A State of War ...

The War did not begin here.  The War existed before us, but it will end with us.  Victory is assured, but it is not “our” victory, it will only ever be His.  Jesus Christ won this war before it was ever begun, because Love was destined to defeat Evil.  There was only ever one outcome that is possible in this war.  If evil “could” win, there would be no existence at all.  But while evil is defeated, it is not going down without a fight.  When our enemy has realized he will not win, he cannot win, his only recourse is to inflict as much pain, damage, and death as he can before he goes down in flames.  Surrender is not within his ability to choose; for evil enslaves its participants, making Satan as much a slave to himself, as we would be without Christ breaking our chains and freeing us to sin no more.  So while our enemy is desperate for his time grows short, his time is not over yet.  Mercy yet attempts to reclaim every soul that will at last accept the gift of freedom Jesus Christ alone can offer.  While mercy is extended, Satan continues his war of pain, damage, and death against the thing that impacts the heart of God the most … namely you and I.

We live within a state of War.  It is not a national war, but a war that extends beyond all borders, and lives within the hearts of man.  The War has active heroes and villains.  It has soldiers on both sides.  And like all wars, this War causes casualties.  Sadly, death is not the first aim of our enemy.  Pain and damage are.  Satan’s only goal is to cause us to miss out on the freedom from selfishness that Jesus offers.  He wishes us to live lives that are ever degenerating into deeper and deeper realms of selfishness.  When we succumb to the power of pleasing self, we inevitably inflict pain and damage on those we love and those who love us the most.  Because ultimately God loves each of us the most, it is He who suffers in anguish while we choose to yet again forsake His victories, and pursue our degradation to entirely new levels of depravity.  Because the Love of God will inevitably defeat the evil of Satan; Satan uses every tool in his arsenal to inflict pain back on God.  You and I are mere pawns in Satan’s plans, but precious treasure in the plans of the Lord.

Peter knew this.  He saw it in the living love of Jesus Christ and how He treated those He encountered.  Peter also saw how deep evil can go in the lives and actions of the Pharisees who ultimately killed the Author of their religion, in the name of their religion.  The cloak of scriptures, traditions, and religion was not enough to expel evil from the heart.  Men used the very things that should have led them to humility and submission, as tools to grow power and control over others.  Thus evil found a foothold in their hearts until they were willing to kill Love, before embracing Love.  These were the religious leaders who did these crimes, supposedly the best of the Jewish people and faith.  Yet even the best of men are no match for the seduction of self.  Peter had seen the casualties of this War, as its first casualty was Jesus Christ.  The suffering Satan desires to inflict pre-dated our Savior, and would not end, just because He had ascended back to heaven.  Instead Satan would resume his primary targeting against us.

So in chapter four of his first letter to the church, Peter begins in verse 12, by stating what he sees as the obvious in any state of War writing … “Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you:”  Notice first he begins by reminding his readers that “they” are the “be-loved” of Jesus Christ.  We are the most valued commodity in the kingdom of our Lord.  Jesus could care less about how much gold He has, and cares the most about insuring He gets to spend eternity with YOU.  Next, with the realization of how much we mean to Christ, comes the knowledge that it makes us the primary target for the fiery trials Satan will inevitably inflict upon us.  It is not a strange or unusual occurrence, it is a reality of War, and it will happen.  One might take comfort in witnessing it, because should all be going “well” it might lead us to wonder which side of the War we have landed on.

Peter continues in verse 13 … “But rejoice, inasmuch as ye are partakers of Christ's sufferings; that, when his glory shall be revealed, ye may be glad also with exceeding joy.”  But here, Peter appears to go completely off the deep end.  Instead of just knowing evil may be coming with trial by fire, Peter actually states we should “rejoice” that this occurs.  No, Peter is not a Sadist, or Masochist.  It is not pain Peter enjoys; no shades of gray here at all.  But Christ suffered because of the love He showed to those in need.  It was for His love that He was constantly punished by the religious leadership.  The knowledge that someone experienced love, perhaps for the first time, is something to rejoice about.  That we should suffer for showing love, indicates our enemy thinks we did a good job at showing it.  It we were clumsy showing love, of selfish showing love, our enemy would encourage us to keep screwing up.  But when we reflect the love of Christ unselfishly to someone in need “THAT” is the event that warrants punishing us to the highest level possible.

Peter continues in verse 14 … “If ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye; for the spirit of glory and of God resteth upon you: on their part he is evil spoken of, but on your part he is glorified.”  Peter echoes his earlier sentiment, love that reflects Christ well, comes from the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.  As we submit to Christ, as we allow Him to change HOW we love, and WHO we love (others, not ourselves), we allow a greater and greater measure of the Holy Spirit within us.  The actions and words of love we reflect emulate the source of love.  We become a reflection of Jesus.  It is this condition that causes our enemy to freak out, and hurl insult after insult our way.  He MUST malign our motives and actions in order to reduce the impact of the love we show.  Those who embrace evil will never speak well of Love, of Jesus, they will only ever insult and ridicule Him.  They have no choice.  For if they spoke the truth, they would convert themselves to His cause.  While we will receive no “glory” from those who hate the name of Christ, we will receive the only “glory” that counts from God, in that we have the honor to participate in His redemptive work for mankind.

Peter continues in verse 15 … “But let none of you suffer as a murderer, or as a thief, or as an evildoer, or as a busybody in other men's matters.”  This passage has two meanings.  First, Peter wants to insure we are not being criticized for evil deeds we do.  It is only justice to suffer for the deeds of evil we may embrace.  If we “have it coming” so to speak, that is not quite the thing to rejoice about suffering for.  But Second, Peter is also calling attention to the condition of sin.  Deeds of murder, or theft, or generic malice, or even getting invested in the lives of others to suit our own motives … are all actions that cause us to “suffer”.  Peter is reminding us, the Christ breaks our chains to selfishness, and gives us the means not to have to suffer in the sins that may have once ruled our lives.  It is interesting to me, that while we consider sin on a sliding scale, Peter begins at our most heinous crime of murder, but continues the thought down to the level of “busybody”.  Sin causes pain and suffering, whether from large heinous crimes like murder, but also from seemingly innocent crimes of evil motive in the matters of other men.  To win this War, we must be saved to the uttermost by our hero, savior, and conqueror, Jesus Christ.

Peter continues in verse 16 … “Yet if any man suffer as a Christian, let him not be ashamed; but let him glorify God on this behalf.”  Continuing on his prior duality, if we suffer for our acts of love we should not be ashamed of what they call us, or what they do to us, but glorify God instead.  Notice Peter does not advocate we take credit for our reflections of Christ’s love, instead He requests we continue to point the glory back to where it belongs (never with us, always with Him).  Peter also points out once again; retribution, condemnation, and judgment are NOT supposed to be our response to persecution whether deserved or not.  Glory to God is to be our response. 

From a second point of view, should we as Christians “suffer” because we have fallen, lost His victory, and embraced our self-centered evil once again.  We should also forsake our shame, and embrace the glory of His forgiveness.  It is no light thing to need the very blood of Christ to wash our sins away.  But having bathed in that blood, we must accept the forgiveness He offers, and not let guilt destroy us and cause us to embrace evil again and again.  The power of the gospel is to free us from sin, not just give us the means to live in sin, continually asking for forgiveness.  The power of the gospel does not end at forgiveness, it begins there.  It ends when perfection through submission is achieved, and we no longer want to sin, or commit them anymore.  It ends, when victory in us is completed by Him.

Peter continues in verse 17 … “For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God? [verse 18] And if the righteous scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear?”  Here Peter points out that this War will not easily be won.  It sounds simple enough to surrender our will to God.  But so few of us are willing to give Him everything to work with.  We hold back our cherished pleasures.  We hold back our loved ones under the presumption we don’t think He would ever ask for those.  But in so doing we forget the example of our first parents.  Eve sinned, perhaps because she was deceived, perhaps because the sensation of vanity was new and little understood, perhaps because she was alone having strayed from Adam’s side.  But Adam knew exactly what had happened and what the cost would be.  Adam “could” have refused to eat the forbidden fruit, and instead “trusted” that God would find a way to save Eve for him.  To do this, he would have had to be willing to lose Eve.  He would have had to be willing to let the thing he loved the most be put into the hands of God.  To trust God with it.  Why do we think our spouse, or our children, or our parents, or our lovers are any different? 

So few of us are willing to have our feelings changed for those we love, should we need them to.  How many are in relationships they should not be in; relationships that harm both parties, based on bad initial decisions, reinforced by a series of bad subsequent decisions.  Or how many are in bad relationships that could be healed, but the only way to heal them, is to submit how we think and how we love to Christ.  For perhaps it is not our partner who needs to change, perhaps it is us who needs to look at things differently and see things from a perspective outside of ourselves.  But to rectify any of these conditions we must be willing to put the person we love the most into the care and trust of God.  We must be willing to lose them if that is what is needed, and trust that God can work a miracle.  In short, we must do, what Adam could not bring himself to do.  And like Adam a great deal of suffering might be avoided if we trust God with those we love the most; or a great deal of more suffering might be experienced because we “could not” bring ourselves to trust.

Peter points out these decisions to give it all to Christ, are not so easy, not so simple.  Our hearts may not want the right things.  “Who” we are may still reflect wanting what is not good for us.  Which makes being willing to let it go, something hard to take.  If we who understand the love of God, and have experienced what He frees us to do, have such a hard time making these decisions, can you imagine how hard it must be for someone with no experience or no reason to trust to make them.  This is the reason Peter stresses in this passage that judgment of those who “get it” is hard enough, imagine how few will embrace this path, if even we cannot provide them a living example of why it is the better choice.

Peter concludes his explanation of living in a state of War in verse 19 … “Wherefore let them that suffer according to the will of God commit the keeping of their souls to him in well doing, as unto a faithful Creator.”  The War may rage on.  We may suffer pain because our enemy inflicts it upon us.  But no matter what we suffer, while we reflect the love of God to others, we must renew our strength in our surrender to Him.  We must continue to commit our souls to Him.  We must continue to allow Him to remake what we “want” into what He wants.  To be in harmony with God will allow us to continue in well-doing. 

It is our Creator, our faithful Creator Peter points our attention to.  The reason he chooses these words is that we NEED a Creator in order to “remake” us into His image.  We will not “evolve” into perfection.  We will be “remade” into perfection.  This is not a biological evolution of getting better over time based on practice, experience, or sheer power of will.  This is a “creative” experience where our Genesis in His kingdom begins with a sudden unexplainable transformation of our hearts from something that loves only self, to something that loves only others.  Only a Creator can do for us, what we need Him to do.  Evolution and modern ideologies, have no solution that works, there is no alternative.  There is only Christ.  There is only one way evil is defeated, it is by unselfish Love, the kind of Love only Christ can create in the human heart.

Peter asks us not to be casualties of War, but to reflect the love of the only One who can and will win it …