed him: "Do you have a job?"
"Are you crazy?" sneered the other.
He pulled away from the pole, revealing the right sleeve of his jacket
- flat, the cuff stuffed into the pocket.
He had no arm.
"So," said the Ragman. "Give me your
jacket,
and I'll give you mine."
Such quiet authority in his voice!
The one-armed man took off his
jacket.
So did the Ragman -
and I trembled at what I saw:
for the Ragman's arm stayed in its sleeve,
and when the other put it on he had two good arms,
thick as tree limbs: but the Ragman had only one.
"Go to work," he said.
After that he found a drunk,
lying unconscious beneath an army blanket,
an old man hunched, wizened, and sick.
He took the man’s blanket and
wrapped it round himself,
but for the drunk he left new clothes.
And now I had to run to keep up with the Ragman.
Though he was weeping uncontrollably,
and bleeding freely at the forehead,
pulling his cart with one arm,
stumbling for drunkenness, falling again and again,
exhausted, old, old, and sick,
yet he went with terrible speed.
On spider's legs he skittered through the alleys of the
City,
this mile and the next, until he came to its limits,
and then he rushed beyond.
I wept to see the changes in this man.
I hurt to see his sorrow.
And yet I needed to see where he was going in such haste,
perhaps to know what drove him so.
The little old Ragman - he came to a landfill.
He came to the garbage pits.
And then I wanted to help him in what he did,
but I hung back, hiding.
He climbed a hill.
With tormented labor he cleared a little space on that hill.
Then he sighed.
He lay down.
He pillowed his head on a handkerchief and a jacket.
He covered his bones with an army blanket. And he died.
Oh, how I cried to witness that death!
I slumped in a junked car and wailed and mourned as one who has no hope -
because I had come to love the Ragman.
Every other face had faded in the wonder of this man,
and I cherished him;
but he died.
I sobbed myself to sleep.
I did not know - how could I know? --
that I slept through Friday night and Saturday and its night, too.
But then, on Sunday morning,
I was awakened by a violence.
Light - pure, hard, demanding light -
slammed against my sour face,
and I blinked, and I looked,
and I saw the last and the first wonder of all.
There was the Ragman,
folding the blanket most carefully,
a scar on his forehead,
but alive!
And, beside that, healthy!
There was no sign of sorrow nor of age,
and all the rags that he had gathered shined for cleanliness.
Well, then I lowered my head and,
trembling for all that I had seen,
I myself walked up to the Ragman.
I told him my name with shame,
for I was a sorry figure next to him.
Then I took off all my clothes in that place,
and I said to him with dear yearning in my voice:
"Dress me."
He dressed me. My Lord,
he put new rags on me, and I am a wonder with him.
The Ragman, the Ragman, the Christ!”
When he died for me, yes he took my guilt, and yes, he bore
the penalty but it is equally true he also broke the POWER of all that sin
which diseased and enslaved me – by his grace I have been healed and freed; by
His grace, I can follow him as Shepherd and Overseer of my
soul.
1 Peter 2:24-25 “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that we
might die to sins and live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been
healed. For you were like sheep going astray, but now you have returned to the
Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.