Fires in the coal rich mines under Centralia, Pennsylvania, finally forced the residents to consider relocating to another area. Some could not force themselves to make the break with their home. It was the only home they had ever known and they couldn’t imagine life without it. In reality there was no choice. Fires continued to burn uncontrolled, flinging smoke, gases and dirt into the air. Twice the flames had broken through the surface and buckled the only highway into town. They must move if they were to avoid their death.
In a spiritual sense many have the difficulty of surrendering old, discredited, useless ways to which they have gripped for so many years. But in this passage of Scripture Peter is showing his readers that now is the time to make the break with our past. Now is the time to put off that which has controlled our lives for too long. In this passage of Scripture Peter’s key idea is that you must commit yourself to making a decisive break with your past lifestyle so that you can truly live for God by the power of the Gospel.
Peter gives us three aspects to understand in making a decisive break with the past.
1. A Call to Be Ready to Suffer
The first aspect to understand in making a decisive break with your past lifestyle is a call to be ready to suffer. As Peter mentions that Christ had suffered in the flesh he looks back to verse 18 describing Christ’s agonizing death. He uses this as the springboard to call each believer to be likewise ready to suffer.
He once again employs military metaphors to describe this call to suffer. He says, “arm yourselves also with the same purpose.” We are to gear up, if you will, in being ready to suffer. Peter says that there are two dynamic results that occur when we arm ourselves with the determination to suffer for Jesus Christ.
A. Cause us to cease from sin
The first dynamic result that occurs when we arm ourselves with the determination to suffer for Christ is that it will cause us to cease from sin. Peter says this at the end of verse 1. “He who has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin.” But just what does Peter mean that we cease from sin. He explains what he means to cease from sin by the “so as” clause in verse 2 (read). To cease from sin (in Peter’s mind) is to no longer pursue after our own desire for sin like we did before we were saved. Look at these two verses together. “Because he who suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin, so as to live the rest of the time in the flesh no longer for the lusts of men, but for the will of God.”
So we can see Peter is saying that once we have determined to live for Christ regardless of whether we will suffer for it or not we will no longer be seeking to live to fill our own sinful appetites. The Apostle Paul describes a similar attitude in Galatians 2:20. He says, “I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ lives in me and the life I live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave Himself for me.” Paul was describing the attitude of how we are to live today for Christ. As Christians, we are to recognize that when Christ suffered and died for us he took our place and the ownership of our lives have been transferred over to Him. This is why we can no longer live for our own sinful pleasures. We see that because of our sin our lives were as good as dead. But Christ gave us new life. And with our focus on that we see that it is Christ’s life we have and should live as He would live. Again Paul says in 1 Corinthians that we have been bought with a price and we do not belong to ourselves any longer. Christ owns us. If we truly believe that Christ owns us we will seek what He wants us to do.
This is what Peter says arming ourselves with the determination to suffer for Christ will do. It will cause us to no longer live the rest of our time in the flesh for our own sinful desires but to accomplish God’s eternal will.
B. Cause us to recognize we’ve wasted enough time
The second dynamic result that occurs when we arm ourselves with the determination to suffer for Christ is that it will cause us to recognize we’ve wasted enough time. This is what Peter says in verse 3. “For the time already past is sufficient for you to have carried out the desire of the Gentiles, having pursued a course of sensuality, lusts, drunkenness, carousing, drinking parties and abominable idolatries.”
Here Peter says that when we see that our lives belong to Christ and need an all out commitment to Him that we recognize that we’ve wasted as much time as we should have. When Peter says that the time already past is sufficient or enough, he is not saying that you’ve had enough time to follow your sinful desires, he is saying that you had way too much time. All of that time you spent in seeking your own pleasure was wasted. Jesus uses this word, “sufficient” or “enough” in Matthew 6:34 where He says that each day has “enough” trouble of its own. Or in other words, each day has too much trouble to add any more. Peter is saying that it doesn’t matter how much evil you pursued, that was too much and that should now be relegated to your past life and not carried into your present life in Christ. What Peter is saying is that we must now be careful not to be manipulated into adopting the lifestyle of the society around us in which we live. Though the world becomes more and more corrupt we must not follow after them and their ways or we will find that we have become as salt that has lost its taste.
Peter lists here general categories of the sinful desires of the Gentiles. Of course this is not all-inclusive but encompasses major areas that describe the debauchery of every generation.
The first two that Peter lists are sensuality and lusts. These words describe sexual sins that beset these gentiles. They include all kinds of immoral behavior. The first word, sensuality, describes living without any kind of moral restraint in giving oneself over to sexual immorality or physical violence associated with it. In his second letter, Peter uses this word even to describe the deviant practices of those in the city of Sodom.
We find ourselves inundated by the world’s advances to legitimize sexual immorality. Television and movies advance sexual intimacy as if it was something as casual as chewing gum. Billboards & commercials flaunt sex by the way they portray what they sell. The sexual tentacles of the Internet are sharp barbs that will not let the unwary escape. The world system is attempting to shape us into its mold in the area of sexuality. But Peter says that as we who have been given new life in Christ, immoral sexual behavior must be cast off from our lives.
The next set of sins that Peter lists deals with drinking. Drunkeness, carousing (or festival drinking resulting in more immorality) and drinking parties. Peter is describing the damaging affects of alcohol on a society. One only needs to once visit a secular college campus on a Friday or Saturday evening to understand the powerful pull of liquor on a person’s life.
My own life at campus before my conversion was enough to cause me to forever eschew such conduct. Whenever I hear someone say, “I just have one to loosen up,” I remember all the times that being loosened up caused me to say or do something I shouldn’t have. It may loosen up your inhibitions but I have never found anyone acquitted for the responsibility of their actions in court because alcohol made them do it when they were loosened up.
Peter says you’ve wasted enough time with the stuff. Don’t be entrapped by it any longer. Let me also say that when alcohol gets hold of you, it will only be by the grace of God that you’ll get free.
Finally Peter concludes this list with abominable idolatries. These final practices that Peter says we are to avoid is idolatry. This is anything that we find takes the place of God. An idol pulls a person’s heart away from God. If you find yourself being pulled away from time with God because of something, guess what you have. An idol! So if you’re saying, I can’t read my Bible because I’m busy playing video games or watching TV, or I don’t have time to pray because I’ve got to be at my friend’s house, or I don’t have time to come to church because my third job is keeping me up too late on Saturday night then you have an idol.
Peter wants us to realize that if we have resolutely set our minds to live for Christ then we will realize that all the things upon which we set our desires before Christ has been a waste. And in recognizing that our life is not our own but Jesus Christ’s who bought us we will seek that which accomplishes the will of God and not our own sinful desires.
But lest we get the idea that Peter is giving us an exhaustive list and if what we are doing is not on this list we are OK then remember that there are a thousand other things that keep us from accomplishing God’s will including the legalism of keeping up our appearance of being a Christian. We can put all these things that Peter mentions out of our lives but if we are not living by the power of the Spirit then we simply have a list of do’s and don’ts and this is not Christianity. If you are not living with the love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control we have acquiesced to a mere outer shell of Christianity without real power. We can never really live the Christian life without the power of the Spirit. And if we put off sexual immorality and drunkeness by our own strength we have merely set ourselves up as an idol. This is the deadliness of legalism. It sets guidelines & hem lines without the direction of the Spirit. It produces a life of outward conformity but no inward joy and peace. We need not only to break with grievous sin of our past life but also with the dead legalism that kept us from recognizing the Gospel in the first place. So let’s stop wasting time living like the Gentiles and live in the power of God’s Spirit.
2. The Response of Those Who Reject the Gospel (vv. 4-5)
The second aspect to understand in making a definite break with our past lifestyle is the response of those who reject the Gospel. Peter wants us to recognize the response of those who reject the Gospel so that we are not surprised by their response and become despondent by it. When we understand and believe the Gospel our eyes have been opened. We become like the blind man who was healed by Jesus in John 9 when he declared, “I once was blind but now I see.” And now that we have this new sight we begin to expect everyone else to see the truth of the Gospel as clearly as we have. We begin to think that everyone around us will embrace this new truth we have discovered. But Peter is warning us so that our break with our past lifestyle is not turned over. Peter notes that there are two characteristics and one result of their response in rejecting the Gospel.
A. They cannot understand it
The first characteristic of the response of those who reject the Gospel is that they cannot understand it. Verse 4 says, “in all this, they are surprised that you do not run with them into the same excesses of dissipation.” When we first come to those with whom we used to run prior to our conversion they cannot understand what has changed us. Why don’t you want to go out drinking with us? Why don’t you want to do this with me? Why don’t you want to go here? They are confused because they have never come to grips with the fact that what they have been doing is wrong.
Literally, the verse reads, “They think it strange.” They think that what you are doing is strange. Their thought process is clouded by the sin that has been prevalent in their lives. And we must recognize too that unless it was for the grace of God we also would be thinking that such behavior is strange. Do you remember the charge that the early church planters received in the book of Acts? They were called “These men who have turned the world upside down.” They were accused of flipping the world upside down. In reality the world was already topsy-turvy and by proclaiming the good news of Jesus Christ they were merely tipping it back right side up.
So don’t get discouraged about living for Christ when people don’t understand what you are saying when you tell them about a coming judgment of the righteous and the wicked. When you tell them that there are absolutes, absolutely. And that God’s Word is the truth. If they don’t understand it is only because the Spirit of God has not illumined their minds to understand it.
B. They curse
The second characteristic of the response of those who reject the Gospel is that they curse. Verse 4 says, “they are surprised that you do not run with them into the same excesses of dissipation and they malign you.” Not only will those who knew you before you found Christ not understand why you are living the way you are but they will also curse you. Do not be surprised at that. Peter tells us up front so that we ourselves will not be dismayed by their behavior.
Because your unsaved friends do not understand why you want to live a pure life they will take it that you are judging them. Because they begin to see the difference between righteousness and wickedness and they think that you are judging them, they begin to take offense at it. And out of this they begin to speak evil about you. Perhaps you have experienced this very thing where your friends didn’t understand why you want to live a new life in Christ. Peter tells us this so that we will not be alarmed when it takes place. When you want to take a stand for Christ and live a life pleasing to Him you will take some heat for it.
While I was in college, one of my ROTC instructors would give me a very rough time for being a Christian. Once he forbade me from reading my Bible before class started and equated it with reading pornography. Talk about calling evil good and good evil. But by not being dismayed due to his conduct, later that year I was able to give him a Bible that he received willingly.
C. They will give an account
There is also one result of the response of those who reject the Gospel. It is that they will give an account. Peter notes it in verse 5. “But they will give an account to Him who is ready to judge the living and the dead. This account that Peter speaks of here is a verbal account. The “term” for account in this verse is literally, “a word.” They will give a word to Him who is ready to judge the living and the dead. How fitting for those who used their mouths to curse God’s people will now have to give a word (a verbal account) of their own despicable words.
God is ready to judge them and He will judge them at the proper time. Peter wants us to realize that no one will get away with anything. If someone mistreated you, they will receive their due punishment. You do not need to fret about their treatment to you. They will give an account. You treat them with the love and grace of Christ so that perhaps they will come to trust Him as their Savior too.
3. The Purpose for God’s Timeless Gospel
Finally in verse 6, we see the third aspect to understand in making a definite break with our past lifestyle is the purpose for God’s timeless Gospel. Peter describes two purposes that God has established in his good news offer to forgive sins. But before we discuss those two purposes we need to look at verse 6 and understand what it is saying because the translation is probably not as clear as it could be. Verse 6 reads, For the Gospel has for this purpose been preached even to those who are dead, that though they are judged in the flesh as men, they may live in the spirit according to the will of God.”
A. This verse’s meaning
i. It has always been preached.
The first part of verse 6 says, “For the Gospel has for this purpose been preached even to those who are dead.” What this phrase is describing is the fact that the Gospel has always been preached. It is not saying that those who are dead now have an opportunity to hear the Gospel. It is saying that the Gospel had been preached for millennia before Christ, even to those who are now dead. The Gospel of God’s forgiveness of sins through a coming Messiah had been made clear by God. The reason that so few had received it is because they have blocked their ears to its truth. It was passed down from Adam and Eve in that first seed promise of a coming deliverer. But only few of their children accepted it. It was passed on through Noah but likewise those at the tower of Babel rebelled against God.
This section of the verse is simply saying that God has always made the Gospel clear and its proclamation sure and its obfuscation (or confusion) was not caused by any deficiency on God’s part. As Peter says, “The Gospel has been preached.”
ii. It describes two responses
The second part of this verse describes two responses to those who trust the Gospel. It says, “Though they are judged in the flesh as men, they may live in the spirit according to the will of God.” To translate this verse more clearly it reads this way. “Though believers are judged in the flesh by (according to) men, they may live in the Spirit by (according to) God.
In other words, this verse is saying, that though unbelievers judge and mistreat Christians in the flesh, God has really given us (new life or) the ability to live through the Spirit. So these two responses toward people who believe the Gospel are (first) a condemnation by men (they are judged in the flesh by men) but (second) an approval by God through the imparting of life through the Spirit of God (they may live in the Spirit by God).
B. This Gospel’s purpose
Now that we have seen this verse’s meaning we can focus on the Gospel’s purpose. The verse says that the Gospel has for this purpose been preached. I think the purpose that Peter describes here is that the Gospel has always been preached for the purpose of causing people to be saved that they might live by the power of the Spirit.
When someone receives the Gospel, the good news of eternal life in Jesus Christ, it allows them to really live. Though others might condemn them God has received them. Romans 8:31 says, “If God is for us who then can be against us?” If others condemn us, yet God Himself is for us.
As this verse makes the distinction between being judged in the flesh by men and made alive by the Spirit, it reminds me of Jesus’ words in John 6:63, “It is the Spirit who gives life, the flesh profits nothing.” What does it matter if we are condemned by others when we have God’s approval? Jesus also said, “What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world but loses his own soul?”
The Gospel, to those who receive it, is the source of true life. It is eternal life when we die and abundant life now. It is abundant life if we make a decisive break with our past lifestyle. Will you doubt any longer? Can you believe His promise to you that His Spirit will allow you to live for Him? Make a decisive break with your past in living for yourself. God doesn’t want you to waver in living for Him completely. He wants to supernaturally equip you to live for Him. Will you say that today you will make a break with your selfishness, your legalism, your old lusts? Will you be like those in Centralia, Pennsylvania who refused to leave their fire-scarred town? Will you waste the future that God has for you because you wish to remain in the ashes of a sinful life that will only bring you shame when meet the Savior? Commit yourself to make a break with your past lifestyle today.
Perhaps you are here today and you need to receive Christ as your Savior. Don’t put off what you need to do in trusting Him. The Gospel is so simple that a child can believe it and be saved. What is keeping you? Do you recognize that your sin is an offense to a holy God? Do you understand that the punishment for your sin is an eternal hell? Do you know that Jesus died to pay for all your sin? Will you call out to Him to save you? He paid the price will you accept His payment? ( Proud person – example of restaurant check)