If you could turn to Psalm 1, and I wanted to start out tonight by asking everyone a question. One of the songs we sang tonight says, All I have is Christ. And so what I want to know from you is, is that true? Is all that you have Christ? Is Christ all you have? And I don't mean from a theological perspective or from a perspective of, well, I have a family and all that kind of stuff. But I want to know, and I want you to think through in your heart, is Christ, compared to all the other things that you might have, is Christ all that you have? As you think through that, think through that throughout the sermon, because tonight we're going to be looking at that subject in that area. So let me read for us Psalm 1, which says this, Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers. But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. And all He does, He prospers." You see right there, Psalm 1, as Pastor Steve has been going through the Psalms, when we went through Psalm 1, if you remember, Psalm 1 is there for a reason. It lays out the the purpose of the Psalms. So when we look at Psalm 1, what is the dichotomy? There's two groups that it's talking about here. There's the unrighteous and the righteous man. And the righteous man, it says, the righteous man does not partake in those things of sinners. It does not stand in the path of sinners, does not sit in the seat of mockers. But instead, it says he delights in the law of the Lord and I would propose to you tonight that that the delighting in the law of the Lord is the same thing as saying Jesus Christ is all that I have because if Jesus is all we have how do we how do we know him how do we know what it is that he is like what his character is what he would have us do. How do we know these things? The only way we can know them is through his word. And so the righteous man meditates on the law of the Lord day and night. And when you see the word law, don't think just commands. It's not just saying the Ten Commandments, but it's saying every word that comes from the mouth of God, that is the law of the Lord. So when we look at these things when you think about it when you? Consider your Christian life what you need to see is if all I have is Christ Then the only way I have to get to Christ is through his word because God in all his wisdom and All his wisdom chose to give us his truth to reveal himself in his word Now, many of you might wonder what I'm doing here with chairs up here. It isn't to have unruly people sit up here as an example, but instead, this is an illustration I want to bring to you. And so in a minute, I'm going to talk more about these chairs. But last time that I was able to preach for you all, I talked on the subject of the sin of homosexuality. And as part of that, if you've been following our culture at all, when the Supreme Court gets out there and makes a ruling that says that we must honor these homosexual marriages as they may be termed, we have to understand that that is directly contrary to what the Bible tells us about marriage. right in the beginning in Genesis it says for this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife and the two shall become one so God set marriage up at the very beginning but the thing is this is sort of a second half of that last sermon because I'm not going to talk about homosexuality but the thing is what do we do now because for most of us we've lived in a country we've lived in a society where in one way or another we've been able to say Maybe with our eyes half closed, but we've been able to say, well, we live in a country that is a Christian country, a Christian nation, or at least a nation that gives us freedom, freedom to worship God, freedom to come together and assemble without the worry of ramifications for that. But these days we cannot guarantee those things. There's that song that says, you know, for the flag still flies for freedom and they can't take that away. But you know what? They can take that away. And we have to be sure and understand as Christians that many of these freedoms that we've had for many, many years are in fact going away. So then what will we do? What do we do if we are persecuted? What do we do if now it costs you to come to church? What do we do if now co-workers sneer at you? Or you lose your job because you posted something on Facebook. Or you're fined because you will not celebrate the cause of the day that the culture has. What will you do? All we have is Christ. the righteous man meditates on the Word of God. You see these are the things that we have but is that enough? Is it enough? Amen, it is enough. Now here, with these three chairs, what I want to illustrate with these three chairs is that we have the church and the church is rooted and founded on the Word of God and this is where it stands. Now our culture, our society can be illustrated by this third chair here. Now what is the society? What is culture at large? What is the basis for culture at large? What is their grounding and their driving force behind culture? Alright, a lot of these things. I see what you've got there. So let's look at Ephesians chapter 2 verses 1 & 2 because in Ephesians 2, 1 & 2 it gives us everything I heard you guys saying there is true but even on a lower level on a spiritual level lower than that it gives us the answer so Ephesians chapter 2 verses 1 & 2 here's what it says and you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked following the course of this world following the prince of the power of the air the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience so it's talking about people that were dead in their trespasses and sins now what is it that powers society then what powers the world it says here the prince of the power of the air now who's the prince of the power of the air Satanist. So what we have to understand is that culture, our American culture for us, is empowered by the prince of the power of the air, by Satan himself. So that, can we reasonably expect that the world is going to stay in alignment with the church? No, we can't. It would be foolish to think so. As a matter of fact, some people will say that America was founded as a Christian nation. And I've read a lot of different things, but here's the thing. What does the Declaration of Independence say? What does the Constitution say? Does it ever talk about Jesus Christ? Does it ever talk about our need for righteousness, our need for Christ? It doesn't say anything like that. It talks about nature's God. and things of that nature. So many of the founding fathers, while they may have been religious and may had some understanding of who God was and the idea of appealing to a sovereign being as being something that appealed to them, they were never Christian. They never set up the United States to be a Christian nation. And what has happened over the years? Rationalism has moved the society away from the church we have evolution has came in and what did evolution say there was no creator but if we're going to stand on the truth of scripture what does it say in Genesis in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth but our society doesn't believe that we're getting into the political season how many times you bet a Republican is going to be asked Do you believe that dinosaurs lived a few years ago? Or do you believe that the earth is only 6,000 years old? And they'll hymn and haw and do all kinds of things. Because what is the culture saying? If you believe that, you're a fool. Divorce, adultery, fornication, The society celebrates these things and society moves farther and farther away from the truth of scripture. Now this second chair here, why did I put this one? Well, there's also straddlers. There's the church, there's the culture, and then there's straddlers. For much of the history of the United States, people have been able to sort of straddle between the society and the church. It was respectable to be a deacon in the church, to be an elder in the church, to be a member of a church. That was a respectable thing to do. To call upon God, that was a respectable thing. So people would sit in the middle, in the second chair, but as society pushes farther and farther away from the church what happens? the Stradleyers they have a problem if they stay close to the church close to the truth what's going to happen? they're no longer going to have the cover of society the society is going to turn to them and call them fools as well but if they push this way, what's going to happen to the men? Then they have a problem because then there's a difference between them and what the church should be talking about, what scripture says. And in fact, in our society, what have we seen? We have many churches, many religious movements that have, in fact, they've moved over. They've said, hey, wait a minute, Maybe God used the Big Bang and created things over billions of years, but he thought God was standing a long ways off, and he thought it was six days. Or maybe it's a poem. Maybe we really weren't supposed to think it was six days. And maybe marriage isn't really one man and one woman for life, but maybe it's whatever we think love should be. And so these straddlers are caught in a tension. But there are two groups that I want to talk about of these straddlers here. Some are true believers. Some who straddle are true believers who are weak. Maybe they're attached to the things of this world, weighed down by what goes on in this world. And so they don't want to be called fools. They don't want to be called radical, so instead they want to straddle the middle. But on the other hand, the Bible tells us that in the church we will find terrors, weeds, those who masquerade as being part of the church but in fact were never God's people. So one of the things I want us to think about, and I want you to personally think about and look through and meditate in your mind about is, where are you? Are you standing on the truth of scripture? Are you straddling? Do you come to church, but maybe you don't remember what the pastor says after lunch? Or are you starting to turn your attention to attacking the church? Those hypocrites? Those unfriendly people who don't want to accept that somebody else has a different definition of love? Those people who don't want to accept that I fell in love with someone who's not my wife? Which one are you in? Because if you're in the straddling camp here The problem is the stress is getting greater and greater because the society is going farther and farther from what their church stands on. So that was my introduction. So now what I'd like us to do is we're going to be looking in the book of 1 Peter and we're going to be looking at chapter 3 of 1 Peter. And in here, I want to cover the four steps for believers to overcome the world. How are we going to live in this society that is now antagonistic towards us? What do we do? What do we rely on? How do we live out this life? and so in order to do that we want to go to the book of first peter and let me give you a quick summary of the book of first peter not a summary but just uh... some background peter it says in first peter one one he says Peter and Apostle Jesus Christ are those who are elect exiles of the dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia. So the key thing there is exiles. Persecution had started to occur for the early church and so Peter is writing to people who had been scattered by this persecution and his desire was to give them what they needed to overcome this persecution. Now, He didn't gather them together as an army to go and destroy the people who opposed them, but He gave them the truth. He gave them the truth of the word. And so what did He say to them? If we look at verses 13 through 16 of chapter 1, He says this, Therefore preparing your minds for action and being sober minded set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ as Obedient children do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, but as he who called you is holy You also be holy in all your conduct so in answer to oppression and persecution and Peter is calling for them to be holy. And why should they be holy? Because Jesus Christ is holy. Because God is holy. Is all you have Christ? And if Christ is holy, then he calls us to be holy as well. You see, Peterson is teaching them here that we need to rely on the only thing that we can rely on, which is Jesus Christ and His holiness, His righteousness, His love, and His grace and mercy. He is the only one we can rely on. If we rely on our intellect, we will be defeated. If we rely on money, on the good grace of society, on common sense, on wisdom, on knowledge, any of these things, we will be defeated. But, what does he say? Be holy as He is holy, as God Himself is holy. That's what he tells us in 1 Peter 1. Now, if we continue on and look at chapter 2, verses 18 through 20, he continues on. here he says servants be subject to your masters with all respect not only to the good and gentle but also to the unjust for this is a gracious thing when mindful of God one endure sorrow while suffering unjustly for what credit is it if when you sin you are beaten for it you endure but if When you do good and suffer for it, you endure. This is a gracious thing in the sight of God. Alright, so is Peter telling, he's telling servants, he's telling slaves, he says that they need to obey their masters. Now why? Why would slaves be needing to obey their masters? Because the Lord has set it up that way. And remember that God is in control. We serve a sovereign God, a God who has set in motion all aspects of history. And so, if God is for us, who can be against us? But is anybody against us? Yes or no? Right, we have society against us, right? But do we need to fear society? now because he is so with the servant needs to obey his master even when they are cruel even when they are not doing what God would would want the master to do and we do that because we all we have is Christ and we have his command to do to be holy because he is holy and even though We will suffer by the hands of society, by the hands of people in control. We can still trust that God, in fact, is in control of this. Now, what if we go on to 1 Peter chapter 3 and verses 1 and 2? Here's what it says. Likewise, wives, be subject to your own husbands, so that even if some do not obey the word, they may be won without a word by the conduct of their wives when they see your respectful and pure conduct alright so wives what is it saying here be subject to your own husbands because your husband is godly man is always going to make the right decision so that he's going to do what is best for you always now not any husband I've ever known does that all the time. But it says wives, why would a wife be subject to her husband if he makes mistakes? And even in here where it says, even if some do not obey the word, why would she be? And she would be because she trusts in Christ, because all she has is Christ. And even though her husband doesn't do what is right, she trusts that Christ will, in fact, do what is right. All right? So now we'll get to our actual verses here. Let's go to chapter 3, verses 14 through 16. Because Peter has continued to tell them that God is for us. Who can stand against us? And then in verse 13, actually, he says, now who is there to harm you if you are zealous for what is good? Who is there to harm us? Well, society. Society is there to harm us. But what is society compared to Christ? It's nothing. What are these? These are temporary, light afflictions. So he's saying, who is there? Society may oppose you, but society is not God. Society is temporal, society will go away, but Christ and His holiness will remain. Verse 14, but even if you should suffer for righteousness sake, and you will, 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 a reason for the hope that is in you, yet to do this 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. Will they be put to shame now? Maybe, but maybe not. In fact, many will be celebrated. I was reading something just the other day that said that in some psychiatric manuals, they are now labeling zealous spiritual belief as a mental disorder. Do you think that could affect you? If you say I did this because the Bible compels me to do so, Can they not say you're mentally, you've got a mental problem? You see, but society is doing that, but Christ says, be holy as I am holy. And how can we be holy? Except for to do what the Bible commands us to do, because the Bible is the revealed word of God. We have only the Bible to stand on Only the Bible to stand on So again tonight, we're going to look at four steps for believers to overcome the world and the first one we find in Verse 14, which says do not fear the world But even if you should suffer for righteousness sake you will be blessed have no fear of them so why would we have no fear of them if they're if they're taking away our jobs and they're trying to brainwash our children and They're saying that we cannot preach on certain topics and all of these things. Why should we not be afraid of them? Have no fear. Why should we be without fear? And that's because of who we serve of who we belong to Christ because he is eternal and he has called us to this and Did they persecute Christ? So if we're servants of God how would we expect any difference? So do not fear the world or the things that are in the world because we understand that in fact God is in control. In Ephesians 2.10 it tells us that God has a plan for our lives and that plan is clear and that plan is unmovable. It says here in 210, ìFor we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.î so God has prepared for you if you are a child of God this evening he has prepared for you good works which you will do in obedience to him so what fear do you have of the society that what fear should you have when they when you call you a bigot what fear should you have none because God has a plan and he has designed and determined what in fact you will do in this life. So you can be bold. You can be obedient in a zealous fashion, bold for Christ, knowing that he will accomplish everything that God has called you to accomplish. Now what does it tell us in 2 Timothy 3.12? Let's turn to 2 Timothy 3.12. Here's what it says in 2nd Timothy 3 12. It says indeed all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus Will be persecuted It will happen But we are not to fear If you're playing Monopoly, right and if you've got your your stack of money Would do you fear losing it? Well in the context of a game you might But what about in the context of real life? It's a game. You throw that money around, no big deal. You lose it all, it hasn't hurt you at all. Well, what is reality? Our reality is that spiritually we are in the hands of God and that He has said that He will protect us, He will keep us and that all whom He called He justifies and all that He justified He will glorify. So there is no way for society to, they could take all your money, but we still have Christ. So that's the first point. The second point that I want to make is, it says in our passage here, it says, have no fear of them, nor be troubled, but in your hearts, honor Christ the Lord as holy. Honor Christ the Lord as holy. In another translation it says, sanctify the Lord in your heart. What does that mean? What does it mean to be holy and to set him apart as holy? Well, holy is to be set apart. And we don't, doesn't just mean we stick him next to the other things that are important in life, but that we separate everything else from God. And he in fact is the only one who matters. He is the creator. Everything else is the creation. we set him on the pedestal that he must be on we set him above all things and we say you are the one Christ who I will follow you are the one who I will devote my life to even if this world slays me I will obey you we need to honor Christ is holy in the interest of time I'm gonna go on to my next point here which is is a third point says we need to be prepared to make a defense for the hope that is in you so if we continue reading the verse have no fear of them nor be troubled but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord is holy always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asked you for a reason for the hope that is in you Now this verse is well used by apologists, Christian apologists, because that's what that word defense, that's an apology. And apology doesn't mean, I'm sorry, I won't do that again, but an apology is reasons why we believe what we believe. But now I wanna use this in a specific way for you all tonight. Is all you have Christ? Christ what is who is revealed throughout in every word and every page of the scripture so my question then is do you know what the Bible says I don't mean do you know generally what the Bible says or you know the golden rule and you know that you should do more good things than bad but I want to know do you know what the Bible says. If you're in Bruce's Sunday school class, he's been going through several books of the Bible. I understood him to say that he was in 2 Thessalonians now. If you're in his class, do you know what 2 Thessalonians is talking about? Can you bring a defense as to what the argument of the apostle is in 2 Thessalonians? What is he saying? What proofs is he bringing? Where has he said the same thing? Are you able to make a defense for the truth of 2 Thessalonians? Or if you're in Joe's class or Bob's class, as they go through things, if you're here on Sunday nights and Pastor Steve is going through Ephesians, what is the book of Ephesians about? Do you know? You should know. In fact, you must know. Because if Christ is all you have, and if you are to be holy, and you are to set Him apart as holy and separate from all other things, and if you understand that society is against you, and all you have is the Word of God, then do you know it? Now, not everybody is called to be a pastor. But everybody is called to know the word of God. Every believer is called to know the word of God. In the book of Jude, and Jude only has one chapter, so Jude, if we look at chapter 1 verse 3, I'm just going to read here, it says, Beloved, although I was very eager to write to you about our common salvation, I found it necessary to write appealing to you to contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints." Alright, who's he writing to? He's writing to believers. And what does he want you to do? To contend for the faith. Well, how are you going to contend for the faith if you don't know what the Word of God is. Now, I'm not trying to beat you over the head with this. What I am wanting you to do is to understand the vital nature of each and every believer knowing what the Word of God says. Because we don't know if they're going to outlaw assemblies in churches. We don't know if or when that's going to happen in the United States. But if you do not have this church to go to, will you know what the Bible says? Or if you've been at this church for 10 years, 5 years, 10 years, 20 years, you've sat under some of the best teaching available in America. Do you know what the Bible says in all these books of the Bible that Steve has gone over, that Bruce has gone over, that Joe, that Jason, that Kurt before that? Do you know what those books are about? You young people, we've studied much in youth group. Do you know what the book of Ephesians is about? You should. Christ is holy and if he is all you have and We are anchored on this Then I encourage you exhort you Learn how to study the Bible so that you can put those truths in your heart So the Holy Spirit can remind you can bring to your mind those truths that he has put in your heart. I Now the fourth point that I'm making tonight is we need to proclaim the truth of Jesus Christ with gentleness and respect. It says, again in 1 Peter, if we continue on it says, 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 the reason for the hope that is in you, yet to do this with gentleness and respect. All right, so why is Peter saying this? If they hate us and they call you a fool and a simpleton, and a hypocrite and a hater why should you be respectful to them shouldn't we rise up and say you are wrong and you are evil and you are sinful well we need to proclaim the truth we need to tell them that they are apart from God, that they are in need of a Savior. But we have to remember who are we? In Ephesians 2 it says, it said we were all dead in our transgressions and sins. But it was just by the grace of God through faith that He called us out of darkness into light. So it's not because we were better or we were greater or more intelligent or more loving or more anything. We are Believers in Christ because God has called us to that So we need to look at the unbeliever with love Not to love what they say but understand that they're a person who was Created in the image of God and that they need Christ and that if they die apart from Christ they will pay for eternity apart from Christ and and we do not want that for anyone even the person who is standing up and calling us evil and throwing people in jail and anything else we still need to be respectful and here's the other thing if all you have is Christ and you are standing firm on Christ then what fear do you have of anything else? We have no reason to fear anything else. And if we have no reason to fear anything else, we don't have to lash out in fear or anger. Instead, we can be loving and gentle, tell them the truth. At this church, we are not saying Don't tell people the truth, but we say go and tell them. Go into your neighborhoods and proclaim the gospel. Go to Central America and proclaim the gospel. Go where God calls you to do and proclaim it boldly, but not with arrogance. Boldly, but with the love of God. understanding that we stand on the foundation of Christ, not our own righteousness. Because even the most devout Christian that you know today, if he or she had to stand on their own righteousness, they would crumble and fall. So we have no place to be arrogant or angry. Instead, we need to share the truth boldly with respect and gentleness now let me as I bring this to a close let me let me go back to my illustration here and here's the thing what I worry about a lot in church is the people who are sitting here the people who come to church, maybe you come Sunday mornings, or if you're here right now, you come Sunday nights as well. But those who have been at this church for 20 years, and sometimes I talk to some of the people, and they don't seem to know what the Bible says, as someone who's been here that long should. I'm not saying that to tell you I'm better than you, or somebody else is better than you, but I want you to be fully equipped It's time to take the step off of the straddle line and put all your weight on the Word of God. Pastor Steve on our question and answer, elder question and answer thing said that there's a cleansing of the church coming and that's a good thing. Well, it is a good thing but it's a painful thing because the people who are straddling are going to get hit. And if you are a tear, if someone is just hanging on, drifting along with the flow, they're going to be ripped away from the church. And if you are sitting here unwilling to put all your weight on the truth of the word, you are going to suffer and understand that you are being disobedient to the one who has called you to himself. Because God calls us all to be radical believers fully relying on the Word of God. Now, there's a passage I want to conclude with which is Luke 6, 46 through 49. And so Jesus is speaking here and he says, why do you call me Lord, Lord, and do not do what I tell you? Do you call Jesus Lord and then do not do what he tells you to do? Because what he has told you to do is to sanctify the Lord in your heart and to not fear this society but to go and do what God has called you to do. So Jesus says, why do you call me Lord, Lord and do not do what I tell you? Everyone who comes to me and hears my words and does them, I will show you what he is like. He is like a man building a house who dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock. And when the flood arose and the stream broke against the house and it could not shake it because it had been well built. This chair is to represent that. Well built, why? Because it's on the word of God. It is standing there. And has the storm arisen? The storm is rising. The wind is blowing, but if you're standing on the rock, your house will stand. But what about the straddler here? But the one who hears and does not do them is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation. When the stream broke against it, immediately it fell. And the ruin of that house was great. Do not be a straddler because the ruin of the house is great. Come And make sure that you have placed all of your weight, all of your desires, all of your hopes on Christ and him alone, because he is the one who is the rock, the foundation, and every wise man will build his life on the rock. And if you're here tonight and you haven't come to Christ, maybe Maybe you are part of the culture in general and you thought that the people of the church are nothing but hypocrites and liars. I'm calling you to say to look at the truth. Scripture tells us that all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God and that without faith in Jesus Christ, repentance and faith, we will suffer loss and we will Suffer apart from God for eternity But then maybe you're again the straddler The ruin of the house of the straddler is coming quickly you do not want to be there Therefore come on over and Put your full life into the hands of the Holy God because he is able to care for you And He will care for you. And this is how we overcome the world. Not through our own might, but through the righteousness of Jesus Christ and Him alone. Let's pray. Dear Lori, thank you so much for your word. Thank you, Lord, that you are the rock that we can hold to. And I pray that every one of us, that myself included, that we would not be lazy and put things off or hear sermons and let them go out our ears without meditating on them, without studying the Word to see if what we've heard is true, but instead that we will be zealous, zealous for truth and zealous for you and that we will like a hungry wolf we will grab every morsel of truth that we can and we will bring it in and we will trust in you so that as society turns against us more and more that we will be firm and steady on the rock that is Jesus Christ. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.