The Journey with Pastor Steve DeWitt

Study Guide for Spiritual Exiles, 1 Peter 4:7-11

Scripture Reference: 1 Peter 4:7-11

Visit the series page: Exiles: A study in 1 Peter

Donate to Support The Journey

Sermon Series: Spiritual Exiles 

Message: Stretchy Love 

Airdate:10/27 - 10/28/26

Programs: 2387 and 2388

Good morning, Bethel Church. Great to see you all here today, and, greetings to our other campuses, this morning and, especially, Cedar Lake. How great would it be to be the Cedar Lake campus with the, upcoming weeks that they have moving into a new church home and facility and celebrations along that line. It's gonna be, gonna be a fun couple weeks for you. I also need to mention, here at Crown Point, if you look around, we're, like, packed here this morning, and, which is great, but school hasn't started yet.

So we always have this big influx once school begins. And I just put out to, this service that, we have an 08:15 and an 11:15 service that if you wanna get up a little earlier, would be great. You wanna sleep in a little bit, would be great. Might be, something for you to consider to help us, to consider one of those other services that would be a blessing to us, especially coming into the school year. I want to, begin by talking about a, Christian hero.

I think he's a hero by any measure. His name is Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and maybe you're familiar with that name. He, was a man from the last century. There's one biography about him that, has as the subtitle, martyr, pastor, prophet, and spy. He sounds intriguing already, doesn't he?

And indeed, he is. Just to tell you a little bit about the guy, he was raised in a famously intellectual family in Germany. His dad was the best known psychiatrist in the whole country. He there was a large family .He had many siblings, and all the siblings were sort of like Renaissance people.

They were academics. They were into culture and art and all of that. To give you an idea of the caliber of, brain that we're talking about, his brother helped Albert Einstein crack the atomic code K? So we're talking about top tier type intellects, and this family embodied that in, in Germany in the first part of the last century.

So Bonhoeffer, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, takes that intellectual capacity and points it towards theology. And he goes to school, and by 21, he has his PhD. He begins to be a lecturer at the University of Berlin, which was arguably the most prestigious theological school, at the time. And as the Nazis rose to power, Bonhoeffer became increasingly a critic of Hitler and the socialist philosophy that he was promoting. And the Lutheran church then aligned with Hitler and the Nazis.

And as that happened, Bonhoeffer had a conscientious decision to make. Do I leave the Lutheran church or not? And indeed, he did. He formed essentially his own denomination called the Confessing Church of Germany. And all of this was happening in the days leading up to and after the beginning of World War two.

So, during World War two, he establishes three seminaries, three, covert seminaries, dare I call them exile seminaries, and he was the teacher, he was the headmaster, and the students there, they all kind of live together in kind of a commune sort of setting. And by all accounts, the Christian fellowship and community that those students with Bonhoeffer experienced was very, very special. And this led Bonhoeffer to write a book that is considered a Christian classic called Life Together, and I have a copy of it right here. It's an entire book about healthy Christian community. And it's not very big.

You can see. It's kind of a thin little book, but so much wonderful truth in this book. And I'm going to be kind of featuring Bonhoeffer and quotes from this book in my message today. Just to finish the rest of the story with, Bonhoeffer, though, one of the great ethical dilemmas he wrote a book on ethics. Probably his, signature book was a book on ethics, and his own personal ethical dilemma was whether or not he as a Christian should participate in the assassination of Adolf Hitler, which he ended up believing that he needed to do.

And so he was a part of a vast kind of, network of people that were, you know, disheartened about what had was going on in Germany. And if you saw the movie Valkyrie a few years ago starring Tom Cruise, that is a story of part of the network that Bonhoeffer was associated with. And if you saw the movie or know your history, assassination attempt did not work. And so there were many arrests, and Bonhoeffer was one of them. And he spent time in some of these camps.

You know? And, Himmler and Hitler personally sentenced him to execution, and he was he was he died by hanging. This would have been 04/09/1945 at the age of 39. Dietrich Bonhoeffer died three weeks before Hitler committed suicide in his bunker in Berlin. So if you think about like, if Dietrich Bonhoeffer would have lived all of the wonderful things that he would have been able to write about in a kind of peaceful setting where he could just think and write and be a theologian, but he never had that.

He his life was lived in tumultuous times, some of the most in all of human history, and he died as a martyr. So I think that gives a little extra power to the words of Bonhoeffer because they're the words of a martyr. And I'm going to be quoting from him because what he talks about in this book ties very closely to the passage that we have in front of us here as we are preaching through first Peter. So let's begin with Peter, and then we'll get to Dietrich. K?

Begin with Peter, and we'll get to Dietrich. And so here we are in chapter four seven verses seven through 11. Last week, we zeroed in on verse 10. This week, I wanna pull back and look at the paragraph as a whole. Now before we get into it, though, notice in verses one through six of chapter four, Peter describes the lifestyles of the pagan world around them, and he does so eloquently.

We'll study this passage in the coming week, but, because we're doing this a little bit out of order. But, in it, he just talks about how the pagan world, they're just they're just off in their immorality. They're off living lives loosely and wantonly. In fact, he calls the the generally, he says, a flood of debauchery. A flood of debauchery.

Now we live in a flood of our own, don't we? You think about the world that is around us. It resembles closely the kinds of things that were going on in the pagan world of the first century. And he Peter says, the people that live around you are shocked that you don't, like, jump in and be a part of the same stuff that they're all about. They're shocked that you're, like, into something different.

And indeed, Christian community ought to be very much different than the kind of activities and priorities and morality that is in the world that does not know Jesus Christ. And so that contrast now, he transitions in verse seven, with these words. He says, “The end of all things is at hand. Therefore, be self controlled and sober minded for the sake of your prayers. Above all, keep loving one another earnestly since love covers a multitude of sins.”

“Show hospitality to one another without grumbling. As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another as good stewards of God's varied grace.” And now he describes two general categories of service. “Whoever speaks as one who speaks oracles of God, whoever serves as one who serves by the strength that God supplies.” And here's his bottom line.

“In order that in everything, God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. To him belong glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.” Now you don't have to be a Bible scholar here to see what Peter is getting at. He lays out four qualities, four attributes of healthy Christian community.

Christian community and Christian relationships when the gospel is shaping it and when the Holy Spirit is empowering it? Like, what does that look like? And what should be the things that we as Christians care about? And notice the the the these are easy. You can see them right here.

First of all, a self controlled life of prayer. Secondly, love that overcomes interpersonal offenses. Third, open hearted hospitality. And finally, stewarding giftedness in the direction of serving one another. So that's gonna be our outline today.

And let's just walk through these now. “The end of all things is at hand. Therefore, be self controlled and sober minded for the sake of your prayers.” “The end of all things is at hand.” You might read that and say to yourself, well, Peter certainly got that wrong, didn't he?

I mean, he wrote this in the first century. He says to the people he's writing, hey. The end is almost here. You better get ready. And now two thousand years have passed.

He clearly got something wrong. And chronologically speaking, I would agree with that. But when the Bible talks about time, it does not do so the way that we do with, like, our calendars and our watches and our minutes and our seconds and our hours. When the Bible talks about history and time, it talks about it redemptively. In terms of the things that God is doing in history, these key redemptive moments.

And when Peter says, the end of all things is at hand, what he means is this, redemptively speaking, there is nothing yet that needs to happen. Everything that needs to happen has already happened. God has created. Jesus has man sinned. Jesus has come, died on the cross, resurrected from the dead at the right hand of God.

Now redemptively speaking, the next thing that happens is Jesus comes back, and final consummation of history and final fulfillment of all the things the Bible talks about in terms of what is yet to happen. We are living in the Bible calls it the last days, and it called it the last days two thousand years ago. Because redemptively, we're in the time when the next thing that happens is Jesus comes back. So the end of all things is at hand. The pagans live their lives completely ignorant of redemptively where we are in history and where we are in the story.

So, therefore, they're like, hey, eat, drink, be merry. Let's go out. Let's partake. Let's have a great time. We live without any accountability.

We can do whatever we want. Don't you tell me anything about judgment. Because I'm gonna go out, and I'm gonna make the most of every single moment. I'm living for me. I'm living for pleasure.

That's the world that we live in to this day, don't we not? That's the that's the mindset around us. It's all about me, and I have no fear about what's going to come. But the Christian sees the Bible and the story of redemption, and we realize there is something that is coming that is the biggest thing of all. This whole history and life is going somewhere.

Jesus is coming back, and every human being is going to stand before God. In fact, he notes that in verse five, “but they will give an account to him who is ready to judge the living and the dead.” The world around us, no fear of that judgment. We look at this, and what does the reality of what is about to come do for us? We are not silly.

We're not superficial. It makes us sober minded. It causes us to be self controlled about life and to view things through the grid of the priorities that knowing what's about to happen creates. It's like somebody who finds out they have cancer. You've probably had friends or family that they they get the diagnosis of cancer.

What happens instantly? All of a sudden, life becomes more serious, doesn't it? All of a sudden, relationships become more important, and family becomes more important. And they there's a there's a mindset that comes to the cancer patient that they didn't have prior. And spiritually speaking, we realize that there is something big about to happen, and that makes all of this critically important.

It makes relationships critically important. It means the church and what God is doing through the gospel critically important. And there ought to be amongst Christians, we don't take ourselves seriously, but we take the things of God seriously. Communion is not a snack. The church is not just a social club, and these relationships are not just disposable.

Why? Because Jesus is coming back. And someday, we're gonna see that all of these things in the eyes of God critically critically important. Now Peter here focuses on one thing that that ought to do for us. Notice what he says.

“Be self controlled and sober minded for the sake of your prayers.” Now I bet you weren't expecting that. For the sake of your prayers, what's the connection between sober minded and self control and a prayer life? Well, in my opinion, of all the things in the Christian life that requires self control, it would be prayer. What's the first thing that goes on a busy day?

When you're like, man, I can't I don't know if I can get everything done today. Prayers go out the window, don't they? I'll get to that later. Off it goes. And over time, we get in the habit of not praying, and we get in the habit of not getting before God and and and offering ourselves to him on that day and praying over our day and asking for God will to be done on earth as it is in heaven and all of that.

And so we then get, what, dry, and we get sort of superficial. And Peter says, listen, it's what's coming that causes us to realize that prayer is super important, and it makes me self controlled. In fact, if I could ask you Christian this last week, think about a second. Think about your prayer life this last week. And I'll bet last Sunday, you left church thinking, I wanna pray more today or something like that.

I wanna pray more this week. And yet this comes in and that comes in and all that. Are you a little dry today? Because for me, there is nothing more like spiritual battery charging than when I spend a little time in God's word, and I get in prayer and open my heart to God, and I say, Holy Spirit, convict me of anything that is displeasing you. Pray over my day.

Pray for my family. Pray for my church. It just puts energy, doesn't it? And Peter knew that. But it won't happen without controlling other aspects of life to create margin for prayer.

Now in a few weeks, I'm gonna share a new prayer endeavor that we're doing here at our church. And, it'll take some self control to be a part of it. We've never done anything like it. I'm super excited about it. But why are we doing it?

Because prayer is like oxygen in the church. And a community of people that are experiencing genuine Christianity will be a praying group of people and are gonna make priority for that. So self controlled life of prayer. Notice secondly, in this verse, it might be the most famous verse in all of Peter. I don't know.

It's certainly one of them. Maybe it stood out to you as I read it before. Notice what he says. “Above all, keep loving one another earnestly since love covers a multitude of sins.” Now I thought about just doing this this verse, that's it, and forgetting all the others because it's such an important truth here.

And I hope that all of you dial in with me right now because what we're talking about here, I think, is one of the keys, not only to healthy church, but healthy marriage, healthy family relationships, healthy friendships. This verse has a truth that is absolutely critical. In fact, Peter says, above all, keep on loving. Paul said the same thing, faith, hope, and love, but the greatest of these is agape, is love. So love.

Love in the Christian community. Why is this so important? Of all the qualities that we ought to strive for, why love? Here's one reason. Because love is what God is like.

Love is what God is like. First John four eight says it this way. “God is love.” It doesn't say God is mercy, although he's mercy, and it doesn't say God is kindness, although he certainly is kind and holy and beautiful and many other things. What it says is that “God is love.”

And that doesn't mean that love is God, but it does mean that if you're going to pick one quality of God that is central to all that He is in His being, it is love. Now our definition of love around here is that love is self giving for the good and joy of another. You've heard that a thousand times. I say it because I love you again and again and again. Self giving for the good and joy of another.

That is the kind of love that is being described here. That is the kind of love that God has within the Trinity, the Father, the Son, and the Spirit, eternally loving and giving and communicating and sharing for the good and joy of the other member of the Trinity. This is what God is like. So, Christian relationships then and this is really the focus of the text here is horizontal relationships. Christian relationships ought to and will reflect that quality of God because the Christian is being shaped into the likeness of God himself in terms of our attitudes and actions.

I can say that better. How about Romans eight? What is God doing? He is conforming us to the likeness of his Son. And who embodies love more than Jesus?

Who embodied love for us more than Jesus? Who loved us while we were yet sinners? Christ died for us. Love is what God is like. So, as children of God, having now by through salvation the very nature of God, we are called then to reflect that love in our relationships with one another.

This is what God is like. This is what a godly Christian and a godly church will embody. Now one thing I love about this verse is it is it's so honest and real. And this is what if I had a whole message on it, I would focus on. I'm just gonna touch on it here.

It's so honest and real to what relationships end up being like. Notice again what it says. Keep loving one another. Does not the word keep infer the fact that this is not easy to do, to keep on loving somebody? Now we all can do the splash and dash love, can't we?

Like a one off. I'm gonna show love to them one time, and then I don't have to do it anymore. And I feel good about it. Oh, I love that person. Are you kidding me?

Ten years ago, we showed up at his house or something like that. You know, one time, I did this one thing. I'm good. I'm love. I I I showed my love.

Keep on loving. The only reason he has to command that is because naturally, we don't wanna keep on loving. We may start with love, but we end somewhere else. I love the book title by John Ortberg, Everyone is Normal Until You Get to Know Them Because to be in relationships with other Christians is to be forced into loving people that inevitably you discover are annoying, right?

That disappoint you, that aren't what you hoped they would be. And I say that because I am one of them. Everyone's normal until you get to know them. And so what happens then in churches is that these differences and these annoyances over time wear on you. And you begin thinking to yourself, you know what?

Maybe in a different small group, there would be people that aren't annoying. The problem with my group is all the other people in this group. And so you hop to another small group. Or over time in the church, these people I don't have enough people that are like me and think like me and believe all the things that I believe. And maybe there's a group of people, there's a church out there that is exactly like me, and I can be there, and there'll be everything's wonderful.

And so we hop churches hoping that the next church will not have annoying people in them. And yet, what do you find at that other church? They're often more annoying than even the people at Bethel Church. I joke with that. Although, if you're visiting here today, I'm warning you.

Take that as a warning. And this is where I think this little phrase here has such a wonderful help to us. Because no matter what long term relationship you're in, it's not just church. This is friendship. This is family.

This is marriage. Over time, you discover in everybody aspects about their character, their preferences, their beliefs that easily rub you the wrong way or become over time increasingly difficult to sort of like swallow. The kind of love that God births in us through the gospel is elastic. In fact, the Greek word there for cover, it means this. It means at full stretch, At full stretch. 

That love stretches over a multitude of sins. Now by that, I don't think Peter is denying other passages where it talks about the church disciplining the rebellious sinner out of the church. It doesn't mean we don't speak the truth in love, as Paul says in Ephesians four. It doesn't mean that if we're somewhere and we know that there's an offense, we leave the gift at the altar, as Jesus said, and go and make that right. All of those things apply.

I think what Peter is getting at here is not overlooking sin in other people's life. He's talking about the inevitable interpersonal slights and offenses and little things that in community with other people easily could divide us if we make that thing a big thing. In those cases, what does love do? Agape love stretches to cover them and to remain united within that what I'm calling stretchy love, okay? Love is elastic, stretchy.

Now, to illustrate it, I got it. Here we go. And this is so simple. Okay? This is not profound, but sometimes these make the best illustrations.

I have a rubber band here. And can I just walk us through what typically happens in any relationship? K? So here's the rubber band. We meet somebody.

Right? We meet somebody, and and love doesn't have to stretch much because we think that person's wonderful. They think like I think. I enjoy their personality. We're aligned politically.

We're aligned theologically. They're they're good folk. And so we're like, hey. We're in relationship. It's all comfy and all that.

But what happens inevitably? Like, the third time you're at their house, all of a sudden you realize that they believe, what? And all of a sudden now, k? We still like them, but it's a little uncomfortable. Right?

Because, the rubber band right now is going, ow. Love stretches a little bit. Well, then guess what happens? All of a sudden, you discover something really wacky. It's not this.

It's like it's like out here somewhere. Right? And now you're asking yourself, is this relationship worth the effort? Because they got this, like, crazy thing out here going on. And now I'm describing most of our marriages.

Right? When we are sort of like, oh, wow. Okay. And over time, because we're all broken and fallen and we all say the wrong thing, do stupid things, all of that, over time, you have all of these things that pop up. And so, like, you could describe our most of our relationships with people like this.

Right? So what is Peter saying? Peter is saying this, that the Christian who understands that God loving me was the ultimate stretch. Understands the gospel. Now, in relationship with other Christians, when that stretchiness is required and that preference that that person has or that time they forgot to call me when I was in the hospital or that unkind word about whatever happens in Christian community.

You've been in church, this is what it's like right here. It stretches. Gospel love stretches. Now, the person that doesn't get the gospel, maybe you've had rubber bands before or, like, you know, socks when the elasticity is gone. What happens?

You just, like, pull it a little bit, and there's just, like, nothing. Right? Or it just snaps. But gospel love stretches because I realized the ultimate stretch was God loving me and Jesus. And if he did that much for me, well, then I can kinda stretch this far to love my fellow believer.

Now I asked first service if that was good, I should use it, and they thought it was. But I don't have to use it third service. Was that helpful? Okay. Love covers some ultra stretches.

Alright. Some of you stretched just to clap there. I thank you for that. He needs affirmation. He's one of those kinds.

Yes. I do. Here's what Bonhoeffer says. And he he he's talking about Christians who have sort of this, like, ideal for what the church ought to be like. Like, it ought to be this way.

And if I was in charge, it would be this way, and everybody would be awesome like this. He calls it the the the wish dream of Christian community. Those who love their dream of a Christian community more than the Christian community itself become destroyers of that Christian community, even though their personal intentions may be ever so honest, earnest, and sacrificial. God hates this wishful dreaming because it makes the dreamer proud and pretentious. Those who dream of this idealized community demand that it be fulfilled by God, by others, and by themselves.

They enter the community of Christians with their demands, set up their own law, and judge one another and even God accordingly. Therefore, will not the very moment of great disillusionment with my brother or sister be incomparably wholesome for me because it is so thoroughly it so thoroughly teaches us that both of us can never live by our own words and deeds, but only by that one word indeed that really binds us together, the forgiveness of sins in Jesus Christ. The bright day of Christian community dawns wherever the early morning mists of dreamy visions are lifting. Now he wrote that in German, but it sounded awesome in English, didn't it? That is eloquent writing.

It is precisely when we get to that kind of stretchy point that we can actually be authentic with one another, and real God empowered Holy Spirit uniting community can happen. I just think of so many people at that very moment when the small group might actually be real with one another, they run or the church or the marriage or the whatever. That moment is the moment when all of a sudden the gospel is as real as it can be. Don't run. Stretch and apply gospel love.

The next quality that Peter talks about here is hospitality. Notice what he says. “Show hospitality to one another without grumbling.” “Show hospitality to one another without grumbling.” Now whenever we talk about hospitality, I think many people think it it's like when your friends come over and you have nice silverware.

K? That is not hospitality biblically. That is not silverware is fine, but it's that's like trifling. What he's talking about here is much bigger and much broader. The word is a compound word.

Literally, it means it's this, stranger, love. Stranger, love. So this is not about you having, the right meal when your friends come over to watch the Bears game or something. This is loving somebody different than me, outside my circle. This is stranger love.

This is good Samaritan type love. And, of course, in that, Jesus answering the question, who is my neighbor? He tells the story of the good Samaritan. I won't tell it again, but that good Samaritan loves somebody who is ethnically different than him, religiously different than him, inconvenient for him, yet he loves and meets his needs. That is Christian hospitality.

One commentator translated it open heartedness. That's a pretty good word picture, isn't it? My heart is open to people, and I'm ready to show love, express love, open heartedly. And Peter adds that we are to do this without grumbling. Apparently, human nature hasn't changed a lot in two thousand years because what do we oftentimes think when God brings some person with some need or whatever in our path?

We instantly think about, a, our schedule. This is inconvenient for me. I had plans today, and this was not what I was planning on doing. Or it is expensive. This guy's gonna eat us out of the house and home.

Have you seen the way he puts it away? We don't want him over. Let's buy him a gift card and minimize the expense. Here's what Bonhoeffer says. We must be ready to allow ourselves to be interrupted by God.

God will constantly, cross our will be constantly crossing our paths and canceling our plans by sending us people with claims and petitions. If we pass them by, we pass by the visible sign of the cross raised in our path to show us that not our way, but God's way must be done. It is part of the discipline of humility that we must not spare our hand where it can perform a service and that we do not assume that our schedule is ours our own to manage, but allow it to be arranged by God. Who here is not convicted by that quote right there? That is so convicting, isn't it?

How often we overlook little opportunities that we have to help people, to minister to people, to pray with people, to give them a kind word, to give them like, just to listen to them, to spend time listening to them. We're off on our thing. I know this well myself. And yet God is constantly bringing people across our path. And those are moments that call us to love them and to seek to be knee meeting their needs.

So I wonder if you see how this all connects. K? The Christian is someone who looks at history and looks at the future, not like the pagan who says, hey. We can do what we want, but sees that there is something really big coming, and there is a judgment day, and I'm gonna stand before God myself at the judgment seat of Christ. And because of all of that and eternity in heaven and hell, there is a sort of serious and sober mindedness about today.

Everything is precious, and people are valuable, and life is precious, which calls me then to apply gospel love to people and all of the sort of stretchy, uncomfortable things that people create. Even strangers, I'm willing to love them as best I can. And the Christian commits that our unity is not based on performance. It is not based on you being enough like me that I can love you. It is in fact, we don't we don't make Christian unity, do we?

The Spirit has unified us. We seek to reflect that in the way that we care for one another and are of one mind and of one heart. And this allows us to be stretchy, stretchy love, stranger love because God's been stretchy love, stranger love towards us. And notice it goes one step further. Look at verse 10.

This is what it calls us to. “As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another as good stewards of God's varied grace” Whoever speaks is one who speaks oracles of God. Whoever serves is one who serves by the strength that God supplies in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. Now we looked at verse 10 last week.

I'm not gonna spend a lot of time on this other than for you to see the progression here. Let me do it again. I look ahead as a Christian, and I see what is coming, and that makes me serious about my life. I'm not silly. I'm not superficial.

I'm like, everything's important now. This calls me then to apply the gospel love that I have received from God and to stretch it over all of the little things that otherwise could divide me with my other Christians. I open my heart to people that come across my path. I give them stranger love. And the final step is that I actually view my life as being an opportunity to serve other people.

How do you know when somebody understands the gospel? Not when they've got their doctrine right, not when they can answer the questions right. It is when I am willing to take up the basin and the towel and actually wash the feet of other people and to serve them. What did Jesus say in that same passage? I believe in Mark.

“Even the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.” So in Christian community then, where people are getting the gospel and Jesus is the hero and we want to be like him, we don't look at that service as being something that is beneath me. I look at it as being something that is Christ like. And you say, I'm gonna be a servant. Well, guess what?

Who are we called to serve? One another, the text says. Other Christians. Indeed, the people that are sitting right around you right now with a servant heart in this. Using gifts, we talked about this last week.

The Holy Spirit has given us enablements and empowerments. Everybody here that's a Christian, you have something special that you can do that is joy to you and joy to God and joy to others. But I I view myself as a servant. And we see then in this that what Peter is saying is that this horizontal thing and the unity and love covering and stranger love and stretchy love, these are not add ons to the gospel. This is not add ons to Christianity.

This is part and parcel of what real Christianity is all about, and it shows who gets it. A lot of people, I think, view the gospel this way. They say, I believe in Jesus. When I die, I go to heaven. That's all that I need.

And then you read passages like this, and we realize, wait a second. The gospel that saves us is a gospel that changes us. And that change changes the way that we view other people. And the way that I know that I am a disciple of Jesus is that I love one another. It's not an add on.

It's not a if you want to or if you get to it. It is what Christianity is because this is who Christ was. Again, Bonhoeffer, when God had mercy on us, when God revealed Jesus Christ to us as our brother, when God won our hearts by God's own love, our instruction in Christian love began at the same time. When God was merciful to us, we learned to be merciful with one another. When we receive forgiveness instead of judgment, we too were made ready to forgive each other.

What God did to us, we then owed to others. The more we received, the more we were able to give, and the more more meager our love for one another, the less we were willing we were living by God's mercy and love. Thus, God taught us to encounter one another as God encountered us in Christ. That's like church. That's what this should be like.

And yet, it even in saying that, it is always imperfect. Don't get the wish dream thing going. That's right. And if this church got it, they'd be a lot more that way, and the other people would be that way towards me. That's the wish dream that Bonhoeffer also talked about.

It is when we imperfectly love imperfect people but do so for Jesus' sake that we are showing that we understand that God loved us while we were sinners. Amen. We get the gospel. So how are you doing with that? Husband and wife.

Let me just go to the to me, the pinnacle. Stretchy love requirement in that very intimate relationship. How many couples right here in this room, your marriage is calling you to stretch and to love a husband or wife who has preferences and idiosyncrasies that are driving you crazy. He's a believer. You're a believer.

Is the gospel shaping the way that you relate, love, and forgive that spouse? And if not, might there be a little confessing that is needed, That your marriage might come under that agape love and the blessing that comes with it. Christian in the church, sitting here right now hoping that some other person maybe is hearing this because they're the one that offended you. Is there any relationship in the church that has been unglorifying to God, and you've allowed a preference or a moment where they disappointed you or whatever to create conflict that is unresolved. “Love covers a multitude of sins.”

Think of all this applies to family relationships, so many of those strained, so many things. That's the beauty of this passage, I think, is that it applies in so many ways, and nobody gets away from this message without feeling conviction. None of us do. So I think this is one of these passages that particularly challenges people that simply attend the church. And can I just say in pastoral love, truly, to you that the sum of your Christian expression is the fact that you come here to church?

Do you see in this and in the words of Bonhoeffer, there is so much more that God wants for you to experience and for you to be blessed and to be a blessing and might the Holy Spirit allow this message to spur you. 

Here's we step into kind of a new season of ministry around here. School's beginning. It's a great time for a fresh start. Might God be calling you to take that step, and maybe that step is into a small group. Maybe that step is into membership of the church.

Maybe that step is into some area of ministry. To that end, let me just go back through our list, practically speaking. Number one, what did he say? Prayer. And I told you, I got some things to share about prayer in the coming weeks.

Stay tuned. Stretchy love. Stretchy love assumes that you are in relationship with other Christians. As I just got done saying, maybe God would be calling you to take a step. Why not join a small group as a practical step to being in relationship with other Christians?

Stranger love. Stranger love. This is the inconvenient service moment. And one of the things I've observed over the years is it seems like whenever God brings us to a particular passage in the body life of our church, all of a sudden, there are things that God sort of, like, brings into our path. And I'm just wondering, light of talking about this, in our church, how many of us are going to have a stranger love moment this coming week when maybe this passage will come to your mind and you will do something different than you otherwise would.

I think it's gonna happen. I'm so confident that's gonna happen that I asked our, IT department to make an email address. So here it is, [email protected] I would love to hear your story of stranger love from this coming week, and, perhaps we'll have a chance to share that and encourage others. And finally, Servi love.

K? Servi love. It's a little it's not a word, but you get the idea. Right? Servi love.

We have opportunities that we're making available to you, and, I'm gonna talk about those in just a moment. And remember, why all of this? “So that in everything, God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. To him belong glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.”

* This transcript was generated using AI transcription technology and reviewed for accuracy but may contain errors. Please refer to the original audio for precise wording.

Study Guide for Spiritual Exiles, 1 Peter 4:7-11

Scripture Reference: 1 Peter 4:7-11

Visit the series page: Exiles: A study in 1 Peter

Donate to Support The Journey

Sermon Series: Spiritual Exiles

Message: Serving Jesus by Serving His Church

Airdate: 10/26/26

Program: 2386 

That’s worth clapping about some stories from, folks right here in our own church and just how meaningful and, what a blessing it is for them to serve the Lord and to serve his church. I still can’t get over the story Rick shared earlier about the man who served in our security team and apparently had communicated to his family that he wanted to be buried in his security uniform for the church. I mean, never heard that before until today, but I think it’s a powerful testimony along with what, you heard in this video of how meaningful serving the Lord can be and what I’m gonna suggest to you, ought to be for us as Christians, and we’re gonna get into that in in just a moment. Again, we’re celebrating we’re celebrating God’s work amongst us. We’re celebrating Jesus and the Holy Spirit equipping the church.

We’re celebrating the opportunity and the privilege. Like he said, at the end there, he says that the God of heaven would have some use for me is an amazing thought. And we want every single person here to have that thought today that you are somebody equipped by God to do something very meaningful in the church. That at the end of your life and for all eternity will be what you’ll look back on and say, I’m so glad that I invested in the church of Jesus Christ. You know, we’re celebrating it here today.

God celebrates this as well. I wonder if if you’ve ever thought about the delight that God himself has in the service and the and the the sacrifices of his people. And the Bible tells us that, you know, to serve the Lord, like we say, hey, I wanna serve Jesus. That sounds great, but he’s not around here, is he? I haven’t seen him here this morning, have you?

No. But what do we have? We have the body of Christ. Metaphorically, it’s called that. We have the church and ministry that is done within the church and ministering in the name of Jesus to people in the economy of God is ministry that is done to him.

This is what Jesus said in principle when he said, if you’ve done it to the least of these, my brothers, you’ve done it unto me and that just is such an inspiring truth, isn’t it? To realize that that child and that teenager or that difficult person in CR or as the testimony shared, that sort of hard-hearted guy in the balcony sitting there, you know, just like, why am I here? That these are all opportunities that we must minister to Jesus by ministering to his people. And to see that connection is what allows people to serve in ministry for decades as we heard earlier and to remain faithful to it. Now, today, we’re gonna move ahead just a little bit in First Peter.

We’re a little out of order, but you’ll forgive me, I hope, to chapter four verses, 11, I’m sorry, eight through 11, and a section where Peter talks about the privilege that we have to serve the Lord. So let me read this now, and this ends a section. It begins at chapter two verse 11 through chapter four verse 11, where he’s talking about living out faith in exile and doing so in community with one another. And he describes here what healthy church community looks like and feels like. Look at verse seven.

“The end of all things is at hand. Therefore, be self-controlled and sober minded for the sake of your prayers. Above all, keep loving one another earnestly since love covers a multitude of sins. Show hospitality to one another without grumbling” as each and this will be the verse we’re keying in on. Verse 10.

“As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another as good stewards of God’s varied grace.” Whoever speaks as one who speaks oracles of God, whoever serves as one who serves by the strength that God supplies. In order that in everything, God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. To him belong glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.”

Now, we’re gonna spend two weeks in this, in this passage here, but I want you to see that Peter is describing life within the faith community in four categories of spiritual vitality. He says, first of all, prayer. Secondly, hospitality. Third, love, and finally, service. K?

So, prayer, hospitality, love, and service. In a church where things are healthy, these are going to be categories of, like, life and ministry that people are about and are zealous and earnest for. And all of these things, he says at the end, notice in verse 11, in order that in everything, God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. So, I take from that that as the church body is actively pursuing these four categories of spiritual vitality, that God is honored and is glorified by that particular local church. At the same time, I believe the opposite is true.

A church that is not giving itself to prayer, is not hospitable, is not loving, is not serving, is not a church that brings honor and glory to God. Now you might ask the question, well, how why is God glorified in a local church that’s doing those four things really well? And this is a principle we talk about quite a bit around here because the Bible talks a lot about this. God is glorified when pictures of God represent what he is like. We’ve talked about this in terms of salvation that each of us, Romans eight, are being conformed to the likeness of his Son.

And so, God is God is honored in us as our attitudes and actions reflect those of Jesus, and so he is making us into Jesus’ juniors and delights then in seeing that character in us. But corporately, as a local church, God is also honored and glorified when we look like what he is like. And if you think about those four categories, all of them are what God is like. God is self-controlled. God is hospitable to strangers.

He loved us in our sin. God is loving and covers a multitude of sins, and God is a serving God. He is a God that sent his Son Jesus, and Jesus epitomizes that divine servanthood as he came into this world. He served us, and he served the church by dying on the cross for our sins. If you wanna think about who the who’s the ultimate volunteer in the church, like, wins volunteer of the year every year?

It’s Jesus. You know, so we have the competition again next year. Jesus wins again that year. Why? Not only did he serve the church in his death, but he ongoingly serves the church.

Right now, he is at the right hand of God. He is interceding for the church. His eye is upon the church. Read the early part of Revelation as he walks among the lampstands of his church. He knows the heart of this church.

He knows the values, and he knows the spiritual fervor of this church and he ongoingly ministers, sending his Spirit, praying for us, loving us, and coming back even as we just got done singing. One day, oh glorious day, coming back for his church. Jesus is the ultimate volunteer of the local church, But God is glorified in the pictures that look like him. And since he is a loving, serving, hospitable God, a godly church will reflect those qualities within their community, in the ethos, and the vibe, and the passions, and priorities of the church, which by the way, is the people of the church. We talk about the church like it’s some kind of institution.

A church is people, and so it’s the hearts of the people of the church and the lives of the people of the church reflecting what God is like. We picture what he is like, and God is is honored the more we look like what he is like. It’s like any picture. If I go to your home, probably, if we just jumped to the car, ran to your house, I’d probably find pictures in that home of loved ones that you have, friends, family, whatever. And they’re framed, and there, you know, mounted very beautifully in the in your house, and maybe there’s little candles burning in front of them if you really love them.

And you delight in those pictures because they look like they look like the one that you love. The ones that don’t look like them, you probably heard, oh, it’s a terrible picture of her. She’s much better looking than that. What do you mean by that? That picture doesn’t it doesn’t resemble her.

It’s a bad picture of her. And there are churches that are bad pictures of what God is like. They don’t look like him at all. But Peter is exhorting us to look like him. K?

Do you see the connection then? We honor God as we reflect his character. We’re a mirror to God. He delights in us. And the part that we’re focusing on today is this wonderful privilege that we have to serve the Lord Jesus by serving his church.

And this, of course, is what Jesus himself said. “The Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.” Why did Jesus come into the church? He or to the world? He came into the world as a volunteer for the church.

He came to ransom the church. He came to redeem the church by the precious blood of his own life. He died for the church. And for us to realize that in this world, the one thing, the one called an organization, but the one thing that passes on to eternity is the church. Jesus is coming back for the church.

Jesus said, I’m building my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. So of all the things there are in this world to be excited about and to be sort of like investing yourself in, what has more enduring value than the church of Jesus Christ? And to think about how we get distracted in these other lesser things that are passing away and all the excitement about the sports team and all the excitement about some school or some other organization or, you know, your clubby thing you’re doing or whatever it is, fine. Do it. But it perishes, and the investment in those things does as well.

But what we do for Jesus, and his church lasts forever because the church lasts forever. So where should our priority be? What should we be fired up about? I would say it would be the church bought with the precious blood of Jesus, the ultimate volunteer. The center of this passage is verse 10, and this is what I wanna focus on with you.

As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another as good stewards of God’s varied grace. Here is the exhortation. The apostle Peter and the Holy Spirit exhorting us. Use your gift as a steward. Now, this might be a new concept for you.

If you’ve have never heard about spiritual gifts, let’s talk about this a little bit. Peter wants to talk about it. And the first thing that we see here is that every Christian has a spiritual gift. What does he say there? As each has received a gift.

We can go to the apostle Paul. He says the same thing. Here’s chapter 12. He writes this, “There are variety of gifts but the same Spirit and there are varieties of service but the same Lord and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who empowers them all in everyone. To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.”

Each has a gift. If you’re a Christian here, you have a gift. God has given you some ability that he intends for you to use to his glory within the context of the church. Now here’s the definition I like. One of the guys I like, Wayne Grunem, defines spiritual gifts this way.

He says a spiritual gift is any ability that is empowered by the Holy Spirit and used in any ministry of the church. Now, there is a debate as to whether or not spiritual gifts are things that you’re naturally good at, that God uses in some you know, significant spiritual way or if it’s something that prior to salvation, you had no ability, then all of a sudden, you have this ability given to you by the Holy Spirit. I think it can be both and in reality, I’m not sure it matters because everything that we can that we have and that we’re good at, we ought to use in any way that we can for the Lord but the point is this, is that that gifting is something that you have that God gave to you and he intended for you to use it to bless the common good, it says there, for the for the common good of the church, for the building up of the church family. And this gift is something that we call it a spiritual gift. It doesn’t necessarily mean that it is a miraculous gift.

You might say, oh, it’s something that I can do and it’s like, you know, I’m calming the seas by my prayer or something like that. No. Cups of cold water given in Jesus name don’t themselves feel miraculous but what God does in using them in the lives of people is something that is truly supernatural and that’s the thing that is encouraging because you might be here going, oh, I I don’t know that I’m good at anything or I don’t feel like you’re talking about this so like gloriously but I don’t see in myself anything supernatural. The gifts are spiritual. The effects of the gift are supernatural because they are empowered by the Holy Spirit.

So that cup that is given in Jesus’ name, that cold water that is given in Jesus’ name is not it’s not miraculous to be able to do that, but the effect in the heart of the person receiving that grace gift is something that the Spirit empowers and does. So, you are not miraculous in that way, but God will use that gift in supernatural ways, which is a very exciting thing. Let me give you another example how true this is. What am I doing right now? Here I am up here.

I’m teaching, preaching. I think God has given me a a gift for this, and I I want to use this gift. But in reality, what am I doing? I am flapping my gums up here. That’s all that I’m doing.

Blah blah blah blah blah. You’re very kindly listening right now, acting like you’re interested. But my my words, my voice, the amplification of it in the microphone, these things don’t themselves have any power whatsoever. Nothing. No matter how oratorically beautiful it is, they have no power.

But the word of God through the gift of God does something in the hearts of the people of God. Not because it’s my words, but it is the word of God and the Spirit of God using it. And that’s the beauty of what we’re talking about here. You have a gift that if you use it, God will use that in the life of the person you’re ministering to in a way that you yourself can’t do, which ought to inspire us to say, wow. I can have this opportunity to bless and to build and to equip and to encourage the church.

Yes. You can. Yes. You can. You have a gift.

We’re exhorted to use it, and we all love using gifts, don’t we? I mean, if you get a new set of golf clubs for Father’s Day, right? You’re on like on the phone right away. Can I get a tee time tomorrow? I wanna try these things out or if you get a gift card to one of your favorite restaurants, how long do you wait to use it?

Or do you do you use it? Of course, you use it. We love using gifts and spiritual gifts for us ought to be the same if we realize the opportunity that they provide for us and the blessing that it is to use them. This also tells us that we shouldn’t glory in our gifts. That’s what the Corinthians were doing.

Right? They picked a few gifts, they said, oh, man, if only I had that gift. And they wanted the public gifts, and they thought that was the key one, and the other ones didn’t matter. And Paul’s Paul says this, “If the eye says, I wish I was an ear, where’s the sense of seeing? And if the ear says, I wish I was the eye, where’s the sense of hearing?”

All of a sudden, you realize everything in the body is important. Like this week, I’ve had terrible back problems this week. My lower back, and I don’t think about my back except when it’s not working right. Right? Or when some little thing goes wrong in your body, all of a sudden, you’re like, man, this thing’s important.

I need to get it fixed. And how easy it is for us to think these other gifts don’t matter when everything matters in the body of Christ, and the Spirit gives us these gifts so that the this this local body is not as effective as God intends it to be when you sit on your gift, and you leave it in the closet and you don’t use it. There is something missing. We’re not hitting on all cylinders here. God has given you a gift.

He wants you to use it. May I ask you? What would you say is your spiritual gift or gifts? I think there can be more than one. And how effectively are you using it?

One great way to know what your gift might be is to ask yourself, what is life giving and joy giving to me when I when I do it? I think that our gifts are generally meaningful to us, And that there’s gonna be a variety of these things. What I like doing and what’s joy giving to me is gonna be different than you because God has gifted you differently than he’s gifted me. And so that’s the beauty. We had all these different gifts here.

These variety of gift, one Spirit, variety of gifts, one to Lord, but all of them are critically important. What brings you joy? What is the thing that you kinda get involved in and you leave there, and you go, like, that was awesome. You look back and like, that was that was a highlight in my life. What shirt do you wanna be buried in?

Might be an indication of where your gifts lie. Notice secondly that Peter says, it is to be used to serve one another. As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another And here is the privilege that we have. First of all, as stewards in the using of it, but also secondly, in the direction of the using of it. These are not self-serving gifts.

These are not gifts that we take and we say, I’m gonna go bless IBM with this. These are gifts that we use. He’s writing to the church. So, I believe primarily the context for where we sort of invest our giftings and our servings is within the church and the blessing in the building up of the local congregations. Jesus said it this way, “it is more blessed to give than to receive” I believe there is more joy in a life lived to the service of Jesus.

Then whatever else you might put in there instead. Think of Laura Frank. Thirty-six years serving children in this church. Now you compare I’m sure we probably have somebody in our church who’s gone here maybe around that long, and they’ve sat on their gift the entire time. Now who has the better story?

Who has more meaning? And in the end, in eternity, who’s glad they live their life the way that they did? My money’s on Laura Frank. More than the guy who sat on his gift but had a a two handicap on the golf course or whatever thing you wanna put in there. You see where my thoughts go.

I’m wearing an Olympia Fields shirt today, for goodness sakes. All things in their proper place. Oh, that’s funny. Now you might be here saying, man, all this talk about serving the Lord, it almost feels like these people are trying to earn their salvation by doing these things. I mean, is this one of these sort of creepy cultic churches that we’re in where they’re all trying to earn their salvation?

No. We believe that salvation is by faith in Jesus. It is God’s grace to us. It is a gift to us. But we have to realize that the same Bible that teaches that that says that we’re not saved by serving, it says that we are saved for serving.

There is something that God wants to do in us as a result of this work that he has done or through us as a result of this work that he’s done in us. That’s better said. Listen to the beautiful balance of this in Ephesians two. Grace and service. Paul writes, “For by grace you’ve been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing.”

Okay? We are not saved by our efforts. We are not saved by our service. We are not saved by our sweat. We are saved by grace through faith in Jesus.

“It is the gift of God, not a result of works so that no one can boast.” But verse 10 is sometimes missed. “For we are God’s workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.” We delight in electing sovereign God that purposed our salvation in eternity past, but a part of what he also prepared beforehand was the life of ministry and service that we would also offer to him, not to be saved, but because we are saved. It is the fruit of, you know, it’s it, if, if, if, if it’s, in fact, this is interesting.

It is God’s grace to us in order to be saved. You know what the word is for gifting? Charismata is the word. It literally is grace gift. Salvation is a kind of charismata to us, but our service is also a charismata.

It is me taking the grace of God that I have received and through my gifting, extending that grace to other people. I have been saved by grace, and now I wanna give it. And I want to serve in the church. I want to bless other people. I want to build up.

Build the church, the gates of hell not prevailing against it. And so, friends, this is you. We’re not talking about some ethereal person. If you’re a Christian, you have a gift from God. You have been empowered in this by the Holy Spirit to serve, and you’re called to be a steward of it, which is how he ends here.

Serving Jesus is stewardship and it is worship as good stewards of God’s varied grace. Now, what’s interesting about Peter bringing up stewardship is if we go back in Luke, Jesus tells a parable about a servant whose master put him in charge of the house and then the master went away and was going to be gone for a long time. Well, this servant, knowing the master was going be gone for a long time, thought to himself, hey, I got the run of the place. I’m going to do what I want, and he was lazy, and he mistreated the other servants. He was a terrible, terrible servant.

Well, guess what happens? The master comes back before he had said and discovers this servant not doing what the master had told him to do, being lazy, and all the rest. And Jesus makes this point in that parable. “Everyone to whom much was given of him; much will be required.” You know what disciple asked Jesus?

What does that mean? You look it up. It was Peter. And I wonder if maybe as he’s writing this letter, some of that kinda echoes in his mind regarding the need to be a steward of the opportunities and the giftings that God gives to us? How many in the church are like the lazy servant who think, oh, someday I’ll get serious about it, or someday Jesus is coming back, and their life is invested poorly and unwisely.

We will all give an account. Realize that. We are all going to give an account of our life. The Bible calls it the judgment seat of Christ and that judgment for Christian Christians is not a judgment of whether we are saved or not. It is a qualitative judgment on the quality of service that we offer the Lord in this life that we are living.

And, again, too much is given, much shall be required. What do we wanna hear on that day? “Well done, good, and faithful servant.” I mean, if when I’m standing there in my heart, I’m gonna be going, well done. Well done.

Well done. That’s what I wanna hear from Jesus about my life as he makes a qualitative judgment of the quality of the service and sacrifice and investment that I made in my life. What’s he gonna say about you? Are you actively involved in kingdom work? Is it the highest priority of your life?

I would say that it ought to be for all of us. And further, you know what the Psalm says? Psalm 100 verse two, “serve the Lord with gladness.” What better master is there out there than the Lord Jesus Christ? Who could we find that we could serve that loves us more than the Lord Jesus Christ?

We ought to serve him not out of duty but out of delight and with gladness and joy. Look what he has done for us. I think about my life. I’ve been a pastor for twenty-three years, almost exactly right now, would be about my anniversary of ministry. And one of the things that I love about vocational ministry, and I know most here are not in a vocational sort of way, but one of the things I love about vocational ministry is the opportunity that I have day after day to sort of give myself to these things.

And it’s a joy to me. Now is every day a joy? No. Not every day is a joy. Every day with Jesus is not sweeter than the day before.

That’s a lie. K? We’re never singing that song again at this church. But that’s not because Jesus isn’t sweeter. It’s because I’m a fallen, wretched sinner who is selfish and too often in it for myself.

But I’m here to tell you that it is a joy to me to serve the Lord. There’s nothing more that I would want to do. And I believe that all of everybody here can serve the Lord in vocation. We believe a high view of vocation, and we serve the Lord in our families, and we serve the Lord in many different ways. But we are primarily called to serve the Lord by joining Jesus himself in the building of his church and in the ministry to people.

The church is people. I was struck as I was sitting here during the interview how they talked about relationships. What is it about? It’s about relationships and love and care and meeting the needs of others to be a servant to the world. Again, as Jesus said, whatever you do for the least of these, you do for me.

And I just think, you know, people, we don’t connect. I don’t think we connect very well that child with what I do to him or her in God’s economy, he views it as being done to him or that in CR, that difficult person who is still in their addiction or is still in their struggle and they’re acting that out to see ministry to that person in God’s eyes is actually being ministry, you know, to him. Wouldn’t that change the way that we view service? Because all too often, what do we do? We view it like this.

I’ll see if I can work it in. Or I’ll do that when it’s like convenient for me. I don’t wanna be inconvenienced. I don’t want it to be awkward. I don’t want it to be uncomfortable because I just, I don’t know.

I just don’t want to. Right? And yet we look at the example of our Lord Jesus Christ. Aren’t you glad Jesus didn’t view his volunteer that way? His volunteering that way?

Aren’t we glad that Jesus didn’t go die on the cross, Father? I don’t think so. It’s uncomfortable. Incarnation into a body, it’s just not really what I was thinking. Can we do it on a different schedule like never?

Aren’t you glad Jesus didn’t volunteer the way so many of us view volunteering, but that he was faithful to the call and that he obeyed the will of the Father, and he voluntarily died on the cross for our sins. We look at volunteering and serving in the church. We can always know that Jesus bears the heavier load, doesn’t he? It’s like the song. I love that line in the song that we sang.

Such a tiny offering compared to Calvary. Nevertheless, we lay it at your feet. Everything that we could do, a whole life lived in service compared to what Jesus did is a tiny offering. Yet, that is what we have to offer to him. This one life that we have, to offer it to the Lord and to intentionally think about my time, talents, and treasures, and to say, what can I do to to bless you, God, by blessing your people and ministering to those whom you love?

Can you imagine if Jesus came walking into church here this morning? Like, you know, in the commons, all of a sudden, there’s Jesus and people are like, it’s Jesus. Oh, what’s he look like? And where is he? And you know what?

I think we all would do first. Fall on our faces and worship, right? So, there we all are on our faces before the Lord. But eventually, somebody’s gonna go, hey, Jesus. Is there anything I can do for you?

Can I park your car for you? Hey, Jesus. Can I shine your sandals for you? Can I do that right now? Hey, Jesus.

Can I walk you down to a seat in the auditorium? We’re so glad you’re here. Hey, Jesus. Is there anything? Anything.

You name it. I’ll do it for you right now. If it was Jesus standing right, there. And yet, the church is the body of Christ. Jesus isn’t showing up here on a Sunday or any day of the week, But here we are, and that person sitting next to you and that child and that, teenager and that, you know, senior citizen who needs the leaves raked or whatever it is, ministry done in Jesus’ name to them is ministry done to him.

And for those of us that love him and want to serve him with our life and do anything we can to bless him, it motivates us in a faithful enduring way. How do you how do you teach kids for thirty-six years? Part of it is seeing that as ministry to Jesus himself. And that’s what allows us to stay faithful in ministry. And, again, thank you.

I mean, we could pull so many people up here to share stories and testimonies about how you have faithfully served here. That’s the big thing that we’re doing here. I’m exhorting, but we’re also celebrating God’s great servants here in this church. We could not do this ministry without you. You are the church.

You are the church. I’m the guy flapping my gums up here. But in terms of what really makes this church go, it is the people of this church. It is you and your gifts and God using you in the profound and wonderful ways that he is. And why do we do all of this?

“In order that in everything, God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. To him belong glory forever and ever.” And may that be the story and the legacy of this local church as we strive to bring honor and glory to him. Okay. Here’s what we’re gonna do now.

We’re enduring we’re ending totally different than normal. K? Again, this is the volunteer appreciation day, and we want to just pour the love on to all of our volunteers here. So, here’s what we’re gonna do. We’re gonna stand.

In fact, why don’t we do that right now? Can we all stand? I’m going to pray, and we have a reception right outside these doors. Actually, these doors on this side, just go down the hallway. We have a tent and tables.

There’s, mocha coffee and snacks and leaders there to say thank you to you and we want any regular volunteer in any ministry of this church, and we’ll let you define that in the way that you want. You are invited to come to that reception. I’m gonna hustle my buns out there so that I can show appreciation as well, and we just want you to know how much we appreciate everything that you do. And so that’s how we’re gonna end this this service. So, I’m gonna pray, and then we’re kinda dismiss out that direction.

* This transcript was generated using AI transcription technology and reviewed for accuracy but may contain errors. Please refer to the original audio for precise wording.

Study Guide for Spiritual Exiles, 1 Peter 3:16-17

Scripture Reference: 1 Peter 3:16-17

Visit the series page: Exiles: A study in 1 Peter

Donate to Support The Journey

Sermon Series: Spiritual Exiles 

Message: A Guide to Gospel Conversations

Airdate: 10/20 –10/21/26

Programs: 2382 and 2383

Well, I didn't know if I was going to be here today, and I am. So that means that we do not have a baby on the way. I checked my phone between services just to make sure that nothing had happened. But this is the week. So hopefully, we'll have a fun little announcement we'll share with you.

I said to Jennifer, I hope she's not born on Father's Day because I want Father's Day to be about me, right? So if she could avoid Father's Day, that would be great. I said jokingly. But, yes. So we're, we're excited about a new addition to the family.

We appreciate your prayers about that. We really do. I also wanted to give a little shout out to our Executive Director of Operations, Dave Harvey, who I think is in this service. It's his birthday today. And we have this is the guy that we assume so many things around here are operating right and working right in the facilities and all the different things.

This is the guy that's managing all of that. I'm so thankful for Dave Harvey. And today is his birthday, and I think he's somewhere in here. So can we give him a one clap, happy birthday? I'm confusing some of you with that, but happy birthday, David Harvey. 

Okay. Today, we're we're this is a message it's kind of an application message, sort of a practical message coming out of last week's study in first Peter chapter three verse 15, this fairly well known passage about being ready to give an answer for the hope that is in us. And we're talking about the church as witness. We're talking about the church on mission. And so today, I wanna talk more practically about how do we engage people in gospel conversations.

The assumption is that Christians will do this, but how do we do that? And so I've got some very practical tips today. We're gonna get into that. I'd like to read the text though again. And so let me begin reading first Peter chapter three verse 13, and please listen as I read God's word.

“Now who is there to harm you if you are zealous for what is good? But even if you should suffer for righteousness sake, you will be blessed. Have no fear of them nor be troubled, but in your hearts, regard Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you. Yet do it with gentleness and respect, having a good conscience so that when you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame. For it is better to suffer for doing good if that should be God’s will than for doing evil.”

I came across this week a an ancient Chinese proverb that I'd like to share with you. It goes like this. Man stand for long time with mouth open before roast duck fly in. It just struck my funny my funny bone. Some of you are still pondering it, like, does that mean?

A man will stand for a long time before a fully prepared and cooked duck will fly into his mouth. There's a truth in there. Right? What is it saying there? That you can sit back and just open your mouth and hope and think that what you're craving and what you're desiring is going to fly in, but you stayed a long time for roast duck to fly in.

It doesn't happen. And our evangelism in the church often is like the Chinese man standing with his mouth open hoping the right thing flies in. And we miss the fact that while God is sovereign over salvation, he works through means to accomplish it. And the means by which he does this is the church, and specifically is the people in the church engaging in gospel conversations with unbelievers. That's the way that it happens.

In fact, if you're a Christian here today, there was somebody in your life that engaged in some short or long term conversation with you that shared the gospel of Jesus with you, and you are a Christian as a result of it. And what happens often is somebody has that conversation with us, and then we turn into the Chinese man waiting for the roast duck to fly in. We sit back, we isolate, we're by ourselves, and we think, oh, some how this happens, I guess. When that's not how it happened for us. Somebody engaged us, and now we're called as Christians to engage other people in gospel conversations so that they can come to know the same Lord Jesus, the same hope that we have.

And so that's where we're going today. It doesn't just happen. Roast ducks don't just fly in. How does it happen? And Peter is writing to Christians who, as we've said many times now in our series, they are in persecution.

They are in crisis. They're in a place hostile to their faith. You might be in a tough time right now yourself. Maybe you're in some kind of season of trial in your life. And you're thinking to yourself, you know, this is a time really I might have to put ministry on the back burner.

When in reality, this is prime time opportunity for you to give the reason for the hope that is in you. And that's where we're going here is how do we do that and when are what are the context within which and how do we cultivate those contexts so that we can have these kinds of conversations? Now Peter says first in verse 13 that lives of kindness and compassion lived out in the world earn the right for us to be heard. It causes the the world to sort of stop and pay attention. Oh, wait.

You're being kind. You're you're caring for people. You're doing this or that. What's what's the deal with you? And we saw last week that the theology behind what Peter is talking about here in terms of kindness, good works done for people that have nothing to offer us, that we're doing purely out of a desire to minister to them, causes people to stop and listen.

And it did in the early church. We saw that in the first three centuries of the early church, the the the way that Christianity rocked the Roman Empire was not because they were great preachers or that they had all these amazing books to read. Most of them couldn't read. How did the early church rock the Roman Empire? Because they cared for widows and they cared for orphans and they cared for strangers.

They cared for the people that the folks that go to the Aphrodite Temple and the Zeus Temple could care less about. That's who they cared about. And it caused the world to go, what is the deal with these Christians? And, again, the theology behind this, we saw last week, is that everybody is made in the image of God. And even a non Christian is an image bearer of God and wired by God for God and for seeing glimpses of God in the world around them.

And we had a diagram, if you put that up a moment, that illustrates how this works and what Peter is getting at here. What is the common ground that the Christian and the non Christian have? It is this image bearing, the fact that we have a conscience within us. And in the world, even even in the world, these things are admired. Moral beauty, love, self sacrifice, compassion.

These are all things that cause people in the world to go, you know what? That's good. Right? That's that's a good thing. And so in the world, if you're about, you know, stopping human trafficking or if you're into caring for children in crisis or something like that, even nonbelievers look at that and go, wow.

That's really awesome that you're doing that. K? It's common ground that we have in the world. So with that said, let's build now on this a guide to gospel conversations. How do we do this?

And the first thing that we see Peter saying here is that unbelievers observe something in us that they don't have. And you might say, is it our haircuts? Is it our clothes? Is it you know? No.

That's silly. It's not those things. That's not what makes Christianity distinctive. It is hope. That's what Peter says.

They come to us, and they ask us about the hope that we have. Now when is hope observable? When everything's great? No. I don't need hope when my life is fantastic and and everything's wonderful.

We talked about this last week that part of our struggle is that we're all the time projecting to everybody else that we're fantastic, and everything's fantastic. And so, you know, we come to each other. We say, how are you doing? I'm doing awesome. How are you doing?

I'm awesomer. Right? Everything's fantastic. I'm good. The kids are wonderful.

It's like I'm living a panacea of wonderfulness all the time. And we project these kinds of everything's going great, and people can't relate to that. Because the reality in the world is that everything is not great. And there might be times where things seem to be, you know, okay and we're doing okay. But generally speaking, we are either entering a crisis or we just got out of one.

And that's true in the unbelieving world. So that, yes, they can common ground is moral beauty. Common ground is is love and self sacrifice. But a huge common ground that we have with the people around us is pain and suffering. Christians have pain and suffering.

Non Christians have pain and suffering. The difference is we have hope in the midst of it, which they don't have. So imagine with me, for example, first century, Asia Minor Christian Frank applies for membership in a, business society, business guild that was gonna help his business and build relationships and stuff like that. He applies for membership in it. The board of directors gets together and they say, I understand Frank's one of those Christians.

Have you heard about these Christians? Yeah. They don't go to the Temple Of Aphrodite. They're not at the Temple Of Zeus. We don't want this guy in our guild.

I say we deny him just because of that. They go, that's probably a good idea. We don't wanna associate with people like that. The board member goes to Frank and says, hey, you know what? You've got a fine business and things look good, but you're a Christian, so you're out.

You can't or you're not in. We're not we're not accepting you. After sharing the news, Frank is surprisingly upbeat. The board member leaves thinking to himself, well, he took that quite well. What's up with Frank?

First century Asia Minor Christian student Sally is at school. Everybody knows that her family does not worship the emperor and does not worship at Aphrodite's temple. Word gets out that maybe she's one of those Christians that people have heard about. The parents warn their kids, don't associate with Sally. The cool girls in the school, they are so ostracizing Sally, but they sense from Sally that Sally's kind of okay with it.

Like, doesn't she know she should be upset that she's not sitting at our table? It's almost like her identity isn't found in what the cool girls think about her. And they don't know what to deal. How what's up with Sally? One more.

You're like, well, he was really creative in his preparation this week. Yes, I was. First century Asia Minor Christian John is at the hospital. He's seeing the doctors. He's seeing the nurses.

They're seeing him. He's one of a, you know, 100 patients that week. He's going through some health crisis, just like everybody else is. He doesn't wanna be in pain. He doesn't wanna be sick, just like everybody else doesn't wanna be sick.

But they sense him, John, that he has something going on in the midst of that. Like he's talking about how he's praying for the doctor. He's praying for the nurse. And that, you know, he's very confident that that God is with him. And they the nurses sense in John something in the midst of his pain that they're all dealing with pain and stuff in their life that they're like, he's got something I don't got.

And I wonder about John. Rich, poor, atheist, agnostic, religious person, educated, powerful, not, everybody suffers, don't we? Everybody goes through tragedy, don't we? We all have things that we deal with. And the difference that Peter is highlighting in verse 15 is that Christians go through these things with hope that the world doesn't have.

But the world observes us having it and wants it as well, even though they don't know where it comes from. And they come to the hope demonstrating Christian and ask, where did you get that from? Where did you get that from? And that doesn't mean that we don't cry and we don't grieve and we don't do things Jesus himself did. It just means that in the midst of that, we have a kind of vertical hope and assurance in terms of God and His presence with us and His promises for us that the unbelieving world imagine, you know, if you've a Christian a long time, you sort of get used to that promises of God and assurance from God.

The world goes through these things. They got nothing. I do funerals sometimes. You know, the funeral home will call and say, hey. Will you come over and do this funeral?

And I'll I'll do the funeral of of family. I mean, there's no faith, and they're like, hey. Can we get this done soon? And you just get this sense that there's just it's just emptiness. Right?

Or maybe they don't want it to get done. They stand at the casket and they're weaving. They don't want to close the door. Why? Because there's no hope of anything.

Once that door once that casket goes closed, we never see that person ever again. And you just sense that. Right? Totally different than a Christian funeral that's filled with hope, the hope of the gospel, the hope of eternal life. And so Peter is bringing this up, and what I am urging us here is that we must live our faith out in the midst of our pain and be honest about it, or the world is never going to observe it in us.

In other words, authenticity. Okay? Authenticity. A great place for that to start, of course, is in the church. And even in the church, we still sort of project this like, hey, I'm like it's like me and Billy Graham.

We're just like amazing, godly, spiritual people. And we all know that's not true. It's not true for me. Is it true for you? So maybe authenticity let's start in the church and just being real with each other.

But it must transfer into the world around us, which we're not good at, are we? But to be honest with our struggles or people are never going to realize the hope that is in us. Because the only time it's like hope's like the stars. When do you see the stars? It's never when the sun's up.

It's when the sun goes down that you see the stars. Hope is never seen when life is fantastic all the time. It's when life stinks that suddenly hope becomes evident. So unbelievers must see the hope that we have, and the only way they see it is when we are real about the struggles that we have. Now all of this is assuming relationship with unbelievers, isn't it?

We're gonna get into that in a little bit. But everybody knows what it's like when work is frustrating. Everybody can relate to a home and family and relationships that has conflict and strife. Everybody knows what it's like to have financial struggles. Everybody knows what it's like to suffer loss and hurt.

Everybody knows what it's like to have such a crazy busy schedule. You feel like you're, you know, the the the not the rat. What's the the hamster on the wheel. Thank you. We all know what it's like to be discouraged.

We all know what it's like to have doubts about life. And one of the most powerful witnesses that God's people have is when we go through those things, all of those same struggles, and yet we say and believe that there is good news found in Jesus Christ. And I have found Jesus to be a powerful help in the midst of my trial. Now we say, why is this so important? Here's why.

And this is kind of part of what I'm saying here is I'm arguing against an approach to evangelism that just uses canned presentations. I don't know if you know what I'm talking about there. And there's a place for them. But when we just automatically go into robo evangelist with people that are going through you know, the person goes, you know, I'm my my I just found out my mom has cancer. And you're like, I'm gonna take you down the Romans Road.

They're like, what? Are you talking to me? My mom's got cancer. And when we just do these canned gospel presentations, it doesn't connect the gospel with real life struggles. K?

Let's go to Charleston right now. Why? Why is the world paying attention to Charleston? Absolute tragedy that happened, and that is evil and wrong in every way. K?

But within a few days, we have we see some amazing good that has come from that as that church steps forward and says, we forgive the murderer. We forgive the murderer. Now the world sits up and goes, what? What'd you say? Because you're supposed to be, like, all about vengeance right now.

You're supposed to, like, get a mob and go and and get the guy and just, you know, beat him to a pulp. You're supposed to be all, like, hateful and angry about this, but you're offering grace and forgiveness. I bet the church is overflowing today, don't you think? And some of them are going to be visitors who are thinking to themselves, if this church can forgive that guy, they've got something I don't have because I'm still dealing with what my dad did to me when I was growing up. I'm going show up here.

Want see what this is about. And you see, it connects the gospel with real life. And that's what Peter is calling us to. K? To give an answer for the hope that is in us.

Where have we got this hope? We have this hope by faith in Jesus and the promises of God becoming real to us by the Holy Spirit and trusting in a God who sent his Son. Romans eight thirty two, “if God did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also along with him graciously give us all things?” If God gave me Jesus, he can give me what I need in this trial, and my hope is in him. That's the Christian response.

And all of a sudden, the gospel hits home in pain and in trials and in suffering when they see how the hope is working in us and they ask us about it. K? So second thing Peter highlights here is the tone with which we speak. Again, look at verse fifteen and sixteen. Always ready to make a defense to anyone who asks for a reason for the hope that is in you.

Some people read that and they're like, that's right. We're arming for bear. Well, I'm going go into that. I'm going to out argue. I can out argue anybody about the gospel.

I'm ready. Oh, just ask me about it. But then Peter adds this, yet do it with gentleness and respect. Gentleness and respect. Some of you can relate to this.

I was raised in in the church and we were raised in a more confrontational style of evangelism, you know, where you sort of get the person by the throat metaphorically speaking and you just pound them with the gospel, and you hope the Holy Spirit saves them. And you have, you know, these answers for these questions. And there's a place for that. Don't get me wrong. But the vast majority of people, that's not our gig.

Right? I don't even got no PhD in Christian apologetics. We're just normal people. Right? And so when we get all confrontational and high how do you respond when somebody, like, confronts you?

It's like, oh, that's what you believe? Well, let me tell you a better way. And that person's like, wait. My mama believed this. My grandma believed this.

And now you're gonna tell me this. And they get all what? Defensive. And how well do we listen when we're on the defense? Right?

So Peter's like, hey, the tone with which you approach people is critical. Be gentle. Be meek. This is the sense that the other person gets as we're talking to them. Stay calm.

Be kind. Listen. It endears the truth that we want to share with them. And you might be like, oh, no. That's not the way that Jesus did.

Wait a second. What did he do with the woman at the well as an example of what I'm talking about? This woman was in sexual sin. Jesus knew it. And who's the only one who actually has the right to be sort of judgmental towards people?

It would be Jesus. And yet does Jesus say, you're a sinner. Let's talk about sin, you know, and your sexual sin living with a man, divorce all these other guys, you're terrible. You need me. Is that what he said?

No. What did he say? He talked to her in a way that drew her in. Right? He drew her in.

He built rapport with her. She sensed that he cared about her. And when the whole conversation was done, what does she do? She runs into the village and says, come talk to this guy. This is amazing.

That's a sign of a really good gospel conversation when they go into their town and say, everybody, come talk to this guy. I've never had that happen, but it would be wonderful if it did. Jesus had a tone of gentleness. And he says, secondly, and respect and respect. Greek word there is phobos.

We get the word phobia from it. The scholars debate whether this is phobia respect for the other person or respect for God, probably for God, but I think it applies. When I have respect for God, I am respectful, you know, with other people. But the whole the point is, I think, similar to gentleness where there is a sense as I am doing this that I am I am respectful of the other person. I'm not an authority.

Like, I'm not coming at this like I got all the answers and down with you. I'm not speaking down the mountain at people. I'm respecting their story. I'm respecting their life. I'm listening to them.

They're listening to me. That's the kind of conversation that wins people's hearts, isn't it? Not victory all, not demeaning, not what's wrong with you because you don't believe this, not let me show you how smart I am with my answers, but a respectful conversation, a winsome one. So towards the goal of doing this, I have some tips. Those are just kind of a practical message.

Right? I've got some tips for how to engage in gospel conversations or what I'm calling a lifestyle of evangelism. And here's the first one, is that we must be intentional. We must be intentional about this. There's a writer named Jonathan Dodson. 

I've learned most of these tips are from him, actually. I give him credit for it. But one of the things that he talks about in terms of intentionality is the fact that many, many Christians have no time for unbelievers. By the time I get done doing all my church activities and I get done all my work activities and my, you know, school activities, there's no margin for relationships with an unbeliever. Maybe if I could ask you, is that true for you?

Do you have any intentional margin that you create to have and to build a relationship with somebody that doesn't know Jesus? Because right now, even as I'm talking to somebody, you're probably like, I got no time for this. I got no time for this. And yet, what has Jesus left us here to do? Why did why wasn't it instant rapture?

You know, when you become a Christian, boop, up you go. Why are we still here? Is it so that we can, you know, work and do well? No. We're here to be a witness to Jesus Christ.

Right? And to share the good news of Jesus with as many people as we possibly can. That's why we're here. And so this is partly a matter of prioritizing this and creating margin in our schedules so that we can have relationships with unbelievers. And frankly, I say that to myself as much as I say it to you.

I just said to Jennifer recently, by the time I get done pastoring the church and all this stuff, I feel like I have little time for relationships with people that aren't a part of the church. I feel convicted about that. Maybe you can too. So some practical tips on how to create context for relationship where these things can happen. This is from Jonathan Dodson.

Number one, eat with non Christians. What do we all have in common with unbelievers? We all like to eat, and we all eat three times a day. Some of us, more than that. So but I digress.

Most people are willing to have lunch with a coworker or a neighbor or to grill out, you know, to barbecue with with a neighbor. You want come over for burgers? Most people are like, that sounds nice. And what does it also sound like? It sounds like friendship, doesn't it?

See? Eat with non Christians. It's not like when you sit down and you go, okay. I'm gonna order, and now I take you down the Romans Road. You know?

Be normal. Talk about stuff. You know? Maybe you have, you know, 10 of those before spiritual stuff comes up. Jesus did this.

He Jesus used meals to build relationship with people. We see him doing it often in the gospels. Secondly, he says, walk, don't drive. Walk, don't drive. Is your neighborhood like mine where often it's like this?

People, we live in houses. In the morning, the bridge of the moat goes up called a garage door. And we're in our cars, and we pull out. We're in our bubble. We drive through the neighborhood.

We might wave, little wave there, little wave there, and off we go. And at night, we come home, still in our bubble, right? Maybe a wave, maybe a wave. The drawbridge goes up of the moat, the garage door. And we pull in, the bridge goes down of the moat, garage door goes down.

And I can live in my neighborhood without any conversation, if I wanted to, without one conversation with anybody. And many people do that. Right? Many people do that. Christians shouldn't do that.

Agreed? Who's the best neighbors in every neighborhood? It's the evangelical Christians, I hope. Right? So part of this we have to fight against is to he suggests walking.

Okay? Walk around the neighborhood. Just walk. I would tell you, from based on my experience, get a stroller. It doesn't matter if there's a kid in there or not.

Just have a stroller because a stroller is like it's like instant friendship. You know? Just like, oh, oh, oh, it's so cute. And, I mean, strangers at the mall suddenly are like your best friends if you have a stroller. But the walking point here is that it allows an opportunity to just meet people, to say hi, engage them in some way.

Walk around your neighborhood. Somebody else I read suggested, you know, sit in front of your house, not behind your house. We typically want to sit in the backyard, you know, sort of isolate in our little cocoon. Sit on the driveway and have your little fire pit there and marshmallows and people that are walking by be like, hey, and, you know, front yard conversations. Third, be a regular.

Be a regular. What this means is that if there's a coffee house you like, a cafe that you like, go to that one over and over again because then you get to know the waitstaff, and you get to know maybe the owner, and you get to know some of the other patrons there. And over time, you're able to build relationship. If you're always going to this one, that one, they don't know you, you don't know them, and nothing happens. So be a regular.

Hobby with non Christians. Hobby with non Christians. Everybody's got hobbies, mutual points of interest. So if you like to fish, you know, and there's a dude who lives next to you and you're like, hey, most men can say this, want to go fishing? That's like male love language, isn't it?

That's like that's like women saying, do you want to get a pedicure together? I mean, it's like, wow, I didn't know that we were that good of friends. We're going to fish together and then go fishing or, you know, watch the Bears game or whatever it is. You know, we all have these hobbies. And for men, a lot of those are kind of points of shared interest, hobby with them.

Friendships can form over mutual interest. Here's another, volunteer with nonprofits. This is, again, it's a non kind of confrontational sort of way to engage people. If Habitat for Humanity is building a house in Gary and your neighbor's a kind of handyman, why don't you say, hey, you wanna spend three hours on Saturday and we'll go do this Habitat for Humanity thing? And you get to drive up and you get to do something together.

And serving others might sort of tap a little meaning place in his heart. You never know what might come of that. Participate in city events. No matter what city you live in, all of them around here have cleaning days, and they've got sort of the corn fest or they got this, that, or the other. Be a part of that.

Get your kids off the Xbox and go clean the city for three hours. And you're going to meet other people that care about the city, and they're a part of that, and they see you caring, and you can build relationships with people that you don't know. Here's a big one. Serve your neighbors. Serve your neighbors.

Now the first part is assuming that you know their name. We live in a day where people live next to people that they don't know their name. And I'll be honest, it's not a very big circle around my house that I know people's names. So we say that to some measure of shame. But serve your neighbors.

And this can be big and small ways. It can be, you know, blowing out the snow on the driveway, or it can be helping with raking the leaves, or it can be maybe a more meaningful thing if they're going through a crisis or a trial of some kind where you help them out in some way. All of those things communicate something that ought to be true in our hearts. Right? If we're called the second great command is to love our neighbor as ourself, it communicates what?

Love. And love is a universal language of relationship. Help them out, especially in their times of crisis. It tears down defenses. My wife, Jennifer, is particularly good at this.

She's got a little bit of an eye for it. And we recently we have a neighbor that's going through a terrible kind of long term kind of crisis. And so Jennifer fixed this feast for them. And we showed up on their doorstep unannounced, bags of food. And they opened the door and we're like, hey, we just know it's been a tough time.

We brought this stuff for you. How do you think they responded to that? Slam the door. I told you look out for those neighbors. No.

They were like, really? You know, in the church, that's more been more sort of normal, but in the world, people don't do that kind of thing. They're like, really? Come come on in. And so we stepped in and we got, you know, all the here's this and this gotta heat at 03:50 and here's the dessert and all that.

And by the way, how's it going? And now in that kind of context of care, now the eyes fill with tears, and you we had a really special moment with them. Does it feel any different now when we are, like, waving in the morning? They're like Why? Because they're like, well, that's a house of people that care about us right there.

How? Just serving them. Serve them. A little bit goes a really long way. Do you have a neighbor that you could serve in some practical way that might build rapport with them, might communicate that you care about them?

So take a moment right now and just think through that list. Let me say them again. And maybe you can identify two things here, and we're going give you this list as you leave today, that maybe you could sort of renew involvement in mission work this way. Eat with non Christians. Walk, don't drive.

Be a regular hobby with non Christians. Volunteer with nonprofits. Participate in city events. Serve your neighbors. The next tip I have, and I'm not going spend a lot of time on this, but, is this, is be a story listener.

Be a story listener. Everybody has a story, and everybody's story is sacred to them. So too often, Christians, we we're like, oh, I've gotta be evangelistic. So now I'm again, I'm having lunch with you, and I'm gonna God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life. And I've got a little booklet here right here I'd like to take you through.

Would you smile as I do it? Point number one, point number two, point number three. And they're sitting there eating their chips going, Am I buying a vacuum when this is done? What's going on? A great starting point with people is to simply ask their story.

Ask their story. Everybody loves talking about themselves. Find out where they're from. Find out what kind of house they or home they grew up in, what their dad did, mom did, whatever. Find out their story.

And as part of that, if you've built if you've, you know, vacuumed their house or blew out the snow or done whatever, they'll share the failures as well. And in those failures then, sort of that conversation moves to that kind of deeper level where now you're sort of communing together. Listen to it. Don't interrupt it and go, well, if Jesus was in your life right there, then this would have been the feeling you would have had. Don't do that.

Why? Because we're not we're in here with gentleness and respect. We're not in here as know it alls. We're we're we're sinners too. Listen to their story.

It tells them that you care about them, which, of course, is the key. And then after hearing their story, tell your story. Tell your story. And by that, I don't mean the how all your kids are wonderful and you were amazing in in high school and what a great athlete you were and, you know, how you're the best employee. Know, take out all the hubris, take out all the pride, and just be a real person and tell your story.

And as part of telling that story, talk about the difference that Jesus has made in your life. Simply that. And don't get all sort of weird as you do it. Sometimes it feels that way, doesn't it, where you can talk about the college you went to, the school that you grew up in, but when you sort of if you say anything spiritual, it's like beads of sweat come down your face, and you know, it's it just weirds people out. Don't be awkward.

Can I say it that way? Just be normal. Be normal. Tell your story. Now you might be like me and think, my story is boring, especially my faith story.

Grew up in a Christian home, became a Christian when I was six, blah blah blah. I wanna encourage you that I doubt, for example, in Charleston right now, they care about when hope came to that church. They just care about how. Right? How?

And this again is where I think the formula approach is unhelpful because the gospel is not a formula. It is a person. The gospel is Jesus. And if we are Christians here today, that means Jesus has transformed our lives. And yes, we go through trials, and yes, we go through troubles, and none of us is super Christian.

But there is a reality to it that we feel in the midst of our sufferings, and we can share with other people who don't have that hope. Just talk about the difference your faith made with when you lost your job or the church or something like that that just kind of connects the gospel with real life, and people will listen to it. People will listen. And, of course, this assumes that hope is a reality in our own hearts. The Bible or the Bible, Spurgeon said, evangelism is one beggar telling another beggar where he found bread.

Maybe you've heard that before. But that assumes that the one beggar actually has found it. Tell them about that. Tell them about how, you know, your dad or that college friend or whatever it was introduced you to Jesus. Talk about him like he's as real as the wind.

Talk about him as a real person. And the world will think, man, this is like real to you, isn't it? Yeah. It is real. It's made a real difference in my life.

I kinda like that. I wish I had some of that hope in my heart. That's what they need to hear. So have it here first. Share it second.

And finally, I would just simply say this, pray for people. Pray for your neighbors. Is there or your coworker. Is there is there anybody currently that you are actively praying for that God would allow you to be a part of them coming to know the Lord Jesus? Are you praying for anybody by name?

Or how about in your neighborhood? As maybe you're having a time of prayer just to pray up for the two houses around you. You know? Pray for opportunities. Pray that God would help you be faithful to opportunities that he would provide.

Pray for wisdom when they come. K? So be intentional. Be ready. Be winsome and gentle.

Be real and authentic. Listen, and then speak and tell your story of hope in Jesus. And the world will listen, and we hope we'll come to believe in Christ as well. Right? And wouldn't that be a great day?

Seeing them people being baptized, starting to disciple them, see them to sort of grow and experience the blessing that we have had in the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what we want. So I'm gonna ask you to stand with me right now, and let's just pray. Let's just pray this very truth. In fact, I'm gonna give you just a moment to pray for that person in your life.

And maybe you gotta come up with a name real quick right now, but that'll be good. Why don't you pray for one person by name that is in your sphere of relationship and ask God to help you be a faithful witness to them.

* This transcript was generated using AI transcription technology and reviewed for accuracy but may contain errors. Please refer to the original audio for precise wording.

Study Guide for Spiritual Exiles, 1 Peter 3:21-22

Scripture Reference: 1 Peter 3:21-22

Visit the series page: Exiles: A study in 1 Peter

Donate to Support The Journey

Sermon Series: Spiritual Exiles 

Message: A Guide to Gospel Conversations

Airdate: 10/20 –10/21/26

Programs: 2382 and 2383

Well, I didn't know if I was going to be here today, and I am. So that means that we do not have a baby on the way. I checked my phone between services just to make sure that nothing had happened. But this is the week. So hopefully, we'll have a fun little announcement we'll share with you.

I said to Jennifer, I hope she's not born on Father's Day because I want Father's Day to be about me, right? So if she could avoid Father's Day, that would be great. I said jokingly. But, yes. So we're, we're excited about a new addition to the family.

We appreciate your prayers about that. We really do. I also wanted to give a little shout out to our Executive Director of Operations, Dave Harvey, who I think is in this service. It's his birthday today. And we have this is the guy that we assume so many things around here are operating right and working right in the facilities and all the different things.

This is the guy that's managing all of that. I'm so thankful for Dave Harvey. And today is his birthday, and I think he's somewhere in here. So can we give him a one clap, happy birthday? I'm confusing some of you with that, but happy birthday, David Harvey. 

Okay. Today, we're we're this is a message it's kind of an application message, sort of a practical message coming out of last week's study in first Peter chapter three verse 15, this fairly well known passage about being ready to give an answer for the hope that is in us. And we're talking about the church as witness. We're talking about the church on mission. And so today, I wanna talk more practically about how do we engage people in gospel conversations.

The assumption is that Christians will do this, but how do we do that? And so I've got some very practical tips today. We're gonna get into that. I'd like to read the text though again. And so let me begin reading first Peter chapter three verse 13, and please listen as I read God's word.

“Now who is there to harm you if you are zealous for what is good? But even if you should suffer for righteousness sake, you will be blessed. Have no fear of them nor be troubled, but in your hearts, regard Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you. Yet do it with gentleness and respect, having a good conscience so that when you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame. For it is better to suffer for doing good if that should be God’s will than for doing evil.”

I came across this week a an ancient Chinese proverb that I'd like to share with you. It goes like this. Man stand for long time with mouth open before roast duck fly in. It just struck my funny my funny bone. Some of you are still pondering it, like, does that mean?

A man will stand for a long time before a fully prepared and cooked duck will fly into his mouth. There's a truth in there. Right? What is it saying there? That you can sit back and just open your mouth and hope and think that what you're craving and what you're desiring is going to fly in, but you stayed a long time for roast duck to fly in.

It doesn't happen. And our evangelism in the church often is like the Chinese man standing with his mouth open hoping the right thing flies in. And we miss the fact that while God is sovereign over salvation, he works through means to accomplish it. And the means by which he does this is the church, and specifically is the people in the church engaging in gospel conversations with unbelievers. That's the way that it happens.

In fact, if you're a Christian here today, there was somebody in your life that engaged in some short or long term conversation with you that shared the gospel of Jesus with you, and you are a Christian as a result of it. And what happens often is somebody has that conversation with us, and then we turn into the Chinese man waiting for the roast duck to fly in. We sit back, we isolate, we're by ourselves, and we think, oh, some how this happens, I guess. When that's not how it happened for us. Somebody engaged us, and now we're called as Christians to engage other people in gospel conversations so that they can come to know the same Lord Jesus, the same hope that we have.

And so that's where we're going today. It doesn't just happen. Roast ducks don't just fly in. How does it happen? And Peter is writing to Christians who, as we've said many times now in our series, they are in persecution.

They are in crisis. They're in a place hostile to their faith. You might be in a tough time right now yourself. Maybe you're in some kind of season of trial in your life. And you're thinking to yourself, you know, this is a time really I might have to put ministry on the back burner.

When in reality, this is prime time opportunity for you to give the reason for the hope that is in you. And that's where we're going here is how do we do that and when are what are the context within which and how do we cultivate those contexts so that we can have these kinds of conversations? Now Peter says first in verse 13 that lives of kindness and compassion lived out in the world earn the right for us to be heard. It causes the the world to sort of stop and pay attention. Oh, wait.

You're being kind. You're you're caring for people. You're doing this or that. What's what's the deal with you? And we saw last week that the theology behind what Peter is talking about here in terms of kindness, good works done for people that have nothing to offer us, that we're doing purely out of a desire to minister to them, causes people to stop and listen.

And it did in the early church. We saw that in the first three centuries of the early church, the the the way that Christianity rocked the Roman Empire was not because they were great preachers or that they had all these amazing books to read. Most of them couldn't read. How did the early church rock the Roman Empire? Because they cared for widows and they cared for orphans and they cared for strangers.

They cared for the people that the folks that go to the Aphrodite Temple and the Zeus Temple could care less about. That's who they cared about. And it caused the world to go, what is the deal with these Christians? And, again, the theology behind this, we saw last week, is that everybody is made in the image of God. And even a non Christian is an image bearer of God and wired by God for God and for seeing glimpses of God in the world around them.

And we had a diagram, if you put that up a moment, that illustrates how this works and what Peter is getting at here. What is the common ground that the Christian and the non Christian have? It is this image bearing, the fact that we have a conscience within us. And in the world, even even in the world, these things are admired. Moral beauty, love, self sacrifice, compassion.

These are all things that cause people in the world to go, you know what? That's good. Right? That's that's a good thing. And so in the world, if you're about, you know, stopping human trafficking or if you're into caring for children in crisis or something like that, even nonbelievers look at that and go, wow.

That's really awesome that you're doing that. K? It's common ground that we have in the world. So with that said, let's build now on this a guide to gospel conversations. How do we do this?

And the first thing that we see Peter saying here is that unbelievers observe something in us that they don't have. And you might say, is it our haircuts? Is it our clothes? Is it you know? No.

That's silly. It's not those things. That's not what makes Christianity distinctive. It is hope. That's what Peter says.

They come to us, and they ask us about the hope that we have. Now when is hope observable? When everything's great? No. I don't need hope when my life is fantastic and and everything's wonderful.

We talked about this last week that part of our struggle is that we're all the time projecting to everybody else that we're fantastic, and everything's fantastic. And so, you know, we come to each other. We say, how are you doing? I'm doing awesome. How are you doing?

I'm awesomer. Right? Everything's fantastic. I'm good. The kids are wonderful.

It's like I'm living a panacea of wonderfulness all the time. And we project these kinds of everything's going great, and people can't relate to that. Because the reality in the world is that everything is not great. And there might be times where things seem to be, you know, okay and we're doing okay. But generally speaking, we are either entering a crisis or we just got out of one.

And that's true in the unbelieving world. So that, yes, they can common ground is moral beauty. Common ground is is love and self sacrifice. But a huge common ground that we have with the people around us is pain and suffering. Christians have pain and suffering.

Non Christians have pain and suffering. The difference is we have hope in the midst of it, which they don't have. So imagine with me, for example, first century, Asia Minor Christian Frank applies for membership in a, business society, business guild that was gonna help his business and build relationships and stuff like that. He applies for membership in it. The board of directors gets together and they say, I understand Frank's one of those Christians.

Have you heard about these Christians? Yeah. They don't go to the Temple Of Aphrodite. They're not at the Temple Of Zeus. We don't want this guy in our guild.

I say we deny him just because of that. They go, that's probably a good idea. We don't wanna associate with people like that. The board member goes to Frank and says, hey, you know what? You've got a fine business and things look good, but you're a Christian, so you're out.

You can't or you're not in. We're not we're not accepting you. After sharing the news, Frank is surprisingly upbeat. The board member leaves thinking to himself, well, he took that quite well. What's up with Frank?

First century Asia Minor Christian student Sally is at school. Everybody knows that her family does not worship the emperor and does not worship at Aphrodite's temple. Word gets out that maybe she's one of those Christians that people have heard about. The parents warn their kids, don't associate with Sally. The cool girls in the school, they are so ostracizing Sally, but they sense from Sally that Sally's kind of okay with it.

Like, doesn't she know she should be upset that she's not sitting at our table? It's almost like her identity isn't found in what the cool girls think about her. And they don't know what to deal. How what's up with Sally? One more.

You're like, well, he was really creative in his preparation this week. Yes, I was. First century Asia Minor Christian John is at the hospital. He's seeing the doctors. He's seeing the nurses.

They're seeing him. He's one of a, you know, 100 patients that week. He's going through some health crisis, just like everybody else is. He doesn't wanna be in pain. He doesn't wanna be sick, just like everybody else doesn't wanna be sick.

But they sense him, John, that he has something going on in the midst of that. Like he's talking about how he's praying for the doctor. He's praying for the nurse. And that, you know, he's very confident that that God is with him. And they the nurses sense in John something in the midst of his pain that they're all dealing with pain and stuff in their life that they're like, he's got something I don't got.

And I wonder about John. Rich, poor, atheist, agnostic, religious person, educated, powerful, not, everybody suffers, don't we? Everybody goes through tragedy, don't we? We all have things that we deal with. And the difference that Peter is highlighting in verse 15 is that Christians go through these things with hope that the world doesn't have.

But the world observes us having it and wants it as well, even though they don't know where it comes from. And they come to the hope demonstrating Christian and ask, where did you get that from? Where did you get that from? And that doesn't mean that we don't cry and we don't grieve and we don't do things Jesus himself did. It just means that in the midst of that, we have a kind of vertical hope and assurance in terms of God and His presence with us and His promises for us that the unbelieving world imagine, you know, if you've a Christian a long time, you sort of get used to that promises of God and assurance from God.

The world goes through these things. They got nothing. I do funerals sometimes. You know, the funeral home will call and say, hey. Will you come over and do this funeral?

And I'll I'll do the funeral of of family. I mean, there's no faith, and they're like, hey. Can we get this done soon? And you just get this sense that there's just it's just emptiness. Right?

Or maybe they don't want it to get done. They stand at the casket and they're weaving. They don't want to close the door. Why? Because there's no hope of anything.

Once that door once that casket goes closed, we never see that person ever again. And you just sense that. Right? Totally different than a Christian funeral that's filled with hope, the hope of the gospel, the hope of eternal life. And so Peter is bringing this up, and what I am urging us here is that we must live our faith out in the midst of our pain and be honest about it, or the world is never going to observe it in us.

In other words, authenticity. Okay? Authenticity. A great place for that to start, of course, is in the church. And even in the church, we still sort of project this like, hey, I'm like it's like me and Billy Graham.

We're just like amazing, godly, spiritual people. And we all know that's not true. It's not true for me. Is it true for you? So maybe authenticity let's start in the church and just being real with each other.

But it must transfer into the world around us, which we're not good at, are we? But to be honest with our struggles or people are never going to realize the hope that is in us. Because the only time it's like hope's like the stars. When do you see the stars? It's never when the sun's up.

It's when the sun goes down that you see the stars. Hope is never seen when life is fantastic all the time. It's when life stinks that suddenly hope becomes evident. So unbelievers must see the hope that we have, and the only way they see it is when we are real about the struggles that we have. Now all of this is assuming relationship with unbelievers, isn't it?

We're gonna get into that in a little bit. But everybody knows what it's like when work is frustrating. Everybody can relate to a home and family and relationships that has conflict and strife. Everybody knows what it's like to have financial struggles. Everybody knows what it's like to suffer loss and hurt.

Everybody knows what it's like to have such a crazy busy schedule. You feel like you're, you know, the the the not the rat. What's the the hamster on the wheel. Thank you. We all know what it's like to be discouraged.

We all know what it's like to have doubts about life. And one of the most powerful witnesses that God's people have is when we go through those things, all of those same struggles, and yet we say and believe that there is good news found in Jesus Christ. And I have found Jesus to be a powerful help in the midst of my trial. Now we say, why is this so important? Here's why.

And this is kind of part of what I'm saying here is I'm arguing against an approach to evangelism that just uses canned presentations. I don't know if you know what I'm talking about there. And there's a place for them. But when we just automatically go into robo evangelist with people that are going through you know, the person goes, you know, I'm my my I just found out my mom has cancer. And you're like, I'm gonna take you down the Romans Road.

They're like, what? Are you talking to me? My mom's got cancer. And when we just do these canned gospel presentations, it doesn't connect the gospel with real life struggles. K?

Let's go to Charleston right now. Why? Why is the world paying attention to Charleston? Absolute tragedy that happened, and that is evil and wrong in every way. K?

But within a few days, we have we see some amazing good that has come from that as that church steps forward and says, we forgive the murderer. We forgive the murderer. Now the world sits up and goes, what? What'd you say? Because you're supposed to be, like, all about vengeance right now.

You're supposed to, like, get a mob and go and and get the guy and just, you know, beat him to a pulp. You're supposed to be all, like, hateful and angry about this, but you're offering grace and forgiveness. I bet the church is overflowing today, don't you think? And some of them are going to be visitors who are thinking to themselves, if this church can forgive that guy, they've got something I don't have because I'm still dealing with what my dad did to me when I was growing up. I'm going show up here.

Want see what this is about. And you see, it connects the gospel with real life. And that's what Peter is calling us to. K? To give an answer for the hope that is in us.

Where have we got this hope? We have this hope by faith in Jesus and the promises of God becoming real to us by the Holy Spirit and trusting in a God who sent his Son. Romans eight thirty two, “if God did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also along with him graciously give us all things?” If God gave me Jesus, he can give me what I need in this trial, and my hope is in him. That's the Christian response.

And all of a sudden, the gospel hits home in pain and in trials and in suffering when they see how the hope is working in us and they ask us about it. K? So second thing Peter highlights here is the tone with which we speak. Again, look at verse fifteen and sixteen. Always ready to make a defense to anyone who asks for a reason for the hope that is in you.

Some people read that and they're like, that's right. We're arming for bear. Well, I'm going go into that. I'm going to out argue. I can out argue anybody about the gospel.

I'm ready. Oh, just ask me about it. But then Peter adds this, yet do it with gentleness and respect. Gentleness and respect. Some of you can relate to this.

I was raised in in the church and we were raised in a more confrontational style of evangelism, you know, where you sort of get the person by the throat metaphorically speaking and you just pound them with the gospel, and you hope the Holy Spirit saves them. And you have, you know, these answers for these questions. And there's a place for that. Don't get me wrong. But the vast majority of people, that's not our gig.

Right? I don't even got no PhD in Christian apologetics. We're just normal people. Right? And so when we get all confrontational and high how do you respond when somebody, like, confronts you?

It's like, oh, that's what you believe? Well, let me tell you a better way. And that person's like, wait. My mama believed this. My grandma believed this.

And now you're gonna tell me this. And they get all what? Defensive. And how well do we listen when we're on the defense? Right?

So Peter's like, hey, the tone with which you approach people is critical. Be gentle. Be meek. This is the sense that the other person gets as we're talking to them. Stay calm.

Be kind. Listen. It endears the truth that we want to share with them. And you might be like, oh, no. That's not the way that Jesus did.

Wait a second. What did he do with the woman at the well as an example of what I'm talking about? This woman was in sexual sin. Jesus knew it. And who's the only one who actually has the right to be sort of judgmental towards people?

It would be Jesus. And yet does Jesus say, you're a sinner. Let's talk about sin, you know, and your sexual sin living with a man, divorce all these other guys, you're terrible. You need me. Is that what he said?

No. What did he say? He talked to her in a way that drew her in. Right? He drew her in.

He built rapport with her. She sensed that he cared about her. And when the whole conversation was done, what does she do? She runs into the village and says, come talk to this guy. This is amazing.

That's a sign of a really good gospel conversation when they go into their town and say, everybody, come talk to this guy. I've never had that happen, but it would be wonderful if it did. Jesus had a tone of gentleness. And he says, secondly, and respect and respect. Greek word there is phobos.

We get the word phobia from it. The scholars debate whether this is phobia respect for the other person or respect for God, probably for God, but I think it applies. When I have respect for God, I am respectful, you know, with other people. But the whole the point is, I think, similar to gentleness where there is a sense as I am doing this that I am I am respectful of the other person. I'm not an authority.

Like, I'm not coming at this like I got all the answers and down with you. I'm not speaking down the mountain at people. I'm respecting their story. I'm respecting their life. I'm listening to them.

They're listening to me. That's the kind of conversation that wins people's hearts, isn't it? Not victory all, not demeaning, not what's wrong with you because you don't believe this, not let me show you how smart I am with my answers, but a respectful conversation, a winsome one. So towards the goal of doing this, I have some tips. Those are just kind of a practical message.

Right? I've got some tips for how to engage in gospel conversations or what I'm calling a lifestyle of evangelism. And here's the first one, is that we must be intentional. We must be intentional about this. There's a writer named Jonathan Dodson. 

I've learned most of these tips are from him, actually. I give him credit for it. But one of the things that he talks about in terms of intentionality is the fact that many, many Christians have no time for unbelievers. By the time I get done doing all my church activities and I get done all my work activities and my, you know, school activities, there's no margin for relationships with an unbeliever. Maybe if I could ask you, is that true for you?

Do you have any intentional margin that you create to have and to build a relationship with somebody that doesn't know Jesus? Because right now, even as I'm talking to somebody, you're probably like, I got no time for this. I got no time for this. And yet, what has Jesus left us here to do? Why did why wasn't it instant rapture?

You know, when you become a Christian, boop, up you go. Why are we still here? Is it so that we can, you know, work and do well? No. We're here to be a witness to Jesus Christ.

Right? And to share the good news of Jesus with as many people as we possibly can. That's why we're here. And so this is partly a matter of prioritizing this and creating margin in our schedules so that we can have relationships with unbelievers. And frankly, I say that to myself as much as I say it to you.

I just said to Jennifer recently, by the time I get done pastoring the church and all this stuff, I feel like I have little time for relationships with people that aren't a part of the church. I feel convicted about that. Maybe you can too. So some practical tips on how to create context for relationship where these things can happen. This is from Jonathan Dodson.

Number one, eat with non Christians. What do we all have in common with unbelievers? We all like to eat, and we all eat three times a day. Some of us, more than that. So but I digress.

Most people are willing to have lunch with a coworker or a neighbor or to grill out, you know, to barbecue with with a neighbor. You want come over for burgers? Most people are like, that sounds nice. And what does it also sound like? It sounds like friendship, doesn't it?

See? Eat with non Christians. It's not like when you sit down and you go, okay. I'm gonna order, and now I take you down the Romans Road. You know?

Be normal. Talk about stuff. You know? Maybe you have, you know, 10 of those before spiritual stuff comes up. Jesus did this.

He Jesus used meals to build relationship with people. We see him doing it often in the gospels. Secondly, he says, walk, don't drive. Walk, don't drive. Is your neighborhood like mine where often it's like this?

People, we live in houses. In the morning, the bridge of the moat goes up called a garage door. And we're in our cars, and we pull out. We're in our bubble. We drive through the neighborhood.

We might wave, little wave there, little wave there, and off we go. And at night, we come home, still in our bubble, right? Maybe a wave, maybe a wave. The drawbridge goes up of the moat, the garage door. And we pull in, the bridge goes down of the moat, garage door goes down.

And I can live in my neighborhood without any conversation, if I wanted to, without one conversation with anybody. And many people do that. Right? Many people do that. Christians shouldn't do that.

Agreed? Who's the best neighbors in every neighborhood? It's the evangelical Christians, I hope. Right? So part of this we have to fight against is to he suggests walking.

Okay? Walk around the neighborhood. Just walk. I would tell you, from based on my experience, get a stroller. It doesn't matter if there's a kid in there or not.

Just have a stroller because a stroller is like it's like instant friendship. You know? Just like, oh, oh, oh, it's so cute. And, I mean, strangers at the mall suddenly are like your best friends if you have a stroller. But the walking point here is that it allows an opportunity to just meet people, to say hi, engage them in some way.

Walk around your neighborhood. Somebody else I read suggested, you know, sit in front of your house, not behind your house. We typically want to sit in the backyard, you know, sort of isolate in our little cocoon. Sit on the driveway and have your little fire pit there and marshmallows and people that are walking by be like, hey, and, you know, front yard conversations. Third, be a regular.

Be a regular. What this means is that if there's a coffee house you like, a cafe that you like, go to that one over and over again because then you get to know the waitstaff, and you get to know maybe the owner, and you get to know some of the other patrons there. And over time, you're able to build relationship. If you're always going to this one, that one, they don't know you, you don't know them, and nothing happens. So be a regular.

Hobby with non Christians. Hobby with non Christians. Everybody's got hobbies, mutual points of interest. So if you like to fish, you know, and there's a dude who lives next to you and you're like, hey, most men can say this, want to go fishing? That's like male love language, isn't it?

That's like that's like women saying, do you want to get a pedicure together? I mean, it's like, wow, I didn't know that we were that good of friends. We're going to fish together and then go fishing or, you know, watch the Bears game or whatever it is. You know, we all have these hobbies. And for men, a lot of those are kind of points of shared interest, hobby with them.

Friendships can form over mutual interest. Here's another, volunteer with nonprofits. This is, again, it's a non kind of confrontational sort of way to engage people. If Habitat for Humanity is building a house in Gary and your neighbor's a kind of handyman, why don't you say, hey, you wanna spend three hours on Saturday and we'll go do this Habitat for Humanity thing? And you get to drive up and you get to do something together.

And serving others might sort of tap a little meaning place in his heart. You never know what might come of that. Participate in city events. No matter what city you live in, all of them around here have cleaning days, and they've got sort of the corn fest or they got this, that, or the other. Be a part of that.

Get your kids off the Xbox and go clean the city for three hours. And you're going to meet other people that care about the city, and they're a part of that, and they see you caring, and you can build relationships with people that you don't know. Here's a big one. Serve your neighbors. Serve your neighbors.

Now the first part is assuming that you know their name. We live in a day where people live next to people that they don't know their name. And I'll be honest, it's not a very big circle around my house that I know people's names. So we say that to some measure of shame. But serve your neighbors.

And this can be big and small ways. It can be, you know, blowing out the snow on the driveway, or it can be helping with raking the leaves, or it can be maybe a more meaningful thing if they're going through a crisis or a trial of some kind where you help them out in some way. All of those things communicate something that ought to be true in our hearts. Right? If we're called the second great command is to love our neighbor as ourself, it communicates what?

Love. And love is a universal language of relationship. Help them out, especially in their times of crisis. It tears down defenses. My wife, Jennifer, is particularly good at this.

She's got a little bit of an eye for it. And we recently we have a neighbor that's going through a terrible kind of long term kind of crisis. And so Jennifer fixed this feast for them. And we showed up on their doorstep unannounced, bags of food. And they opened the door and we're like, hey, we just know it's been a tough time.

We brought this stuff for you. How do you think they responded to that? Slam the door. I told you look out for those neighbors. No.

They were like, really? You know, in the church, that's more been more sort of normal, but in the world, people don't do that kind of thing. They're like, really? Come come on in. And so we stepped in and we got, you know, all the here's this and this gotta heat at 03:50 and here's the dessert and all that.

And by the way, how's it going? And now in that kind of context of care, now the eyes fill with tears, and you we had a really special moment with them. Does it feel any different now when we are, like, waving in the morning? They're like Why? Because they're like, well, that's a house of people that care about us right there.

How? Just serving them. Serve them. A little bit goes a really long way. Do you have a neighbor that you could serve in some practical way that might build rapport with them, might communicate that you care about them?

So take a moment right now and just think through that list. Let me say them again. And maybe you can identify two things here, and we're going give you this list as you leave today, that maybe you could sort of renew involvement in mission work this way. Eat with non Christians. Walk, don't drive.

Be a regular hobby with non Christians. Volunteer with nonprofits. Participate in city events. Serve your neighbors. The next tip I have, and I'm not going spend a lot of time on this, but, is this, is be a story listener.

Be a story listener. Everybody has a story, and everybody's story is sacred to them. So too often, Christians, we we're like, oh, I've gotta be evangelistic. So now I'm again, I'm having lunch with you, and I'm gonna God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life. And I've got a little booklet here right here I'd like to take you through.

Would you smile as I do it? Point number one, point number two, point number three. And they're sitting there eating their chips going, Am I buying a vacuum when this is done? What's going on? A great starting point with people is to simply ask their story.

Ask their story. Everybody loves talking about themselves. Find out where they're from. Find out what kind of house they or home they grew up in, what their dad did, mom did, whatever. Find out their story.

And as part of that, if you've built if you've, you know, vacuumed their house or blew out the snow or done whatever, they'll share the failures as well. And in those failures then, sort of that conversation moves to that kind of deeper level where now you're sort of communing together. Listen to it. Don't interrupt it and go, well, if Jesus was in your life right there, then this would have been the feeling you would have had. Don't do that.

Why? Because we're not we're in here with gentleness and respect. We're not in here as know it alls. We're we're we're sinners too. Listen to their story.

It tells them that you care about them, which, of course, is the key. And then after hearing their story, tell your story. Tell your story. And by that, I don't mean the how all your kids are wonderful and you were amazing in in high school and what a great athlete you were and, you know, how you're the best employee. Know, take out all the hubris, take out all the pride, and just be a real person and tell your story.

And as part of telling that story, talk about the difference that Jesus has made in your life. Simply that. And don't get all sort of weird as you do it. Sometimes it feels that way, doesn't it, where you can talk about the college you went to, the school that you grew up in, but when you sort of if you say anything spiritual, it's like beads of sweat come down your face, and you know, it's it just weirds people out. Don't be awkward.

Can I say it that way? Just be normal. Be normal. Tell your story. Now you might be like me and think, my story is boring, especially my faith story.

Grew up in a Christian home, became a Christian when I was six, blah blah blah. I wanna encourage you that I doubt, for example, in Charleston right now, they care about when hope came to that church. They just care about how. Right? How?

And this again is where I think the formula approach is unhelpful because the gospel is not a formula. It is a person. The gospel is Jesus. And if we are Christians here today, that means Jesus has transformed our lives. And yes, we go through trials, and yes, we go through troubles, and none of us is super Christian.

But there is a reality to it that we feel in the midst of our sufferings, and we can share with other people who don't have that hope. Just talk about the difference your faith made with when you lost your job or the church or something like that that just kind of connects the gospel with real life, and people will listen to it. People will listen. And, of course, this assumes that hope is a reality in our own hearts. The Bible or the Bible, Spurgeon said, evangelism is one beggar telling another beggar where he found bread.

Maybe you've heard that before. But that assumes that the one beggar actually has found it. Tell them about that. Tell them about how, you know, your dad or that college friend or whatever it was introduced you to Jesus. Talk about him like he's as real as the wind.

Talk about him as a real person. And the world will think, man, this is like real to you, isn't it? Yeah. It is real. It's made a real difference in my life.

I kinda like that. I wish I had some of that hope in my heart. That's what they need to hear. So have it here first. Share it second.

And finally, I would just simply say this, pray for people. Pray for your neighbors. Is there or your coworker. Is there is there anybody currently that you are actively praying for that God would allow you to be a part of them coming to know the Lord Jesus? Are you praying for anybody by name?

Or how about in your neighborhood? As maybe you're having a time of prayer just to pray up for the two houses around you. You know? Pray for opportunities. Pray that God would help you be faithful to opportunities that he would provide.

Pray for wisdom when they come. K? So be intentional. Be ready. Be winsome and gentle.

Be real and authentic. Listen, and then speak and tell your story of hope in Jesus. And the world will listen, and we hope we'll come to believe in Christ as well. Right? And wouldn't that be a great day?

Seeing them people being baptized, starting to disciple them, see them to sort of grow and experience the blessing that we have had in the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what we want. So I'm gonna ask you to stand with me right now, and let's just pray. Let's just pray this very truth. In fact, I'm gonna give you just a moment to pray for that person in your life.

And maybe you gotta come up with a name real quick right now, but that'll be good. Why don't you pray for one person by name that is in your sphere of relationship and ask God to help you be a faithful witness to them.

* This transcript was generated using AI transcription technology and reviewed for accuracy but may contain errors. Please refer to the original audio for precise wording.

Study Guide for Spiritual Exiles, 1 Peter 3:21-22

Scripture Reference: 1 Peter 3:21-22

Visit the series page: Exiles: A study in 1 Peter

Donate to Support The Journey

Sermon Series: Spiritual Exiles 

Message: A Guide to Gospel Conversations

Airdate: 10/20 –10/21/26

Programs: 2382 and 2383

Well, I didn't know if I was going to be here today, and I am. So that means that we do not have a baby on the way. I checked my phone between services just to make sure that nothing had happened. But this is the week. So hopefully, we'll have a fun little announcement we'll share with you.

I said to Jennifer, I hope she's not born on Father's Day because I want Father's Day to be about me, right? So if she could avoid Father's Day, that would be great. I said jokingly. But, yes. So we're, we're excited about a new addition to the family.

We appreciate your prayers about that. We really do. I also wanted to give a little shout out to our Executive Director of Operations, Dave Harvey, who I think is in this service. It's his birthday today. And we have this is the guy that we assume so many things around here are operating right and working right in the facilities and all the different things.

This is the guy that's managing all of that. I'm so thankful for Dave Harvey. And today is his birthday, and I think he's somewhere in here. So can we give him a one clap, happy birthday? I'm confusing some of you with that, but happy birthday, David Harvey. 

Okay. Today, we're we're this is a message it's kind of an application message, sort of a practical message coming out of last week's study in first Peter chapter three verse 15, this fairly well known passage about being ready to give an answer for the hope that is in us. And we're talking about the church as witness. We're talking about the church on mission. And so today, I wanna talk more practically about how do we engage people in gospel conversations.

The assumption is that Christians will do this, but how do we do that? And so I've got some very practical tips today. We're gonna get into that. I'd like to read the text though again. And so let me begin reading first Peter chapter three verse 13, and please listen as I read God's word.

“Now who is there to harm you if you are zealous for what is good? But even if you should suffer for righteousness sake, you will be blessed. Have no fear of them nor be troubled, but in your hearts, regard Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you. Yet do it with gentleness and respect, having a good conscience so that when you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame. For it is better to suffer for doing good if that should be God’s will than for doing evil.”

I came across this week a an ancient Chinese proverb that I'd like to share with you. It goes like this. Man stand for long time with mouth open before roast duck fly in. It just struck my funny my funny bone. Some of you are still pondering it, like, does that mean?

A man will stand for a long time before a fully prepared and cooked duck will fly into his mouth. There's a truth in there. Right? What is it saying there? That you can sit back and just open your mouth and hope and think that what you're craving and what you're desiring is going to fly in, but you stayed a long time for roast duck to fly in.

It doesn't happen. And our evangelism in the church often is like the Chinese man standing with his mouth open hoping the right thing flies in. And we miss the fact that while God is sovereign over salvation, he works through means to accomplish it. And the means by which he does this is the church, and specifically is the people in the church engaging in gospel conversations with unbelievers. That's the way that it happens.

In fact, if you're a Christian here today, there was somebody in your life that engaged in some short or long term conversation with you that shared the gospel of Jesus with you, and you are a Christian as a result of it. And what happens often is somebody has that conversation with us, and then we turn into the Chinese man waiting for the roast duck to fly in. We sit back, we isolate, we're by ourselves, and we think, oh, some how this happens, I guess. When that's not how it happened for us. Somebody engaged us, and now we're called as Christians to engage other people in gospel conversations so that they can come to know the same Lord Jesus, the same hope that we have.

And so that's where we're going today. It doesn't just happen. Roast ducks don't just fly in. How does it happen? And Peter is writing to Christians who, as we've said many times now in our series, they are in persecution.

They are in crisis. They're in a place hostile to their faith. You might be in a tough time right now yourself. Maybe you're in some kind of season of trial in your life. And you're thinking to yourself, you know, this is a time really I might have to put ministry on the back burner.

When in reality, this is prime time opportunity for you to give the reason for the hope that is in you. And that's where we're going here is how do we do that and when are what are the context within which and how do we cultivate those contexts so that we can have these kinds of conversations? Now Peter says first in verse 13 that lives of kindness and compassion lived out in the world earn the right for us to be heard. It causes the the world to sort of stop and pay attention. Oh, wait.

You're being kind. You're you're caring for people. You're doing this or that. What's what's the deal with you? And we saw last week that the theology behind what Peter is talking about here in terms of kindness, good works done for people that have nothing to offer us, that we're doing purely out of a desire to minister to them, causes people to stop and listen.

And it did in the early church. We saw that in the first three centuries of the early church, the the the way that Christianity rocked the Roman Empire was not because they were great preachers or that they had all these amazing books to read. Most of them couldn't read. How did the early church rock the Roman Empire? Because they cared for widows and they cared for orphans and they cared for strangers.

They cared for the people that the folks that go to the Aphrodite Temple and the Zeus Temple could care less about. That's who they cared about. And it caused the world to go, what is the deal with these Christians? And, again, the theology behind this, we saw last week, is that everybody is made in the image of God. And even a non Christian is an image bearer of God and wired by God for God and for seeing glimpses of God in the world around them.

And we had a diagram, if you put that up a moment, that illustrates how this works and what Peter is getting at here. What is the common ground that the Christian and the non Christian have? It is this image bearing, the fact that we have a conscience within us. And in the world, even even in the world, these things are admired. Moral beauty, love, self sacrifice, compassion.

These are all things that cause people in the world to go, you know what? That's good. Right? That's that's a good thing. And so in the world, if you're about, you know, stopping human trafficking or if you're into caring for children in crisis or something like that, even nonbelievers look at that and go, wow.

That's really awesome that you're doing that. K? It's common ground that we have in the world. So with that said, let's build now on this a guide to gospel conversations. How do we do this?

And the first thing that we see Peter saying here is that unbelievers observe something in us that they don't have. And you might say, is it our haircuts? Is it our clothes? Is it you know? No.

That's silly. It's not those things. That's not what makes Christianity distinctive. It is hope. That's what Peter says.

They come to us, and they ask us about the hope that we have. Now when is hope observable? When everything's great? No. I don't need hope when my life is fantastic and and everything's wonderful.

We talked about this last week that part of our struggle is that we're all the time projecting to everybody else that we're fantastic, and everything's fantastic. And so, you know, we come to each other. We say, how are you doing? I'm doing awesome. How are you doing?

I'm awesomer. Right? Everything's fantastic. I'm good. The kids are wonderful.

It's like I'm living a panacea of wonderfulness all the time. And we project these kinds of everything's going great, and people can't relate to that. Because the reality in the world is that everything is not great. And there might be times where things seem to be, you know, okay and we're doing okay. But generally speaking, we are either entering a crisis or we just got out of one.

And that's true in the unbelieving world. So that, yes, they can common ground is moral beauty. Common ground is is love and self sacrifice. But a huge common ground that we have with the people around us is pain and suffering. Christians have pain and suffering.

Non Christians have pain and suffering. The difference is we have hope in the midst of it, which they don't have. So imagine with me, for example, first century, Asia Minor Christian Frank applies for membership in a, business society, business guild that was gonna help his business and build relationships and stuff like that. He applies for membership in it. The board of directors gets together and they say, I understand Frank's one of those Christians.

Have you heard about these Christians? Yeah. They don't go to the Temple Of Aphrodite. They're not at the Temple Of Zeus. We don't want this guy in our guild.

I say we deny him just because of that. They go, that's probably a good idea. We don't wanna associate with people like that. The board member goes to Frank and says, hey, you know what? You've got a fine business and things look good, but you're a Christian, so you're out.

You can't or you're not in. We're not we're not accepting you. After sharing the news, Frank is surprisingly upbeat. The board member leaves thinking to himself, well, he took that quite well. What's up with Frank?

First century Asia Minor Christian student Sally is at school. Everybody knows that her family does not worship the emperor and does not worship at Aphrodite's temple. Word gets out that maybe she's one of those Christians that people have heard about. The parents warn their kids, don't associate with Sally. The cool girls in the school, they are so ostracizing Sally, but they sense from Sally that Sally's kind of okay with it.

Like, doesn't she know she should be upset that she's not sitting at our table? It's almost like her identity isn't found in what the cool girls think about her. And they don't know what to deal. How what's up with Sally? One more.

You're like, well, he was really creative in his preparation this week. Yes, I was. First century Asia Minor Christian John is at the hospital. He's seeing the doctors. He's seeing the nurses.

They're seeing him. He's one of a, you know, 100 patients that week. He's going through some health crisis, just like everybody else is. He doesn't wanna be in pain. He doesn't wanna be sick, just like everybody else doesn't wanna be sick.

But they sense him, John, that he has something going on in the midst of that. Like he's talking about how he's praying for the doctor. He's praying for the nurse. And that, you know, he's very confident that that God is with him. And they the nurses sense in John something in the midst of his pain that they're all dealing with pain and stuff in their life that they're like, he's got something I don't got.

And I wonder about John. Rich, poor, atheist, agnostic, religious person, educated, powerful, not, everybody suffers, don't we? Everybody goes through tragedy, don't we? We all have things that we deal with. And the difference that Peter is highlighting in verse 15 is that Christians go through these things with hope that the world doesn't have.

But the world observes us having it and wants it as well, even though they don't know where it comes from. And they come to the hope demonstrating Christian and ask, where did you get that from? Where did you get that from? And that doesn't mean that we don't cry and we don't grieve and we don't do things Jesus himself did. It just means that in the midst of that, we have a kind of vertical hope and assurance in terms of God and His presence with us and His promises for us that the unbelieving world imagine, you know, if you've a Christian a long time, you sort of get used to that promises of God and assurance from God.

The world goes through these things. They got nothing. I do funerals sometimes. You know, the funeral home will call and say, hey. Will you come over and do this funeral?

And I'll I'll do the funeral of of family. I mean, there's no faith, and they're like, hey. Can we get this done soon? And you just get this sense that there's just it's just emptiness. Right?

Or maybe they don't want it to get done. They stand at the casket and they're weaving. They don't want to close the door. Why? Because there's no hope of anything.

Once that door once that casket goes closed, we never see that person ever again. And you just sense that. Right? Totally different than a Christian funeral that's filled with hope, the hope of the gospel, the hope of eternal life. And so Peter is bringing this up, and what I am urging us here is that we must live our faith out in the midst of our pain and be honest about it, or the world is never going to observe it in us.

In other words, authenticity. Okay? Authenticity. A great place for that to start, of course, is in the church. And even in the church, we still sort of project this like, hey, I'm like it's like me and Billy Graham.

We're just like amazing, godly, spiritual people. And we all know that's not true. It's not true for me. Is it true for you? So maybe authenticity let's start in the church and just being real with each other.

But it must transfer into the world around us, which we're not good at, are we? But to be honest with our struggles or people are never going to realize the hope that is in us. Because the only time it's like hope's like the stars. When do you see the stars? It's never when the sun's up.

It's when the sun goes down that you see the stars. Hope is never seen when life is fantastic all the time. It's when life stinks that suddenly hope becomes evident. So unbelievers must see the hope that we have, and the only way they see it is when we are real about the struggles that we have. Now all of this is assuming relationship with unbelievers, isn't it?

We're gonna get into that in a little bit. But everybody knows what it's like when work is frustrating. Everybody can relate to a home and family and relationships that has conflict and strife. Everybody knows what it's like to have financial struggles. Everybody knows what it's like to suffer loss and hurt.

Everybody knows what it's like to have such a crazy busy schedule. You feel like you're, you know, the the the not the rat. What's the the hamster on the wheel. Thank you. We all know what it's like to be discouraged.

We all know what it's like to have doubts about life. And one of the most powerful witnesses that God's people have is when we go through those things, all of those same struggles, and yet we say and believe that there is good news found in Jesus Christ. And I have found Jesus to be a powerful help in the midst of my trial. Now we say, why is this so important? Here's why.

And this is kind of part of what I'm saying here is I'm arguing against an approach to evangelism that just uses canned presentations. I don't know if you know what I'm talking about there. And there's a place for them. But when we just automatically go into robo evangelist with people that are going through you know, the person goes, you know, I'm my my I just found out my mom has cancer. And you're like, I'm gonna take you down the Romans Road.

They're like, what? Are you talking to me? My mom's got cancer. And when we just do these canned gospel presentations, it doesn't connect the gospel with real life struggles. K?

Let's go to Charleston right now. Why? Why is the world paying attention to Charleston? Absolute tragedy that happened, and that is evil and wrong in every way. K?

But within a few days, we have we see some amazing good that has come from that as that church steps forward and says, we forgive the murderer. We forgive the murderer. Now the world sits up and goes, what? What'd you say? Because you're supposed to be, like, all about vengeance right now.

You're supposed to, like, get a mob and go and and get the guy and just, you know, beat him to a pulp. You're supposed to be all, like, hateful and angry about this, but you're offering grace and forgiveness. I bet the church is overflowing today, don't you think? And some of them are going to be visitors who are thinking to themselves, if this church can forgive that guy, they've got something I don't have because I'm still dealing with what my dad did to me when I was growing up. I'm going show up here.

Want see what this is about. And you see, it connects the gospel with real life. And that's what Peter is calling us to. K? To give an answer for the hope that is in us.

Where have we got this hope? We have this hope by faith in Jesus and the promises of God becoming real to us by the Holy Spirit and trusting in a God who sent his Son. Romans eight thirty two, “if God did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also along with him graciously give us all things?” If God gave me Jesus, he can give me what I need in this trial, and my hope is in him. That's the Christian response.

And all of a sudden, the gospel hits home in pain and in trials and in suffering when they see how the hope is working in us and they ask us about it. K? So second thing Peter highlights here is the tone with which we speak. Again, look at verse fifteen and sixteen. Always ready to make a defense to anyone who asks for a reason for the hope that is in you.

Some people read that and they're like, that's right. We're arming for bear. Well, I'm going go into that. I'm going to out argue. I can out argue anybody about the gospel.

I'm ready. Oh, just ask me about it. But then Peter adds this, yet do it with gentleness and respect. Gentleness and respect. Some of you can relate to this.

I was raised in in the church and we were raised in a more confrontational style of evangelism, you know, where you sort of get the person by the throat metaphorically speaking and you just pound them with the gospel, and you hope the Holy Spirit saves them. And you have, you know, these answers for these questions. And there's a place for that. Don't get me wrong. But the vast majority of people, that's not our gig.

Right? I don't even got no PhD in Christian apologetics. We're just normal people. Right? And so when we get all confrontational and high how do you respond when somebody, like, confronts you?

It's like, oh, that's what you believe? Well, let me tell you a better way. And that person's like, wait. My mama believed this. My grandma believed this.

And now you're gonna tell me this. And they get all what? Defensive. And how well do we listen when we're on the defense? Right?

So Peter's like, hey, the tone with which you approach people is critical. Be gentle. Be meek. This is the sense that the other person gets as we're talking to them. Stay calm.

Be kind. Listen. It endears the truth that we want to share with them. And you might be like, oh, no. That's not the way that Jesus did.

Wait a second. What did he do with the woman at the well as an example of what I'm talking about? This woman was in sexual sin. Jesus knew it. And who's the only one who actually has the right to be sort of judgmental towards people?

It would be Jesus. And yet does Jesus say, you're a sinner. Let's talk about sin, you know, and your sexual sin living with a man, divorce all these other guys, you're terrible. You need me. Is that what he said?

No. What did he say? He talked to her in a way that drew her in. Right? He drew her in.

He built rapport with her. She sensed that he cared about her. And when the whole conversation was done, what does she do? She runs into the village and says, come talk to this guy. This is amazing.

That's a sign of a really good gospel conversation when they go into their town and say, everybody, come talk to this guy. I've never had that happen, but it would be wonderful if it did. Jesus had a tone of gentleness. And he says, secondly, and respect and respect. Greek word there is phobos.

We get the word phobia from it. The scholars debate whether this is phobia respect for the other person or respect for God, probably for God, but I think it applies. When I have respect for God, I am respectful, you know, with other people. But the whole the point is, I think, similar to gentleness where there is a sense as I am doing this that I am I am respectful of the other person. I'm not an authority.

Like, I'm not coming at this like I got all the answers and down with you. I'm not speaking down the mountain at people. I'm respecting their story. I'm respecting their life. I'm listening to them.

They're listening to me. That's the kind of conversation that wins people's hearts, isn't it? Not victory all, not demeaning, not what's wrong with you because you don't believe this, not let me show you how smart I am with my answers, but a respectful conversation, a winsome one. So towards the goal of doing this, I have some tips. Those are just kind of a practical message.

Right? I've got some tips for how to engage in gospel conversations or what I'm calling a lifestyle of evangelism. And here's the first one, is that we must be intentional. We must be intentional about this. There's a writer named Jonathan Dodson. 

I've learned most of these tips are from him, actually. I give him credit for it. But one of the things that he talks about in terms of intentionality is the fact that many, many Christians have no time for unbelievers. By the time I get done doing all my church activities and I get done all my work activities and my, you know, school activities, there's no margin for relationships with an unbeliever. Maybe if I could ask you, is that true for you?

Do you have any intentional margin that you create to have and to build a relationship with somebody that doesn't know Jesus? Because right now, even as I'm talking to somebody, you're probably like, I got no time for this. I got no time for this. And yet, what has Jesus left us here to do? Why did why wasn't it instant rapture?

You know, when you become a Christian, boop, up you go. Why are we still here? Is it so that we can, you know, work and do well? No. We're here to be a witness to Jesus Christ.

Right? And to share the good news of Jesus with as many people as we possibly can. That's why we're here. And so this is partly a matter of prioritizing this and creating margin in our schedules so that we can have relationships with unbelievers. And frankly, I say that to myself as much as I say it to you.

I just said to Jennifer recently, by the time I get done pastoring the church and all this stuff, I feel like I have little time for relationships with people that aren't a part of the church. I feel convicted about that. Maybe you can too. So some practical tips on how to create context for relationship where these things can happen. This is from Jonathan Dodson.

Number one, eat with non Christians. What do we all have in common with unbelievers? We all like to eat, and we all eat three times a day. Some of us, more than that. So but I digress.

Most people are willing to have lunch with a coworker or a neighbor or to grill out, you know, to barbecue with with a neighbor. You want come over for burgers? Most people are like, that sounds nice. And what does it also sound like? It sounds like friendship, doesn't it?

See? Eat with non Christians. It's not like when you sit down and you go, okay. I'm gonna order, and now I take you down the Romans Road. You know?

Be normal. Talk about stuff. You know? Maybe you have, you know, 10 of those before spiritual stuff comes up. Jesus did this.

He Jesus used meals to build relationship with people. We see him doing it often in the gospels. Secondly, he says, walk, don't drive. Walk, don't drive. Is your neighborhood like mine where often it's like this?

People, we live in houses. In the morning, the bridge of the moat goes up called a garage door. And we're in our cars, and we pull out. We're in our bubble. We drive through the neighborhood.

We might wave, little wave there, little wave there, and off we go. And at night, we come home, still in our bubble, right? Maybe a wave, maybe a wave. The drawbridge goes up of the moat, the garage door. And we pull in, the bridge goes down of the moat, garage door goes down.

And I can live in my neighborhood without any conversation, if I wanted to, without one conversation with anybody. And many people do that. Right? Many people do that. Christians shouldn't do that.

Agreed? Who's the best neighbors in every neighborhood? It's the evangelical Christians, I hope. Right? So part of this we have to fight against is to he suggests walking.

Okay? Walk around the neighborhood. Just walk. I would tell you, from based on my experience, get a stroller. It doesn't matter if there's a kid in there or not.

Just have a stroller because a stroller is like it's like instant friendship. You know? Just like, oh, oh, oh, it's so cute. And, I mean, strangers at the mall suddenly are like your best friends if you have a stroller. But the walking point here is that it allows an opportunity to just meet people, to say hi, engage them in some way.

Walk around your neighborhood. Somebody else I read suggested, you know, sit in front of your house, not behind your house. We typically want to sit in the backyard, you know, sort of isolate in our little cocoon. Sit on the driveway and have your little fire pit there and marshmallows and people that are walking by be like, hey, and, you know, front yard conversations. Third, be a regular.

Be a regular. What this means is that if there's a coffee house you like, a cafe that you like, go to that one over and over again because then you get to know the waitstaff, and you get to know maybe the owner, and you get to know some of the other patrons there. And over time, you're able to build relationship. If you're always going to this one, that one, they don't know you, you don't know them, and nothing happens. So be a regular.

Hobby with non Christians. Hobby with non Christians. Everybody's got hobbies, mutual points of interest. So if you like to fish, you know, and there's a dude who lives next to you and you're like, hey, most men can say this, want to go fishing? That's like male love language, isn't it?

That's like that's like women saying, do you want to get a pedicure together? I mean, it's like, wow, I didn't know that we were that good of friends. We're going to fish together and then go fishing or, you know, watch the Bears game or whatever it is. You know, we all have these hobbies. And for men, a lot of those are kind of points of shared interest, hobby with them.

Friendships can form over mutual interest. Here's another, volunteer with nonprofits. This is, again, it's a non kind of confrontational sort of way to engage people. If Habitat for Humanity is building a house in Gary and your neighbor's a kind of handyman, why don't you say, hey, you wanna spend three hours on Saturday and we'll go do this Habitat for Humanity thing? And you get to drive up and you get to do something together.

And serving others might sort of tap a little meaning place in his heart. You never know what might come of that. Participate in city events. No matter what city you live in, all of them around here have cleaning days, and they've got sort of the corn fest or they got this, that, or the other. Be a part of that.

Get your kids off the Xbox and go clean the city for three hours. And you're going to meet other people that care about the city, and they're a part of that, and they see you caring, and you can build relationships with people that you don't know. Here's a big one. Serve your neighbors. Serve your neighbors.

Now the first part is assuming that you know their name. We live in a day where people live next to people that they don't know their name. And I'll be honest, it's not a very big circle around my house that I know people's names. So we say that to some measure of shame. But serve your neighbors.

And this can be big and small ways. It can be, you know, blowing out the snow on the driveway, or it can be helping with raking the leaves, or it can be maybe a more meaningful thing if they're going through a crisis or a trial of some kind where you help them out in some way. All of those things communicate something that ought to be true in our hearts. Right? If we're called the second great command is to love our neighbor as ourself, it communicates what?

Love. And love is a universal language of relationship. Help them out, especially in their times of crisis. It tears down defenses. My wife, Jennifer, is particularly good at this.

She's got a little bit of an eye for it. And we recently we have a neighbor that's going through a terrible kind of long term kind of crisis. And so Jennifer fixed this feast for them. And we showed up on their doorstep unannounced, bags of food. And they opened the door and we're like, hey, we just know it's been a tough time.

We brought this stuff for you. How do you think they responded to that? Slam the door. I told you look out for those neighbors. No.

They were like, really? You know, in the church, that's more been more sort of normal, but in the world, people don't do that kind of thing. They're like, really? Come come on in. And so we stepped in and we got, you know, all the here's this and this gotta heat at 03:50 and here's the dessert and all that.

And by the way, how's it going? And now in that kind of context of care, now the eyes fill with tears, and you we had a really special moment with them. Does it feel any different now when we are, like, waving in the morning? They're like Why? Because they're like, well, that's a house of people that care about us right there.

How? Just serving them. Serve them. A little bit goes a really long way. Do you have a neighbor that you could serve in some practical way that might build rapport with them, might communicate that you care about them?

So take a moment right now and just think through that list. Let me say them again. And maybe you can identify two things here, and we're going give you this list as you leave today, that maybe you could sort of renew involvement in mission work this way. Eat with non Christians. Walk, don't drive.

Be a regular hobby with non Christians. Volunteer with nonprofits. Participate in city events. Serve your neighbors. The next tip I have, and I'm not going spend a lot of time on this, but, is this, is be a story listener.

Be a story listener. Everybody has a story, and everybody's story is sacred to them. So too often, Christians, we we're like, oh, I've gotta be evangelistic. So now I'm again, I'm having lunch with you, and I'm gonna God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life. And I've got a little booklet here right here I'd like to take you through.

Would you smile as I do it? Point number one, point number two, point number three. And they're sitting there eating their chips going, Am I buying a vacuum when this is done? What's going on? A great starting point with people is to simply ask their story.

Ask their story. Everybody loves talking about themselves. Find out where they're from. Find out what kind of house they or home they grew up in, what their dad did, mom did, whatever. Find out their story.

And as part of that, if you've built if you've, you know, vacuumed their house or blew out the snow or done whatever, they'll share the failures as well. And in those failures then, sort of that conversation moves to that kind of deeper level where now you're sort of communing together. Listen to it. Don't interrupt it and go, well, if Jesus was in your life right there, then this would have been the feeling you would have had. Don't do that.

Why? Because we're not we're in here with gentleness and respect. We're not in here as know it alls. We're we're we're sinners too. Listen to their story.

It tells them that you care about them, which, of course, is the key. And then after hearing their story, tell your story. Tell your story. And by that, I don't mean the how all your kids are wonderful and you were amazing in in high school and what a great athlete you were and, you know, how you're the best employee. Know, take out all the hubris, take out all the pride, and just be a real person and tell your story.

And as part of telling that story, talk about the difference that Jesus has made in your life. Simply that. And don't get all sort of weird as you do it. Sometimes it feels that way, doesn't it, where you can talk about the college you went to, the school that you grew up in, but when you sort of if you say anything spiritual, it's like beads of sweat come down your face, and you know, it's it just weirds people out. Don't be awkward.

Can I say it that way? Just be normal. Be normal. Tell your story. Now you might be like me and think, my story is boring, especially my faith story.

Grew up in a Christian home, became a Christian when I was six, blah blah blah. I wanna encourage you that I doubt, for example, in Charleston right now, they care about when hope came to that church. They just care about how. Right? How?

And this again is where I think the formula approach is unhelpful because the gospel is not a formula. It is a person. The gospel is Jesus. And if we are Christians here today, that means Jesus has transformed our lives. And yes, we go through trials, and yes, we go through troubles, and none of us is super Christian.

But there is a reality to it that we feel in the midst of our sufferings, and we can share with other people who don't have that hope. Just talk about the difference your faith made with when you lost your job or the church or something like that that just kind of connects the gospel with real life, and people will listen to it. People will listen. And, of course, this assumes that hope is a reality in our own hearts. The Bible or the Bible, Spurgeon said, evangelism is one beggar telling another beggar where he found bread.

Maybe you've heard that before. But that assumes that the one beggar actually has found it. Tell them about that. Tell them about how, you know, your dad or that college friend or whatever it was introduced you to Jesus. Talk about him like he's as real as the wind.

Talk about him as a real person. And the world will think, man, this is like real to you, isn't it? Yeah. It is real. It's made a real difference in my life.

I kinda like that. I wish I had some of that hope in my heart. That's what they need to hear. So have it here first. Share it second.

And finally, I would just simply say this, pray for people. Pray for your neighbors. Is there or your coworker. Is there is there anybody currently that you are actively praying for that God would allow you to be a part of them coming to know the Lord Jesus? Are you praying for anybody by name?

Or how about in your neighborhood? As maybe you're having a time of prayer just to pray up for the two houses around you. You know? Pray for opportunities. Pray that God would help you be faithful to opportunities that he would provide.

Pray for wisdom when they come. K? So be intentional. Be ready. Be winsome and gentle.

Be real and authentic. Listen, and then speak and tell your story of hope in Jesus. And the world will listen, and we hope we'll come to believe in Christ as well. Right? And wouldn't that be a great day?

Seeing them people being baptized, starting to disciple them, see them to sort of grow and experience the blessing that we have had in the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what we want. So I'm gonna ask you to stand with me right now, and let's just pray. Let's just pray this very truth. In fact, I'm gonna give you just a moment to pray for that person in your life.

And maybe you gotta come up with a name real quick right now, but that'll be good. Why don't you pray for one person by name that is in your sphere of relationship and ask God to help you be a faithful witness to them.

* This transcript was generated using AI transcription technology and reviewed for accuracy but may contain errors. Please refer to the original audio for precise wording.

Study Guide for Spiritual Exiles, 1 Peter 3:16-17

Scripture Reference: 1 Peter 3:16-17

Visit the series page: Exiles: A study in 1 Peter

Donate to Support The Journey

Sermon Series: Spiritual Exiles 

Message: A Guide to Gospel Conversations

Airdate: 10/20 –10/21/26

Programs: 2382 and 2383

Well, I didn't know if I was going to be here today, and I am. So that means that we do not have a baby on the way. I checked my phone between services just to make sure that nothing had happened. But this is the week. So hopefully, we'll have a fun little announcement we'll share with you.

I said to Jennifer, I hope she's not born on Father's Day because I want Father's Day to be about me, right? So if she could avoid Father's Day, that would be great. I said jokingly. But, yes. So we're, we're excited about a new addition to the family.

We appreciate your prayers about that. We really do. I also wanted to give a little shout out to our Executive Director of Operations, Dave Harvey, who I think is in this service. It's his birthday today. And we have this is the guy that we assume so many things around here are operating right and working right in the facilities and all the different things.

This is the guy that's managing all of that. I'm so thankful for Dave Harvey. And today is his birthday, and I think he's somewhere in here. So can we give him a one clap, happy birthday? I'm confusing some of you with that, but happy birthday, David Harvey. 

Okay. Today, we're we're this is a message it's kind of an application message, sort of a practical message coming out of last week's study in first Peter chapter three verse 15, this fairly well known passage about being ready to give an answer for the hope that is in us. And we're talking about the church as witness. We're talking about the church on mission. And so today, I wanna talk more practically about how do we engage people in gospel conversations.

The assumption is that Christians will do this, but how do we do that? And so I've got some very practical tips today. We're gonna get into that. I'd like to read the text though again. And so let me begin reading first Peter chapter three verse 13, and please listen as I read God's word.

“Now who is there to harm you if you are zealous for what is good? But even if you should suffer for righteousness sake, you will be blessed. Have no fear of them nor be troubled, but in your hearts, regard Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you. Yet do it with gentleness and respect, having a good conscience so that when you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame. For it is better to suffer for doing good if that should be God’s will than for doing evil.”

I came across this week a an ancient Chinese proverb that I'd like to share with you. It goes like this. Man stand for long time with mouth open before roast duck fly in. It just struck my funny my funny bone. Some of you are still pondering it, like, does that mean?

A man will stand for a long time before a fully prepared and cooked duck will fly into his mouth. There's a truth in there. Right? What is it saying there? That you can sit back and just open your mouth and hope and think that what you're craving and what you're desiring is going to fly in, but you stayed a long time for roast duck to fly in.

It doesn't happen. And our evangelism in the church often is like the Chinese man standing with his mouth open hoping the right thing flies in. And we miss the fact that while God is sovereign over salvation, he works through means to accomplish it. And the means by which he does this is the church, and specifically is the people in the church engaging in gospel conversations with unbelievers. That's the way that it happens.

In fact, if you're a Christian here today, there was somebody in your life that engaged in some short or long term conversation with you that shared the gospel of Jesus with you, and you are a Christian as a result of it. And what happens often is somebody has that conversation with us, and then we turn into the Chinese man waiting for the roast duck to fly in. We sit back, we isolate, we're by ourselves, and we think, oh, some how this happens, I guess. When that's not how it happened for us. Somebody engaged us, and now we're called as Christians to engage other people in gospel conversations so that they can come to know the same Lord Jesus, the same hope that we have.

And so that's where we're going today. It doesn't just happen. Roast ducks don't just fly in. How does it happen? And Peter is writing to Christians who, as we've said many times now in our series, they are in persecution.

They are in crisis. They're in a place hostile to their faith. You might be in a tough time right now yourself. Maybe you're in some kind of season of trial in your life. And you're thinking to yourself, you know, this is a time really I might have to put ministry on the back burner.

When in reality, this is prime time opportunity for you to give the reason for the hope that is in you. And that's where we're going here is how do we do that and when are what are the context within which and how do we cultivate those contexts so that we can have these kinds of conversations? Now Peter says first in verse 13 that lives of kindness and compassion lived out in the world earn the right for us to be heard. It causes the the world to sort of stop and pay attention. Oh, wait.

You're being kind. You're you're caring for people. You're doing this or that. What's what's the deal with you? And we saw last week that the theology behind what Peter is talking about here in terms of kindness, good works done for people that have nothing to offer us, that we're doing purely out of a desire to minister to them, causes people to stop and listen.

And it did in the early church. We saw that in the first three centuries of the early church, the the the way that Christianity rocked the Roman Empire was not because they were great preachers or that they had all these amazing books to read. Most of them couldn't read. How did the early church rock the Roman Empire? Because they cared for widows and they cared for orphans and they cared for strangers.

They cared for the people that the folks that go to the Aphrodite Temple and the Zeus Temple could care less about. That's who they cared about. And it caused the world to go, what is the deal with these Christians? And, again, the theology behind this, we saw last week, is that everybody is made in the image of God. And even a non Christian is an image bearer of God and wired by God for God and for seeing glimpses of God in the world around them.

And we had a diagram, if you put that up a moment, that illustrates how this works and what Peter is getting at here. What is the common ground that the Christian and the non Christian have? It is this image bearing, the fact that we have a conscience within us. And in the world, even even in the world, these things are admired. Moral beauty, love, self sacrifice, compassion.

These are all things that cause people in the world to go, you know what? That's good. Right? That's that's a good thing. And so in the world, if you're about, you know, stopping human trafficking or if you're into caring for children in crisis or something like that, even nonbelievers look at that and go, wow.

That's really awesome that you're doing that. K? It's common ground that we have in the world. So with that said, let's build now on this a guide to gospel conversations. How do we do this?

And the first thing that we see Peter saying here is that unbelievers observe something in us that they don't have. And you might say, is it our haircuts? Is it our clothes? Is it you know? No.

That's silly. It's not those things. That's not what makes Christianity distinctive. It is hope. That's what Peter says.

They come to us, and they ask us about the hope that we have. Now when is hope observable? When everything's great? No. I don't need hope when my life is fantastic and and everything's wonderful.

We talked about this last week that part of our struggle is that we're all the time projecting to everybody else that we're fantastic, and everything's fantastic. And so, you know, we come to each other. We say, how are you doing? I'm doing awesome. How are you doing?

I'm awesomer. Right? Everything's fantastic. I'm good. The kids are wonderful.

It's like I'm living a panacea of wonderfulness all the time. And we project these kinds of everything's going great, and people can't relate to that. Because the reality in the world is that everything is not great. And there might be times where things seem to be, you know, okay and we're doing okay. But generally speaking, we are either entering a crisis or we just got out of one.

And that's true in the unbelieving world. So that, yes, they can common ground is moral beauty. Common ground is is love and self sacrifice. But a huge common ground that we have with the people around us is pain and suffering. Christians have pain and suffering.

Non Christians have pain and suffering. The difference is we have hope in the midst of it, which they don't have. So imagine with me, for example, first century, Asia Minor Christian Frank applies for membership in a, business society, business guild that was gonna help his business and build relationships and stuff like that. He applies for membership in it. The board of directors gets together and they say, I understand Frank's one of those Christians.

Have you heard about these Christians? Yeah. They don't go to the Temple Of Aphrodite. They're not at the Temple Of Zeus. We don't want this guy in our guild.

I say we deny him just because of that. They go, that's probably a good idea. We don't wanna associate with people like that. The board member goes to Frank and says, hey, you know what? You've got a fine business and things look good, but you're a Christian, so you're out.

You can't or you're not in. We're not we're not accepting you. After sharing the news, Frank is surprisingly upbeat. The board member leaves thinking to himself, well, he took that quite well. What's up with Frank?

First century Asia Minor Christian student Sally is at school. Everybody knows that her family does not worship the emperor and does not worship at Aphrodite's temple. Word gets out that maybe she's one of those Christians that people have heard about. The parents warn their kids, don't associate with Sally. The cool girls in the school, they are so ostracizing Sally, but they sense from Sally that Sally's kind of okay with it.

Like, doesn't she know she should be upset that she's not sitting at our table? It's almost like her identity isn't found in what the cool girls think about her. And they don't know what to deal. How what's up with Sally? One more.

You're like, well, he was really creative in his preparation this week. Yes, I was. First century Asia Minor Christian John is at the hospital. He's seeing the doctors. He's seeing the nurses.

They're seeing him. He's one of a, you know, 100 patients that week. He's going through some health crisis, just like everybody else is. He doesn't wanna be in pain. He doesn't wanna be sick, just like everybody else doesn't wanna be sick.

But they sense him, John, that he has something going on in the midst of that. Like he's talking about how he's praying for the doctor. He's praying for the nurse. And that, you know, he's very confident that that God is with him. And they the nurses sense in John something in the midst of his pain that they're all dealing with pain and stuff in their life that they're like, he's got something I don't got.

And I wonder about John. Rich, poor, atheist, agnostic, religious person, educated, powerful, not, everybody suffers, don't we? Everybody goes through tragedy, don't we? We all have things that we deal with. And the difference that Peter is highlighting in verse 15 is that Christians go through these things with hope that the world doesn't have.

But the world observes us having it and wants it as well, even though they don't know where it comes from. And they come to the hope demonstrating Christian and ask, where did you get that from? Where did you get that from? And that doesn't mean that we don't cry and we don't grieve and we don't do things Jesus himself did. It just means that in the midst of that, we have a kind of vertical hope and assurance in terms of God and His presence with us and His promises for us that the unbelieving world imagine, you know, if you've a Christian a long time, you sort of get used to that promises of God and assurance from God.

The world goes through these things. They got nothing. I do funerals sometimes. You know, the funeral home will call and say, hey. Will you come over and do this funeral?

And I'll I'll do the funeral of of family. I mean, there's no faith, and they're like, hey. Can we get this done soon? And you just get this sense that there's just it's just emptiness. Right?

Or maybe they don't want it to get done. They stand at the casket and they're weaving. They don't want to close the door. Why? Because there's no hope of anything.

Once that door once that casket goes closed, we never see that person ever again. And you just sense that. Right? Totally different than a Christian funeral that's filled with hope, the hope of the gospel, the hope of eternal life. And so Peter is bringing this up, and what I am urging us here is that we must live our faith out in the midst of our pain and be honest about it, or the world is never going to observe it in us.

In other words, authenticity. Okay? Authenticity. A great place for that to start, of course, is in the church. And even in the church, we still sort of project this like, hey, I'm like it's like me and Billy Graham.

We're just like amazing, godly, spiritual people. And we all know that's not true. It's not true for me. Is it true for you? So maybe authenticity let's start in the church and just being real with each other.

But it must transfer into the world around us, which we're not good at, are we? But to be honest with our struggles or people are never going to realize the hope that is in us. Because the only time it's like hope's like the stars. When do you see the stars? It's never when the sun's up.

It's when the sun goes down that you see the stars. Hope is never seen when life is fantastic all the time. It's when life stinks that suddenly hope becomes evident. So unbelievers must see the hope that we have, and the only way they see it is when we are real about the struggles that we have. Now all of this is assuming relationship with unbelievers, isn't it?

We're gonna get into that in a little bit. But everybody knows what it's like when work is frustrating. Everybody can relate to a home and family and relationships that has conflict and strife. Everybody knows what it's like to have financial struggles. Everybody knows what it's like to suffer loss and hurt.

Everybody knows what it's like to have such a crazy busy schedule. You feel like you're, you know, the the the not the rat. What's the the hamster on the wheel. Thank you. We all know what it's like to be discouraged.

We all know what it's like to have doubts about life. And one of the most powerful witnesses that God's people have is when we go through those things, all of those same struggles, and yet we say and believe that there is good news found in Jesus Christ. And I have found Jesus to be a powerful help in the midst of my trial. Now we say, why is this so important? Here's why.

And this is kind of part of what I'm saying here is I'm arguing against an approach to evangelism that just uses canned presentations. I don't know if you know what I'm talking about there. And there's a place for them. But when we just automatically go into robo evangelist with people that are going through you know, the person goes, you know, I'm my my I just found out my mom has cancer. And you're like, I'm gonna take you down the Romans Road.

They're like, what? Are you talking to me? My mom's got cancer. And when we just do these canned gospel presentations, it doesn't connect the gospel with real life struggles. K?

Let's go to Charleston right now. Why? Why is the world paying attention to Charleston? Absolute tragedy that happened, and that is evil and wrong in every way. K?

But within a few days, we have we see some amazing good that has come from that as that church steps forward and says, we forgive the murderer. We forgive the murderer. Now the world sits up and goes, what? What'd you say? Because you're supposed to be, like, all about vengeance right now.

You're supposed to, like, get a mob and go and and get the guy and just, you know, beat him to a pulp. You're supposed to be all, like, hateful and angry about this, but you're offering grace and forgiveness. I bet the church is overflowing today, don't you think? And some of them are going to be visitors who are thinking to themselves, if this church can forgive that guy, they've got something I don't have because I'm still dealing with what my dad did to me when I was growing up. I'm going show up here.

Want see what this is about. And you see, it connects the gospel with real life. And that's what Peter is calling us to. K? To give an answer for the hope that is in us.

Where have we got this hope? We have this hope by faith in Jesus and the promises of God becoming real to us by the Holy Spirit and trusting in a God who sent his Son. Romans eight thirty two, “if God did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also along with him graciously give us all things?” If God gave me Jesus, he can give me what I need in this trial, and my hope is in him. That's the Christian response.

And all of a sudden, the gospel hits home in pain and in trials and in suffering when they see how the hope is working in us and they ask us about it. K? So second thing Peter highlights here is the tone with which we speak. Again, look at verse fifteen and sixteen. Always ready to make a defense to anyone who asks for a reason for the hope that is in you.

Some people read that and they're like, that's right. We're arming for bear. Well, I'm going go into that. I'm going to out argue. I can out argue anybody about the gospel.

I'm ready. Oh, just ask me about it. But then Peter adds this, yet do it with gentleness and respect. Gentleness and respect. Some of you can relate to this.

I was raised in in the church and we were raised in a more confrontational style of evangelism, you know, where you sort of get the person by the throat metaphorically speaking and you just pound them with the gospel, and you hope the Holy Spirit saves them. And you have, you know, these answers for these questions. And there's a place for that. Don't get me wrong. But the vast majority of people, that's not our gig.

Right? I don't even got no PhD in Christian apologetics. We're just normal people. Right? And so when we get all confrontational and high how do you respond when somebody, like, confronts you?

It's like, oh, that's what you believe? Well, let me tell you a better way. And that person's like, wait. My mama believed this. My grandma believed this.

And now you're gonna tell me this. And they get all what? Defensive. And how well do we listen when we're on the defense? Right?

So Peter's like, hey, the tone with which you approach people is critical. Be gentle. Be meek. This is the sense that the other person gets as we're talking to them. Stay calm.

Be kind. Listen. It endears the truth that we want to share with them. And you might be like, oh, no. That's not the way that Jesus did.

Wait a second. What did he do with the woman at the well as an example of what I'm talking about? This woman was in sexual sin. Jesus knew it. And who's the only one who actually has the right to be sort of judgmental towards people?

It would be Jesus. And yet does Jesus say, you're a sinner. Let's talk about sin, you know, and your sexual sin living with a man, divorce all these other guys, you're terrible. You need me. Is that what he said?

No. What did he say? He talked to her in a way that drew her in. Right? He drew her in.

He built rapport with her. She sensed that he cared about her. And when the whole conversation was done, what does she do? She runs into the village and says, come talk to this guy. This is amazing.

That's a sign of a really good gospel conversation when they go into their town and say, everybody, come talk to this guy. I've never had that happen, but it would be wonderful if it did. Jesus had a tone of gentleness. And he says, secondly, and respect and respect. Greek word there is phobos.

We get the word phobia from it. The scholars debate whether this is phobia respect for the other person or respect for God, probably for God, but I think it applies. When I have respect for God, I am respectful, you know, with other people. But the whole the point is, I think, similar to gentleness where there is a sense as I am doing this that I am I am respectful of the other person. I'm not an authority.

Like, I'm not coming at this like I got all the answers and down with you. I'm not speaking down the mountain at people. I'm respecting their story. I'm respecting their life. I'm listening to them.

They're listening to me. That's the kind of conversation that wins people's hearts, isn't it? Not victory all, not demeaning, not what's wrong with you because you don't believe this, not let me show you how smart I am with my answers, but a respectful conversation, a winsome one. So towards the goal of doing this, I have some tips. Those are just kind of a practical message.

Right? I've got some tips for how to engage in gospel conversations or what I'm calling a lifestyle of evangelism. And here's the first one, is that we must be intentional. We must be intentional about this. There's a writer named Jonathan Dodson. 

I've learned most of these tips are from him, actually. I give him credit for it. But one of the things that he talks about in terms of intentionality is the fact that many, many Christians have no time for unbelievers. By the time I get done doing all my church activities and I get done all my work activities and my, you know, school activities, there's no margin for relationships with an unbeliever. Maybe if I could ask you, is that true for you?

Do you have any intentional margin that you create to have and to build a relationship with somebody that doesn't know Jesus? Because right now, even as I'm talking to somebody, you're probably like, I got no time for this. I got no time for this. And yet, what has Jesus left us here to do? Why did why wasn't it instant rapture?

You know, when you become a Christian, boop, up you go. Why are we still here? Is it so that we can, you know, work and do well? No. We're here to be a witness to Jesus Christ.

Right? And to share the good news of Jesus with as many people as we possibly can. That's why we're here. And so this is partly a matter of prioritizing this and creating margin in our schedules so that we can have relationships with unbelievers. And frankly, I say that to myself as much as I say it to you.

I just said to Jennifer recently, by the time I get done pastoring the church and all this stuff, I feel like I have little time for relationships with people that aren't a part of the church. I feel convicted about that. Maybe you can too. So some practical tips on how to create context for relationship where these things can happen. This is from Jonathan Dodson.

Number one, eat with non Christians. What do we all have in common with unbelievers? We all like to eat, and we all eat three times a day. Some of us, more than that. So but I digress.

Most people are willing to have lunch with a coworker or a neighbor or to grill out, you know, to barbecue with with a neighbor. You want come over for burgers? Most people are like, that sounds nice. And what does it also sound like? It sounds like friendship, doesn't it?

See? Eat with non Christians. It's not like when you sit down and you go, okay. I'm gonna order, and now I take you down the Romans Road. You know?

Be normal. Talk about stuff. You know? Maybe you have, you know, 10 of those before spiritual stuff comes up. Jesus did this.

He Jesus used meals to build relationship with people. We see him doing it often in the gospels. Secondly, he says, walk, don't drive. Walk, don't drive. Is your neighborhood like mine where often it's like this?

People, we live in houses. In the morning, the bridge of the moat goes up called a garage door. And we're in our cars, and we pull out. We're in our bubble. We drive through the neighborhood.

We might wave, little wave there, little wave there, and off we go. And at night, we come home, still in our bubble, right? Maybe a wave, maybe a wave. The drawbridge goes up of the moat, the garage door. And we pull in, the bridge goes down of the moat, garage door goes down.

And I can live in my neighborhood without any conversation, if I wanted to, without one conversation with anybody. And many people do that. Right? Many people do that. Christians shouldn't do that.

Agreed? Who's the best neighbors in every neighborhood? It's the evangelical Christians, I hope. Right? So part of this we have to fight against is to he suggests walking.

Okay? Walk around the neighborhood. Just walk. I would tell you, from based on my experience, get a stroller. It doesn't matter if there's a kid in there or not.

Just have a stroller because a stroller is like it's like instant friendship. You know? Just like, oh, oh, oh, it's so cute. And, I mean, strangers at the mall suddenly are like your best friends if you have a stroller. But the walking point here is that it allows an opportunity to just meet people, to say hi, engage them in some way.

Walk around your neighborhood. Somebody else I read suggested, you know, sit in front of your house, not behind your house. We typically want to sit in the backyard, you know, sort of isolate in our little cocoon. Sit on the driveway and have your little fire pit there and marshmallows and people that are walking by be like, hey, and, you know, front yard conversations. Third, be a regular.

Be a regular. What this means is that if there's a coffee house you like, a cafe that you like, go to that one over and over again because then you get to know the waitstaff, and you get to know maybe the owner, and you get to know some of the other patrons there. And over time, you're able to build relationship. If you're always going to this one, that one, they don't know you, you don't know them, and nothing happens. So be a regular.

Hobby with non Christians. Hobby with non Christians. Everybody's got hobbies, mutual points of interest. So if you like to fish, you know, and there's a dude who lives next to you and you're like, hey, most men can say this, want to go fishing? That's like male love language, isn't it?

That's like that's like women saying, do you want to get a pedicure together? I mean, it's like, wow, I didn't know that we were that good of friends. We're going to fish together and then go fishing or, you know, watch the Bears game or whatever it is. You know, we all have these hobbies. And for men, a lot of those are kind of points of shared interest, hobby with them.

Friendships can form over mutual interest. Here's another, volunteer with nonprofits. This is, again, it's a non kind of confrontational sort of way to engage people. If Habitat for Humanity is building a house in Gary and your neighbor's a kind of handyman, why don't you say, hey, you wanna spend three hours on Saturday and we'll go do this Habitat for Humanity thing? And you get to drive up and you get to do something together.

And serving others might sort of tap a little meaning place in his heart. You never know what might come of that. Participate in city events. No matter what city you live in, all of them around here have cleaning days, and they've got sort of the corn fest or they got this, that, or the other. Be a part of that.

Get your kids off the Xbox and go clean the city for three hours. And you're going to meet other people that care about the city, and they're a part of that, and they see you caring, and you can build relationships with people that you don't know. Here's a big one. Serve your neighbors. Serve your neighbors.

Now the first part is assuming that you know their name. We live in a day where people live next to people that they don't know their name. And I'll be honest, it's not a very big circle around my house that I know people's names. So we say that to some measure of shame. But serve your neighbors.

And this can be big and small ways. It can be, you know, blowing out the snow on the driveway, or it can be helping with raking the leaves, or it can be maybe a more meaningful thing if they're going through a crisis or a trial of some kind where you help them out in some way. All of those things communicate something that ought to be true in our hearts. Right? If we're called the second great command is to love our neighbor as ourself, it communicates what?

Love. And love is a universal language of relationship. Help them out, especially in their times of crisis. It tears down defenses. My wife, Jennifer, is particularly good at this.

She's got a little bit of an eye for it. And we recently we have a neighbor that's going through a terrible kind of long term kind of crisis. And so Jennifer fixed this feast for them. And we showed up on their doorstep unannounced, bags of food. And they opened the door and we're like, hey, we just know it's been a tough time.

We brought this stuff for you. How do you think they responded to that? Slam the door. I told you look out for those neighbors. No.

They were like, really? You know, in the church, that's more been more sort of normal, but in the world, people don't do that kind of thing. They're like, really? Come come on in. And so we stepped in and we got, you know, all the here's this and this gotta heat at 03:50 and here's the dessert and all that.

And by the way, how's it going? And now in that kind of context of care, now the eyes fill with tears, and you we had a really special moment with them. Does it feel any different now when we are, like, waving in the morning? They're like Why? Because they're like, well, that's a house of people that care about us right there.

How? Just serving them. Serve them. A little bit goes a really long way. Do you have a neighbor that you could serve in some practical way that might build rapport with them, might communicate that you care about them?

So take a moment right now and just think through that list. Let me say them again. And maybe you can identify two things here, and we're going give you this list as you leave today, that maybe you could sort of renew involvement in mission work this way. Eat with non Christians. Walk, don't drive.

Be a regular hobby with non Christians. Volunteer with nonprofits. Participate in city events. Serve your neighbors. The next tip I have, and I'm not going spend a lot of time on this, but, is this, is be a story listener.

Be a story listener. Everybody has a story, and everybody's story is sacred to them. So too often, Christians, we we're like, oh, I've gotta be evangelistic. So now I'm again, I'm having lunch with you, and I'm gonna God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life. And I've got a little booklet here right here I'd like to take you through.

Would you smile as I do it? Point number one, point number two, point number three. And they're sitting there eating their chips going, Am I buying a vacuum when this is done? What's going on? A great starting point with people is to simply ask their story.

Ask their story. Everybody loves talking about themselves. Find out where they're from. Find out what kind of house they or home they grew up in, what their dad did, mom did, whatever. Find out their story.

And as part of that, if you've built if you've, you know, vacuumed their house or blew out the snow or done whatever, they'll share the failures as well. And in those failures then, sort of that conversation moves to that kind of deeper level where now you're sort of communing together. Listen to it. Don't interrupt it and go, well, if Jesus was in your life right there, then this would have been the feeling you would have had. Don't do that.

Why? Because we're not we're in here with gentleness and respect. We're not in here as know it alls. We're we're we're sinners too. Listen to their story.

It tells them that you care about them, which, of course, is the key. And then after hearing their story, tell your story. Tell your story. And by that, I don't mean the how all your kids are wonderful and you were amazing in in high school and what a great athlete you were and, you know, how you're the best employee. Know, take out all the hubris, take out all the pride, and just be a real person and tell your story.

And as part of telling that story, talk about the difference that Jesus has made in your life. Simply that. And don't get all sort of weird as you do it. Sometimes it feels that way, doesn't it, where you can talk about the college you went to, the school that you grew up in, but when you sort of if you say anything spiritual, it's like beads of sweat come down your face, and you know, it's it just weirds people out. Don't be awkward.

Can I say it that way? Just be normal. Be normal. Tell your story. Now you might be like me and think, my story is boring, especially my faith story.

Grew up in a Christian home, became a Christian when I was six, blah blah blah. I wanna encourage you that I doubt, for example, in Charleston right now, they care about when hope came to that church. They just care about how. Right? How?

And this again is where I think the formula approach is unhelpful because the gospel is not a formula. It is a person. The gospel is Jesus. And if we are Christians here today, that means Jesus has transformed our lives. And yes, we go through trials, and yes, we go through troubles, and none of us is super Christian.

But there is a reality to it that we feel in the midst of our sufferings, and we can share with other people who don't have that hope. Just talk about the difference your faith made with when you lost your job or the church or something like that that just kind of connects the gospel with real life, and people will listen to it. People will listen. And, of course, this assumes that hope is a reality in our own hearts. The Bible or the Bible, Spurgeon said, evangelism is one beggar telling another beggar where he found bread.

Maybe you've heard that before. But that assumes that the one beggar actually has found it. Tell them about that. Tell them about how, you know, your dad or that college friend or whatever it was introduced you to Jesus. Talk about him like he's as real as the wind.

Talk about him as a real person. And the world will think, man, this is like real to you, isn't it? Yeah. It is real. It's made a real difference in my life.

I kinda like that. I wish I had some of that hope in my heart. That's what they need to hear. So have it here first. Share it second.

And finally, I would just simply say this, pray for people. Pray for your neighbors. Is there or your coworker. Is there is there anybody currently that you are actively praying for that God would allow you to be a part of them coming to know the Lord Jesus? Are you praying for anybody by name?

Or how about in your neighborhood? As maybe you're having a time of prayer just to pray up for the two houses around you. You know? Pray for opportunities. Pray that God would help you be faithful to opportunities that he would provide.

Pray for wisdom when they come. K? So be intentional. Be ready. Be winsome and gentle.

Be real and authentic. Listen, and then speak and tell your story of hope in Jesus. And the world will listen, and we hope we'll come to believe in Christ as well. Right? And wouldn't that be a great day?

Seeing them people being baptized, starting to disciple them, see them to sort of grow and experience the blessing that we have had in the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what we want. So I'm gonna ask you to stand with me right now, and let's just pray. Let's just pray this very truth. In fact, I'm gonna give you just a moment to pray for that person in your life.

And maybe you gotta come up with a name real quick right now, but that'll be good. Why don't you pray for one person by name that is in your sphere of relationship and ask God to help you be a faithful witness to them.

* This transcript was generated using AI transcription technology and reviewed for accuracy but may contain errors. Please refer to the original audio for precise wording.

Study Guide for Spiritual Exiles, 1 Peter 3:16-17

Scripture Reference: 1 Peter 3:16-17

Visit the series page: Exiles: A study in 1 Peter

Donate to Support The Journey

Sermon Series: Spiritual Exiles 

Message: A Guide to Gospel Conversations

Airdate: 10/20 –10/21/26

Programs: 2382 and 2383

Well, I didn't know if I was going to be here today, and I am. So that means that we do not have a baby on the way. I checked my phone between services just to make sure that nothing had happened. But this is the week. So hopefully, we'll have a fun little announcement we'll share with you.

I said to Jennifer, I hope she's not born on Father's Day because I want Father's Day to be about me, right? So if she could avoid Father's Day, that would be great. I said jokingly. But, yes. So we're, we're excited about a new addition to the family.

We appreciate your prayers about that. We really do. I also wanted to give a little shout out to our Executive Director of Operations, Dave Harvey, who I think is in this service. It's his birthday today. And we have this is the guy that we assume so many things around here are operating right and working right in the facilities and all the different things.

This is the guy that's managing all of that. I'm so thankful for Dave Harvey. And today is his birthday, and I think he's somewhere in here. So can we give him a one clap, happy birthday? I'm confusing some of you with that, but happy birthday, David Harvey. 

Okay. Today, we're we're this is a message it's kind of an application message, sort of a practical message coming out of last week's study in first Peter chapter three verse 15, this fairly well known passage about being ready to give an answer for the hope that is in us. And we're talking about the church as witness. We're talking about the church on mission. And so today, I wanna talk more practically about how do we engage people in gospel conversations.

The assumption is that Christians will do this, but how do we do that? And so I've got some very practical tips today. We're gonna get into that. I'd like to read the text though again. And so let me begin reading first Peter chapter three verse 13, and please listen as I read God's word.

“Now who is there to harm you if you are zealous for what is good? But even if you should suffer for righteousness sake, you will be blessed. Have no fear of them nor be troubled, but in your hearts, regard Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you. Yet do it with gentleness and respect, having a good conscience so that when you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame. For it is better to suffer for doing good if that should be God’s will than for doing evil.”

I came across this week a an ancient Chinese proverb that I'd like to share with you. It goes like this. Man stand for long time with mouth open before roast duck fly in. It just struck my funny my funny bone. Some of you are still pondering it, like, does that mean?

A man will stand for a long time before a fully prepared and cooked duck will fly into his mouth. There's a truth in there. Right? What is it saying there? That you can sit back and just open your mouth and hope and think that what you're craving and what you're desiring is going to fly in, but you stayed a long time for roast duck to fly in.

It doesn't happen. And our evangelism in the church often is like the Chinese man standing with his mouth open hoping the right thing flies in. And we miss the fact that while God is sovereign over salvation, he works through means to accomplish it. And the means by which he does this is the church, and specifically is the people in the church engaging in gospel conversations with unbelievers. That's the way that it happens.

In fact, if you're a Christian here today, there was somebody in your life that engaged in some short or long term conversation with you that shared the gospel of Jesus with you, and you are a Christian as a result of it. And what happens often is somebody has that conversation with us, and then we turn into the Chinese man waiting for the roast duck to fly in. We sit back, we isolate, we're by ourselves, and we think, oh, some how this happens, I guess. When that's not how it happened for us. Somebody engaged us, and now we're called as Christians to engage other people in gospel conversations so that they can come to know the same Lord Jesus, the same hope that we have.

And so that's where we're going today. It doesn't just happen. Roast ducks don't just fly in. How does it happen? And Peter is writing to Christians who, as we've said many times now in our series, they are in persecution.

They are in crisis. They're in a place hostile to their faith. You might be in a tough time right now yourself. Maybe you're in some kind of season of trial in your life. And you're thinking to yourself, you know, this is a time really I might have to put ministry on the back burner.

When in reality, this is prime time opportunity for you to give the reason for the hope that is in you. And that's where we're going here is how do we do that and when are what are the context within which and how do we cultivate those contexts so that we can have these kinds of conversations? Now Peter says first in verse 13 that lives of kindness and compassion lived out in the world earn the right for us to be heard. It causes the the world to sort of stop and pay attention. Oh, wait.

You're being kind. You're you're caring for people. You're doing this or that. What's what's the deal with you? And we saw last week that the theology behind what Peter is talking about here in terms of kindness, good works done for people that have nothing to offer us, that we're doing purely out of a desire to minister to them, causes people to stop and listen.

And it did in the early church. We saw that in the first three centuries of the early church, the the the way that Christianity rocked the Roman Empire was not because they were great preachers or that they had all these amazing books to read. Most of them couldn't read. How did the early church rock the Roman Empire? Because they cared for widows and they cared for orphans and they cared for strangers.

They cared for the people that the folks that go to the Aphrodite Temple and the Zeus Temple could care less about. That's who they cared about. And it caused the world to go, what is the deal with these Christians? And, again, the theology behind this, we saw last week, is that everybody is made in the image of God. And even a non Christian is an image bearer of God and wired by God for God and for seeing glimpses of God in the world around them.

And we had a diagram, if you put that up a moment, that illustrates how this works and what Peter is getting at here. What is the common ground that the Christian and the non Christian have? It is this image bearing, the fact that we have a conscience within us. And in the world, even even in the world, these things are admired. Moral beauty, love, self sacrifice, compassion.

These are all things that cause people in the world to go, you know what? That's good. Right? That's that's a good thing. And so in the world, if you're about, you know, stopping human trafficking or if you're into caring for children in crisis or something like that, even nonbelievers look at that and go, wow.

That's really awesome that you're doing that. K? It's common ground that we have in the world. So with that said, let's build now on this a guide to gospel conversations. How do we do this?

And the first thing that we see Peter saying here is that unbelievers observe something in us that they don't have. And you might say, is it our haircuts? Is it our clothes? Is it you know? No.

That's silly. It's not those things. That's not what makes Christianity distinctive. It is hope. That's what Peter says.

They come to us, and they ask us about the hope that we have. Now when is hope observable? When everything's great? No. I don't need hope when my life is fantastic and and everything's wonderful.

We talked about this last week that part of our struggle is that we're all the time projecting to everybody else that we're fantastic, and everything's fantastic. And so, you know, we come to each other. We say, how are you doing? I'm doing awesome. How are you doing?

I'm awesomer. Right? Everything's fantastic. I'm good. The kids are wonderful.

It's like I'm living a panacea of wonderfulness all the time. And we project these kinds of everything's going great, and people can't relate to that. Because the reality in the world is that everything is not great. And there might be times where things seem to be, you know, okay and we're doing okay. But generally speaking, we are either entering a crisis or we just got out of one.

And that's true in the unbelieving world. So that, yes, they can common ground is moral beauty. Common ground is is love and self sacrifice. But a huge common ground that we have with the people around us is pain and suffering. Christians have pain and suffering.

Non Christians have pain and suffering. The difference is we have hope in the midst of it, which they don't have. So imagine with me, for example, first century, Asia Minor Christian Frank applies for membership in a, business society, business guild that was gonna help his business and build relationships and stuff like that. He applies for membership in it. The board of directors gets together and they say, I understand Frank's one of those Christians.

Have you heard about these Christians? Yeah. They don't go to the Temple Of Aphrodite. They're not at the Temple Of Zeus. We don't want this guy in our guild.

I say we deny him just because of that. They go, that's probably a good idea. We don't wanna associate with people like that. The board member goes to Frank and says, hey, you know what? You've got a fine business and things look good, but you're a Christian, so you're out.

You can't or you're not in. We're not we're not accepting you. After sharing the news, Frank is surprisingly upbeat. The board member leaves thinking to himself, well, he took that quite well. What's up with Frank?

First century Asia Minor Christian student Sally is at school. Everybody knows that her family does not worship the emperor and does not worship at Aphrodite's temple. Word gets out that maybe she's one of those Christians that people have heard about. The parents warn their kids, don't associate with Sally. The cool girls in the school, they are so ostracizing Sally, but they sense from Sally that Sally's kind of okay with it.

Like, doesn't she know she should be upset that she's not sitting at our table? It's almost like her identity isn't found in what the cool girls think about her. And they don't know what to deal. How what's up with Sally? One more.

You're like, well, he was really creative in his preparation this week. Yes, I was. First century Asia Minor Christian John is at the hospital. He's seeing the doctors. He's seeing the nurses.

They're seeing him. He's one of a, you know, 100 patients that week. He's going through some health crisis, just like everybody else is. He doesn't wanna be in pain. He doesn't wanna be sick, just like everybody else doesn't wanna be sick.

But they sense him, John, that he has something going on in the midst of that. Like he's talking about how he's praying for the doctor. He's praying for the nurse. And that, you know, he's very confident that that God is with him. And they the nurses sense in John something in the midst of his pain that they're all dealing with pain and stuff in their life that they're like, he's got something I don't got.

And I wonder about John. Rich, poor, atheist, agnostic, religious person, educated, powerful, not, everybody suffers, don't we? Everybody goes through tragedy, don't we? We all have things that we deal with. And the difference that Peter is highlighting in verse 15 is that Christians go through these things with hope that the world doesn't have.

But the world observes us having it and wants it as well, even though they don't know where it comes from. And they come to the hope demonstrating Christian and ask, where did you get that from? Where did you get that from? And that doesn't mean that we don't cry and we don't grieve and we don't do things Jesus himself did. It just means that in the midst of that, we have a kind of vertical hope and assurance in terms of God and His presence with us and His promises for us that the unbelieving world imagine, you know, if you've a Christian a long time, you sort of get used to that promises of God and assurance from God.

The world goes through these things. They got nothing. I do funerals sometimes. You know, the funeral home will call and say, hey. Will you come over and do this funeral?

And I'll I'll do the funeral of of family. I mean, there's no faith, and they're like, hey. Can we get this done soon? And you just get this sense that there's just it's just emptiness. Right?

Or maybe they don't want it to get done. They stand at the casket and they're weaving. They don't want to close the door. Why? Because there's no hope of anything.

Once that door once that casket goes closed, we never see that person ever again. And you just sense that. Right? Totally different than a Christian funeral that's filled with hope, the hope of the gospel, the hope of eternal life. And so Peter is bringing this up, and what I am urging us here is that we must live our faith out in the midst of our pain and be honest about it, or the world is never going to observe it in us.

In other words, authenticity. Okay? Authenticity. A great place for that to start, of course, is in the church. And even in the church, we still sort of project this like, hey, I'm like it's like me and Billy Graham.

We're just like amazing, godly, spiritual people. And we all know that's not true. It's not true for me. Is it true for you? So maybe authenticity let's start in the church and just being real with each other.

But it must transfer into the world around us, which we're not good at, are we? But to be honest with our struggles or people are never going to realize the hope that is in us. Because the only time it's like hope's like the stars. When do you see the stars? It's never when the sun's up.

It's when the sun goes down that you see the stars. Hope is never seen when life is fantastic all the time. It's when life stinks that suddenly hope becomes evident. So unbelievers must see the hope that we have, and the only way they see it is when we are real about the struggles that we have. Now all of this is assuming relationship with unbelievers, isn't it?

We're gonna get into that in a little bit. But everybody knows what it's like when work is frustrating. Everybody can relate to a home and family and relationships that has conflict and strife. Everybody knows what it's like to have financial struggles. Everybody knows what it's like to suffer loss and hurt.

Everybody knows what it's like to have such a crazy busy schedule. You feel like you're, you know, the the the not the rat. What's the the hamster on the wheel. Thank you. We all know what it's like to be discouraged.

We all know what it's like to have doubts about life. And one of the most powerful witnesses that God's people have is when we go through those things, all of those same struggles, and yet we say and believe that there is good news found in Jesus Christ. And I have found Jesus to be a powerful help in the midst of my trial. Now we say, why is this so important? Here's why.

And this is kind of part of what I'm saying here is I'm arguing against an approach to evangelism that just uses canned presentations. I don't know if you know what I'm talking about there. And there's a place for them. But when we just automatically go into robo evangelist with people that are going through you know, the person goes, you know, I'm my my I just found out my mom has cancer. And you're like, I'm gonna take you down the Romans Road.

They're like, what? Are you talking to me? My mom's got cancer. And when we just do these canned gospel presentations, it doesn't connect the gospel with real life struggles. K?

Let's go to Charleston right now. Why? Why is the world paying attention to Charleston? Absolute tragedy that happened, and that is evil and wrong in every way. K?

But within a few days, we have we see some amazing good that has come from that as that church steps forward and says, we forgive the murderer. We forgive the murderer. Now the world sits up and goes, what? What'd you say? Because you're supposed to be, like, all about vengeance right now.

You're supposed to, like, get a mob and go and and get the guy and just, you know, beat him to a pulp. You're supposed to be all, like, hateful and angry about this, but you're offering grace and forgiveness. I bet the church is overflowing today, don't you think? And some of them are going to be visitors who are thinking to themselves, if this church can forgive that guy, they've got something I don't have because I'm still dealing with what my dad did to me when I was growing up. I'm going show up here.

Want see what this is about. And you see, it connects the gospel with real life. And that's what Peter is calling us to. K? To give an answer for the hope that is in us.

Where have we got this hope? We have this hope by faith in Jesus and the promises of God becoming real to us by the Holy Spirit and trusting in a God who sent his Son. Romans eight thirty two, “if God did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also along with him graciously give us all things?” If God gave me Jesus, he can give me what I need in this trial, and my hope is in him. That's the Christian response.

And all of a sudden, the gospel hits home in pain and in trials and in suffering when they see how the hope is working in us and they ask us about it. K? So second thing Peter highlights here is the tone with which we speak. Again, look at verse fifteen and sixteen. Always ready to make a defense to anyone who asks for a reason for the hope that is in you.

Some people read that and they're like, that's right. We're arming for bear. Well, I'm going go into that. I'm going to out argue. I can out argue anybody about the gospel.

I'm ready. Oh, just ask me about it. But then Peter adds this, yet do it with gentleness and respect. Gentleness and respect. Some of you can relate to this.

I was raised in in the church and we were raised in a more confrontational style of evangelism, you know, where you sort of get the person by the throat metaphorically speaking and you just pound them with the gospel, and you hope the Holy Spirit saves them. And you have, you know, these answers for these questions. And there's a place for that. Don't get me wrong. But the vast majority of people, that's not our gig.

Right? I don't even got no PhD in Christian apologetics. We're just normal people. Right? And so when we get all confrontational and high how do you respond when somebody, like, confronts you?

It's like, oh, that's what you believe? Well, let me tell you a better way. And that person's like, wait. My mama believed this. My grandma believed this.

And now you're gonna tell me this. And they get all what? Defensive. And how well do we listen when we're on the defense? Right?

So Peter's like, hey, the tone with which you approach people is critical. Be gentle. Be meek. This is the sense that the other person gets as we're talking to them. Stay calm.

Be kind. Listen. It endears the truth that we want to share with them. And you might be like, oh, no. That's not the way that Jesus did.

Wait a second. What did he do with the woman at the well as an example of what I'm talking about? This woman was in sexual sin. Jesus knew it. And who's the only one who actually has the right to be sort of judgmental towards people?

It would be Jesus. And yet does Jesus say, you're a sinner. Let's talk about sin, you know, and your sexual sin living with a man, divorce all these other guys, you're terrible. You need me. Is that what he said?

No. What did he say? He talked to her in a way that drew her in. Right? He drew her in.

He built rapport with her. She sensed that he cared about her. And when the whole conversation was done, what does she do? She runs into the village and says, come talk to this guy. This is amazing.

That's a sign of a really good gospel conversation when they go into their town and say, everybody, come talk to this guy. I've never had that happen, but it would be wonderful if it did. Jesus had a tone of gentleness. And he says, secondly, and respect and respect. Greek word there is phobos.

We get the word phobia from it. The scholars debate whether this is phobia respect for the other person or respect for God, probably for God, but I think it applies. When I have respect for God, I am respectful, you know, with other people. But the whole the point is, I think, similar to gentleness where there is a sense as I am doing this that I am I am respectful of the other person. I'm not an authority.

Like, I'm not coming at this like I got all the answers and down with you. I'm not speaking down the mountain at people. I'm respecting their story. I'm respecting their life. I'm listening to them.

They're listening to me. That's the kind of conversation that wins people's hearts, isn't it? Not victory all, not demeaning, not what's wrong with you because you don't believe this, not let me show you how smart I am with my answers, but a respectful conversation, a winsome one. So towards the goal of doing this, I have some tips. Those are just kind of a practical message.

Right? I've got some tips for how to engage in gospel conversations or what I'm calling a lifestyle of evangelism. And here's the first one, is that we must be intentional. We must be intentional about this. There's a writer named Jonathan Dodson. 

I've learned most of these tips are from him, actually. I give him credit for it. But one of the things that he talks about in terms of intentionality is the fact that many, many Christians have no time for unbelievers. By the time I get done doing all my church activities and I get done all my work activities and my, you know, school activities, there's no margin for relationships with an unbeliever. Maybe if I could ask you, is that true for you?

Do you have any intentional margin that you create to have and to build a relationship with somebody that doesn't know Jesus? Because right now, even as I'm talking to somebody, you're probably like, I got no time for this. I got no time for this. And yet, what has Jesus left us here to do? Why did why wasn't it instant rapture?

You know, when you become a Christian, boop, up you go. Why are we still here? Is it so that we can, you know, work and do well? No. We're here to be a witness to Jesus Christ.

Right? And to share the good news of Jesus with as many people as we possibly can. That's why we're here. And so this is partly a matter of prioritizing this and creating margin in our schedules so that we can have relationships with unbelievers. And frankly, I say that to myself as much as I say it to you.

I just said to Jennifer recently, by the time I get done pastoring the church and all this stuff, I feel like I have little time for relationships with people that aren't a part of the church. I feel convicted about that. Maybe you can too. So some practical tips on how to create context for relationship where these things can happen. This is from Jonathan Dodson.

Number one, eat with non Christians. What do we all have in common with unbelievers? We all like to eat, and we all eat three times a day. Some of us, more than that. So but I digress.

Most people are willing to have lunch with a coworker or a neighbor or to grill out, you know, to barbecue with with a neighbor. You want come over for burgers? Most people are like, that sounds nice. And what does it also sound like? It sounds like friendship, doesn't it?

See? Eat with non Christians. It's not like when you sit down and you go, okay. I'm gonna order, and now I take you down the Romans Road. You know?

Be normal. Talk about stuff. You know? Maybe you have, you know, 10 of those before spiritual stuff comes up. Jesus did this.

He Jesus used meals to build relationship with people. We see him doing it often in the gospels. Secondly, he says, walk, don't drive. Walk, don't drive. Is your neighborhood like mine where often it's like this?

People, we live in houses. In the morning, the bridge of the moat goes up called a garage door. And we're in our cars, and we pull out. We're in our bubble. We drive through the neighborhood.

We might wave, little wave there, little wave there, and off we go. And at night, we come home, still in our bubble, right? Maybe a wave, maybe a wave. The drawbridge goes up of the moat, the garage door. And we pull in, the bridge goes down of the moat, garage door goes down.

And I can live in my neighborhood without any conversation, if I wanted to, without one conversation with anybody. And many people do that. Right? Many people do that. Christians shouldn't do that.

Agreed? Who's the best neighbors in every neighborhood? It's the evangelical Christians, I hope. Right? So part of this we have to fight against is to he suggests walking.

Okay? Walk around the neighborhood. Just walk. I would tell you, from based on my experience, get a stroller. It doesn't matter if there's a kid in there or not.

Just have a stroller because a stroller is like it's like instant friendship. You know? Just like, oh, oh, oh, it's so cute. And, I mean, strangers at the mall suddenly are like your best friends if you have a stroller. But the walking point here is that it allows an opportunity to just meet people, to say hi, engage them in some way.

Walk around your neighborhood. Somebody else I read suggested, you know, sit in front of your house, not behind your house. We typically want to sit in the backyard, you know, sort of isolate in our little cocoon. Sit on the driveway and have your little fire pit there and marshmallows and people that are walking by be like, hey, and, you know, front yard conversations. Third, be a regular.

Be a regular. What this means is that if there's a coffee house you like, a cafe that you like, go to that one over and over again because then you get to know the waitstaff, and you get to know maybe the owner, and you get to know some of the other patrons there. And over time, you're able to build relationship. If you're always going to this one, that one, they don't know you, you don't know them, and nothing happens. So be a regular.

Hobby with non Christians. Hobby with non Christians. Everybody's got hobbies, mutual points of interest. So if you like to fish, you know, and there's a dude who lives next to you and you're like, hey, most men can say this, want to go fishing? That's like male love language, isn't it?

That's like that's like women saying, do you want to get a pedicure together? I mean, it's like, wow, I didn't know that we were that good of friends. We're going to fish together and then go fishing or, you know, watch the Bears game or whatever it is. You know, we all have these hobbies. And for men, a lot of those are kind of points of shared interest, hobby with them.

Friendships can form over mutual interest. Here's another, volunteer with nonprofits. This is, again, it's a non kind of confrontational sort of way to engage people. If Habitat for Humanity is building a house in Gary and your neighbor's a kind of handyman, why don't you say, hey, you wanna spend three hours on Saturday and we'll go do this Habitat for Humanity thing? And you get to drive up and you get to do something together.

And serving others might sort of tap a little meaning place in his heart. You never know what might come of that. Participate in city events. No matter what city you live in, all of them around here have cleaning days, and they've got sort of the corn fest or they got this, that, or the other. Be a part of that.

Get your kids off the Xbox and go clean the city for three hours. And you're going to meet other people that care about the city, and they're a part of that, and they see you caring, and you can build relationships with people that you don't know. Here's a big one. Serve your neighbors. Serve your neighbors.

Now the first part is assuming that you know their name. We live in a day where people live next to people that they don't know their name. And I'll be honest, it's not a very big circle around my house that I know people's names. So we say that to some measure of shame. But serve your neighbors.

And this can be big and small ways. It can be, you know, blowing out the snow on the driveway, or it can be helping with raking the leaves, or it can be maybe a more meaningful thing if they're going through a crisis or a trial of some kind where you help them out in some way. All of those things communicate something that ought to be true in our hearts. Right? If we're called the second great command is to love our neighbor as ourself, it communicates what?

Love. And love is a universal language of relationship. Help them out, especially in their times of crisis. It tears down defenses. My wife, Jennifer, is particularly good at this.

She's got a little bit of an eye for it. And we recently we have a neighbor that's going through a terrible kind of long term kind of crisis. And so Jennifer fixed this feast for them. And we showed up on their doorstep unannounced, bags of food. And they opened the door and we're like, hey, we just know it's been a tough time.

We brought this stuff for you. How do you think they responded to that? Slam the door. I told you look out for those neighbors. No.

They were like, really? You know, in the church, that's more been more sort of normal, but in the world, people don't do that kind of thing. They're like, really? Come come on in. And so we stepped in and we got, you know, all the here's this and this gotta heat at 03:50 and here's the dessert and all that.

And by the way, how's it going? And now in that kind of context of care, now the eyes fill with tears, and you we had a really special moment with them. Does it feel any different now when we are, like, waving in the morning? They're like Why? Because they're like, well, that's a house of people that care about us right there.

How? Just serving them. Serve them. A little bit goes a really long way. Do you have a neighbor that you could serve in some practical way that might build rapport with them, might communicate that you care about them?

So take a moment right now and just think through that list. Let me say them again. And maybe you can identify two things here, and we're going give you this list as you leave today, that maybe you could sort of renew involvement in mission work this way. Eat with non Christians. Walk, don't drive.

Be a regular hobby with non Christians. Volunteer with nonprofits. Participate in city events. Serve your neighbors. The next tip I have, and I'm not going spend a lot of time on this, but, is this, is be a story listener.

Be a story listener. Everybody has a story, and everybody's story is sacred to them. So too often, Christians, we we're like, oh, I've gotta be evangelistic. So now I'm again, I'm having lunch with you, and I'm gonna God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life. And I've got a little booklet here right here I'd like to take you through.

Would you smile as I do it? Point number one, point number two, point number three. And they're sitting there eating their chips going, Am I buying a vacuum when this is done? What's going on? A great starting point with people is to simply ask their story.

Ask their story. Everybody loves talking about themselves. Find out where they're from. Find out what kind of house they or home they grew up in, what their dad did, mom did, whatever. Find out their story.

And as part of that, if you've built if you've, you know, vacuumed their house or blew out the snow or done whatever, they'll share the failures as well. And in those failures then, sort of that conversation moves to that kind of deeper level where now you're sort of communing together. Listen to it. Don't interrupt it and go, well, if Jesus was in your life right there, then this would have been the feeling you would have had. Don't do that.

Why? Because we're not we're in here with gentleness and respect. We're not in here as know it alls. We're we're we're sinners too. Listen to their story.

It tells them that you care about them, which, of course, is the key. And then after hearing their story, tell your story. Tell your story. And by that, I don't mean the how all your kids are wonderful and you were amazing in in high school and what a great athlete you were and, you know, how you're the best employee. Know, take out all the hubris, take out all the pride, and just be a real person and tell your story.

And as part of telling that story, talk about the difference that Jesus has made in your life. Simply that. And don't get all sort of weird as you do it. Sometimes it feels that way, doesn't it, where you can talk about the college you went to, the school that you grew up in, but when you sort of if you say anything spiritual, it's like beads of sweat come down your face, and you know, it's it just weirds people out. Don't be awkward.

Can I say it that way? Just be normal. Be normal. Tell your story. Now you might be like me and think, my story is boring, especially my faith story.

Grew up in a Christian home, became a Christian when I was six, blah blah blah. I wanna encourage you that I doubt, for example, in Charleston right now, they care about when hope came to that church. They just care about how. Right? How?

And this again is where I think the formula approach is unhelpful because the gospel is not a formula. It is a person. The gospel is Jesus. And if we are Christians here today, that means Jesus has transformed our lives. And yes, we go through trials, and yes, we go through troubles, and none of us is super Christian.

But there is a reality to it that we feel in the midst of our sufferings, and we can share with other people who don't have that hope. Just talk about the difference your faith made with when you lost your job or the church or something like that that just kind of connects the gospel with real life, and people will listen to it. People will listen. And, of course, this assumes that hope is a reality in our own hearts. The Bible or the Bible, Spurgeon said, evangelism is one beggar telling another beggar where he found bread.

Maybe you've heard that before. But that assumes that the one beggar actually has found it. Tell them about that. Tell them about how, you know, your dad or that college friend or whatever it was introduced you to Jesus. Talk about him like he's as real as the wind.

Talk about him as a real person. And the world will think, man, this is like real to you, isn't it? Yeah. It is real. It's made a real difference in my life.

I kinda like that. I wish I had some of that hope in my heart. That's what they need to hear. So have it here first. Share it second.

And finally, I would just simply say this, pray for people. Pray for your neighbors. Is there or your coworker. Is there is there anybody currently that you are actively praying for that God would allow you to be a part of them coming to know the Lord Jesus? Are you praying for anybody by name?

Or how about in your neighborhood? As maybe you're having a time of prayer just to pray up for the two houses around you. You know? Pray for opportunities. Pray that God would help you be faithful to opportunities that he would provide.

Pray for wisdom when they come. K? So be intentional. Be ready. Be winsome and gentle.

Be real and authentic. Listen, and then speak and tell your story of hope in Jesus. And the world will listen, and we hope we'll come to believe in Christ as well. Right? And wouldn't that be a great day?

Seeing them people being baptized, starting to disciple them, see them to sort of grow and experience the blessing that we have had in the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what we want. So I'm gonna ask you to stand with me right now, and let's just pray. Let's just pray this very truth. In fact, I'm gonna give you just a moment to pray for that person in your life.

And maybe you gotta come up with a name real quick right now, but that'll be good. Why don't you pray for one person by name that is in your sphere of relationship and ask God to help you be a faithful witness to them.

* This transcript was generated using AI transcription technology and reviewed for accuracy but may contain errors. Please refer to the original audio for precise wording.

Study Guide for Spiritual Exiles, 1 Peter 3:13-17

Scripture Reference: 1 Peter 3:13-17

Visit the series page: Exiles: A study in 1 Peter

Donate to Support The Journey

Sermon Series: Spiritual Exiles 

Message: Living Questionably and Answering Hopefully

Airdate: 10/16 and 10/19/26

Programs: 2380 and 2381

Well, good morning again, and hello, Cedar Lake campus, Hope Portage campus this morning. I, last weekend, had the joy of speaking, ministering at one of our former associate pastor's churches. He is Jeremy Carr, who is the senior pastor now in North Des Moines at Johnston E. Free Church. And so I was able to go and to see his ministry there.

He's been there about a year now, and God's blessing, and they seem to be doing super great. So it was great to to be with them. I also understand while I was gone that we had a special offering last weekend to help meet needs in Nepal with the earthquake victims as well as some of the needs that we have with our facilities here. When I say here, mean at our Gary campus and at HP and at Cedar Lake with some of our facilities we use for primarily youth ministry and student ministry, our gymnasiums that we have. And I just was encouraged.

We had an offering last weekend, second offering, kind of like lunch money, people throwing it in, of $13,500 that came in for that, which is really great. And if you're an old sports guy, you love sports, and maybe you have a heart for young people and all that, I'm sure you could still throw money in the offering towards that. And we'd find a way to apply that to some of the things that we need and probably still will need in those facilities. But thank you, everybody, for being a part of that. And that's pretty exciting for me because I'm one of those old sports guys.

And I'd love to see our facilities be able to minister through athletics to primarily young people. Well, my title today kind of gives away the whole sermon, frankly. Here's my title: Living Questionably and Answering Hopefully. Now I could just stop and say, amen, amen, let's go home, because that's basically all that I'm going to say today. And some of you are excited right now.

Like, wow, we're going to get out of here early today. The problem is most of us would leave having no idea what that means. And that's really what lies before us here is, like, what does that mean? What does it mean to live lives that are questionable and give answers that are filled with hope? And what does that have to do with really God's entire plan for the fulfilling of the great commission?

It is a summary of first Peter three verse 15. If you went to Moody Bible Institute and say, I'm gonna take a class on evangelism, this might be the very first verse that you would memorize. If you have ever read a book on Christian apologetics, this verse always talked about. So this is one of these verses that that that stands out in a unique category and is often referred to when it comes to the whole matter of how we represent our faith, how we even share our faith. What does it mean to live Christianly and to speak Christianly in a hostile environment around us?

And so we have this verse about bold, fearless witness. And who's the writer of it? Ironically, Peter, the most famous coward in all of the Bible. But I'll get into that in a moment. So let me read the text.

And so follow along, please, if you have your Bibles. I think we have it on the screens as well. Here's what Peter writes beginning in verse now 13. “Now who is there to harm you if you are zealous for what is good? But even if you should suffer for righteousness' sake, you will be blessed.

Have no fear of them nor be troubled. But in your hearts, honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you. Yet do it with gentleness and respect, having a good conscience, so that when you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame. For it is better to suffer for doing good, if that should be God's will, than for doing evil.” Now if that language sounds familiar, it means that you've been dialed in in this entire series in first Peter because he is repeating what he has said here over and over again, of in different contexts.

But basically, this same point. Christian, how do we live in a hostile environment? How do you how do you represent Jesus when the world around you looks down on that? You live lives of moral and spiritually observable beauty that causes the people around you to think maybe there's something to this Christianity. That's the whole point really of first Peter.

And you do that primarily in your persecution and in your suffering. Now he has already said that as it relates, for example, the beginning of this chapter to Christian wives who are married to unbelieving husbands. What are they supposed to do? They are to by their moral behavior and their the beauty of their life, he says, to win their husbands over without a word. K?

We talked about that. He talked about it with slaves, with their owners with their owners, and he's talked about it with Christian citizens as it relates to the government. And it's the same kind of point that he is trying to pound home. And I think we need to hear that it is our lives that speak about the truth of the claims that we make regarding Jesus being the Savior of the world and the person that will transform your life into one of hope and one of of of moral beauty and one that will live forever with eternal life. So what I wanna do today, since some of this is repeat, I wanna focus in on what is is unique that we have not seen so far, and that primarily is in verse 15.

Again, I'll just read it. “In your hearts, Christ the Lord is holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you.” So we find these threads being weaved here regarding the implications and the applications of living a life of love and of goodness to others that even an unbelieving world can't deny. But he is saying something unique here because he gets at what I think is really our big obstacle in doing this. What's the biggest thing that all of us struggle with when it comes to somehow identifying ourselves with other people as Christians?

I would submit to you, the biggest thing we struggle with is fear. Right? Fear. We are afraid of something. Maybe you know how this works.

Let me just walk you through it, see if you can relate to this. You're at work. You're in some context, and you're having a conversation with your neighbor, your coworker, your family member, doesn't matter what it is. They'll say it's at work, it's coworker. And you're having a conversation, you're talking about the Blackhawks game last night.

And you're like, yeah, in the second in the second period, did you see the and then did did you notice that? And yeah. He's like, yeah, man. That was awesome. And, yeah, it's just smooth.

It's natural. You're having a great conversation. And then somehow, you say, well, how did the weekend go? Oh, my daughter. You know, she's dealing with that chronic illness.

And my wife and I, we just oh, we're so devastated. We're just wondering what, like, what's this all about? And in that moment, there is a frog that resides down here. And in that moment, it goes ribbit right to the throat. Right?

And now in your throat, there is something that with the Blackhawks or with whatever else it was, your garden, natural conversation, all of a sudden now, in the moment where the door swings wide open, Right? Because that person is sharing something very personal to them, something down on the heart level, down on the soul level. They're hurting. They're in pain. They're looking for what?

Hope. They're looking for hope. But in their worldview, atheist, secular, agnostic, whatever it is, there is no hope. There is no confidence about anything in the future. Everything's random.

Everything you just don't know what's gonna happen. They want hope. And the door swings wide open in that moment. And in your throat, there's ribbit, ribbit. And you're like, buddy.

And something in you is going, tell them your story about when your daughter was sick. Tell them your story. When your mom had cancer, tell them your story of how you went through that terrible thing in your marriage. But your throat's going ribbit ribbit ribbit. And all we can sometimes get out in that moment is like, I pray for you.

Oh, look at the time. I gotta go. And off we scamper. And that person who in that gospel moment of heart level kind of interaction is left hopeless. Can you relate to that?

What is it about those moments that we get all clunky? Right? We are eloquent with the gardening and clunky with Jesus. What is it? And I believe Peter is putting his finger down on the heart of the issue that we have, so many of us have, when it comes to this.

We are stupid, if I can use that word. Children, don't use it. But we're we're spiritually stupid. Why are we being stupid? Because there is something inside of us that is assessing whether or not this person's opinion of me is going to rise or fall dependent on what I dare share with them about the hope that I have in Jesus.

And you might say, no, it's not that. I haven't completed my PhD in apologetics yet. And so until I get that done, I don't think God wants me to say nothing, and I'm just gonna stay silent until I have the diploma on the wall. Or you might say, well, yes, but I'm that's not my gift. I'm more called to a serving ministry.

So I'm gonna mow his yard for him. But I'm not gonna tell him about the hope that I have found in the Lord Jesus Christ. This fear, Peter addresses in verse 13 by saying, now who is there that is going to harm you if you are zealous for doing what is good? But even if you should suffer for righteousness' sake, you will be blessed. In other words, when we do what God has called us to do, when and that can be in word or in deed, but as we are kind of living out loud this Gospel that we believe, sing, treasure, he says those kinds of activities generally are not going to have people saying to you, you're an evil person.

There there are generally good things that we are doing, helping other people, showing care and concern that in the world is not so evident. But he says, but even if let's just say that the opinion of that person goes down on you because you say something spiritual in that moment. He says, you'll be blessed by it. Blessed by who? Class. 

God himself. God himself. There's a promise there. I've never heard anybody say, those Christians are so evil with all their feeding of the poor and the caring of the orphans. May the world be rid of them.

People don't say that. In fact, if you look at the first three centuries of the church. K? So this is prior to basically, in in church history, deciding moment is in the the early fourth century when Constantine, the emperor of Rome, himself becomes a Christian and then legalizes Christianity throughout the Roman Empire. Big moment.

Because up to that point, Christianity was largely hated and Christians were viewed extremely suspiciously and terrible persecution. Read Fox's Book of Martyrs as an example of the terrible things that were done to the early Christians. So prior to Constantine's conversion, if you look at that those three centuries, it's a interesting time to see how the church was the church when everybody hated them. And here is what one Christian apologist writing actually in the first century in the city of Athens writes about he writes to emperor Hadrian, emperor of Rome, about Christians. Here's how he describes them.

They love one another. They never fail to help widows. They save orphans from those who would hurt them. If they had something, they if they have had something, they give freely to the man who has nothing. If they see a stranger, they take him home and are happy as though he were a real brother.

First century people like you and me believing in Jesus. What did that look like for them? It looked like that. Not perfectly. They were sinners like we are.

But generally, that's kind of the ethos of the first century church. Now let me ask you a question. When Hadrian gets this letter from this guy named Aristides, what does he think about these Christians that he's heard about when he hears about their care for the orphans and that they're always taking people home that are strangers and they love, care, and meet the needs of of the widows? What does he think in his mind? Does he think to himself, these people are really bad people.

We've gotta get them out of the empire. Or in spite of what he had heard about Christians, when he hears about the way they conducted themselves, what did it do in Hadrian's heart? I'm saying to you, it created curiosity. It created curiosity. What are these people all about?

I know they claim there's only one God. They deny Zeus. But what's their deal? Because they're like about things that don't know anybody else is doing that kind of stuff. And that is the power and was the power in the first century, in the first three centuries, of people like you and me taking the love that God has showed into our hearts, shined into our hearts, and expressing it in ways that were observable in the world around them.

It said something powerful to people. It made them wonder what is the deal with these people. And the if you're saying, well, what's the theology behind it? Here's the theology behind that curiosity. It is known as the Imago Dei, the image of God.

And the Bible tells us that when God made man Adam and Eve back in the garden, Genesis one, Genesis two, that when he made Adam and Eve, he made us, all of humanity, different than anything else in the entire galaxy. He placed within us this spiritual, soulish capacity. Right? We are spiritual beings. And in that spiritual place, he placed his image, likeness, his morality or sense of it, a sense of right and wrong, good and evil kind of a thing.

Everybody has that. There is something innate within a human being that knows when something is good generally and when something is wrong. It's the Imago Dei. The fall happens. Right?

Mankind falls into sin, but we retain, the Bible calls this, Paul calls it in Romans, the conscience. We all have a conscience, and that is the theology behind what he is getting at here. And it is a powerful help for us when we are trying to evangelize is that there are we know that that other person is made in the image of this God and has a sensibility about them, broken, dulled, fallen, but it's still there. As John Stott said, in all evangelism, I find it a constant encouragement to say to myself, the other person's conscience is on my side. I like that.

And so this is the mantra of Peter throughout the entire letter is do you realize that you we, Christians, have an ace in the hole when it comes to buttressing the claims that we have about Jesus, and it is our lives and the kinds of things that we care about. And the world sees that, and they wonder. I drew up a diagram just to illustrate this. Maybe this will help. If you think about what is the common ground between an unbeliever, a non Christian, and and a and a Christian.

Because there I mean, we're a new creation. The old is gone. The new has come, Paul writes. But we still have shared common ground. This is this is the place that we can speak the language that even a non Christian can understand.

And you notice that non Christian and Christians made in the image of God. We all have a conscience. Right? And it is in this category that moral beauty and love and self sacrifice and compassion, these things speak to the non Christian in a way that bypasses their mental defenses against Christianity, and it gets right down to the heart, right down to where the gospel speaks first. And Peter says, leverage that.

Don't be afraid of them. If they look down on you, you're blessed anyway. Rather, leverage the normal Christian expression of love and good works in this world, which Paul writes that we were ordained before time began to do. Leverage those things. Do them in observable ways so that the world around you wonders inside what's up with them.

What is up with them? What is their deal? It's true for the unbelieving husband toward his Christian wife, the unbelieving employer towards his Christian employee, the whatever unbeliever toward whatever Christian whose lifestyle shows Christian love and moral beauty. And that's why Peter writes in verse 14, “have no fear of them nor be troubled. But in your hearts, honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for the reason of the hope that is in you.” 

K? Now I just wanna point out to you, there's tremendous irony here in this passage about bold witness and not being afraid. Again, who's writing this? Peter. Right?

What do we know about Peter in the story, in his own story? We go all the way back to the Garden of Gethsemane. Here come the Roman soldiers way back. Actually, we go to the upper room, don't we? They're in the upper room.

Peter says to Jesus, though every other disciple here leaves you, I will never leave you. Hubris pride. Right? I will never leave you. And what does Jesus say?

Before the cock crowed, you're gonna deny me three times. Peter's like, no. I would never do that. Well, within a few hours, he's running away from the Roman mob that came to arrest Jesus. And shortly after that, he is right there in the courtyard.

And who does Peter who is Peter afraid of? And you might say, it was the Roman legion or he they had a point of a spear in front of him, and so maybe we can give him grace. No. It was a little girl. Excuse me?

Aren't you one of Jesus' disciples? And Peter's like, woah. No. No. I never knew the man.

Right? He's the most famous coward in the whole New Testament. He's the guy that's writing this. Now if we go ahead in the story a little bit, what do we find? After Peter's conversion, after the Spirit comes at Pentecost, right away now, there is this dramatic change with these disciples.

The same guys that ran away in the Garden of Gethsemane now are standing up to not only the Romans, but also the Jewish authorities that had put Jesus to death just days before. And they haul Peter in front of the whole Sanhedrin, and they command him not to preach this message anymore. And what does Peter say? “We must obey God rather than men.” Wait.

Aren't you the aren't you the same guy that like, the little girl? Isn't that you? And, of course, it is. And so we have in front of us somebody who knows something about going from being afraid and living by fear to living boldly as a testimony to Jesus Christ. This is a man that knows how to go from A to B, which ought to be encouraging, I think, for us because I would suspect that there's a lot of people still living in A.

And we look at B, which is the boldness bold witness, and we think, I could never do that. I can never be that way. And yet Peter, by the Spirit of God and the work of God in his life, becomes a bold witness and exhorts the church not to be like him in the garden, but to be like him in front of the Sanhedrin. But how do we get there? Like, what's the key to go from living as a Christian according to fear to living as a Christian boldly and by faith?

And I think Peter gives us the absolute key in verse 15. Look again. Don't be afraid of them. Rather, in your hearts, Christ the Lord as holy. Notice he doesn't say get out your apologetics books and get an answer to every question they might throw at you.

He doesn't say get your educational degree. He doesn't say go into hiding. Rather, it does so it it doesn't start here. So many people think, for me to be a faithful witness, I've got to have it right here. No.

That is not the key. It's not here. It's right here is the issue. Who is Lord of your heart? Or to say it in this context, whose opinion do you care the most about?

Really? Now we sing songs about the majesty of Jesus, and we talk about it's all about him, and we sing about the glory of God and all of that. But when I'm talking Blackhawks with a guy who shares with me that his child has is suffering a terrible disease, and they're wondering what to think about all of it, and the frog rivets in my throat, what does that say about who I'm really caring about? And Peter says, settle the matter, Christian. Who is Lord of your heart?

And you place Jesus Christ and his opinion right on that throne. And allow the boldness that comes from carrying only what he thinks to shape the way that you live your life. So when you're talking to the little girl in the courtyard, you're not ribbit, ribbit, ribbit. I wrote this sentence. Thought it was so good.

Want to read it. The frog rivets in our throats because fear of man resides in our hearts. That's the bottom line. Right? Proverbs says “the fear of man is a snare.”

It's a snare. How do we overcome it? I believe it's by consciously committing, like like deciding in my heart, in my life, I want Jesus and his opinion to rule the day. And when Christ is squarely exalted and treasured in that place, really frankly, it's just the application of what we believe, isn't it? Like, if right now we had the eyes to see, isn't it true that right now there is a throne?

It's the highest throne in heaven. And Jesus is alive. Holes in his hands and in his feet, glorified body, glory radiating from him, the infinite glory of the Son of God. He is sitting right there at the right hand of God. Do you believe that?

And that right now if we had ears to hear, we would hear the echoing, rejoicing song of innumerable air angels and seraphim and cherubim singing glory to Jesus. Do you believe that? And if we truly could see into that place, we would see the high and holy and exalted place that Jesus is. And if we could truly understand that and see that, which we believe it to be true, but if we could see and hear and grapple with that, and there he is. He's my Lord Jesus.

I worship you more than anything else. You're at the you're on the throne of my heart. Now I'm talking Blackhawks with the guy who's like three cubicles over in the office. How afraid of his opinion am I when it comes to sharing hope, the only hope there is in this world? See?

Do you see that? The higher he is, the lower the opinion of man. Bonhoeffer said it this way, those who are afraid of men have no fear of God, and those who fear God have no fear of men. So can I ask you, Bethel Church, and you individually, who really is Lord in your heart? Really?

Whose opinion do you really care about? Now I'll confess to you, I get this. Right? I get this. I talk spiritual things.

This is like what I do for a living. Right? So you might say, well, if we walked around with pastor Steve all the time, it'd be like, you know, amazing. Right? Because you just talk Jesus everywhere you go.

It's just natural for you. It's not natural for me. When I sit on an airport and and frankly, I have some advantage over most of you. Because when I'm on the airplane or meeting somebody at the golf course or whatever, you know, what's your name? First question.

Second question, what do you do? Right? So on the airplane, when the person said, so what do you do for a living? And I say, I pastor a church. They're like, oh, okay.

And right away, either that's a major turn off or it becomes a counseling session right away in that moment. So you like, okay. I went through a divorce three years ago, and then on it goes. Right? And in my heart, it's not like, you know, frankly, honestly, this is the sinful heart.

Sometimes I just wanna read my book that I brought with me, and now I have a two hour counseling session with this with and and even in that time, it's my mind is grappling. What do I share? What do I say? So it's I'm just being honest with you. I'm not up here condemning anybody here.

I say this to myself. I got the frog ribbiting in my throat plenty. So what do we do? How do we handle this? And I think Peter is just laying out a simple approach to lifestyle evangelism here.

Notice again, number one, we live a lifestyle of normal Christian love and others' orientation. In your neighborhood, are you one of the neighbors that all the other neighbors know when they're gone on vacation, you'll pull their trash bin back? Right? Or if they have some little need or something, you're the are you a conduit in your neighborhood, in your school, in your workplace? Are you are are you somebody that people sense they sort of care about me?

That's normal Christianity, isn't it? What are we called to do? Love one another. Right? Love one another.

So I'm not spending a lot of time on this, but we we live the normal expected Christian life. We just live that kind of change that Jesus makes in our hearts that turns us from being self centered and self obsessed to a approach where we're caring for people, engaging people. We hold high, secondly, Jesus. He is on the throne of our hearts above the opinion of anybody else. I want His approval more than I care about the guy three cubicles down from me.

So I'm free now. Right? I'm free because I'm living hopefully in a way that pleases the Lord. Third, keep your gospel bags packed. Here's what it says.

Always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you. Keep your gospel bags packed. You're thinking, does that mean? Well, it's just what came to my mind as an illustration of this because we're like eight days from delivery roughly. My wife is expecting our second child.

And these kids, they don't tell you when they're coming, right? So about three weeks ago, realizing that we were entering the danger zone, we got ready. Now my wife's been getting ready for, like, months. Our house right now, we should sell it. It's like a showpiece.

Right? She has cleaned everything. The nest is ready. Right? There's something to that whole female nesting thing.

There really is. So she's been getting ready for but the last couple of weeks, we've been, like, really dialing it in. And if you were to go into our bedroom right now, you would see that we have you know, the the luggage is there. The bags are packed. In the in the bag is the clothes that we might need, little snacks, any little, you know, toiletries, any doodads, whatever.

It's all there. It's all ready to go. And the reason for that is that we don't know when this baby is showing up. So we gotta be ready just in case. Because when she goes, ah, I'm getting the bag, we're getting in the van, and off we go to the hospital.

I have found in my life the opportunities that I have to share in the world rarely come at unexpected times. They come at unexpected times. Okay? Now if your neighbors are like, okay, in three weeks, I'm going to ask you a very soulish question about pain in my life, you could be like, okay, I'm going to get ready for it, right? And you show up, you got your notes and okay, point number one, point number two, point number three.

They never do that, right? It's that meeting them on the way to the mailbox moment or happen to sit next to you in the lunchroom at work kind of moment where all of a sudden now this door swings wide open. Are you ready? Are you ready in that moment to say something that might lead them from the curiosity about your life towards an interest in who Jesus is and the difference he's made in your life. Like if right now, I took a microphone and I went into the crowd and I said, okay, what would you say?

Could you would you be ready to say something? I'm not gonna do that, but could you do that? And now here I'm freaking you out because you're like, oh, I've got to have all these answers and all of that. And the and and I want this is the the main thing that I've learned in this passage is this point right here is what is Peter suggesting that we say? Like, what are we supposed to be ready to say?

Notice it says, anyone who asks you for a reason. K? Asked you for a reason. Many of us look at this and say, I'm gonna go to the street corner and I'm gonna shout to that jazz festival in Chicago this weekend, Jesus is Lord, and I'll take on anybody. No.

That's not what he's saying here, isn't it? Where does this conversation start? It starts with them asking you a question. But where does that come from? They have observed hope.

There is something in your demeanor, in your approach to the problems in your own life that makes them curious, and they come to you. Now that doesn't mean that we don't broach things and all that. There's a place for Marcel preaching. But that's not what Peter is saying. They come to us and they ask us, what is your deal?

Like, I've known you a while here, and there's something going on here that I don't have going on in my own life. And here's the sobering reality, I think, that too often we give our answers when they aren't asking questions. And they aren't asking questions because our lives aren't creating them. One man writes this for Pascal, talking about a French cool theologian guy, who if I had had a son, I might name him after Pascal. I love Pascal.

I digress. For Pascal, presenting someone with a list of proofs for Christianity or evidence for faith is probably a waste of time. If someone basically doesn't want to believe, no amount of proof or proof text can ever convince her. And even if she were convinced, then it wouldn't be the Christian God that she had come to believe in, but only what Pascal called the God of the philosophers. The crucial factor in persuading someone to believe then is not to present evidence, but first to awaken a desire for God in them.

In other words, when commending Christianity to people, make it attractive, make good men wish it were true, and then show that it is. Such arguments as there are for Christianity can convince those who hope it is true, but will never convince those who don't. And Peter says here, there is one aspect primarily that the unbeliever is going to wonder about. And did you see it there? Always being ready to make a defense to anyone who asks you for the reason for the what?

Hope. The hope that is in you. What is hope? Confidence about the future that brings assurance into today. Now as Christians, we have every reason to be confident, don't we?

Future in heaven, future on the new earth, life with Jesus, glorified body, inheritance, being with Christ, and other loved ones in Christ. All of that sounds great and fantastic. It's not just that future hope, but also in our present trials where the promises of God come to assure us, “I will never leave you. I will never forsake you. Cast all your anxieties on me for I care for you,” etcetera, etcetera, provides the Christian who is in the hospital bed, in the hospital facing a major surgery with something that the guy in the gurney next to him doesn't have.

Right? He doesn't have that. And the neighbor whose daughter is dealing with the sickness doesn't have that. And the friend who just lost his job doesn't have the promise that I will never leave you nor forsake you. But the Christian does.

So guess when we have the best opportunity to be a faithful witness to Jesus in this world around us? Is it when everything's great, my health is great, when my life is great. And, of course, this is the way we present ourselves to one another. And even in the world, how are you doing? Everything's great.

And they walk away going, I can't relate to that guy. Because in reality, everything isn't great for any of us. I don't care what you said to me on the way in today. We all have trials and we all have troubles, but we live inauthentically in this sort of sheen like everything's fantastic and wonderful because that's what I'm supposed to say. But it's not.

And when Christians live authentic Christian lives of hope in trouble and in trial, or in this case, when they're being persecuted by the world around them, the world looks into that and wonders, what is the deal with these people? We they're hurting. They're dealing with troubles just like we are, but they got something I don't have. And so they come to us and they say, what is your gig? What is your deal?

And we respond, because he lives, I can face tomorrow. Because he lives, all fear is gone. Because I know, know, know who holds the future. And life is worth a living just because he lives. And they don't know what to do with that, but it intrigues them, and they come to want it.

I ask people often, how did you come to faith? New people in the church, I regularly hear this story. I was in college in my dorm in the dorm next to me, there was this dude. He was just like totally different. Or I was it was at work, and I worked with this woman, and I could just tell she had something that I didn't.

I wanted it. I mean, we hear that all the time. What is that? That is first Peter three fifteen. The life lived creating curiosity, and then in that door swinging open moment, not rivets, but simply sharing your story of the difference that Jesus has made in your life.

Not five theories about the existence of God, not seven proofs of the resurrection, but your story of how you have found hope in the midst of trouble. That's what Peter is getting at here. He isn't asking if we have the answers, but whether our lives are creating any questions. One great quote. I got to get to this, and I got to I got to be done.

The world today, as we all are well aware, is not ready to listen to us or to preaching. It tells us it has no interest in theology and dogma, and there may be some truth in that. The world has become psychological, not to say cynical, and it is not prepared to listen to what people say. But when it sees a life which is triumphant, a personality that is clearly victorious, then it begins to pay attention. The first Christians conquered the ancient world just by being Christians.

It was their love for one another and their type of life that made such an impact upon the pagan world. And there is no question but that this is the greatest need of the hour, the Christian quality of life being demonstrated among men and women. That is something to which we are called and something which we can do. And I just think that's the encouragement here. Like, if I got up here and said, alright, we gotta be ready to make an answer.

So you go out, memorize your Bible, memorize three books on apologetics, and we're gonna have a quiz next week. Everybody leaves here discouraged, and so do I because I don't have all the answers. But who here doesn't have a story? Who here, if you're a Christian, you have met Jesus, and that meeting has changed your life? Tell the story.

Tell that story. Weave into that a little bit the claims of Christianity and what it means to become a Christian. And we're next week's message is gonna be all about how to have these kind of gospel conversations. Okay? So that's next week.

This week is what Peter is the essence of what Peter is getting at. It's not philosophy. It's not arguments, but generous lives of Christian love lived in a way that creates curiosity and then sharing your own story of hope in Jesus. It's a powerful, powerful witness, and we'll talk more about it next week. And so right now, I'm gonna ask campus pastors if you would come to the stage and lead in a final prayer.

And here at Crown Point, I'm gonna ask you to stand with me, if you would, please. Heavenly Father God, the potential just right here in this room of us leaving here, taking the hope, living out that hope, being ready in that moment to share about the hope that we have in Jesus. Thank you for the hope, first of all. Thank you, God, that there is every reason for joy in the midst of our trials and our sufferings. But, God, I pray that you would help us to not just be self focused with that, but to leverage that in powerful and effective ways in a world that is hopeless.

May they come to know hope through us and through Jesus, to whom be all glory, seated on the throne at the right hand of God, angels shouting, singing. We join with them here at Bethel Church. All praise be to you. We love you. We thank you.

We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. God's grace to you all. We'll see you next week.

* This transcript was generated using AI transcription technology and reviewed for accuracy but may contain errors. Please refer to the original audio for precise wording.

Study Guide for Spiritual Exiles, 1 Peter 3:7

Scripture Reference: 1 Peter 3:7

Visit the series page: Exiles: A study in 1 Peter

Donate to Support The Journey

Sermon Series: Spiritual Exiles 

Message: A Husband By Design 

Airdate: 10/12 –10/13/26

Programs: 2376 and 2377

Well, again, good morning. Good morning to our Cedar Lake campus. And I stand before you today excited about what I get to talk about. And part of the excitement that I have is that over the years I have spoken many times on the role of a husband. And all of those I did as a single man.

This is the very first time I am speaking on this subject as a husband myself. And to move from the more sort of biblical theoretical to being in the battle myself to make this truth practical in my own marriage and in my own life. So, I want to say that on the front end as we get into this that I am, I am in the struggle of all these things just as much as anybody here. And, it is very convicting to me and very helpful to spend this time, getting ready and looking at God's design for a a biblical husband. I have found marriage to be people ask me, how's it going? 

What do you think about marriage? You were single for so many years. I what I say often is that marriage has for me been the the single greatest mechanism for spiritual growth in my entire life. And what I mean by that is that the things that marriage requires are and primarily dying to myself is big thing. But those qualities that marriage requires align very closely with what Christ's likeness looks like.

So as I find myself trying to be a good husband, the changes that single Steve is having to make to be married Steve is making me a better Steve overall and making me, I think, hopefully, more mature Christian man, which I want very much. So as we come to this today and we look at God's blueprint for marriage and specifically for for a husband, I just again want to say, I'm in it with you. What does it mean to lead, love, and serve our wives? What does it mean to be a husband? These are all things that I'm struggling with living out every single day.

So I hope God blesses this. I think this message has tremendous potential to make a profound difference in the homes and in the marriages of our of our church. Let me also add this. All of Scripture is profitable, and so it doesn't matter if you're married or single. This is God's truth, and we all need to listen to it.

And I know that well, having preached it many years as a single man myself. So with that said, let's take a look. We're just studying one verse today. It's all that Peter has to say about the Christian husband. Let's take a look at this one verse and then just milk it for everything that we can.

Here is first Peter chapter three verse seven. Here's what it says. “Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered.” K? There it is.

K? Let's take this apart. And you'll notice the first word in that verse is the word likewise. We saw the same first word in chapter three verse one. He says, “likewise, wives.”

And we find that this is just part of a a sequence, a chain of teaching that goes all the way back to chapter two verse 11 where Peter basically says, hey, what does it look like to be a Christian living in a hostile world, living as an exile? It means that you are working so that your life is earning the respect of unbelievers who may not like what you say about Jesus, but they can't but help but respect the life that you're living. Or to say it another way, that our our our walk needs to sound and look like our talk. And when those two align together, there is a very powerful apologetic for the claims of Christianity. And so we've seen him describe relationships that Christians find themselves in and what what does that look like then.

So he began with a Christian citizen in relationship to government, that we are to be subject, submissive to government authorities. And then we looked at the employer employee relationship and that a Christian employee is to be a the best employee in that entire company and to have respect for the leadership that is over him. And then we saw in chapter three last week, what does it look like for a Christian woman to be married to an unbelieving spouse? And we talked about how as the gospel went across Asia Minor, you had these marital relationships where a woman believes in Jesus and the husband then does not. How does that Christian woman relate to the husband?

It was last week's message. I won't preach it all over again. So this week, how does a Christian husband conduct himself in a marriage? And the assumption here is that he is married to a Christian wife. And the assumption is based on the culture of the day where if a man, as the kind of leader of the household, if he converted to whatever, was expected everybody else in the house would as well.

K? So a Christian man who is following Jesus, the the assumption was that his wife would become a Christian, that his that his children and everybody would be a Christian household. Now there are exceptions to that, and maybe you know exceptions to that, where you have a Christian man who's married to an unbelieving wife. We maybe we all know at least maybe somebody like that, but those are rare. K?

Those are rare. Much more common to have a woman who's a Christian married to an unbelieving husband, which I think is why Peter addresses it as he did at the beginning of chapter three. Now we find here that Peter highlights two qualities of the Christian husband and two reasons that that ought to be important to him. Okay? Two qualities of the Christian husband and two reasons that that ought to be important to him.

Notice quality number one. Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way. Live with your wives. Let's start right there. Now this might seem self evident, but the Bible says that husbands need to live with their wives.

Okay? So this is a command of address. This is geography. This is proximity. This is what it means.

The King James says dwell together, that husbands and wives are to dwell together. I the other day, just drove right around the corner from our Crown Point campus here. There's a little there's a little store that sells decor decor for a home, and it says that on the sign. And the name of the store is Dwellings. Okay?

Dwellings. That's where you go for stuff in your home and and knickknacks and all of that. And so what this is saying is that in the home, the husband's the knick and the wife is the knack. Right? They are knickknacks in the same home.

In fact, that word for live is a word in antiquity that had sexual overtones to it. It means to be a husband and wife in such proximity and in such closeness where intimacy is not only possible but probable. You are not living at separate addresses. It is not simply a contract where, yeah, I've got a wife and she lives in Oregon somewhere. I, as a husband, am dwelling together.

I am living together with my wife. Not just even under the same roof. They live together and they sleep together. Now this is more important than you may realize. And one of the reasons for that is that over the years, I have come across situations where there are married couples where the one spouse has left and has said, you know what?

I don't I don't want to divorce you. I just don't want to live with you anymore. And off they go. And the divorce doesn't happen for, like, years. Doesn't happen.

And I want you to see in this passage, that is not Christian marriage. That is not marriage, to just simply be illegally married and not dwelling together. How should the church handle a situation like that? The church ought to discipline the spouse that has left, and it frees then the remaining spouse to divorce biblically the the one who left for abandonment as first Corinthians seven teaches. And when that doesn't happen, it leaves normally the woman, the wife in the house, wondering for years what is going to come of this.

And that is a very real thing in churches and is a sad thing, and it ought not to happen. Further, I would say this. If you are thinking about getting married to somebody, realize that that person is going to be in your space and in your face for the rest of your life. Choose wisely. To be married is to dwell together for the rest of your life.

Notice also with this that to be a husband to a Christian wife, it's not that you're just simply roommates. You're not just kind of you happen to live at the same place where, okay, these are your sort of duties around here and these are my sort of duties around here. It's not an episode of friends where we're just sort of you know, we happen to be at the same place. Rather, he says here that the husband is to live with the wife in a quote understanding way. Literally, the word means according to knowledge.

Husbands, did you get that? We live with our wives in a way that we are seeking to understand them. We are seeking to know them, to understand what it is that God has wired them to be, what their likes and dislikes, what their preferences and non preferences, what gets them excited and what is discouraging to them, what their dreams are, etcetera, etcetera. A husband is called to live with his wife not as a roommate, but as a student, as a PhD student of his wife to seek to understand her. Now I got a book here somebody gave me years ago.

And I don't if here you can see the title of that. Everything Men Know About Women. And if you look at the top, Fully Reveals the Shocking Truth, Daily News. K? And then you open it up, and there's nothing in it.

Everything men know about women. Now that's a joke. Right? But if this is true for a Christian husband, that is a very, very sad marriage. That is a very, very sad wife that he is married to.

Why? Because to be a husband is to be a student of your wife. Listen to a well known theologian and and a very experienced husband, Wayne Grudem, on this passage says this, the knowledge Peter intends here may include any knowledge that would be beneficial to the husband wife relationship, knowledge of God's purposes and principles for marriage, Knowledge of the wife's desires, goals, and frustrations. Knowledge of her strengths and weaknesses in the physical, emotional, and spiritual realms. A husband who lives according to knowledge will greatly enrich his marriage relationship.

Yet such knowledge can only be gained through regular study of God's word and regular unhurried times of private fellowship together as husband and wife. Husbands, I want to ask you a question right now. What do you feel in your heart when you see or hear a paragraph like this that is calling you to not only care but to seek to understand the way that your wife is wired. Because I'm going to guess many of us see that, and there is inside this negative response to that. There is inside this resistance to wanting to invest the kind of time and energy that it would take to come to know and understand your wife?

Where does that like oh, what is that actually? And I'll tell you what it is because I know it in my own heart. It is the worship of me. It is me ism. And a man, we're wired to be independent.

We think. We're wired to kind of we want to do our own thing. We want to do it in our own way. And then you get married, And now you have somebody who is in your space and is in your face. And you look in the Bible and you realize, I can't just live independent.

We're just not roommates. I'm called biblically. This is the Christian husband that's gonna care what God has to say about something. I'm called to care for my wife and to actually try to understand her. And that resistance flows from pride.

And that is what the Holy Spirit is working in the life of the Christian man to destroy. And that is why I say Christian marriage, husbands, and single men thinking about getting married, it is the death of self. What does it mean to be a Christian husband? It is the death of self. And we men, we don't want to die.

We're made to fight for life. We're made to survive. We don't want to see who I am die. And yet, as C. S.

Lewis said, it is only through death that something can be resurrected. It is not the death of ourselves and then that's it. It is the death of me and the resurrection of a new me. A new me that is not independent, is not only thinking about myself, is not only thinking about my needs, but rather a new me that is interdependent with this feminine beauty that God has placed in my life where now I am intertwined with somebody else. And their needs and their concerns are now my needs and my concerns.

And through that resurrection, there is a better me, a more Christ like me, a more loving me. Because what is the essence of love? To live independently, to live for my own needs, or rather to live for the joy of somebody else and to give of myself sacrificially for their joy, which is what Jesus did for us, isn't it? Or it's what Todd Coster did for Brenda to give his own kidney so that she could live. Jesus gives us life so that we can live.

And we see that through marriage. And as hard as this is for us and trust me, there are days for me where I I'm not like, yay, die to self. I gotta remind myself what my big priority is, Christ likeness. Romans eight, conform to the likeness of Christ. This is what I want.

Even though inside, I don't want to die to myself. But as I do, I know that God is doing a good work inside of me, and, therefore, this is a good thing. And husbands, we have to embrace what God is doing in us, creating us in the likeness of Jesus who died for us. So what does it mean to be a a Christian husband? Number one, I live with my wife.

Number two, I live in a manner where I'm seeking to understand her truly. But notice he goes on now, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel. Showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel. Now ladies, please do not bristle at that weaker vessel thing. Because what he is pointing out here is what is, I would say, fairly universally seen and understand is that generally speaking, men are physically stronger than women.

Now that said, there's a few sisters here in the church I wouldn't want to make mad. Okay? And we'd have a few contenders for the arm wrestling champion, probably even amongst the ladies in our church. But generally speaking, women are men are physically stronger than women. Now what does that create in the carnal man's heart?

The carnal man sees the weakness in women and sees it as an opportunity to exploit them. And if you look down through history at the exploitation of women, it is generally men who are abusing their strength and the woman's weakness for their own selfish needs and their own selfish gains. And we can include things like rape, wife abuse, human trafficking, online predators, and any number of exploitive male activities and actions against women, and all of them are wrong. All of them are not God's will. So physically, we see how men can see that weakness and seek to exploit it.

But I think this goes beyond just the physical that women are the weaker vessel to also the emotional. And again, broad stroke here and there are exceptions to this, but generally speaking, women are emotionally more fragile than men are. Again, men look at that and see weakness as maybe something to be exploited. We look in the Bible and see that as being feminine beauty created by the by the wisdom of God. More emotionally fragile.

You say, I don't know about that. Ask a parent of daughters. Or if you have daughters and sons, who's more fragile and who's not? Or ask an eighth grade girl's basketball coach. Are those girls a little fragile there in the eighth grade?

Or think about, you know, at the college that I went to, we had our our our dorms. This is you know, sounds crazy now in our our contemporary world. But back in the stone age, when I went to college, the Christian college that I attended, the boys had a dorm and the girls had dorms. They were not together. I know it sounds crazy, but yes, they were not together.

And there were always resident directors that were there, kind of these mature adults to keep the inmates under control. And you had men, the resident directors in the men's dorms, resident directors in the women's dorms. I would hate to be a resident director in a woman's dorm. I mean, for all the male craziness, the drama in the female dorm. Talk to somebody like that, and they'll they'll ask you for a job probably.

They want out as quick as possible. What is all of that? Well, all of that, I think, speaks to what Peter is getting at here. And that is that emotionally, that sort of intuitive, nonphysical side of women, there is what I what I would call there is a delicate beauty there, like a flower. Right?

That part of its beauty or fine China, part of its beauty is that it is so delicate. That's part of what makes it so beautiful and so valuable. And, again, men, carnally thinking men, will seek to exploit that weakness and that delicate feminine beauty. But you see Peter here calling Christian husbands to do the opposite of what the carnal man wants to do with that weakness. Rather than exploiting it, the husband is called in this passage to honor it.

That's right, men. We honor the feminine, delicate beauty that God made in Christian wives. We don't exploit it. We don't resent it. And that's hard to say at times, but I'll say it.

We don't resent it, but rather we seek to honor it. Now you might be here, maybe you're a guy and you're like, I'm a dude. Like, I don't even like flowers. Right? I don't like fine China.

That illustration means nothing to me. I'm a dude. Like, I'm into dude things. Dudes aren't into honoring delicate things. Really.

I have a friend who is into cars. And when he was in high school, he had a Dodge Challenger. And so when Dodge came out, this is like 'eight, 'nine, came out with a new version of the Dodge Challenger. Maybe you've probably seen them on the road, muscle car type thing. He just had to have one.

So he buys this Dodge Challenger. And it's really cool. It's really powerful and all of that. But this guy is like you talk to him, he could tell you every detail about this car. Right?

He knows all the wires. He knows all the knobs. He knows all the specs on this thing. And he takes such immaculate care of this car. I mean, you know, when it pulls up, it's just shimmering.

You could do brain surgery in the reflection on the wax. Right? It's just like a mirror. It's just so beautiful. And and why does he take such care of it?

Well, he takes care of it because he loves it. Right? He loves that car. And so every knob is polished and and every the, you know, the grille is beautiful and the and the rims are all just perfect. And the finish on that thing, I mean, it's so easy to scratch a car like this.

So that's why we never drive it. It's like that nice china at the house. But we don't eat off of this china. It's too valuable. We honor it so much, we never eat off of it.

We love this car so much, we never drive it. Because if you drive it, there's the possibility that a molecule of dust could land on the car somehow. And so you drive it around the block and then you wash and wax it all over again. That's kind of the way that this goes. That guy who is honoring that car and all of its little things in that car walks into the house from the garage and finds emotionally delicate wife struggling somehow.

Maybe comes to his mind this passage and he thinks to himself, I just don't want to deal with that. I don't have patience for that. I'm a guy. You're a woman and all your drama. I'm going back to my car.

And he thinks to himself, I can't I can't show honor to something that is delicate. And yet shows all this honor to his car. And you see, we show we take care of things that we value. And the issue is not the woman's delicate beauty. The issue is the man's heart not honoring it.

And that's why Peter says, don't look at the weakness that you see in your wife, how she's different than you physically, emotionally, and seek it and ignore it or resent it or exploit it. Rather, you are to honor it and as a husband to protect it. Wives are like flowers in this world, and that flower looks great on a sunny day, on a beautiful day. That flower can just bloom in all of its beauty. But what happens when the hailstorm comes?

That hail comes and now that flower is just is just it's destroyed. Right? What did it need? It needs protection for it to bloom in all of its beauty. And women and wives are like that.

God has wired them with a kind of delicate beauty, and they live in a world where their that beauty is exploited. And every time they walk to the car, they gotta look behind them. Is anybody following me? And they wonder at the office, and they wonder at the workplace, and they wonder at the school if maybe that person is trying to take advantage of them because they're not a man and they don't have the male voice and all the rest. They live their lives in a kind of wondering, is it safe for me to bloom?

And in Christian marriage, God says, husband, make it safe for her to bloom. Don't destroy that feminine beauty. Don't demean it. Protect it and honor it, and let it just blossom. And by the way, who's that good for?

It's good for her. It's also good for the husband. When his wife is a beautiful rose and feels safe to be all that God has made her to be. Honor means masculine deference to a woman's needs. Masculine deference to a woman's needs.

And if you can't if you feel like you can't treat her as good as Peter says here, at least treat her as good as the car in your garage, and we'll call that a step in the right direction. Right, ladies? Vroom, vroom. Okay? Vroom, vroom.

Now I'm gonna let me just go probe into the husband mind right now. You might be here right now and you can't say it. She's sitting next to you maybe. And you're you're leaning forward, acting interested because you think it earns points with her or something. But in your heart, I suspect that we have husbands here who are thinking to themselves, she's not worth the effort.

I know this woman. I've been around this block before. Okay. Let's talk about your needs again. Why would I why would I open that Pandora's box?

Why would I even go there in the first place? She is not worth it. Peter blunts this carnal thinking by pointing out something that maybe you've missed about that woman that is your wife. Again, look at the verse. “Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel since they are heirs with you of the grace of life and so that your prayers are not hindered.”

Peter gives two reasons that every husband here ought to care about what we're talking about right now. And I want take them in reverse order. First of all, so that God hears your prayers. Now what Peter is saying here is this, that you may not honor your wife, you may not cherish your wife, you may not value your wife, but God Almighty does. And when a husband mistreats his wife, does not honor his wife, doesn't care about her needs, God's in heaven seeing that.

That same Christian husband then goes in prayer about his business, goes in prayer about his career, goes in prayer about the health problem that he has, goes in prayer about some relationship with family or whatever it might be. And God's in heaven, and he's saying to himself, why should I listen to your prayer about some area that I have not revealed my will when you are ignoring where I have revealed my will, you are mistreating your wife. Just keep your prayers to yourself. You're wasting your breath right now. Go take care of your wife like you ought to.

That is the number one priority in relationship. Take care of your wife, and then come to me and talk to me about your business concern and your health problem and your whatever. And we find husbands, and this is what the text says, that our relationship with God is affected and our prayers are unheeded when we don't honor our wife. That's what it says. You say, well, it's not that important.

It's not that big a deal. She's not that big a deal. She is to God. And if she is to God, don't you think she should be to us too? One commentator, closest human relationship, the relationship to one's spouse must be carefully cherished if one wishes a close relationship with God. 

And a Christian husband is a Christian man, and that ought to be a priority for him, his relationship with God. And we find that that horizontal relationship with the wife has a lot to do with this vertical relationship with God. So why should I honor her so God hears my prayers? But notice what he says right before that, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life. Why should I honor this woman that I see in the good, the bad, and the ugly that I see every single morning and every single night that I see in her ups and I see in her downs and her downs and her downs? 

Why honor her? Because God saved her. God treasures her. God loves her. And God always will.

That's what that phrase means, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life. Basically, Peter is saying, Christian husband, you need to wake up to something. Don't let familiarity breed contempt. Don't let seeing her every single day. Don't let that allow you to miss who you are actually married to.

That woman that you are married to is a woman that Jesus died for, that Jesus gave his life for, that Jesus loves and always will love, that God the Father elected an eternity past, that God promises will grant to her glorified body, glorified status, will be forever a co heir with Jesus himself. Christian husband realized that woman that you see every day in the bad breath and the crazy hair in the morning and all of that is actually an object of the eternal love of God Almighty. You may not love her, but God does. And when I come to realize that this woman is not just a woman, she's not a piece of furniture in the house, when I see her as God sees her, I come to realize that I ought to treat her accordingly. And you might be saying, husband, not my wife.

That says more about you than it does her. And what that says is that you are not looking at your world and even your home through the grid of God's truth because God sees her as an object of saving grace. You know, I'm a long ways from my daughter going on a date with any young man, but I've already been thinking about it a little bit. Mostly in terms of surveillance and what ammo to buy is kind of how I've been thinking about it. That boy is going to fear for his life.

And if he doesn't, he's not going out with her. Now the reason I say that is that I want him to feel fear about going out with her. And I want that fear to flow from an understanding of how precious she is to me. And if he messes with her, he is in big trouble. Why?

Because that I love that. I love that little girl. Right? He is not going to treat her according to his hormones. He is not going to treat her according to his lust.

He is not going to treat her like arm candy for his status in the school or whatever. He is not going to do that. If he does that, he is not going to go out with her. That's it. It's done.

Pull up and honk. I'm calling the cops. You are not going out with my wife or my daughter. Because that disrespect tells me something about the kind of person you are. Get off of my property.

You are not going out with my my daughter. She is so I love her so much. She is so precious to me. She will only go out with a boy that I sense is going to treat her according to the way that I feel about her, not himself. I define that relationship until they get married, which is never happening.

Don't exploit her. Don't ignore her. Don't resent her. Don't fail to meet her needs. She is my daughter.

And Christian husband, you are married to the daughter of God. And if you treat her like she is just furniture, don't expect daddy to hear your prayers. Don't expect daddy to be happy with you. Don't expect daddy to bless your life. Why?

Because you are mistreating his daughter. She is a co heir with Jesus. She has exalted status because of what God says about her and how he feels about her. And a Christian husband will treat her accordingly. And what that means is that you live with her.

You seek to understand her. You love her in the ups and downs. Pursue her. Seek to meet her needs. And guess what happens as you do?

That feminine beauty, because God is working in her life as well, is allowed to blossom in your life and to be the blessing that God intended it to be. I wanna read to you a letter that I received years ago. It could have been ten years ago. I don't even know how long I've had this letter. I found it in a file this week.

And it was an anonymous letter. So I don't even know who this is from. K? They may or may not even be in our church anymore. I have no idea.

So I feel safe sharing it because they sent it anonymously. It's written from a wife describing her marriage, and she wrote it after I had preached on marital intimacy years ago. Listen to what she says. Pastor Steve, I found myself thinking about your words from Sunday's sermon. Usually, things are more complex than we think.

I know before I married, I never imagined the complexities of marriage and family that would occur. I am not faulting you for being single, but I do think the understanding is lacking. I have discovered that intimacy hinges on the emotional bond I feel for my husband. Over the years, he has changed and fallen into a pattern of work, sports, TV. Spiritually, he does not lead the family.

He does not pray, ask about my needs, direct our children into spiritual avenues. He does not attend Christian men's programs, opportunities, or ministries offered at the church. I feel alone in my spiritual life, not sharing discussion, goals, concerns because of his lack of communication or interest. God has met those needs through friends and a Bible study, which I am grateful. We do not have interests we share.

I'm not much of a TV watcher or sports nut. We have fallen into separate lives in the same home. I feel alone in the family life much of the time. He refuses to lead in finances. I handle the pressure of bills, savings, cutbacks, and our children's future needs for college.

He does not plan outings, vacations, or dates. Yes. I was the planner in the past, but I stopped hoping he would miss them, desire time, become more actively involved. Consequently, we have not done much together in years. Yes.

I have gone to counseling. Yes. I have prayed regularly. Yes. I feel guilty for not responding to his needs and intimacy.

I find it impossible at times to love him, give to him, enjoy him. So much is missing. The respect that women need to feel is so key to intimacy. Leadership in the home is an attractive thing. When you challenge men on Sunday to not be demanding but to give under their wives understanding, I thought you missed the point.

Yes. It is important to be gentle, understanding, caring during intimacy. The bigger picture is to be a leader in the home. Without it, the weight of leading is on the wife and is an overload of what God intended. A strong leader is appealing and attractive to women.

This lack of relationship in marriage produces guilt, and hearing your words on Sunday produced more. This type of relationship isn't what I signed up for. It isn't what I ever expected. The lack of intimacy has resulted from years of neglect, care, and unattended leadership. I'm not looking for you to address this.

I just want to give you some insights into our relationship and why the things have soured. I know that biblically, God gives us principles to live by, but I find it so hard to know how to change direction of my marriage. There are Scriptures for the unbelieving spouse, the adultery, and the abandoned spouse. But what do I do? I'm married to a man who is a Christian, but I haven't seen growth, change, or the leadership of a godly husband.

Thank you for reading this. I hope in some way this helped you see marriage and intimacy from my eyes. I wish it was as easy as you painted it this past week. And brothers, I just wanna ask you, if your wife wrote a letter, what would it say? How would she describe her experience living in the same home with you and being the recipient of your love?

What has that experience been like? You know, my wife, Jennifer, has written me both letters of encouragement and of admonishing me in areas of weakness that she sees in me. And these are hard to read, but they are a path forward, I think. And the path forward is always coming back to God's basic design. What does it mean to be a husband?

To lead, love, and to serve your wife as a servant leader, to love as Christ loved the church, to look at this passage and to say, wow, I've gotta seek to understand you and to care for you, to know you. If your marriage is broken, it's worth saving. If it's broken, it's worth saving. Husbands, you may everything in you doesn't want to go down that path again, and yet you're married to the daughter of almighty God. She is worth the effort.

She is worth honoring. She is worth cherishing. I would encourage you to start by just seeking understanding. Listen to her. Ask her questions.

Admit where you have failed. Repent. Ask her for grace for future failures that no doubt will come. But treat her with gentleness and with patience and with the kind of honoring that feminine beauty calls for. She's a daughter of the most high God.

Treat her accordingly. Now if I may, I could end right there. I have one other little final, final thought, if I could say this. And for many, many years, I have had a burden for single Christian sisters in the church, many of whom want to get married, and that may be you. And I wanna ask you a question.

What are you really looking for in a husband? And are you being attracted to the right kind of man? And by that, it has nothing to do with his money. It has nothing to do with his looks, figure, career. These kind of eharmony categories have nothing to do with what a Christian marriage is actually all about.

And I wanna ask you, are you attracted to that kind of a guy? And is that kind of a man the priority? Yes, Christian. Oh, he goes to church with me, and I've heard that a thousand times. And to see wonderful Christian girls that grow up and they marry deadbeat husbands spiritually is a burden to me.

And I just wanna say this weekend, make sure you're attracted to the right kind of qualities, and make sure they're the biblical ones. And you will save yourself a lifetime of heartache. Maybe that letter. Let that letter speak to you of what it means to marry a rich, good looking, nice car driving, nice clothes wearing, right cologne wearing guy. But if he doesn't lead you spiritually and if he doesn't dwell with you in an understanding way, you're gonna write a letter like that, and I wanna keep you from it.

I wanna keep you from it. Find a guy that'll love you as Christ loves the church. If he doesn't pray with you now, he's probably not gonna pray with you then. If he doesn't lead you spiritually now, he's probably not gonna lead you spiritually then. And don't let the wedding or anything else get in the way of you marrying the right kind of man.

End of excursions. Amen, congregation? Amen. Amen.

* This transcript was generated using AI transcription technology and reviewed for accuracy but may contain errors. Please refer to the original audio for precise wording.

Study Guide for Spiritual Exiles, 1 Peter 3:13-17

Scripture Reference: 1 Peter 3:13-17

Visit the series page: Exiles: A study in 1 Peter

Donate to Support The Journey

Sermon Series: Spiritual Exiles 

Message: Living Questionably and Answering Hopefully

Airdate: 10/16 and 10/19/26

Programs: 2380 and 2381

Well, good morning again, and hello, Cedar Lake campus, Hope Portage campus this morning. I, last weekend, had the joy of speaking, ministering at one of our former associate pastor's churches. He is Jeremy Carr, who is the senior pastor now in North Des Moines at Johnston E. Free Church. And so I was able to go and to see his ministry there.

He's been there about a year now, and God's blessing, and they seem to be doing super great. So it was great to to be with them. I also understand while I was gone that we had a special offering last weekend to help meet needs in Nepal with the earthquake victims as well as some of the needs that we have with our facilities here. When I say here, mean at our Gary campus and at HP and at Cedar Lake with some of our facilities we use for primarily youth ministry and student ministry, our gymnasiums that we have. And I just was encouraged.

We had an offering last weekend, second offering, kind of like lunch money, people throwing it in, of $13,500 that came in for that, which is really great. And if you're an old sports guy, you love sports, and maybe you have a heart for young people and all that, I'm sure you could still throw money in the offering towards that. And we'd find a way to apply that to some of the things that we need and probably still will need in those facilities. But thank you, everybody, for being a part of that. And that's pretty exciting for me because I'm one of those old sports guys.

And I'd love to see our facilities be able to minister through athletics to primarily young people. Well, my title today kind of gives away the whole sermon, frankly. Here's my title: Living Questionably and Answering Hopefully. Now I could just stop and say, amen, amen, let's go home, because that's basically all that I'm going to say today. And some of you are excited right now.

Like, wow, we're going to get out of here early today. The problem is most of us would leave having no idea what that means. And that's really what lies before us here is, like, what does that mean? What does it mean to live lives that are questionable and give answers that are filled with hope? And what does that have to do with really God's entire plan for the fulfilling of the great commission?

It is a summary of first Peter three verse 15. If you went to Moody Bible Institute and say, I'm gonna take a class on evangelism, this might be the very first verse that you would memorize. If you have ever read a book on Christian apologetics, this verse always talked about. So this is one of these verses that that that stands out in a unique category and is often referred to when it comes to the whole matter of how we represent our faith, how we even share our faith. What does it mean to live Christianly and to speak Christianly in a hostile environment around us?

And so we have this verse about bold, fearless witness. And who's the writer of it? Ironically, Peter, the most famous coward in all of the Bible. But I'll get into that in a moment. So let me read the text.

And so follow along, please, if you have your Bibles. I think we have it on the screens as well. Here's what Peter writes beginning in verse now 13. “Now who is there to harm you if you are zealous for what is good? But even if you should suffer for righteousness' sake, you will be blessed.

Have no fear of them nor be troubled. But in your hearts, honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you. Yet do it with gentleness and respect, having a good conscience, so that when you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame. For it is better to suffer for doing good, if that should be God's will, than for doing evil.” Now if that language sounds familiar, it means that you've been dialed in in this entire series in first Peter because he is repeating what he has said here over and over again, of in different contexts.

But basically, this same point. Christian, how do we live in a hostile environment? How do you how do you represent Jesus when the world around you looks down on that? You live lives of moral and spiritually observable beauty that causes the people around you to think maybe there's something to this Christianity. That's the whole point really of first Peter.

And you do that primarily in your persecution and in your suffering. Now he has already said that as it relates, for example, the beginning of this chapter to Christian wives who are married to unbelieving husbands. What are they supposed to do? They are to by their moral behavior and their the beauty of their life, he says, to win their husbands over without a word. K?

We talked about that. He talked about it with slaves, with their owners with their owners, and he's talked about it with Christian citizens as it relates to the government. And it's the same kind of point that he is trying to pound home. And I think we need to hear that it is our lives that speak about the truth of the claims that we make regarding Jesus being the Savior of the world and the person that will transform your life into one of hope and one of of of moral beauty and one that will live forever with eternal life. So what I wanna do today, since some of this is repeat, I wanna focus in on what is is unique that we have not seen so far, and that primarily is in verse 15.

Again, I'll just read it. “In your hearts, Christ the Lord is holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you.” So we find these threads being weaved here regarding the implications and the applications of living a life of love and of goodness to others that even an unbelieving world can't deny. But he is saying something unique here because he gets at what I think is really our big obstacle in doing this. What's the biggest thing that all of us struggle with when it comes to somehow identifying ourselves with other people as Christians?

I would submit to you, the biggest thing we struggle with is fear. Right? Fear. We are afraid of something. Maybe you know how this works.

Let me just walk you through it, see if you can relate to this. You're at work. You're in some context, and you're having a conversation with your neighbor, your coworker, your family member, doesn't matter what it is. They'll say it's at work, it's coworker. And you're having a conversation, you're talking about the Blackhawks game last night.

And you're like, yeah, in the second in the second period, did you see the and then did did you notice that? And yeah. He's like, yeah, man. That was awesome. And, yeah, it's just smooth.

It's natural. You're having a great conversation. And then somehow, you say, well, how did the weekend go? Oh, my daughter. You know, she's dealing with that chronic illness.

And my wife and I, we just oh, we're so devastated. We're just wondering what, like, what's this all about? And in that moment, there is a frog that resides down here. And in that moment, it goes ribbit right to the throat. Right?

And now in your throat, there is something that with the Blackhawks or with whatever else it was, your garden, natural conversation, all of a sudden now, in the moment where the door swings wide open, Right? Because that person is sharing something very personal to them, something down on the heart level, down on the soul level. They're hurting. They're in pain. They're looking for what?

Hope. They're looking for hope. But in their worldview, atheist, secular, agnostic, whatever it is, there is no hope. There is no confidence about anything in the future. Everything's random.

Everything you just don't know what's gonna happen. They want hope. And the door swings wide open in that moment. And in your throat, there's ribbit, ribbit. And you're like, buddy.

And something in you is going, tell them your story about when your daughter was sick. Tell them your story. When your mom had cancer, tell them your story of how you went through that terrible thing in your marriage. But your throat's going ribbit ribbit ribbit. And all we can sometimes get out in that moment is like, I pray for you.

Oh, look at the time. I gotta go. And off we scamper. And that person who in that gospel moment of heart level kind of interaction is left hopeless. Can you relate to that?

What is it about those moments that we get all clunky? Right? We are eloquent with the gardening and clunky with Jesus. What is it? And I believe Peter is putting his finger down on the heart of the issue that we have, so many of us have, when it comes to this.

We are stupid, if I can use that word. Children, don't use it. But we're we're spiritually stupid. Why are we being stupid? Because there is something inside of us that is assessing whether or not this person's opinion of me is going to rise or fall dependent on what I dare share with them about the hope that I have in Jesus.

And you might say, no, it's not that. I haven't completed my PhD in apologetics yet. And so until I get that done, I don't think God wants me to say nothing, and I'm just gonna stay silent until I have the diploma on the wall. Or you might say, well, yes, but I'm that's not my gift. I'm more called to a serving ministry.

So I'm gonna mow his yard for him. But I'm not gonna tell him about the hope that I have found in the Lord Jesus Christ. This fear, Peter addresses in verse 13 by saying, now who is there that is going to harm you if you are zealous for doing what is good? But even if you should suffer for righteousness' sake, you will be blessed. In other words, when we do what God has called us to do, when and that can be in word or in deed, but as we are kind of living out loud this Gospel that we believe, sing, treasure, he says those kinds of activities generally are not going to have people saying to you, you're an evil person.

There there are generally good things that we are doing, helping other people, showing care and concern that in the world is not so evident. But he says, but even if let's just say that the opinion of that person goes down on you because you say something spiritual in that moment. He says, you'll be blessed by it. Blessed by who? Class. 

God himself. God himself. There's a promise there. I've never heard anybody say, those Christians are so evil with all their feeding of the poor and the caring of the orphans. May the world be rid of them.

People don't say that. In fact, if you look at the first three centuries of the church. K? So this is prior to basically, in in church history, deciding moment is in the the early fourth century when Constantine, the emperor of Rome, himself becomes a Christian and then legalizes Christianity throughout the Roman Empire. Big moment.

Because up to that point, Christianity was largely hated and Christians were viewed extremely suspiciously and terrible persecution. Read Fox's Book of Martyrs as an example of the terrible things that were done to the early Christians. So prior to Constantine's conversion, if you look at that those three centuries, it's a interesting time to see how the church was the church when everybody hated them. And here is what one Christian apologist writing actually in the first century in the city of Athens writes about he writes to emperor Hadrian, emperor of Rome, about Christians. Here's how he describes them.

They love one another. They never fail to help widows. They save orphans from those who would hurt them. If they had something, they if they have had something, they give freely to the man who has nothing. If they see a stranger, they take him home and are happy as though he were a real brother.

First century people like you and me believing in Jesus. What did that look like for them? It looked like that. Not perfectly. They were sinners like we are.

But generally, that's kind of the ethos of the first century church. Now let me ask you a question. When Hadrian gets this letter from this guy named Aristides, what does he think about these Christians that he's heard about when he hears about their care for the orphans and that they're always taking people home that are strangers and they love, care, and meet the needs of of the widows? What does he think in his mind? Does he think to himself, these people are really bad people.

We've gotta get them out of the empire. Or in spite of what he had heard about Christians, when he hears about the way they conducted themselves, what did it do in Hadrian's heart? I'm saying to you, it created curiosity. It created curiosity. What are these people all about?

I know they claim there's only one God. They deny Zeus. But what's their deal? Because they're like about things that don't know anybody else is doing that kind of stuff. And that is the power and was the power in the first century, in the first three centuries, of people like you and me taking the love that God has showed into our hearts, shined into our hearts, and expressing it in ways that were observable in the world around them.

It said something powerful to people. It made them wonder what is the deal with these people. And the if you're saying, well, what's the theology behind it? Here's the theology behind that curiosity. It is known as the Imago Dei, the image of God.

And the Bible tells us that when God made man Adam and Eve back in the garden, Genesis one, Genesis two, that when he made Adam and Eve, he made us, all of humanity, different than anything else in the entire galaxy. He placed within us this spiritual, soulish capacity. Right? We are spiritual beings. And in that spiritual place, he placed his image, likeness, his morality or sense of it, a sense of right and wrong, good and evil kind of a thing.

Everybody has that. There is something innate within a human being that knows when something is good generally and when something is wrong. It's the Imago Dei. The fall happens. Right?

Mankind falls into sin, but we retain, the Bible calls this, Paul calls it in Romans, the conscience. We all have a conscience, and that is the theology behind what he is getting at here. And it is a powerful help for us when we are trying to evangelize is that there are we know that that other person is made in the image of this God and has a sensibility about them, broken, dulled, fallen, but it's still there. As John Stott said, in all evangelism, I find it a constant encouragement to say to myself, the other person's conscience is on my side. I like that.

And so this is the mantra of Peter throughout the entire letter is do you realize that you we, Christians, have an ace in the hole when it comes to buttressing the claims that we have about Jesus, and it is our lives and the kinds of things that we care about. And the world sees that, and they wonder. I drew up a diagram just to illustrate this. Maybe this will help. If you think about what is the common ground between an unbeliever, a non Christian, and and a and a Christian.

Because there I mean, we're a new creation. The old is gone. The new has come, Paul writes. But we still have shared common ground. This is this is the place that we can speak the language that even a non Christian can understand.

And you notice that non Christian and Christians made in the image of God. We all have a conscience. Right? And it is in this category that moral beauty and love and self sacrifice and compassion, these things speak to the non Christian in a way that bypasses their mental defenses against Christianity, and it gets right down to the heart, right down to where the gospel speaks first. And Peter says, leverage that.

Don't be afraid of them. If they look down on you, you're blessed anyway. Rather, leverage the normal Christian expression of love and good works in this world, which Paul writes that we were ordained before time began to do. Leverage those things. Do them in observable ways so that the world around you wonders inside what's up with them.

What is up with them? What is their deal? It's true for the unbelieving husband toward his Christian wife, the unbelieving employer towards his Christian employee, the whatever unbeliever toward whatever Christian whose lifestyle shows Christian love and moral beauty. And that's why Peter writes in verse 14, “have no fear of them nor be troubled. But in your hearts, honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for the reason of the hope that is in you.” 

K? Now I just wanna point out to you, there's tremendous irony here in this passage about bold witness and not being afraid. Again, who's writing this? Peter. Right?

What do we know about Peter in the story, in his own story? We go all the way back to the Garden of Gethsemane. Here come the Roman soldiers way back. Actually, we go to the upper room, don't we? They're in the upper room.

Peter says to Jesus, though every other disciple here leaves you, I will never leave you. Hubris pride. Right? I will never leave you. And what does Jesus say?

Before the cock crowed, you're gonna deny me three times. Peter's like, no. I would never do that. Well, within a few hours, he's running away from the Roman mob that came to arrest Jesus. And shortly after that, he is right there in the courtyard.

And who does Peter who is Peter afraid of? And you might say, it was the Roman legion or he they had a point of a spear in front of him, and so maybe we can give him grace. No. It was a little girl. Excuse me?

Aren't you one of Jesus' disciples? And Peter's like, woah. No. No. I never knew the man.

Right? He's the most famous coward in the whole New Testament. He's the guy that's writing this. Now if we go ahead in the story a little bit, what do we find? After Peter's conversion, after the Spirit comes at Pentecost, right away now, there is this dramatic change with these disciples.

The same guys that ran away in the Garden of Gethsemane now are standing up to not only the Romans, but also the Jewish authorities that had put Jesus to death just days before. And they haul Peter in front of the whole Sanhedrin, and they command him not to preach this message anymore. And what does Peter say? “We must obey God rather than men.” Wait.

Aren't you the aren't you the same guy that like, the little girl? Isn't that you? And, of course, it is. And so we have in front of us somebody who knows something about going from being afraid and living by fear to living boldly as a testimony to Jesus Christ. This is a man that knows how to go from A to B, which ought to be encouraging, I think, for us because I would suspect that there's a lot of people still living in A.

And we look at B, which is the boldness bold witness, and we think, I could never do that. I can never be that way. And yet Peter, by the Spirit of God and the work of God in his life, becomes a bold witness and exhorts the church not to be like him in the garden, but to be like him in front of the Sanhedrin. But how do we get there? Like, what's the key to go from living as a Christian according to fear to living as a Christian boldly and by faith?

And I think Peter gives us the absolute key in verse 15. Look again. Don't be afraid of them. Rather, in your hearts, Christ the Lord as holy. Notice he doesn't say get out your apologetics books and get an answer to every question they might throw at you.

He doesn't say get your educational degree. He doesn't say go into hiding. Rather, it does so it it doesn't start here. So many people think, for me to be a faithful witness, I've got to have it right here. No.

That is not the key. It's not here. It's right here is the issue. Who is Lord of your heart? Or to say it in this context, whose opinion do you care the most about?

Really? Now we sing songs about the majesty of Jesus, and we talk about it's all about him, and we sing about the glory of God and all of that. But when I'm talking Blackhawks with a guy who shares with me that his child has is suffering a terrible disease, and they're wondering what to think about all of it, and the frog rivets in my throat, what does that say about who I'm really caring about? And Peter says, settle the matter, Christian. Who is Lord of your heart?

And you place Jesus Christ and his opinion right on that throne. And allow the boldness that comes from carrying only what he thinks to shape the way that you live your life. So when you're talking to the little girl in the courtyard, you're not ribbit, ribbit, ribbit. I wrote this sentence. Thought it was so good.

Want to read it. The frog rivets in our throats because fear of man resides in our hearts. That's the bottom line. Right? Proverbs says “the fear of man is a snare.”

It's a snare. How do we overcome it? I believe it's by consciously committing, like like deciding in my heart, in my life, I want Jesus and his opinion to rule the day. And when Christ is squarely exalted and treasured in that place, really frankly, it's just the application of what we believe, isn't it? Like, if right now we had the eyes to see, isn't it true that right now there is a throne?

It's the highest throne in heaven. And Jesus is alive. Holes in his hands and in his feet, glorified body, glory radiating from him, the infinite glory of the Son of God. He is sitting right there at the right hand of God. Do you believe that?

And that right now if we had ears to hear, we would hear the echoing, rejoicing song of innumerable air angels and seraphim and cherubim singing glory to Jesus. Do you believe that? And if we truly could see into that place, we would see the high and holy and exalted place that Jesus is. And if we could truly understand that and see that, which we believe it to be true, but if we could see and hear and grapple with that, and there he is. He's my Lord Jesus.

I worship you more than anything else. You're at the you're on the throne of my heart. Now I'm talking Blackhawks with the guy who's like three cubicles over in the office. How afraid of his opinion am I when it comes to sharing hope, the only hope there is in this world? See?

Do you see that? The higher he is, the lower the opinion of man. Bonhoeffer said it this way, those who are afraid of men have no fear of God, and those who fear God have no fear of men. So can I ask you, Bethel Church, and you individually, who really is Lord in your heart? Really?

Whose opinion do you really care about? Now I'll confess to you, I get this. Right? I get this. I talk spiritual things.

This is like what I do for a living. Right? So you might say, well, if we walked around with pastor Steve all the time, it'd be like, you know, amazing. Right? Because you just talk Jesus everywhere you go.

It's just natural for you. It's not natural for me. When I sit on an airport and and frankly, I have some advantage over most of you. Because when I'm on the airplane or meeting somebody at the golf course or whatever, you know, what's your name? First question.

Second question, what do you do? Right? So on the airplane, when the person said, so what do you do for a living? And I say, I pastor a church. They're like, oh, okay.

And right away, either that's a major turn off or it becomes a counseling session right away in that moment. So you like, okay. I went through a divorce three years ago, and then on it goes. Right? And in my heart, it's not like, you know, frankly, honestly, this is the sinful heart.

Sometimes I just wanna read my book that I brought with me, and now I have a two hour counseling session with this with and and even in that time, it's my mind is grappling. What do I share? What do I say? So it's I'm just being honest with you. I'm not up here condemning anybody here.

I say this to myself. I got the frog ribbiting in my throat plenty. So what do we do? How do we handle this? And I think Peter is just laying out a simple approach to lifestyle evangelism here.

Notice again, number one, we live a lifestyle of normal Christian love and others' orientation. In your neighborhood, are you one of the neighbors that all the other neighbors know when they're gone on vacation, you'll pull their trash bin back? Right? Or if they have some little need or something, you're the are you a conduit in your neighborhood, in your school, in your workplace? Are you are are you somebody that people sense they sort of care about me?

That's normal Christianity, isn't it? What are we called to do? Love one another. Right? Love one another.

So I'm not spending a lot of time on this, but we we live the normal expected Christian life. We just live that kind of change that Jesus makes in our hearts that turns us from being self centered and self obsessed to a approach where we're caring for people, engaging people. We hold high, secondly, Jesus. He is on the throne of our hearts above the opinion of anybody else. I want His approval more than I care about the guy three cubicles down from me.

So I'm free now. Right? I'm free because I'm living hopefully in a way that pleases the Lord. Third, keep your gospel bags packed. Here's what it says.

Always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you. Keep your gospel bags packed. You're thinking, does that mean? Well, it's just what came to my mind as an illustration of this because we're like eight days from delivery roughly. My wife is expecting our second child.

And these kids, they don't tell you when they're coming, right? So about three weeks ago, realizing that we were entering the danger zone, we got ready. Now my wife's been getting ready for, like, months. Our house right now, we should sell it. It's like a showpiece.

Right? She has cleaned everything. The nest is ready. Right? There's something to that whole female nesting thing.

There really is. So she's been getting ready for but the last couple of weeks, we've been, like, really dialing it in. And if you were to go into our bedroom right now, you would see that we have you know, the the luggage is there. The bags are packed. In the in the bag is the clothes that we might need, little snacks, any little, you know, toiletries, any doodads, whatever.

It's all there. It's all ready to go. And the reason for that is that we don't know when this baby is showing up. So we gotta be ready just in case. Because when she goes, ah, I'm getting the bag, we're getting in the van, and off we go to the hospital.

I have found in my life the opportunities that I have to share in the world rarely come at unexpected times. They come at unexpected times. Okay? Now if your neighbors are like, okay, in three weeks, I'm going to ask you a very soulish question about pain in my life, you could be like, okay, I'm going to get ready for it, right? And you show up, you got your notes and okay, point number one, point number two, point number three.

They never do that, right? It's that meeting them on the way to the mailbox moment or happen to sit next to you in the lunchroom at work kind of moment where all of a sudden now this door swings wide open. Are you ready? Are you ready in that moment to say something that might lead them from the curiosity about your life towards an interest in who Jesus is and the difference he's made in your life. Like if right now, I took a microphone and I went into the crowd and I said, okay, what would you say?

Could you would you be ready to say something? I'm not gonna do that, but could you do that? And now here I'm freaking you out because you're like, oh, I've got to have all these answers and all of that. And the and and I want this is the the main thing that I've learned in this passage is this point right here is what is Peter suggesting that we say? Like, what are we supposed to be ready to say?

Notice it says, anyone who asks you for a reason. K? Asked you for a reason. Many of us look at this and say, I'm gonna go to the street corner and I'm gonna shout to that jazz festival in Chicago this weekend, Jesus is Lord, and I'll take on anybody. No.

That's not what he's saying here, isn't it? Where does this conversation start? It starts with them asking you a question. But where does that come from? They have observed hope.

There is something in your demeanor, in your approach to the problems in your own life that makes them curious, and they come to you. Now that doesn't mean that we don't broach things and all that. There's a place for Marcel preaching. But that's not what Peter is saying. They come to us and they ask us, what is your deal?

Like, I've known you a while here, and there's something going on here that I don't have going on in my own life. And here's the sobering reality, I think, that too often we give our answers when they aren't asking questions. And they aren't asking questions because our lives aren't creating them. One man writes this for Pascal, talking about a French cool theologian guy, who if I had had a son, I might name him after Pascal. I love Pascal.

I digress. For Pascal, presenting someone with a list of proofs for Christianity or evidence for faith is probably a waste of time. If someone basically doesn't want to believe, no amount of proof or proof text can ever convince her. And even if she were convinced, then it wouldn't be the Christian God that she had come to believe in, but only what Pascal called the God of the philosophers. The crucial factor in persuading someone to believe then is not to present evidence, but first to awaken a desire for God in them.

In other words, when commending Christianity to people, make it attractive, make good men wish it were true, and then show that it is. Such arguments as there are for Christianity can convince those who hope it is true, but will never convince those who don't. And Peter says here, there is one aspect primarily that the unbeliever is going to wonder about. And did you see it there? Always being ready to make a defense to anyone who asks you for the reason for the what?

Hope. The hope that is in you. What is hope? Confidence about the future that brings assurance into today. Now as Christians, we have every reason to be confident, don't we?

Future in heaven, future on the new earth, life with Jesus, glorified body, inheritance, being with Christ, and other loved ones in Christ. All of that sounds great and fantastic. It's not just that future hope, but also in our present trials where the promises of God come to assure us, “I will never leave you. I will never forsake you. Cast all your anxieties on me for I care for you,” etcetera, etcetera, provides the Christian who is in the hospital bed, in the hospital facing a major surgery with something that the guy in the gurney next to him doesn't have.

Right? He doesn't have that. And the neighbor whose daughter is dealing with the sickness doesn't have that. And the friend who just lost his job doesn't have the promise that I will never leave you nor forsake you. But the Christian does.

So guess when we have the best opportunity to be a faithful witness to Jesus in this world around us? Is it when everything's great, my health is great, when my life is great. And, of course, this is the way we present ourselves to one another. And even in the world, how are you doing? Everything's great.

And they walk away going, I can't relate to that guy. Because in reality, everything isn't great for any of us. I don't care what you said to me on the way in today. We all have trials and we all have troubles, but we live inauthentically in this sort of sheen like everything's fantastic and wonderful because that's what I'm supposed to say. But it's not.

And when Christians live authentic Christian lives of hope in trouble and in trial, or in this case, when they're being persecuted by the world around them, the world looks into that and wonders, what is the deal with these people? We they're hurting. They're dealing with troubles just like we are, but they got something I don't have. And so they come to us and they say, what is your gig? What is your deal?

And we respond, because he lives, I can face tomorrow. Because he lives, all fear is gone. Because I know, know, know who holds the future. And life is worth a living just because he lives. And they don't know what to do with that, but it intrigues them, and they come to want it.

I ask people often, how did you come to faith? New people in the church, I regularly hear this story. I was in college in my dorm in the dorm next to me, there was this dude. He was just like totally different. Or I was it was at work, and I worked with this woman, and I could just tell she had something that I didn't.

I wanted it. I mean, we hear that all the time. What is that? That is first Peter three fifteen. The life lived creating curiosity, and then in that door swinging open moment, not rivets, but simply sharing your story of the difference that Jesus has made in your life.

Not five theories about the existence of God, not seven proofs of the resurrection, but your story of how you have found hope in the midst of trouble. That's what Peter is getting at here. He isn't asking if we have the answers, but whether our lives are creating any questions. One great quote. I got to get to this, and I got to I got to be done.

The world today, as we all are well aware, is not ready to listen to us or to preaching. It tells us it has no interest in theology and dogma, and there may be some truth in that. The world has become psychological, not to say cynical, and it is not prepared to listen to what people say. But when it sees a life which is triumphant, a personality that is clearly victorious, then it begins to pay attention. The first Christians conquered the ancient world just by being Christians.

It was their love for one another and their type of life that made such an impact upon the pagan world. And there is no question but that this is the greatest need of the hour, the Christian quality of life being demonstrated among men and women. That is something to which we are called and something which we can do. And I just think that's the encouragement here. Like, if I got up here and said, alright, we gotta be ready to make an answer.

So you go out, memorize your Bible, memorize three books on apologetics, and we're gonna have a quiz next week. Everybody leaves here discouraged, and so do I because I don't have all the answers. But who here doesn't have a story? Who here, if you're a Christian, you have met Jesus, and that meeting has changed your life? Tell the story.

Tell that story. Weave into that a little bit the claims of Christianity and what it means to become a Christian. And we're next week's message is gonna be all about how to have these kind of gospel conversations. Okay? So that's next week.

This week is what Peter is the essence of what Peter is getting at. It's not philosophy. It's not arguments, but generous lives of Christian love lived in a way that creates curiosity and then sharing your own story of hope in Jesus. It's a powerful, powerful witness, and we'll talk more about it next week. And so right now, I'm gonna ask campus pastors if you would come to the stage and lead in a final prayer.

And here at Crown Point, I'm gonna ask you to stand with me, if you would, please. Heavenly Father God, the potential just right here in this room of us leaving here, taking the hope, living out that hope, being ready in that moment to share about the hope that we have in Jesus. Thank you for the hope, first of all. Thank you, God, that there is every reason for joy in the midst of our trials and our sufferings. But, God, I pray that you would help us to not just be self focused with that, but to leverage that in powerful and effective ways in a world that is hopeless.

May they come to know hope through us and through Jesus, to whom be all glory, seated on the throne at the right hand of God, angels shouting, singing. We join with them here at Bethel Church. All praise be to you. We love you. We thank you.

We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. God's grace to you all. We'll see you next week.

* This transcript was generated using AI transcription technology and reviewed for accuracy but may contain errors. Please refer to the original audio for precise wording.