Let's pray together. Lord, thank you for your word now. As we come to it, give us ears and eyes. Feed your sheep. And we are all, all each of us here, I pray your sheep. In Jesus' name, amen. Last week we saw that as Christians living in the world, we are never to have a martyr complex. So we don't forget that. Yes, it's true, we're always to take up our cross and follow Jesus. But it's also always our goal and our desire and our mentality and mindset to overcome evil with good. That's our goal, always. So there is a sense in which, there is a sense, and I've qualified this last week, so I'm not going to do it this week, but there's a sense in which we always live our lives in such a way as to make persecution and mistreatment the least likely of a reality as it can possibly be. So we put it this way, we need to balance a perfect biblical pessimism. We ought to be pessimists, biblically. Pessimists in the sense of there is no common ground between us and the world when it comes to partnership and fellowship. On the other hand, we ought to also be perfect biblical optimists. Because there is a common ground that we see all the time in terms of our witness and our testimony to an unbelieving world. Let's never get imbalanced on that. I shouldn't say let's never get imbalanced, we will. May God always keep bringing us back to center when we do start getting imbalanced. So Peter writes, now who is there to persecute or mistreat you? if you are zealous for what is good. But, but, but even if, even if you should suffer for righteousness sake, you are blessed. Now what Peter's gonna do, now that he's said, okay, hopefully you aren't suffering because you're living good lives, but the reality is the world hates the light. And so suffering's going to happen, and when, if and when that should be God's will, how are we to respond then? In that case, In other words, what if I'm slandered? What if I'm falsely accused and mistreated, truly and only for righteousness sake, only, having only ever been zealous for what is good? Okay, now I'm still suffering, okay, now what? Now what? Peter begins his answer in the second half of verse 14, what we're gonna pick up. He answers this question with these words, so starts off his answer. The fear of them do not fear and do not be dismayed. Now I'm gonna take kind of a little bit of a rabbit trail here, but it'll tie back in. I wanna ask you this question and it'll be a short one, but hang with me on this because it was powerful for me and it really encouraged me and really brought me back again to a place I needed to be. Why do you think Peter talks like this? He says, the fear of them, do not fear. Who talks like that? You might say, well, people writing in Greek talk like that. No, they don't talk like that. Not even in Greek do they talk like that. That's strange and awkward, and he could have said it way more simply even in Greek. He could have just said, do not fear them, period, and do not be dismayed. Instead, awkwardly, the fear of them, do not fear. So, why does he do that? Well, the answer is really very simple and yet important. Peter is quoting, yet again, from the Old Testament Scriptures. Basically, word for word. I did not realize, going through Peter, how much he is constantly quoting the Scriptures. He knew his Old Testament Scriptures. And here he goes again. So, in the days of Ahaz, 600 or so years earlier, He's the king of Judah, and the people were living in fear. They were living in fear of two kings just to the north of them. So there was Pekah, the king of Israel, and Rezin, the king of Syria. And the two of them had made an alliance and they were threatening Ahaz in Judah. They were threatening him by saying that we're gonna come in and invade your land and we're gonna remove you as the king and set someone else up as king who will share our own political agendas. And so because of Judah's terror of these two kings, I mean, people were shaking at the threat of these two kings. Ahaz, the king and the people, they're putting their trust in an alliance with Assyria. I mean, what do you do when these two kings are against you? You look to someone else for help, right? Only in this case, it wasn't their covenant lord and king, it was the king of another pagan, idolatrous nation, the king of Assyria, hoping that he would save them. So it's against that backdrop, as all the people are full of fear, The word of the Lord comes to Isaiah and to all the faithful believers in Israel. He's talking to the faithful and this is what the word of the Lord is in Isaiah chapter 8 verse 12. The fear of them, do not fear and do not be dismayed. Sounds familiar, right? In other words, what's Isaiah saying? What's the Lord saying through Isaiah? The fear that this people has, the fear that all of your neighbors have, I mean, they're all terrified, right? What are they terrified of? The two kings to the north. So the fear of them, of those two kings, you do not fear. Don't be afraid of the things that they're all afraid of. The fear of them, do not fear. Now, does that make sense? I mean, it's still a little weird for us, but now it makes sense in Greek, okay? Now it works. In Isaiah, this language makes perfect sense. It's not strange, it's not awkward, even though it's the same language Peter used. But when Peter quotes this verse, and I won't spend forever on this, so if you're like, I'm not getting this, okay, we're going on, but when Peter quotes this verse, he is not saying, Don't be afraid of the things that they're all afraid of, because there's no other there. There's no one there. When Peter uses this same language, the fear of them is not someone else's fear that we're not to share, like it was in Isaiah. Instead, in Peter, the fear of them is just our own fear of those who mistreat and persecute us. the fear of them, do not fear. He just said it again, and it's weird and it's awkward. Now it's awkward. When Peter says it, it's awkward. When Isaiah said it, it wasn't awkward, because he had a little different context. And so, in your handout, awkward. There's the word. So here's my question. You say, why are we taking time, valuable time, to talk about this? Well, let me ask you, why does Peter do this? Why doesn't Peter change the wording just a little to fit his own context better? And he could have done that. I mean, he's writing inspired scripture and you don't have to quote exactly word for word the Old Testament scriptures to make your point here. He could have just said, do not fear and do not be dismayed. No, he quotes it exactly and in the process ends up saying something very awkward. Why does he do that? It is because he wants us to know. that even here he is rooting his own authoritative message, and it's authoritative because he's an apostle sent out by Jesus Christ himself, but he is rooting his own message in the previous authoritative message of the Old Testament scriptures. Now many of us might say, we might think to that, see that and think to ourselves, so? I don't really care, I believe it's the word of God and that's enough for me. But Peter, for Peter, he felt like it should matter to us. Like he wanted us to see that, yes, what I'm saying is the authority of God's Word, but look, it's even rooted in the Scriptures that we've grown up reading and listening to and studying. It's rooted there. Peter could have said more simply, do not fear them and do not be dismayed. He could have. And he knew this was awkward, but see, what happens when he quotes Isaiah exactly? and even awkwardly, he is compelling us to see how his own apostolic, authoritative, and inspired message to us is grounded in the previous also authoritative, also inspired message of God's covenant word to his covenant people in the Old Testament scriptures. See, they had an esteem and a reverence for the holy scriptures as the word of God that I fear the church today lacks. I fear that I myself and us as a church here may lack that reverence and esteem that they had. And so as I reflected on this, because I'm studying this, and I didn't even know I was gonna do anything with this, but I'm reading this, trying to make sense of why Peter's talking like this, and how it even makes sense from Isaiah, and as it's coming together for me, I'm seeing Peter's esteem for scripture. And I began to be reminded of the esteem that I myself need to hold God's holy word, and in my own heart, and in my own life. And here's the value for us, Once we understand that Peter's quoting Isaiah, okay, now that we know that, and once we understand the message in the context of Isaiah and what was going on, well then all of a sudden, the awkward language of Peter becomes crystal clear. In fact, It's even now doubly confirmed. There it is. Doubly confirmed in our hearts. It's the very word of God to us. Both through the prophet Isaiah and then now again, yet again, through the apostle Peter. It's doubly confirmed to us. We only need it singly confirmed. But Peter says, it's doubly confirmed. Old Testament scriptures, New Testament scriptures, here it is. Brothers and sisters, I wanted to ask then, and ask this of yourself, in your heart of hearts, ask yourself this, where is the grounds and the foundation and the authority And so then also the strength in you, and the power in you, and the joy in you for living all of your life. For your thinking, for how you feel, for your words, all the time, all the time. For our actions, it's all here in this book, in the scriptures. We'll call it the inscripturated covenant word of God to us. his people. How then should we delight to be grounding ourselves in that word, grounding ourselves in it? You know, sometimes I catch myself, I have a Bible reading plan and I love that plan, but sometimes I'll catch myself thinking, okay, I want to make sure I get it in this morning so I don't have to do it tonight. I would never, those are not the words I'm actually saying in my head. But all of a sudden I'll become aware that that's actually the thought that I'm thinking in my heart. I realize, isn't it my delight to ground myself in these scriptures, just the word of God, in their fullness? In your handout, if Peter loved to ground even his own authoritative apostolic message in the prior authority of the scriptures, the scriptures, how much more? should we be glad to root our thinking and feeling and speaking and living all of it in the firm foundation of God's covenant word to us. I just want to say to you, when you come here, always remember that you don't come here to listen to me. I may think that sometimes. I confess that I may get up here thinking that you've come here to listen to me. I know that is not true. May you never come here to listen to me. or to any other who ever stands behind this pulpit, ever, ever, ever, but only that you might understand by grace and by faith the full counsel of this Word of God. So, that's not Peter's main point. What's Peter's main point? It's just this. We are not the first of God's people. to ever be threatened or face the temptation to fear. Fear, fear is a horrible thing, isn't it? And it can come, it does come for all of us at different times. And so Peter wants us to know, no, you're not the first people. He wants the people he's writing to to know you're not the first people. Let's go back 600 years to God's people in the time of Ahaz. Remember that? And what was the word of God to them? The fear of them do not fear. Do not fear what they fear and do not be dismayed. And then Peter said, now we can say, what was God's word to the Christians in Asia Minor facing the threats in the days of Peter? It's the same thing. Peter quotes Isaiah. The fear of them, do not fear. Do not fear those who threaten or mistreat you. Do not be dismayed. Now I ask you, what then is the word of God to us? Whenever we may feel the threats of others, to persecute us or mistreat us for righteousness sake? Does your heart answer? Does your heart answer why it's the same word that he spoke through the prophet Isaiah and also through the apostle Peter, the fear of them Do not fear and do not be dismayed. The word dismayed means don't be troubled in your heart, don't be anxious, don't be afraid. It's one of those repeated refrains throughout the scriptures, isn't it? Fear not, do not be afraid. Are you hearing and listening to this word of God by faith? Fear, what does it do to us? Well, it always leads to sin. It always does. Fear, we see fear oftentimes as something that makes us pitiable, and it does. It elicits sympathy, and in a sense, it does. But fear also ends up making us guilty. Because fear leads to sin, it leads to compromise. And in the case of King Ahaz and the people of Judah, Fear led them to make an alliance with Assyria. Fear leads to an inability to act, to act in faith. Fear, fear leads to an inability to act in faith and truly live for God with a glad obedience. And so God's people are never, ever, ever to be ruled or control. And that's what fear does. It's not one of those things that's off to the side and that kind of messes with us a little bit here and there. No, fear is something that wants to take control and rule and have control. God's people are not to allow fear to control or determine their lives. This is God's word to us, and that's where I want to come back to the grace of it, because we might say, oh, the command is do not fear, and I feel so helpless in it, but the more we stop focusing on my helplessness before it, and the more we hear the command of God, do not fear, the more I'm empowered not to fear. I think when Jesus said to the disciples, fear not, all of a sudden I felt like, oh, I don't have to be afraid, because he told me not to. That's God's word to us. There is a power and a strength just in the command. And it's a command, but of course, isn't it more than that? It's wonderful good news. How would you feel, how would you like it if God came to us and said, I know that sometimes you're gonna be terrified and there's really nothing you can do about that, but just trust me while you're terrified. No, he comes to us and says, don't be terrified. Don't fear. Now, Peter goes even further than this and gives us the key. If you wonder, well, how? Is there more to this? What's the key to overcoming fear? And he gives us that key in verse 15, the first half, the fear of them do not fear and do not be dismayed. But in your hearts, sanctify Christ as Lord. I just wanted to stop here. Sometimes it's just meditation that we need. And that's what I feel like I did more of on this than anything else. Would you ask yourself this question? In my heart, seriously, right now we can just all. In my heart, my daily sanctifying Christ as Lord was this week, this is what I was giving, looking at that book for Beza, I was reading that prayer. I offer to you my life, oh Lord, promptly and sincerely. To sanctify Christ as Lord, what does that mean? And it's important that in some of translations and even in the Greek, it's the word order is this, sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts. The danger of that is that we're gonna think we only sanctify Christ as Lord in our hearts. He's only Lord here in this private individual way. That's not what Peter meant. To sanctify Christ as Lord means that I am, in your handout, bowing to Him, confessing and acknowledging Him as my King. And not only as my King, that's not the point, not just mine, but even as the sovereign ruler over all human beings, I confess Christ as Lord over you, over all the people driving by on the road outside. over all people on this whole planet earth, that's who I confess Christ to be, who we are to at least. As a sovereign ruler over all human beings in all the world. I wonder when we say that, do we realize the full implications of what we're saying? I asked myself how often I am good with sanctifying Christ as Lord, and I was this week. I was like, yeah, Lord, I want to sanctify you as Lord, until it came to something I didn't want to do, not doing what he says, not living out what he has commanded, until that. And then I asked myself, and I asked myself, was I then ever really, truly sanctifying him as Lord? Peter is still quoting from the Old Testament Scriptures here. And the Lord says through Isaiah, in Isaiah 8, the fear of them do not fear and do not be dismayed. And then he goes on to say, the Lord, and in the Hebrew it's Yahweh, In the Greek that Peter's using of the Old Testament, it's Lord, kureas. So the Lord in Hebrew, Yahweh, he is the one you shall sanctify, set apart, set apart in your heart as the king and ruler over all. And so the first thing we notice is when Peter quotes this verse, he does change it up a little. First of all, he identifies who the Lord Yahweh is. He identifies him as Christ. but sanctify Christ as Lord. That shows you how exalted Christ is to be in our hearts and lives. How do we, living right now today under the New Covenant, how do we sanctify Yahweh, the God of the Old Testament, who is also the God of the New, I know, but how do we sanctify Yahweh, the God of the Old Testament? We sanctify Yahweh by actually sanctifying Christ, Christ, as Yahweh. as the only exalted Lord and King over all. You know, we live in a country where we don't have a monarchy, and we're kind of glad we don't and all that, but as a people, we serve a King. We bow and do obeisance before a King. We worship a King. It's Lord over all. The second thing we notice when Peter changes it up is that he adds the words, in your hearts. Now, certainly Isaiah was assuming in your hearts. He wasn't saying, sanctify the Lord only outwardly. But Peter adds these words. He's quoting Isaiah. So when he adds the words, you know he adds them for special emphasis because he wants to draw it out and bring it to your attention, to my attention. For Peter, our heart is the place in your handout of our deepest and most strongly held. I thought about saying most passionately held, but I don't know. So now I've said it. Most strongly held, most zealously held, most passionately held convictions. All of us are people of conviction. It's just a matter of what your deepest convictions are. In Peter, the heart is the control room that determines who we are and the entire course of our lives. So already Peter is said in chapter one, love one another earnestly from the what? From the heart, heart. And then in chapter 3, he says to the wives, let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart. And now Peter says, in your hearts, sanctify Christ as Lord. One of the biggest dangers of Christianity is that it becomes in our practice merely an external exercise. Because we are all, all of us, prone to the externals. That's not what Christianity is by definition. It's not. So one commentator just writes this. It's not the one you have in your handout at first, but the call is for more than an intellectual commitment to truth about Jesus, but a deep commitment to him. And by the way, not to Him as we have invented Him to be, but to Him as the whole of Scripture has revealed Him to be. Another commentator says, we must confess God's Lordship with more than mental ascent. This is Peter's point, in your hearts. We must confess it with our heart's devotion. Devotion. And there's a difference, isn't there? There's a difference, a big difference, even one with eternal ramifications. So let us stop now again, and I will stop with you, and I'll ask myself again, as I've been asking myself this week, in my heart, am I daily sanctifying Christ as Sovereign Lord, Majestic King, Ruler and Supreme, Almighty God over all? in that hidden place of my heart, of my innermost being, am I bowing to Him? Confessing and acknowledging Him as my King, and not just as my King, but as a matter of fact, King over all. Now then, do you see the power in this? Do you see what Peter is saying? When we are truly in our hearts sanctifying Christ as Lord, when that's happening as a matter of truth, there's literally no longer any room in your handout, any place in our hearts for the fear of men. The fear of men, even of men who would persecute us and mistreat us, that's Peter's point here, even of those who would mistreat us is displaced. It is pushed out and even completely overwhelmed by the deepest, innermost conviction of my heart that Christ is Lord and He is Lord over all. This is my confession. So when When we read this, we understand then that the key to responding rightly to the threat of any kind of suffering, to insults or slander as we see the war raging in our own culture here in America, and the increasing hatred, not just of conservatism, but of Christian values and righteousness. The key to overcoming all fear, even the fears of the future, even the fears and the threats of the possible threats in the future, is to be daily right now, brothers and sisters, sanctifying Christ as Lord. That's the key to overcoming fear. That's the negative side of this. But then there's the positive side of our response to suffering. On the negative side, don't fear. On the positive side, Peter continues, The fear of them do not fear, do not be dismayed, but in your heart, sanctify Christ as Lord, always being ready to make a defense to anyone who demands from you an accounting for the hope that is in you. Now, let me read those words again with just a couple of words added in your handout. In your heart, sanctify Christ as Lord, so that, so that, that's Peter's point, you will always be ready to make a defense. What is the key, not only to overcoming fear, but to having a verbal witness and testimony to people around you? What's the key to telling others the message of the gospel of Jesus Christ? Here, be encouraged. It is not brains and it's not smarts. It is not. It is not schooling and it's not studying. It is not having all the right answers. It is none of those things. It's just this, that in your hearts you've sanctified Christ as Lord. Where? In your heart. In your heart. Now this does assume, let's be clear. It assumes that we know the message of Christ. That we know what the true gospel of Jesus is. But here's the beauty of it, and this is a constant struggle, at least for me, and I don't know, you may identify with it. The point here is not that we know the message and the gospel, intellectually as one side of an argument? No, no, no! But rather that we know it as the deepest, innermost, strongly held conviction of our hearts because, after all, my confession of the gospel is my confession of Christ as Lord. When Peter says, always being ready to make a defense, the Greek word for defense is apologia. Can you guess what English word that sounds like or is related to? We have apologetics there. Some of us, when we hear the word apologetics, we get really excited. Apologetics. Some of us get scared. It's possible that both of those responses, the scared response and the excited response, are the result of not understanding what apologetics biblically really is. In the first place, Biblical apologetics assumes the context of suffering and persecution. So all of us who are excited about apologetics, biblical apologetics assumes suffering and persecution. Of being, in your handout, brought to trial. Whether literally on trial, as Paul often was, or figuratively. for a Christian faith. In other words, let me say what apologetics biblically is not. It's not standing on a platform in front of an audience and politely going back and forth with timed responses with an atheist or a Muslim. That's not biblical apologetics. I'm not saying it's bad and that it can't be used well. It's not what biblical apologetics is. Neither is biblical apologetics debating with Jehovah's Witnesses or Mormons at your front door. Neither is it going out to someone else's front door or reasoning with our unsaved neighbor or coworker or a family member about the gospel. That's not biblical apologetics, strictly speaking. All of these things may be good, at least they can be good, But biblical apologetics, as we said, assumes suffering and persecution, and that's what Peter's talking about here. So in the NIV, if you have the NIV, the NIV says that we're to be ready to give an answer to anyone who asks. But isn't there a difference? Think about this. There's a difference between the prosecution asking a question of the defendant. You go to the courtroom, and the prosecution's there asking a question of the defendant. Well, they're asking, aren't they? But that's different from the student raising his hand and asking a question of his teacher. It's two different things. So what we see here is that Peter has in mind not the Christian answering the question he's been asked by a sincere inquirer into the Christian of faith. Of course you ought to ask, be ready to answer them. No, he's saying be ready to answer the prosecution when they come up against you with persecution and attacks. So instead of ask, it's better to translate demands or requires. Instead of give an answer, you're not just giving an answer, you're making a defense. When the defendant answers, he's defending himself or the truth that he swears to. Paul uses this word twice in Philippians chapter 1, and you can put it up on the screen. I'm not going to read it all, but he talks about his defense in his imprisonment when he stands before the rulers. Acts 22 verse 1, Paul says when he's been falsely accused and slandered and is being carried off into prison, brothers and fathers, hear the defense that I now make before you. So finally, to put it all together, where the NIV says that we should always be ready to give an answer to anyone who asks us to give a reason for the hope that's in us. It's better to translate like this, always being ready to make a defense to anyone who demands from you an accounting for the hope that is in you. Now, I had a question here. Why would the world want to put me on trial for my hope? Why should they hold anything against me for having a hope? And the answer is that Peter's not describing things from the world's perspective, from the perspective of the prosecution, but from the perspective of the defendants, that's us. The world would not say, no, the world will never say they're putting you on trial for your hope, for the hope that you have. They're not going to say that. But we know. that our refusal to conform to the ways of the world and all our pursuit of righteousness, our daily pursuit of God's will in our lives for which we are being slandered and mistreated, we know that all of that is just the expression and the living out of our hope. That's what it is. It's not because we're goody-two-shoes and on our pedestal and being better than everyone else. No, it's because we have a hope in Christ as Lord, and we live that out in this way. So when the world gets mad at us for a righteous living, we see that as persecuting us for our hope. The hope that we have, in Peter's words, set fully on the grace that will be brought to us at the revelation of Jesus Christ. In chapter one, Peter says that. We saw that already. I'm going to not read that now. So while the world may not think they're accusing us for our hope, brothers and sisters, this is exactly how we do see it and how we must always see it. Why is it important that we always see it as an accusation for our hope? Because then we'll understand it's not about being antisocial. It's not about being holier than thou. It's never that. And it is certainly, may it never be, about a dry set of doctrines that we're all willing to argue about all the way to the stake. No, it is always about our hope. Now, are we beginning to see That the key to biblical apologetics is not, let me say it again, and we got to grasp this. It is not brains and smarts. It is not schooling and studying. It is not having all the quote right answers. It is not those things. I want to assure us all of that. The key to biblical apologetics to being ready always to give a defense to those who demand an accounting for the hope that is in you. The key. is simply having that hope set firmly on the grace to be brought to us at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Do you believe that? It's this hope that will loose our tongues and teach us what to say. I don't know if you've experienced that at times. I've experienced it at times where I start getting uptight and antsy about winning the argument or saying the right thing, so I respond just right. And then the Lord reminds me, Timothy, this is about your hope. This is about Christ as Lord, who in my heart, I have to sanctify as Lord. And when I come back to that, it's not like my brains are left at the door anymore. But when I come back to that reality, I have the key, not only to not fearing, but to always being ready. My tongue loosed, teaching me what to say. When Peter says we're to be always ready, he's not talking about a studied readiness or an intellectual readiness. He's talking about a spiritual readiness. the readiness that we will all have, all of us, whenever we're truly in our hearts, sanctifying Christ as Lord. So I ask, are you always ready? Always ready. Are you without fear? Always without fear. In your heart, are you sanctifying Christ as Lord? Once we understand these things, well then we'll understand what the content of our defense is. What is our defense? So often we're used to a defense being, it's just winning the argument. Biblical defense of our hope is not winning the argument. It's actually an offensive counter. It's not eloquent speech, it's not fancy arguments. What is our defense, brothers and sisters? It is the foolishness of Christ, crucified, buried, resurrected from the dead, and ascended into heaven as Lord over all. And now also coming again as judge of the living and the dead. And here's key, Paul said this in 1 Corinthians 15. Our defense is not necessarily just that. It is, but it's all of that in fulfillment of what the Scriptures said beforehand must come to pass. And now what the Scriptures have proclaimed have come to pass. Whatever other arguments we may have or not have, however eloquent we may or may not be otherwise, this, brothers and sisters, is our defense. And don't think you need any other. This is the Christ that in our hearts we've sanctified as Lord. This is our only accounting for the hope that is in us. Is there any other way to account for the hope that is in us? No, there's no other way. We have and know no other. And so now we come to the last section for us this morning of this text. Through verse 17, the fear of them, Peter says, do not fear. and do not be troubled, anxious, afraid, or dismayed, but in your hearts, here's the key, sanctify Christ as Lord, so that as a result, you will always, always be ready to make a defense to anyone who demands from you an accounting for, they might not look at it this way, but you know that this is what it is, for the hope. that is in you. Yet do it with meekness and fear. Having a good conscience so that when you are slandered, Peter comes back to what we looked at last week. Those who revile your good conduct in Christ may be put to shame. For it is better to suffer for doing good, if that should be God's will, than for doing evil. Peter knows, as we know, when you're attacked, how do you want to respond? We like to respond, we are flesh, we have to respond in arrogance, in pride. But if we're truly spiritually ready, all the time, always spiritually ready, not intellectually ready, but spiritually ready. And if our defense is not fancy arguments for which we can boast about, but if our defense is simply the proclaiming of the Lordship of Christ, how is it possible then to respond in arrogance? Can't we see that it becomes a literal impossibility? I don't know if I can remember how this commentator put it, but he said, the corruption of the best is the worst. If we as Christians come to the defense of the Christian faith with anything approaching an arrogant or boastful spirit, how what a horrible thing that is. And so Peter reminds us, being spiritually ready and proclaiming the Lordship of Christ makes arrogance an impossibility. Instead, even in our bold and fearless defense, we're always to be characterized. Yes, be bold and fearless. Paul was. I mean, look at Paul in Acts. He was out there with the gospel. but we're to always be characterized by meekness and humility. How does that happen? Not because we're bowing before human kings, not because we're trembling before human persecutors. No, but because we ourselves are always bowing before the Lord. In fact, what Peter's really saying is that it's precisely this meekness, this is the irony of it, It's precisely this meekness and this humility as we are bowing before the Lord that gives to us, in your handout, our real boldness. You want to know bold? Bow before the Lord. That makes us always ready. Do you want to be always ready? Bow before the Lord. Encourage us. And these words are, because in a sense, all of us are the lowliest and all of us are the most uneducated. So this is kind of in quotation marks. But even the lowliest and most uneducated Christian, and in God's economy, there's really no such thing. We're talking weird there. There's the last or first and the first last. But even the lowliest and uneducated Christian can be always fearless and always ready. Are we truly in our hearts sanctifying Christ as Lord? Yeah, Peter's been speaking of apologetics, of defending to anyone who demands an accounting. But as we conclude, I wanna point out that all that Peter has said applies equally to our being always ready for any opportunity to proclaim what is the deepest, and strongest conviction of our hearts, the Lordship of Christ. So my prayer, and I need God to answer this in me, and I pray to answer it in us. Through our witness, may God be pleased to bring others, even our persecutors, to a saving faith in Him. Dear Heavenly Father, These are not our thoughts. In the first place, we confess, we get caught up in external appearances and show, and that's constantly a temptation and a danger. So Lord, may it truly be in our hearts. Second of all, Lord, we confess that we are not always as we should sanctifying Christ as Lord. And so therefore, we're not always ready. And we feel ourselves not to be always ready. We know that feeling. We do fear. And we would confess and ask your forgiveness for this. And we thank you that you are so patient and so good and so kind. And so Lord, I pray that you would fill us all with a fearlessness. that you would cause us all as a people to be always ready, always ready because we have truly sanctified Christ as Lord. Crucified, buried, risen and ascended, ruling and reigning and coming again. As the scripture said, must come to place. And as the Scriptures have told us, have indeed come to their fulfillment. Lord, I pray for opportunities this week, even though we may not yet be in that sense on trial, persecuted or mistreated. Lord, for whatever opportunities we may have to bear witness to those deepest convictions inside us, may you give us grace to live out those convictions. We thank you for this word from you. Work it in our hearts, we pray. Thank you now for this meal that we can partake of together. In Jesus' name, amen.