1 Peter 4:1- 4 “Therefore, since Christ suffered in His body, arm yourselves with the same resolve, because anyone who has suffered in his body is done with sin. Consequently, he does not live out his remaining time on earth for human passions, but for the will of God. For you have spent enough time in the past carrying out the same desires as the Gentiles: living in debauchery, lust, drunkenness, orgies, carousing, and detestable idolatry. Because of this, they consider it strange of you not to plunge with them into the same flood of reckless indiscretion, and they heap abuse on you.”
There is a story about a man whose wife was a Christian and who urged him to accept Christ. While this man agreed that Jesus was the Son of God and that the Bible was the Word of God, he still wavered. This man was a politician and he told his wife, “I just have just one thing I need to put through the state legislature that I know I could never support if I were a Christian. I’m just going to take care of this one issue and then I will follow Christ.” Unfortunately, the course the man followed was quite predictable. The schemes this politician had were evil ones, and once he had begun supporting them, the contacts he made and the actions he took led him further and further away from God until he died without repenting.
Peter had no illusions about the lifestyles new converts had pursued before they became Christians. All the perversions that are being touted as evidence of free speech in America now were already being practiced at the time of the early church. And they are just as sinful now as they were then. Peter doesn’t mince words: “living in debauchery, lust, drunkenness, orgies, carousing, and detestable idolatry.”
“But,” you say, “we don’t have people practicing idolatry.” Oh? In the last few years, statues to Baal and Lucifer have appeared in major American cities. And at any rate, idolatry doesn’t just refer to the worship of physical idols but to focusing on money or power or comfort or sex or lust or anything else rather than living for God.
Peter is sounding a wake – up call! The time when we could play with passions has ended. The question is this: how are we going to live the rest of our lives? Are we going to lurch from one desire to another, from one golden calf to another, from one addiction to another?
Peter advises us to take Jesus Christ as our example: “since Christ suffered in His body, arm yourselves with the same resolve, because anyone who has suffered in his body is done with sin. Consequently, he does not live out his remaining time on earth for human passions, but for the will of God.”
“But what if God wants me to suffer?” you ask. Well, how much real benefit are you deriving from the things you are pursuing right now? It was Blaise Pascal who said that “there is a God shaped vacuum in the heart of every man which cannot be filled by any created thing, but only by God, the Creator, made known through Jesus.” As long as you are trying to fill that God sized vacuum with anything other than God, you will continue to strive. Only God can fill that vacuum. Only God can satisfy.
The peace of the Holy Spirit is a peace that truly is beyond human comprehension. When you give your life to Christ, you will receive that peace. Now you will definitely have problems! Satan is quite real and wants to steal your joy and your peace, kill you, and destroy everything good in your life. And without Christ, you have no protection from Satan. It is only when you accept Christ as Savior and Lord that you are covered by the blood sacrifice He made for your sins on Mount Calvary.
Each of us is choosing every moment to live for God or to live for ourselves. But if we live for ourselves, we are doomed to frustration, failure, and emptiness. If the fear and angst over COVID has accomplished nothing else, it has re – emphasized the fact that there are no guarantees in life. Thousands of years ago, Joshua challenged the Children of Israel with a choice: Choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve… but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.” Joshua 24:15
PRAYER: Father God, help everyone of us to realize the emptiness inside of us without you! Cause all who read this to turn and follow you. In the mighty Name of King Jesus. Amen.
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