Episode Transcript
[00:00:05] Well, good morning.
[00:00:08] My name is Eric Bowling, and I am part of the teaching team here at Village church. I didn't get a chance to participate in the icebreaker question, but I will tell you, my favorite french fry is the tater tot.
[00:00:22] Thank you. Thank you. I know you can tell by looking at me, no way that guy eats tater tots. But it is true.
[00:00:30] It is true.
[00:00:32] Well, 2024 is an election year in the United States.
[00:00:39] It's funny to watch your reactions to that. I wish we could have maybe captured your faces. Some of you, you were just like, oh, like fear, maybe is the right word. Some of you were like, let's go. Like, all different reactions.
[00:00:55] And so what this means is this, we are not going to talk about who to vote for and why this morning, but we are going to talk about why this election feels important to us, why it has such energy around it. Because what's coming, as we know, is an onslaught of professional and amateur punditry, meaning our social media feeds are going to be full. We're going to have campaign ads that are going to come, and we're going to wrestle with, even if we wanted to avoid it, it's going to be almost impossible for us to do that. And so why does this have. So why does this take up so much emotional time energy? Like, why are we so invested?
[00:01:45] Well, I think it's because of a couple of things. Number one is we desire strong leadership. It's part of what we have and we experience. We desire that our next president is going to be looked at as someone who's going to fight for our rights, to represent us, to stand up to our foreign and domestic enemies, all of those things. Our president will literally be referred to as the leader of the free world.
[00:02:16] And so elections are important.
[00:02:19] They take up a lot of space for us culturally. We want leaders who provide for us hope and power, really, when it comes down to it. That's why we invest so much.
[00:02:30] And if we're honest sometimes, I think we would be tempted to say that we have a desire to follow leaders that can sometimes be unhealthy, that can sometimes lead us into places where we really shouldn't be investing as much. But this desire for strong leadership is not a new phenomenon to us living in this time and place. In the Old Testament, Israel dealt with a desire for leadership when they wanted a king. And if you go back and study the nation of Israel, they will go through a time where really they are led by God himself.
[00:03:11] The time of Moses, the exodus, wanderings God literally is a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. And they follow this. And wherever God stops, they stop. However long God stops, they stop for that long. They do that. They're led by God, but they're going into the promised land, where there's all these other nations who have kings, literal human kings, that rule. And so Israel, if we could look at one Samuel, chapter eight, verses four to five, briefly, this is Israel asking for a king like other nations, says this. Then all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel. Samuel, the prophet, who spoke for God at Ramah and said to him, behold, you are old and your sons do not walk in your ways. Appoint for us a king to judge. To judge us like all other nations.
[00:04:04] Why did they want a king so bad? They have God themselves.
[00:04:08] Because that king in that ancient world represented, okay, leadership, strength. They could point to that king, they could go before the king, they could see the king, they could interact with the king. Oftentimes, these kings in this ancient world were thought to be gods, or at least God incarnate. There was a lot that went with that. And Israel says, that's what we want. That's what we're looking for. That's what we need.
[00:04:34] These human kings were sources of hope and power for the people, for the nations.
[00:04:41] And so God, in his wisdom, gives Israel their desire.
[00:04:48] He basically, here's a paraphrase. He basically says, okay, if that's what you think you want, you can have it. How did that work out?
[00:04:58] Not good, right? If you wanna do a deep dive into the time of the kings, start in first and second Samuel, first and second kings, first and second chronicles, and just read what happens to the nation.
[00:05:12] At best, they go through this whole cycle of, if the king is following the Lord, it's great for the people. If the king does not, it's awful for the people.
[00:05:21] And they get kind of torn, thrown back and forth. Depending on how the king followed the Lord, how the king followed God, and it ends with the roman occupation, which is what is happening in the New Testament. So ultimately it ends. Israel has no king. They end up underneath the rule of Rome. So us on this side of this, we know that Jesus has come as our true eternal king, and one day he's going to come back again. We just celebrated that last week at Easter. Jesus personally leads all people from all nations. He's given us the Holy Spirit to actively work in and through his people. The reality is, you and I don't need a king. You and I don't need a president. You and I don't need human leadership. Because if we are followers of Christ, we have the Holy Spirit given to us who will lead us.
[00:06:15] We have God's word who will lead us. But if we're honest, we still feel that pull sometimes to follow human leaders as opposed to following Christ.
[00:06:26] And it's this fact that leads Peter is what Peter is going to address in his book of Second Peter. If you haven't done so already, you can turn to second Peter, chapter one. We're going to look at verses twelve to 15 this morning.
[00:06:41] Second Peter, chapter one, verses twelve to 15 for a little context. Second Peter is Peter's final words to christians that have been a part of his ministry. Peter, one of the apostles, has been leading this kind of growing church movement, and he's getting older. He's soon going to be crucified for his faith in Christ and the book of Second Peter. He's giving kind of his final thoughts to his people. He's saying, these are the things I want you to be reminded of and to remember what's I've gone when I'm gone. It's also written to a group of Christians, the church at this time, that's going through some pretty significant social upheaval. Right. A couple of things that are happening. Peter is soon going to die that we, like we talked about. There's this external threat from Rome itself, where Rome is actively beginning to persecute christians under emperor Nero. To be a Christian would be considered to be an enemy of Rome. That's happening. There's also internal threats that are happening to the church through false doctrine, false teachers. There's a lot happening to these people, and Peter, in his pastoral care for them, wants them to continue to trust in Christ. That's his point. Continue to trust in Christ. Why?
[00:08:08] Because despite the external and internal challenges, God is going to continue to work in the church in mighty power, providing everything they need to live lives of godliness. And so with that, we come to our passage today.
[00:08:24] We're going to start in verse twelve. Second Peter, 112. Peter says this to the church. He says, therefore, I intend to always remind you of these qualities, though you know them and are established in the truth that you have.
[00:08:43] So why does the church need to be reminded? Right? Peter has been with them. Peter is leading them. Peter is guiding them. He's there. Why do they need to be reminded of these qualities?
[00:08:56] He also says, hey, look, you're established in this truth. Why do they need a reminder?
[00:09:02] Because, again, what's going to happen is Peter is going to die. He's going to leave them and he wants them to know, look, these are the foundational, important things. Don't forget this. Be reminded of this how many of us in life need constant reminders on things we should know based on our faith and other things. He's saying, look, don't forget this. Don't forget this. What are the qualities?
[00:09:31] Well, time doesn't permit us to go all the way back to verse one of this and work our way to twelve. But basically verse one to what we're reading today is Peter's talking about the qualities that they should have in order to grow in Christ's likeness. We're just going to look at two, Peter, one, five, seven together.
[00:09:53] It's a summary of what Peter has written about. And Peter says this for this very reason. Make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self control. And self control with steadfastness and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection. And brotherly affection with love. Peter's talking about growing.
[00:10:19] He's talking about these qualities are things you should be growing in. And if we would go back and look at this list, let's be honest, these qualities aren't produced naturally in us through our own thinking and behavior.
[00:10:34] We don't naturally tend towards virtue.
[00:10:38] We don't naturally tend towards brotherly love. We don't naturally tend towards steadfastness. Those are things that have to come through the power of the Holy Spirit.
[00:10:49] And Peter says, look, remember those things. That's what you need to be focused on, these qualities. Don't forget them. Don't forget them.
[00:11:00] He goes on in 13 to strengthen this argument. He says this, I think it right as long as I am in this body to stir you up. By way of reminder, that wording hits us a little strange in terms of it's not the way we usually speak. When he says, as long as I am in this body, he's basically saying, look, my life is temporary.
[00:11:26] As long as I'm living, as long as I'm here, I'm going to use all that I have to stir you up. And that phrase stir you up is an interesting one for us. We use it culturally and we're talking about like rallying people together, getting them motivated, ready to go. I was a high school football coach for over a decade and I'm a sucker for good coach speak. Man, I love it. I'll watch YouTube videos of coaches just firing the team up and I was like, let's go. You know, and it's, and that's what I think of with like stir you up. And that's really not what Peter's getting at. He's not saying, look, I'm gonna bring you together and get everybody really excited, and we're gonna have this rally and we're gonna go out and we're gonna take on Rome. He's not talking about that. The word he uses actually means, it's time for you to wake up.
[00:12:23] It's time for you to pay attention. It's time for you to look around and realize what's happening around you. It's a similar word to what's used in the gospels where the apostles are crossing in a boat and Jesus is with them and they're trying to get to the other side of a lake and the storm swells up. And the storm is so bad that experienced fishermen who some of the apostles were, were afraid they were going to die.
[00:12:54] Think about that for a second. You know how to pilot a boat, you know when it's safe and not safe. These guys are like, we're going to die.
[00:13:04] Where's Jesus?
[00:13:06] He's asleep.
[00:13:09] Just let that sink in for a second. Jesus is taking a nap, he's resting, and they say to him, wake up. There's an urgency, hey, you gotta wake up cause we're going to die.
[00:13:21] And Jesus wakes up and he says, be still. And everything's calm. It's an amazing story. And it's the same urgency Peter brings here. He's saying, look, you gotta wake up. You need to pay attention. Like the time is now.
[00:13:37] He's challenging the church because the church has become over reliant on him.
[00:13:45] The church is used to Peter and Peter's leadership in the face of these challenges. They've become apathetic and they become a little sleepy because they have Peter with him. They have the other apostles.
[00:14:00] The work that the apostles are doing, the people are finding security in that leadership. And the work of the apostles is amazing. If you ever read sort of the death of Jesus through the book of acts, the stuff even particular Peter does, I mean, it's almost beyond comprehension to where Peter goes from denying Jesus and being afraid to becoming really the mouthpiece for the church.
[00:14:30] And you have these stories of Peter and John, heal this man, and the Pharisees and Sadducees and the Sanhedrin, the jewish rulers, they don't like it and they bring them in and they say, again, paraphrase, you need to stop doing this. Don't do this anymore. And Peter and John say, what's better for us? To obey God or to obey you? We're going to keep doing it. And what I love the text says is the jewish religious leaders aren't sure what to do for them. They can't throw them in jail, really, and keep them there because the people will react negatively to that. So they basically give them a sternly worded warning, stop it. And Peter says, no. And that story is replayed a couple times. Peter is said in acts chapter five. When Peter's shadow, when he walks by people, his shadow following on them, heals them in the same way that Jesus was able to heal when someone touched the hem of his garment, like Peter's, a big deal. Peter's the leader. Peter was with Jesus.
[00:15:38] And the people are relying on that. We're good. We got Peter.
[00:15:44] We're good. Peter will take care of that. We're good. Peter will stand up for that. And Peter's saying, no, you guys need to wake up and understand something. I'm not going to be here.
[00:15:57] I am going to leave. I am going to die.
[00:16:02] Pay attention. The people are entirely unprepared for what's coming.
[00:16:09] They're not ready for it. Continued persecution, the death of Peter, like the challenge that's coming.
[00:16:15] And I don't want us to get a negative view this morning of leaders and leadership. I think God provides godly leaders and godly leadership. It's a part of what we need as people.
[00:16:27] But I think if, again, if we're honest, we have that tendency to become complacent when we have good leaders.
[00:16:34] We have a tendency to coast when we have strong leadership. Think about a couple of just cultural things. Think about business.
[00:16:44] How many businesses are run by these powerful, charismatic leaders? And then something happens and the leader steps down or retires or whatever, and the business really falters because it was built on that leader. People are complacent, or even athletics. See this a lot. Coach comes in, takes over a team, and the team has success, and then the coach leaves and the team doesn't do well because people become complacent on the leader about churches.
[00:17:19] Churches can fall in that same trap, particularly in our context here in North America, where we love making people celebrities. We do. We just have to own that. It's part of what we do. And so we have a tendency sometimes to take pastors, teachers, and we say, look, yeah, man, we're good. That's our pastor. They're running things. We're complacent we're following that. And let's be honest, it probably feels pretty good on that other side to have people setting you up for that when people tell you, hey, good job. Hey, that's great. Wow. I love following your leadership. You're a good leader. I'm a high school teacher. I have vision some days that I teach a class, and it's so good. The students stand up and they applaud.
[00:18:13] And it hasn't happened in 22 years, maybe tomorrow. Right?
[00:18:20] But I like that. I like people to say, look, you did a good job. So I get that we have a celebrity making culture, that if we're not careful, we can become complacent and kind of following human leadership and not the Lord.
[00:18:37] Imagine this complacency happens like this. Village church is a place you feel is moving in a positive direction.
[00:18:45] You're coming to village church. You feel like, hey, the ministries are good, things are going in a great direction. You come to church on Sunday, you feel great about the Sunday morning experience.
[00:18:57] You like the music, you really like the pastor and the teaching.
[00:19:04] They didn't get much reaction. 815 either. You like the pastor, you like the teaching.
[00:19:11] Thank you. Thank you.
[00:19:13] That's too late. But hopefully 1115 jumps on that a little quicker. But you like that. We like the pastor. We like everything about it. But you're not growing spiritually. Let's talk about that. So you're coming, you're apart. You like what's happening. You are hearing God's word, you're hearing truth. You're being poured into, but you yourself aren't growing.
[00:19:39] Why is that? It's a lot of reasons. And I'm not here to diagnose every reason why that could be, but maybe you are vicariously living through a leader in your experience at church. It's possible.
[00:19:55] I would say it this way. You're spiritually adjacent to what's happening, but you're not invested and you're coming, but you're not involved. And Peter is saying to his people, who are probably in that same frame of mind, it's time to wake up.
[00:20:15] And what's fascinating about what Peter's saying, he wants to remind people about Jesus, the true eternal king. Not Peter's leadership.
[00:20:24] Peter's human. I'm sure it was very tempting for him to believe the hype, so to speak, around what's going on. And he's saying, it's not about me, it's about Jesus.
[00:20:36] I think a takeaway for us is this. If a leader tries to be or do more than to point us to Jesus. They've missed the point.
[00:20:45] And the flip side is true. If we let a leader be or do more than try to lead us to Jesus, we've missed the point.
[00:20:53] And when we get caught up in that, that's when we find ourselves with issues and problems.
[00:21:00] And there's an urgency to what Peter's writing here. The urgency is this. He's going to die soon.
[00:21:09] Let's look at verse 14 to 15.
[00:21:12] Peter says this about his impending death.
[00:21:16] He says, since I know that the putting off of my body will be soon, as our Lord Jesus Christ made clear to me, and I will make every effort so that after my departure, you may be able at any time to recall these things again. The way that it's worded is a little strange to our ears. But basically Peter's saying this, the putting off of my body, I'm going to die.
[00:21:42] And he says, so in a way that the Lord has made clear to him. To understand that we have to go back to the book of John, chapter 21, verses 18 to 19. And this is a prophecy that Jesus gives to Peter. And it says this. This is Jesus talking to Peter. He says, but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands and another will dress you and carry you where you do not want to go. This he, Jesus said to show by what kind of death he was to glorify God. And after saying this, he said to him, follow me again, a little strange to our ears, but he says, when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will dress you and carry you where you do not want to go. We tend to think of old people stretching out hands. We help them up.
[00:22:32] Right? That's the image that came from me. Oh, Peter's old. And someone is going to have to help him get around, dress him, taking places he may not want to go. What Jesus is actually saying is, stretch out your hands. Isn't this. It's this.
[00:22:46] It's an allusion to crucifixion.
[00:22:49] And so what Jesus is telling Peter is, he's saying, you are going to be crucified on a roman cross like me.
[00:22:58] Peter knows this is coming. Peter trusts Jesus. He knows this to be true.
[00:23:06] The question is, well, why does Peter have to die that way?
[00:23:10] Like, of all the way, why does it have to be that? Well, remember, the church at this time is under roman persecution.
[00:23:18] Rome does not like what's happening with this growing movement of Christianity. And so what the motivation for Rome is, let's take out the leaders. Peter is the leader. Let's get rid of the leader, because if we can remove him, then the movement will die.
[00:23:36] It's part of why Peter has such urgency to remind them, don't lose faith. If I'm gone, keep remember these qualities. Don't lose faith.
[00:23:47] So what happens is this, Peter, in accordance with Jesus prediction and prophecy for him, is killed by Rome.
[00:23:59] And not only is Peter killed, church tradition says that Peter's family is brought before him. And they ask him, denounce Jesus or your family dies.
[00:24:11] Peter says, I can't, I can't deny my lord. And they killed his family and then they crucified him. And church tradition says that Peter was actually crucified upside down because he did not find it to be worthy to die like Jesus.
[00:24:25] I mean, that's amazing to think that through, to be faced with that level of challenge and to know that that level is coming and not trying to get away from it or to avoid it, but to say, this is coming for me, be ready.
[00:24:47] Rome thought they had killed the head of the church, Peter, but they were wrong. Why? Because Jesus is the head of the church and that couldn't be stopped. After the death of Peter, the church explodes.
[00:25:00] It actually increases momentum, increases in terms of church growth and the spread of the gospel.
[00:25:08] Peter's responsibility was to follow Jesus and follow Jesus only.
[00:25:15] That's what he was all about. The reality is every leader in the church is temporary, right? Every leader is not going to be here forever. Things happen.
[00:25:29] Sometimes our leaders in the church, they pass away.
[00:25:34] Sometimes the leaders in our churches are called to new ministries.
[00:25:39] The Lord has a different season for them. Sometimes there's moral failures that happen that make people unqualified to continue to lead, and that leads to transition. And that can be really upsetting to churches as they transition through leadership. I've been in church long enough. I've experienced all three throughout the course of my following Christ. And when that happens, there are some people who look at a transition like that and they leave the church or they leave the faith.
[00:26:17] Now, there are legitimate reasons to leave a church. I'm not going to unpack all of those. But there are legitimate things that happen where people say, look, I'm going to choose to worship somewhere else. We're not talking about that. What we're talking about is possibly some illegitimate reasons where people have been idolizing the person up front and they think, oh, if so and so isn't my pastor, then I'm out again. We got to rely on the guidance of the Holy Spirit when we go through those things. But I think if we're honest, sometimes we have a tendency to do that. We have a tendency, like we talked about, to put people higher than they should be. And it's something we have to guard against. That's why Peter is working to make every effort. So after his departure, after his death, the church would be able at any time to recall these things he wants them to remember. Look, here's what's important. It's all about following Christ, who's given you everything you need for life and godliness.
[00:27:31] Because the reality for the church is, if it does not have a deep understanding of Jesus, if they can't recall what Peter has showed them, then the reality is the continued persecution and death of Peter is going to probably lead them away from Jesus. Like Peter knows this is a pivotal time for the life and health of the church.
[00:27:51] And he's saying, wake up. See what's happening, pay attention.
[00:27:58] Remember all of these things that I've taught you, that I have been taught through Christ. Don't forget them.
[00:28:09] I think the main point that Peter might be driving at is this, is that a faith you don't practice may die with the leader.
[00:28:22] A faith that isn't your own may die with the leader.
[00:28:27] And if we're not growing in our own faith, then we have a tendency to rise and fall, maybe with where our leaders are and what they're doing and what's happening.
[00:28:40] Like the Old Testament, if our leader is following Christ, then we might be more likely to. If they're not, maybe that causes us problems and issues.
[00:28:50] And so when we come to these kind of things in scripture, the same things the church needed then are what we need now.
[00:29:01] Most often coming to church isn't to necessarily share new information. It's to be reminded of what we may already know and to walk out and go, yeah, I needed to hear that.
[00:29:15] I needed to be reminded of that.
[00:29:19] Two, so whats number one, are you the same as when you said yes to Jesus?
[00:29:28] Think about that.
[00:29:31] If we are followers of Christ, most of us have a place where we say, this is where I decided to follow Jesus. For some people, that is like a very clear date time, there it is. For other people, it's more of a process where they were in it. I'll tell you my own faith journey. I made a decision to follow Jesus Christ at age five because I understood my depravity. God's goodness, I didn't understand any of that, okay? I was five. Some of you were like, wow, it's not true. But here's what happened. I was going to this little christian school in Indiana, and we had chapel, and a person was teaching on hell. Now, why they're teaching on hell to kindergartners, I don't know, okay? But they're teaching on hell. And I remember this vividly. They were like, look, you don't want to go to hell. Like, okay, it's dark and there's fire, and you'll burn. Well, here's what I knew. I'm afraid of the dark because I'm five and I know not to touch fire because you get burned. I'm like, I don't want that.
[00:30:41] So I made this profession of faith at five.
[00:30:46] Now, as I've grown in my faith, I can tell you there have been other moments where I wouldn't call them reconversions, but where I've really, God's unfolded more and more and taught me more and more. Sophomore year of high school was a big one. Again, am I going to believe this book? Am I going to follow Jesus? Early college was that, even as I've gone on these other stages, and the point isn't perfection.
[00:31:15] It's not what the Bible calls us to. The Bible calls us to becoming more and more like Jesus. And if we can look at our lives and we can see growth, then we're following and practicing those things that Peter's reminding us of, these qualities.
[00:31:31] I used to think as I followed Jesus, I would start here and I would end here, pretty close to sinless perfection. I'm ready to go home now. Jesus, it's looked a little bit more like this, trending upwards, but steps forward, steps back, second. So what have you been awakened to? The reality that following Christ requires that you pick up your own cross.
[00:31:58] This idea that to grow in our faith, we got to, I'll use an athletic term, we got to put the work in not for our salvation, that's been taken care of, that's been covered, but from our salvation, not for God's grace and mercy, but from God's grace and mercy.
[00:32:23] And so we need to be responsible to teach and learn and to take responsibility for our own spiritual growth.
[00:32:34] Reading the Bible, praying, spiritual disciplines, like, it's our responsibility to take that on and to take that up and to grow.
[00:32:44] Now, I can tell you, but if you come to village church, you're gonna hear the Bible preached, we're gonna worship God, we're gonna celebrate communion, we're gonna do those things, and they're good, and we should be in a community and fellowship of believers together.
[00:32:58] But if that's all we're doing to grow ourselves, we need to do that. And like I said, study for ourselves. Pray, seek the Lord, seek the Holy Spirit.
[00:33:14] Yeah. Be reminded, like the church, pay attention. Look around. Wake up.
[00:33:21] The issues they're facing are the we're facing are the issues we're facing today. Be reminded of these things. Let's pray together. Heavenly Father, we come before you and we are thankful.
[00:33:36] We're thankful for the gift of your son and for his sacrifice for us.
[00:33:42] Lord, we're thankful that we can grow in our faith, that we are not what we used to be, but we're growing into the image and likeness of you, Jesus. Lord, thank you for the Holy Spirit that provides us the insight and power that we need to grow. Lord, help us to be people who are not dissuaded when life happens, to not be dragged down by doubt and discouragement and things we face. Help us always to turn our faces to you.
[00:34:17] We thank you for your love. We thank you for your grace. We thank you for your mercy. Thank you for the gift of your spirit that allows us to be like you. And we pray this in your name. Amen.
