Well, we are continuing this morning with our study through the book of 1 Peter. If you'd like to turn there, we are looking specifically at 1 Peter chapter five, verses five through nine. The context for this whole letter is the fact that the churches Peter is writing to are themselves being persecuted for their faith. Therefore, Peter is giving them counsel, which also turns out to be counsel to us on how to deal with suffering. He begins by reminding them that they are Christians, They have been chosen by God. He has caused them to be born again. They have an imperishable inheritance reserved for them in heaven. And when you're going through difficult or painful trials, it can be a real temptation just to think, where is God in all of this? Does he really care about what's happening to me? Well, absolutely he cares. You are his children, and that's one of the big things that Peter's been emphasizing to them. In chapter 5, earlier in chapter 5, Peter actually describes Christians as the flock of God. So, reminds us there that our salvation is of God. Our salvation was purposed by God the Father. The price for our redemption was paid for by the blood of the Son of God, Jesus Christ. The Holy Spirit applied that glorious salvation work to our hearts. So the Lord took people who were His enemies because of our sin and brought them into His family. So we are Christians, we are the flock of God. God has set us apart to himself and those are truths that we should not forget. The term flock of God also is a reminder that we're not just a group of individuals who have put their faith in Christ. We are the household of God, as Peter also describes it in this letter, we are the church Our commitment to one another, interactions with one another are very important aspects of our Christian life. So Peter reminds us of the need, as he talks about the church, on how to treat one another. Be sympathetic, be kind-hearted, be brotherly, show love, be an encouragement to help one another by serving with your spiritual gifts that the Lord has given you. And then in chapter five, which is the final chapter of this letter, Peter focuses again, more specifically, on living and worshiping together as a church. They are clearly going through a season of intense suffering. As we read the scriptures together, Peter calls it a fiery ordeal that they are dealing with themselves. There is a time of judgment taking place that's beginning with the household of God and then moving to the culture at large. And so the judgment that focuses on the household of God is a judgment of testing and a judgment of purifying or refining. The testing part is testing for the genuineness of their faith. I mean one of the things that persecution and suffering has a way of doing is distinguishing between those who are true believers and those who are not. And so that's one of the aspects of suffering is a time of testing, but it's also a time of purifying the faith of believers. God uses suffering to make us more holy, to make us more loving, to make us more Christ-like. So in chapter four, verse 19, Peter tells his believers to entrust their souls to their faithful creator. You can trust his sovereign plan, you can trust that he will enable you to persevere in doing what is right even when the pressure to compromise is very strong. So it's in that context that Peter then addresses the church, specifically addresses the elders of the church at the beginning of chapter five. He calls on them to shepherd the flock of God among them. In other words, those believers that have been allotted to their charge in particular, their particular churches. So even in times of persecution, we're reminded here that the Lord calls on believers to meet together as a church. The church is one of the most important things the Lord gives to His people to enable us to persevere through those really hard challenges in life. So the elders are to faithfully teach the scriptures because that's the feeding of the flock. They need to lead in times of God-honoring worship. They need to watch over the sheep and be a help to them. They also need to guard against pride and being overbearing, being demanding. They need to be examples to the flock. Well, then after exhorting the elders, Peter has some things to say to the flock as a whole, and that's the verses that we're looking at today. So let me read chapter five, verses five through nine. You younger men, likewise, be subject to your elders. And all of you, clothe yourself with humility toward one another. For God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble. Therefore, humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you at the proper time, casting all your anxiety on him because he cares for you. Be of sober spirit. Be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion. seeking someone to devour, but resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same experiences of suffering are being accomplished by your brethren who are in the world." So there are three different things that Peter actually calls on the flock to do in these verses. He calls them to be humble. He calls them to be alert and watchful. And he also calls on them to resist the devil. Those are the three things he emphasizes. So first we look at the fact that the Lord calls his flock to be humble. The word humble or humility shows up three times there in verses five and six, but Peter actually applied it to the elders as well. He just didn't use that specific word. I mean, in the context of exercising oversight, he warns the elders, don't lord it over the flock. And so what Peter is doing there is calling for humility. I mean, even in a position of authority, humility is necessary. It's supposed to also be exemplary humility because he says, show yourself an example of the flock. But now as Peter addresses the flock, he speaks to them of humility as well. I've heard humility defined as thinking of God and others as more important than yourself. I think that's a good, simple, to-the-point definition. I like to look up Noah Webster in his 1828 dictionary about what he has to say. It's amazing, so many of his definitions, I know I've mentioned this before in the past, he was a Christian man and so many of his definitions, it's almost like reading a Bible commentary as he just defines words. But you gotta get the 1828 version, you're not gonna find it after that, years after that. So he defines humility this way. He says, it's a lowliness of mind, a deep sense of one's own unworthiness in the sight of God, self-abasement, penitence for sin, and submission to the divine will. That's Webster's Dictionary. So God calls us to pursue humility. Peter approaches the issue from several different angles. First one we see is this, those who are younger are reminded of the importance of being subject to the elders of their church. Verse 5 begins by saying, you younger men, likewise, be subject to your elders. The word likewise is meant to connect it with the exhortation to the elders just before it. So as the elders, in other words, have a particular role in the church, likewise the younger men and others do as well. But we need to take note here that the word translated younger men in the New American Standard, which I'm using, is literally the word just for younger. Some of your versions may just have you younger likewise be. subject. Peter seems to be making a play on words to kind of, with this contrast between the youngers and the elders. I mean, the word for elder, literally, is the idea of focusing on one who is older and one who is mature in their faith. But the word for elder, we know, is also used to describe an office in the church, which refers to pastors, shepherds, elders, It's all the same, just different terms to define the same office. So it may be that Peter is doing a similar thing with the word youngers. It's not so much that younger is an office, but he may have the whole flock in mind here. They are not necessarily all younger than those who are the elders, but they do not hold the office of the elder. So they're described in general as the youngers. It's also possible that among the youngers in general, he has a word for younger men in particular. He's giving a caution to be careful about going against what your elders are saying. Peer specifically calls them to be subject to their elders. And one further application here is this. When you are younger, and of course he gives no age range here, so that's good, that's helpful for us. You can all put yourself in the category of younger if you'd like to. So but when we are younger, we are often tempted to reject the faith or examine or whatever, but sometimes even reject the faith of our elders or we could say maybe in our parents more in general here. So no matter who the elders or the authorities in your life are, one thing that is for sure, they have not lived a perfect Christian life. They've made mistakes and I think they would admit that they have made mistakes. But if they're genuine Christians, we need to be careful not to reject what they've taught us. We need to be careful not to reject the example that they've given. It doesn't mean that we have to do everything exactly the same, but the hope is that you can build off of the foundation that's been given to you by those who are your elders in the faith, or even in your family, and even reach greater heights of Christian maturity than they. So the call to be humble here means that we are to see the importance of being subject to those who are our elders. Then Peter speaks more broadly. Next point, all the flock of God are to clothe themselves with humility toward one another. Clothe themselves with humility. Again, this is from verse five. You younger men likewise be subject to your elders and all of you clothe yourselves with humility toward one another. So if there was any doubt that Peter was speaking to all those within the flock, he makes it very clear now. So what he says here applies to all believers. Everyone who's a part of the flock of God, whether it's a man or a woman or a child, whether older, younger, whatever, we are all to clothe ourselves with humility toward one another. Now the imagery here for clothe yourself is that of a slave tying on their apron and preparing to serve. So a servant is especially focused on what they can do or be or how they can be of service to others, maybe because it's their job, but that's what they're supposed to do. So since we're all called to clothe ourselves with humility, in your mind's eye, you can just kind of imagine all of us with servant aprons on, ready to serve, whatever comes up, we're ready. Now, generally speaking, I think we're all naturally more inclined to think about what's most comfortable or most desirable for us, thinking about it from our personal, our own perspective. The servant has to learn to think more of others and what's best for them. So when we're focused on how we can serve, There are so many different ways that can be accomplished, and you're really just looking for opportunities. For example, clothing yourself with humility can mean going out of your way to speak to someone who's not in your normal orbit of who you usually talk to. You want to make them feel more welcome, more at home. It might include asking questions about how their health, their job, their family, or especially if you know that there's challenges that they're facing. And it would also include, of course, praying for them. Clothing yourself with humility can include practical things like picking up trash, emptying a trash can, cleaning up a mess you didn't even make. Clothing yourself with humility, which a lot of people did yesterday here, by the way, clothing yourself with humility can include listening to what someone else has to say, thinking that I can learn from them. It's realizing that there are many things that you don't know, There's oftentimes, it's what other people have to share that really help us grow in our understanding. So humility, being humble, involves being teachable. Clothing yourself with humility is also admitting when you've done something wrong. It's admitting sinful words, it's admitting sinful actions. It's also admitting and recognizing your own weakness. It's admitting that we need help. We need help from the Lord, we need help from other people. We need help. So Peter says that all the flock of God ought to clothe themselves with humility toward one another. Then, Peter tells us his next point, that humility is to be highly valued because God sets himself against the proud, but he grants divine favor to the humble. The reason that humility is something we should pursue is because God says it's right. So to give further incentive to the flock of God, Peter quotes a verse from Psalm, I'm sorry, from Proverbs chapter 3 verse 34. And so he tells us here in verse 5, clothe yourself with humility toward one another for or because God is opposed to the proud but gives grace to the humble. The word for opposed here literally means he sets himself against. And the imagery here is an army lined up against an enemy, and we've all seen movies and that depict—some of you actually fought some of these battles in real life—but they depict enemies lined up against each other. Each army is there to keep the other army from doing what it wants to do or going where it wants to go or getting what it wants to get, whatever. They're going to fight with all their strength, with all the weapons at their disposal. It's going to be an intense battle between these armies. Well here in 1 Peter, the image is of God standing as an enemy against the person who is proud. Now if you're in a battle against a human army, I think you can think, I've got some hope here. There's some hope that I could win this battle. There's some hope that I could win. But if it's God who is opposing you, you have no hope. I mean, it'd be like an ant maybe lined up against the United States Army. I mean, there's no hope, and it's foolish to even consider it. But what's even worse here is the proud person actually thinks they still have a chance, because they're proud. They believe they can stand against the Almighty God and win. Well, that's foolishness, but people do it all the time. Peter's trying to expose the foolishness of being proud. He says, if you're proud, God is lined up against you as an enemy. So the application then, obviously, is don't be proud. So when you're tempted to think more highly of yourself than you ought to think, remember, God is opposed to the proud, but he gives grace to the humble. You don't want to live your life in the proud kind of way. One thing, when you think about pride, though, I mean, it's not just that it comes naturally to us because of how, what's going on in our own hearts. It comes naturally because of what's going on in the culture. I mean, pride is a value that most people hold pretty dear. You see pride in athletes all the time and how they describe themselves, adjectives they use, bragging on themselves, so forth. You'll find, you'll see humility sometimes, but you'll oftentimes gonna see a lot of pride. You'll see pride from movie stars, things of that sort. You'll see celebrities, you'll see pride from politicians and all that they've accomplished and what a great person they are. And even though we may not be a well-known public figure, I mean, we know that pride is a big temptation to us as well. And when you think about it, really every sin that we commit is connected to pride. There really aren't any exceptions. Every sin we commit, comes out of pride. I mean, whether it's being covetousness, being covetous, I mean, the pride is, I deserve that more than them. It can be being lazy, because I deserve that. It can be stealing. I want what they have. I deserve what they have. It can be lusting. It can be holding a grudge. making excuses for our behavior. I mean, whatever it is, we believe that we deserve it and ends up coming out of pride. I mean, every sin you've ever committed ends up being connected to pride in some way. So it's a big issue for all of us. So Peter's warning here is to Christians, and really we should all know better. If anybody should know, we shouldn't be proud as Christians because as Christians we realize that we're sinners when we realize how far short we fall of what we're supposed to be. I mean, we know that the wages of sin is death. We know that. The Bible tells us that. We know that Christ Jesus had to come into the world as a man so that he could suffer and die as a man for the sins that we have committed, because that's what they deserve. They deserve death. He had to pay for our sins, and so we've received Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord. We submit to Him and not to ourselves. He's our Lord. And so all the things really point to the importance of humility, but even when we know the gospel well, we're still tempted to be proud. So Peter reminds us God is opposed to the proud, but of course he doesn't leave it there. Yes, he's opposed to the proud, but on the other hand, he gives grace to the humble. So the way to have God's favor is to recognize and admit that you don't deserve God's favor. is to admit that you're weak, is to admit that you're helpless, is to admit that sin is still a very strong force within you. I'm always impressed with, amazed about how the Lord revealed this to the Apostle Paul when he talks about in 2 Corinthians 12, about the thorn in the flesh. And he talked about how this thorn in the flesh was such a torment to him. And so it says that he asked the Lord three times, Take this away. Take this thorn away. It's such a torment to me." And the Lord said, no. And the Lord told him, my grace is sufficient for you because power is perfected in weakness. So from that, by the way, power is not perfected in proud strength. It's perfected in weakness. So Paul says, okay, I will most gladly then boast about my weaknesses. Boast about the things that, just boast about what is weak so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. So when you come to the place that you are able to boast about your weaknesses, you've learned a lot about what it means to be humble. As Christians, we know how much we need the grace of God. The grace of God and humility go hand in hand. and our God grants divine favor to the humble. Then Peter makes another application about the issue of humility. He tells us that believers are to humbly submit to God's sovereign rule in their life, knowing that he will ultimately vindicate his people. So based on all those things we just pointed out from verse 5, Peter then makes this application in verse 6, which says, So Peter, once again, calls for humility. Now again, the fact that he's brought this up several times to reinforce it, and he's reinforcing it here again, speaks to the fact this is a problem that we all have to deal with. This is something we all have to remind ourselves regularly. That's why he continues to reemphasize it. But he also, he's still talking about humility here, but he's doing it from a different angle here. Yes, humility is our attitude towards people. Verse five, he says, clothe yourself with humility toward one another. So humility toward people. But true humility has to go further than that. True humility has to come with submitting ourselves under the mighty hand of God. We have to acknowledge that God is sovereign over all things. First off, we need to note here, this is something that we're supposed to do. I mean, God will humble us by setting Himself against us if we are proud, but Peter says you're responsible to humble yourself. You have that responsibility. Humble yourself. What that does not mean is this. That does not mean that you learn the words to ksara sara, whatever will be will be, and begin to sing those. Because that has nothing to do with God. That's fatalism. Whatever will be will be is just fatalism. Sometimes you'll hear people say, well, I believe all things happen for a reason. And that's true. I mean, that's a right statement. That's a true statement. But if you leave God out of the picture, you've totally missed the point. God has to be in the picture in order to be able to say, all things work out for a reason. All things are here for a reason. So when Peter speaks of God's mighty hand here, he's reminding us that God is in control of everything that happens. So to humble yourself under the mighty hand of God means that we are actively submitting ourselves to his providential will, whatever that might be. It means that we are acknowledging that he knows what's best. We're acknowledging that He's smarter than we are. He's wise. It's acknowledging that He is a good God and that His things that He does and the things that He providentially brings into our life, we may not always understand the good part, but it comes to us from the hand of a good God and a wise God. By His mighty hand, He's able to bring these things into reality. This would be really relevant to the people that Peter's writing to. And of course he has that in mind, he knows that. The whole context of the letter, like we said, is going through persecution and suffering. It can be quite a challenge to humble yourself under the mighty hand of God when his mighty hand has brought you into this hard place, this really difficult place. But that's what true humility requires. By faith we see his hand even in our adversities. So we say, God, I don't understand this, it's really hard, but I trust you. I trust you. And of course, Peter doesn't leave it with that. He says, humble yourselves unto the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you at the proper time. Notice that this exalting is done at the proper time, and God is the one who determines what that is. When we humble ourselves under God's mighty hand, we trust that he will accomplish his purposes for that in his time, in his way. He's the one who determines what the proper time is, not us. An important part of when he says exalt, he will exalt you. There's several different ways to understand the application of that. I mean, part of the exalting is the very fact that by grace we are enabled to walk through the difficulties that we're enduring. That's in a sense an aspect of the exalting. He's holding us up through whatever's taking place. And you know how encouraging it is when there's someone that you know and you know they're going through really hard times, they're having really hard situations, and you know from seeing them and talking to them that they're continuing to walk through that in faith. It doesn't mean that they never blow it or never have a hard time because they're probably going to, but you can see God sustaining them. That's encouraging to us when we see that happening. That's one sense, I think, of the exalting us whenever we're going through those difficult times. But there's also times when God actually delivers out of the fiery ordeal that are faced in this lifetime. I mean, we've heard of people who suffer persecution. One of the ones I was thinking of when I was thinking about this, some of you know the name Richard Warmbrand. He was a minister who was arrested during the communist days at the height of Romania. and was taken to a prison that basically no one would ever get out of. He was tortured for his faith, but he was set free. He was set free out of that, and he actually, as a result, ultimately began the ministry, Voice of the Martyrs, which we got this video from. And so, there's a sense where there was an exalting, a delivering even, in this time, in this life, from the fiery ordeal that he had to go through. But ultimately, the exalting is promised when we're with the Lord. It's publicly demonstrated on that last day, that day when His glory is revealed and we rejoice in Him with great exaltation. And that day all will be put right and we will be exalted in the Lord. So we are to humbly submit to God's sovereign will in our life, knowing that he will vindicate his people at the proper time. Then Peter makes a final application about humility. Humility includes casting every concern upon the Lord, knowing that he cares deeply for all of his flock. So Peter's saying that one of the ways to humble yourself under God's mighty hand is by casting all your cares on him. I mean, it's often, It's often the personal cares and concerns that we have that really, in a sense, keep us from humbling ourselves under his mighty hand. I mean, there's so many things that can cause us to feel anxiety, whether it's personal physical safety or financial provision or concerns for people that we love, how this is going to affect my job and future of our country or whatever. But Peter makes sure that we see that it doesn't matter whether concerns that we have are like big concerns or whether they're something that seems really small. And you might even be embarrassed that you're concerned about it. He says, don't be. Every care, whether it's the big things or whether it's the small things, we are to cast them on him. Every single one. He says, because he cares for you. The big things and the little things, every single care. It's supposed to be cast onto him. And the big thing, and again, remember the context here is humility. The big thing that keeps us from doing that is really pride. We feel like we're the ones who have to fix those things. It's up to me. It's my job. Now, this doesn't mean that we do nothing about concerns. I mean, Christians are people who are responsible and trustworthy and so forth. But those cares are not to come to the point that they become things that we worry and are anxious about. So to cast the cares onto him is to trust him with those cares, because he says he's trustworthy. He says he cares for you. Every single thing, every single aspect of our life, he cares for you. So all of that is humble trust. The Lord calls his flock to be humble. And of course you can see that's the main thing that he was focusing on. in this passage. But another important thing as well, the second thing he calls his flock to is this, the Lord calls his flock to be alert and watchful in regards to their enemy, the devil. Verse 8 says this, be of sober spirit, be on the alert, your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour. So the fact that we recognize God's sovereignty and his fatherly care over us does not mean that we have no responsibility in the matter. Peter's saying, yes, cast all your cares on the Lord, but you also need to be spiritually alert and watchful. The idea of being sober-minded here is to be free from what we might call mental or spiritual drunkenness. Just kind of, in other words, living your life in a stupor. Kind of living your life and just kind of the idea of saying just whatever. Well, living your life in whatever is not being alert. It's not being watchful. It's not being sober-minded. We're to be awake. We're to be watchful. Peter specifically is calling us to be alert and watchful in regards to the devil. And one of the times that Satan is going to be most active in It's when we're going through trials because He will throw all kinds of temptations at us, tempt us to feel sorry for ourselves, tempt us to be resentful toward those who are doing things that are causing us harm, tempted to hold on to bitterness, tempted to be vengeful, to think you can't trust God, to be mad at God. because he didn't do what you wanted him to do when you wanted him to do it. I mean, there's lots of things to be alert to in regard to Satan's temptations when we're going through difficulties. Now briefly, and there's three statements here that I think sum up why we need to be alert and what we need to be alert, why the issue of being alert to Satan's work is such a big deal. First is this, be alert to the vicious nature of the devil, the vicious nature. The devil's compared to a roaring lion. In other words, he acts like a wild beast. When you think of a flock of sheep, a roaring lion is going to cause that flock to scatter. because they are afraid. The devil is pure evil. He is also described here as our adversary, our sworn enemy. So Peter gives the picture of a wild beast to illustrate that for us, to illustrate those things for us and show us the need to keep our eyes wide open to what he might try because he's vicious in his attacks. Be alert to the fact that the devil is constantly scheming against believers, constantly scheming against believers. Peter describes the devil as rowing a line who is prowling around, pacing back and forth, always on the move, looking for his prey. In Ephesians 6, Paul warns us about being on guard against the schemes of the devil. The devil never takes a break. He will come after you when you are most vulnerable. Remember, he's a vicious beast. He will come after you when you are most vulnerable. That's why Peter gives this warning to people who are being persecuted for their faith. They're vulnerable because of that. He comes after you when you're not being watchful and don't expect it at all. He comes after you when you're at church. He will come after you when you're with your family. He will come after you when you're with your friends. He will come after you when you're by yourself. He will come after you on your days off or when you're on vacation because he never takes a vacation, he never takes a day off. So a big part of Peter's call for alertness is because our adversary the devil, the wild beast, is constantly scheming against us. Finally, be alert to the devil's evil and destructive intentions. evil and destructive intentions. Peter says the devil's like a roaring lion prowling around because he's seeking someone to devour. He's seeking someone to devour. Literally the word for devour means to gulp down, to swallow. When a lion goes after a flock of sheep, his purpose is to find one that he can devour. Satan is also called the destroyer. He wants to destroy the faith of every believer. He wants to destroy your life so that you will spend eternity in hell. He wants to destroy your family. He wants to destroy local churches. He wants to destroy nations. Each of these descriptions are given to emphasize how important it is that every Christian is alert and watchful in regards to the devil, our enemy. And the last instruction that he gives to the flock is a direct follow-up to this one. So our third main point is this, the Lord calls his flock to firmly resist, firmly resist and stand against the devil. So it's not just enough to be watchful. The purpose of being watchful is so that we can respond with firm resistance to the attacks that he makes. Interesting here, the word for resist or stand against is a military term. It's roughly the same word that we talked about in verse 5. It talks about how God opposes or stands against those who are proud. This is the same word for resist the devil. It's in the aorist imperative tense, and what that means is this is an action that needs to be taken in a decisive way with a sense of urgency. So there's two things to help us in carrying out this firm resistance. The first one is this. Believers are to resist the devil by standing firm on the truths of the gospel, the truths of the gospel. Peter says resist him firm, standing firm in your faith. I believe the faith he's talking about is the truths of the gospel, who we are in Christ, the good news of salvation in Christ. So to resist Satan firm in the faith, we have to remember who we are in Christ. We don't resist the devil in our own strength. We resist him knowing that our Lord Jesus Christ has already defeated him. Jesus came into the world to crush the head of the devil, and that's what he did. So we resist the devil as sinners who are fully accepted by God in Christ. So now we are saints. We resist the devil as people who are forgiven in Christ. We resist the devil as people who are righteous in Christ. We resist the devil as people who are children of the Lord Jesus Christ. We resist the devil as people that we know God has begun a work of salvation in us and he's completing that work. We resist him as people who are indwelt by the Holy Spirit. So if we resist him firm in our faith, we're gonna remember those basics, and Peter covered just about all of those at the beginning of the letter. He's just saying, don't forget that stuff that I told you. Resist him standing firm in your faith. You've got to, because Satan, his scheme is gonna try to get us to forget those things, or at least to doubt those things, that they're really true. Don't fall for that scheme. Resist the devil by standing firm on the truths of the gospel. In James chapter 4 verse 7, which is a very similar passage to this, James says, if you resist the devil, he will flee from you. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. So we actively come against temptations by standing firm on the truths of the gospel, reminding ourselves and reminding the Lord, even reminding Satan of who we are in Christ. And the devil will flee from us because our Lord has already defeated him. Then Peter adds one more thing, and this is the perfect thing to remember in a day in which we're praying for the persecuted church of the world. Verse nine says this, resist him firm in your faith, knowing that the same experiences of suffering are being accomplished by your brethren who are in the world. So point B is this, believers are to resist the devil knowing that the brotherhood, the brotherhood does not suffer in vain. their experience of suffering being brought forth to the victorious conclusion that God has designed. The phrase there that says, your brethren, in verse 9, translates a word that actually means brotherhood. It's emphasizing a oneness, it's emphasizing a solidarity that believers have with one another all over the world. This is a reminder that whatever your suffering is, you are not by yourself. Whatever your trials are, you're not the only one. You're not the only one. You're not the only one being attacked by the devil. There are brothers and sisters in Christ all over the world who are dealing with the same kinds of things that you are. And God is using them to accomplish His work, and He's using you and He's using me as well to accomplish His work in those things. We heard today of the great struggles that believers in North Korea and Afghanistan and Somalia and Libya are dealing with. And of course, you know, that's just a small sampling. In the most recent Voice of the Martyrs magazine, it speaks about what happened on Sunday, May 13th, 2018 in Indonesia. On that day, I forget the name of the city, but in one particular city, Muslim terrorists, and by the way, these Muslim terrorists were all one family, including their children, who carried out this attack. They carried out three suicide bombings at three different churches in the same city. Same morning, 15 people were killed altogether. Of course, many, many were seriously injured. It was an awful thing. One of the things that was just really amazing to me when I was reading this article is the very next Sunday, One of the, I mean, it's hard, I can't even imagine. I mean, these suicide vests, I mean, just the awfulness of that. The very next Sunday, one of the churches, they rented tents because there had been damage, obviously, in the building because of these bombings. They rented tents and they had worship services that very next Sunday. There were over a thousand people who attended as a part of these worship services. Would you go to church the next Sunday? after that had just happened? I don't know. Hope I would have the courage to do that. But over a thousand people went to church the very next Sunday after what had taken place to them. And one of the things that they heard multiple times was what a testimony it was to their Muslim neighbors that they did that. It's also a testimony and encouragement to us. That's what Peter's talking about here when he says, what the Christian brotherhood is enduring all over the world. So be humble, be alert, and stand firm in resisting the devil. Lord, we do thank you again for your word and that you address what is real in life. And we know that suffering, trials, difficulty, even persecution is something that is real. So thank you for addressing these things. I want to thank you I'm just so grateful to be a part of a local church. I'm grateful to be a part of this local church in particular. But just so grateful to be a part of a church. And just the opportunity we have to encourage each other, sometimes it's just by our presence. But by our words, by our prayers, by the way we serve and try to help whatever the situation might be, I thank you for being, just the privilege of being a part of a local church. Lord, help us as we live out that idea of being a servant with our apron on. Help us to live out that humility in such a way that we truly are concerned about each other, that we listen to each other, that we pray for each other, that we try to come alongside and help whenever there's an opportunity or something we can do to help. Help us to be humble. Help us to be watchful. There are so many temptations that are there and just sometimes things can just kind of get into your mind and you're doing something before you even sometimes even realize what you're doing. Help us to be people who are watchful and not to fall to the temptations that Satan throws at us. But help us to resist, to stand firm in our understanding of who we are as Christians and stand firm in the gospel truths that we know are true. If you're one who's never put your faith in Christ, I would invite you to receive Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior. A prayer like this will be a way to start. Lord, I realize that I'm sinful. I realize that I have done so many things wrong, but I also realize that Jesus Christ paid the price for my sin, and I want to receive Him as my Savior. I want to submit my life to Him as the Lord of my life. If you want to talk about that commitment to Christ, if you make it in your tarot, we can do that at a later time. We want to take a few moments now to prepare for the fact that we're going to be taking the Lord's Supper together. And we're called by scripture to search our hearts. before we do that. So Lord, I ask that you would search our hearts and just point out sin that we need to be aware of and that we need to confess to you before we take the Lord's Supper together. So Lord, we ask that you might do that for us now. Lord, we thank You that Your Word tells us that as we confess our sins, You are faithful. You are just to forgive us of our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. It's in the name of Christ that we pray. Amen.