How Can Believers Live Good Lives In An Increasing Un-Christian World?

Week # 4 Bible Study~1 Peter 2:11-25


What a question? Peter knows that those under the sound of his voice would struggle with this as we do today. In a world that shouts~ stand up for your rights and if you are wronged get even~ how do we live different? The television screams sew if you maybe you can. But Peter gives us a different approach so unlike that of this world's system.  Jesus did not stand up for His rights nor did he get even with those that mistreated Him. 


Peter also urges us to abstain from fleshly lust. To be in this world but not of this world. To let our good works shine for the glory of God~ not to draw favor with God but to let others see a difference in our lives. To obey the laws of man and to live within the boundaries of our authority. 


Peter explains that we are not of this world but are strangers ~ pilgrims just passing through. Our salvation by grace through the blood of Jesus Christ provides us a home in Heaven for all eternity. We have freedom in Christ but Peter warns not to use this freedom unjustly~to do maliciously. 


¹⁶As free, and not using your liberty for a cloke of maliciousness, but as the servants of God.


  We are to give honor to all men~ love our brethren~ honor our authority. Peter goes on the explain that servants are to be subject to their masters. Ouch~ I don't like that very well and it leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Yet~ Christ used it as an example. He came to this world as a servant. He suffered and was treated unjustly and unfair~he endured grief and suffered wrongly. 


He came as the Lamb of God to be slaughtered. Do you know when a lamb goes to the slaughter it never never makes a sound? That is so very convicting to me. He chose to represent himself as a lamb.


Christ came to take our sins upon Him as they nailed Him to that tree. He suffered and died for my sin and yours.  So that in Him we were made righteous. But it says here that we may live unto righteousness~ being dead to sins. We don't have to live according to this world's rules. We were lost sheep until Christ saved us and now we have a Shepherd.  We are to be different~ we are to follow our Shepherd's example.


 Living Stone Story~
 Taken from 1 Peter Bible Study Leader's Guide Finding Encouragement In Troubling Times


A mother was arrested because she protested the arrest of her bishop. Her five year old daughter, Siao-Mei, was put in her cell with her. When her daughter wept, other prisoners rebuked the mother and the prison director encouraged the mother to renounce Christ so she and her child could go free. In despair, the mother agreed. She was forced to stand on a stage and shout before 10,000 people, "I am no longer a Christian." 


On their way home, her daughter, said, "Mummy, today Jesus is not happy with you." The mother explained, "You wept in prison. I had to say this out of my love for you." The daughter replied, "I promise that if we go to prison again for Jesus I will not weep."  The mother proclaimed her faith in Christ again, both were imprisoned, but this time Siao-Mei did not weep. 


Eyewitness account by Amelio Crotti,
a fellow prisoner in China (1990)


Wow~ what a testimony of such a small child. I want to be as brave as Siao~Mei. This world did not accept my Saviour. They hated Him because He preached a different message. He lived a different life. I love my Jesus and I want to follow in His steps until one day I meet Him face to face. The truth is the only way to live as light in a dark world is by being filled with the Spirit each and every day ~ until we step over into Glory.

1 Peter 2:11-25

King James Version 

 ¹¹Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul;
 ¹²Having your conversation honest among the Gentiles: that, whereas they speak against you as evildoers, they may by your good works, which they shall behold, glorify God in the day of visitation.
 ¹³Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake: whether it be to the king, as supreme;
 ¹⁴Or unto governors, as unto them that are sent by him for the punishment of evildoers, and for the praise of them that do well.
 ¹⁵For so is the will of God, that with well doing ye may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men:
 ¹⁶As free, and not using your liberty for a cloke of maliciousness, but as the servants of God.
 ¹⁷Honour all men. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honour the king.
 ¹⁸Servants, be subject to your masters with all fear; not only to the good and gentle, but also to the froward.
 ¹⁹For this is thankworthy, if a man for conscience toward God endure grief, suffering wrongfully.
 ²⁰For what glory is it, if, when ye be buffeted for your faults, ye shall take it patiently? but if, when ye do well, and suffer for it, ye take it patiently, this is acceptable with God.
 ²¹For even hereunto were ye called: because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that ye should follow his steps:
 ²²Who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth:
 ²³Who, when he was reviled, reviled not again; when he suffered, he threatened not; but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously:
 ²⁴Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed.
 ²⁵For ye were as sheep going astray; but are now returned unto the Shepherd and Bishop of your souls.