Chapter 5. As I mentioned, we are going to finish this first epistle that Paul, excuse me, that Peter wrote to the diaspora. And this is, I don't know if you're keeping record or not, this is the 94th message. I keep records. This is the 94th message that we have put together for the understanding of the, probably the greatest pastoral epistle in all the Bible, certainly in the New Testament, and that is I Peter. This particular chapter I've entitled Humbling Ourselves Because of the Lord Jesus Christ. And there are a lot of opportunities in verses which we have seen and will continue to see in the closing verses here that we have this morning. We're gonna pick up here with verse five, read through the end of the chapter. And Peter wrote this. Likewise, you younger people submit yourselves to your elders, yes, and all of you be submissive to one another and be clothed with humility. For God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble. Therefore, humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time, casting all your care upon him, for he cares for you. Be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary the devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. Resist him, steadfast in the faith, knowing that the same sufferings are experienced by your brotherhood in all the world. But may the God of all greats, who called us to his eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after you have suffered a while, perfect, establish, strengthen, and settle you. To him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen. By Silvanus, our faithful brother, as I consider him, I have written to you briefly, exhorting and testifying that this is the true grace of God in which you stand. She who is in Babylon, elect together with you, greet you, and so does Mark, my son. Greet one another with a kiss of love. Peace to you all who are in Christ Jesus. Amen. Two amens. Let it be in verse 11, and let it be in verse 14. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your Word. Your Word teaches us about your Son and our Savior, Jesus Christ. And so we pray that where we are deficit this morning, and we are because we're sinners, although saved by grace, we're still sinners. And so remind us this morning that we need to confess our sins before you. We need to call out to you and we need to, as Peter says here, we need to be perfect or mature in Jesus Christ. Teach us from the word. We pray that you would be with the perhaps souls here this morning that do not know you as Savior. A prayer is either here or via the internet that they would call out to you in repentance and faith and be born again. We thank you, Lord Jesus, that we have had opportunity to look at First Peter over these past two, two and a half years. Teach us as we close it out this morning. In Jesus' name we make this prayer, amen. All right, Brother Logan, first slide if you would. Chapter five concludes Peter's thoughts in his first epistle. Written to shepherds, that's where he begins in verse one, for the sheep, and that's you and I, as they resist Satan and proclaim acclamation for our Savior's grace. So a wonderful conclusion to the heart of Peter as he calls out to those that he's had opportunity perhaps to pastor in the past and now is ministering to them via the word. Paul Tripp wrote, behind dark clouds of difficulty is a God who is actively working for the good of his children. God regularly takes his children places they never would have planned to go. And I would echo that. In order to produce in and through them things they never could have produced on their own. It's important to recognize that the working of God's grace aren't always predictable, and they certainly are not comfortable. Often, when we think grace has passed us by, God's grace isn't at work. Just not in the way we expect. And of course, the closing of this particular chapter, Peter mentions grace a number of times. So we look at verses six and seven, and we've talked about our devoted father last week, and then began looking at verses eight and nine, a devouring adversary. And then in verses 10 through 14, our divine advocate, this is the doxology that Peter closes with, and further you can subdivide that verses 10 and 11, acclamation for our suffering Savior. And then in verses 12 through 14, appeal to the true grace of God. So we began last Sunday looking at the adversary. because that's what verse eight and nine teach us. And it's interesting that as Peter closes out this particular letter, he'll talk about the adversary quite a bit in his second epistle, but as he closes out his first epistle, he wants us to be prepared. He admonishes us that is clearly linked back to humility. because that's the driving theme of chapter five. In fact, it's one of the driving themes of the entire epistle. What's a believer to do against the adversary? Well, he clearly links that back to humility and trusting God because our God cares for us. As I mentioned last Sunday, and you probably already should know this, the devil, no. does not care for you, does not care for me, never has, never will, never shall. Verses five through seven, it talks about humility, which we've just read, are crucial in the arsenal of our resistance. How do we resist the adversary? We humble ourselves before God. Now that's strange, but that's exactly what Jesus did, next slide. So Ephesians 4, Paul wrote, that great little epistle, be angry and do not sin. Do not let the sun go down on your wrath, nor give place to the devil. So Peter's not the only one, obviously, Paul wrote about him. James, we'll see in just a moment, James wrote about him, John wrote about him, Jesus talked about him, he's mentioned in all the Gospels and all the way through the New Testament. Now in verse eight he begins, he says, I want you to be sober and I want you to be vigilant. I want you to be watchful because when you humble yourselves before God, the adversary thinks because we are humble, he can take advantage of us. And many people think that. Well, because this person is humble, I can take advantage of them. Well, that is the work of Satan. And Peter says, I want you to stay awake. I want you to be ready. I want you to be alert. I want you to be watchful, because if you trust our Lord's mighty hand, it does not mean that we are to be careless, and it does not mean we are to be indulgent. We're not to go from being humble to being arrogant. As Augustine said, many, many years ago, 1,600 years ago, that is something about humility that appeals to my ego. What a marvelous whole statement. So Peter challenges believers to be sober, and turn back to first chapter one. Let's look at this. Three times in this epistle, he challenges the pilgrims that he's writing to in Asia Minor. He challenges them, beginning in verse 13, therefore, gird up the loins of your mind, be sober. And rest your hope fully upon the grace that is to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. So there's the sober-mindedness, and there's the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. In chapter four, and in verse seven, Peter says, but the end of all things is at hand. Therefore be serious and watchful in your prayers. So there's a second challenge, and of course we've seen it here in verse six and verse eight here that he talks about it as well. A spiritual sobriety. A clear-minded and self-controlled nature. being mentally free from confusion and anxiety. One of the things we learned last week that Satan uses in his bag of tactics in his arsenal is the fact that he confuses people. Why? Because Satan was once an archangel. He's not always been the devil. We don't know how long he was an archangel. Really, it's immaterial, because that's in the past. But we do know he was, from what we can gather from Isaiah and the book of Ezekiel, he was probably the primary archangel. At that time, known as Lucifer. Because he was an archangel, he's very subtle. Now turn with me to 2 Corinthians chapter 11. I went to Rustburg, and the mascot for Rustburg was the Red Devils. And back when I was in high school, and I know we have some young people here and adults that went to Rustburg, we kind of made fun of that. Okay, Duke University, the Blue Devil. It's interesting because it's a Methodist, or it was at one time a Methodist university, a Methodist school. But in II Corinthians, it teaches us a great deal about the devil. Look with me at verses 13 through 15. And Paul is talking, obviously, about false apostles. For Satan are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ. And no wonder, for Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light. How does he do that? Because he was once an archangel. Therefore, It is no great thing if his ministers, the false prophets, also transform themselves into ministers of righteousness, whose end will be according to their work. We will, in God's time, they will be revealed. So he's challenged the pilgrims to be sober. He is reminding them that Satan is extremely subtle. He can disguise himself as a good guy, And he never reveals himself as he truly is. He personifies religious personality. And he personifies self-righteousness. If there's one thing that pride does, it makes us self-righteous. And that is emblematic of the devil. And he does these things to counterfeit his character. to appeal to our anxiousness. The word adversary means a legal opponent in a lawsuit. It's a technical term and it's one that is used generally and especially in the New Testament. It's defined and translated as an enemy. So as I said, the devil is no friend of grace, never has been, never shall be, and so remember that when we are tempted. Now we're told, and Peter writes, even though we are to trust God, we need to be alert to the enemy. God's not going to intervene if we're not sober-minded, if we're not vigilant, and we don't resist him. The devil, or diabolos, the slanderer, he plans and he executes malicious attacks. That's what the roaring lion is about. We'll talk about that in a moment. Malicious attacks with an insatiable appetite. I don't want to spend too much time on this, but People are, there are some people that are addicted to certain things. There can be good addictions that become idols. And not so good addictions that will destroy us physically. This is what Satan does. When we speak of insatiable appetites, he is the one that instills through our sin nature this gravitating towards something that we, in our heart of hearts, know will destroy us, but we do it anyway. So keep that in mind. This obviously is one of his tactics. Next slide. Next slide, brother, I'm sorry. So he talks about a roaring lion. A metaphor. He goes further, he says, not only is he loud, boisterous, but he prowls. He seeks to devour. So, the two things we need to remember about Old Slew Foot, as C.S. Lewis called him. We fought the devil in two ways. The first way is we overestimate the devil. And we take him too seriously as if he possessed God's omniscience, his omnipotence, and his omnipresence. He does not. We mentioned this briefly last Sunday morning when we talked about his peripeteo, his prowling, his walking about. The devil is never still. And that teaches us that we as God's people need to be still sometime. And here's an opportunity for us right here this morning to be still and know that I'm God. The devil never stops. He's always moving, primarily, as I mentioned, because he's not omnipresent. The devil is finite. He has a beginning, he will have an end. In this, he is vastly different from the incarnated one, Jesus Christ. And though he can cleverly disguise himself as an angel of light, he is no match for the Son of God. So the first thing we do is we overestimate him, and secondly, we underestimate him. He deceives, he devours, and because of this, he is dangerous. He's not a ruse. He's not a figment of some crazy religious people. Oh, preacher, you still believe in the devil? He's not something that's been conjured up in the imagination. And his ability to deceive is biblical from the book of Genesis to the book of Revelation. He's always prowling, slithering as we talked about last Sunday morning, looking for an opportunity to overwhelm us, sometimes even in worship. A distraction, that's all it takes, some distraction. Something that is more important than the word of God. His aim is to sow discord. We learn this from the book Proverbs, we learn it a number of other places in scripture. His aim is to break fellowship. His aim is to accuse God to men, as God said. His aim is to accuse men to God. Have you considered your servant Job? Why, you've got a hedge about him. He is the accuser of the brethren. He accuses men to each other. He undermines our confidence in the Savior. He silences our confession, our repentance, and he stifles forgiveness. That's the devil. And really, it doesn't require a lot of his temptation. Because the nature of man, as we read this morning in the beginning of Ephesians chapter two, is that we are dead in our sins. In John's gospel, three times he's called the prince of this world. He is allowed by God to sway the earth's systems to a degree. He reigns as prince of this world. Jesus spoke of this. Orchestrating an environment which is slanted toward devouring and poisoning. Believers, unbelievers not so much, but believers especially. to destroy their confidence, to instill fear, to make sure that they remain guilty because they've not confessed before the Lord Jesus Christ. He is a formidable adversary. Next slide, brother Logan. The word devour there in verse eight is, to me, it means to gulp down entirely. to drink it down in full. And this is what ferocious lions do. A few weeks ago on PBS, and I'm not promoting PBS, but every once in a while on Wednesday night when we get home from church, they have a program that's called Nature. And they ran a series on the big cats in Africa. For about a month, and they focused on lions, they focused on leopards, and they focused on cheetahs. And it was interesting as we watched this, that the lions, that the leopards, pound per pound, are the most powerful big cats, not the lions. But, because they are smaller than lions, Often the leopard will have to kill its prey and then drag the prey up into the top reaches of trees so that the lion will not steal it from them. Because when the lion shows up, the leopards run. And the cheetahs are altogether different in this whole array of big cats. So often what lions do is they will watch the other large cats. And when they make a kill, they swoop in and steal the kill. That's what the devil does. Edmund Clowney, who was with the Lord, been with the Lord for a number of years now, and he said, presumably, Satan, like a lion, may hunt by stealth as well as by terror. He could not ask for a better cover than the illusion that he does not exist. And all we have to do is look at our culture. Do you think the overwhelming majority of people are concerned with the reality of the person of Satan? Sometimes I'm persuaded that even the overwhelming majority of Christians are not persuaded of Satan. Sometimes I'm not. So Peter wanted readers to be alert. He wants his readers to know that he is called Prince of the Power of the Air. in Ephesians 2. He is part of the principalities and dominions and powers that are mentioned throughout the Old Testament, of which we'll look at in more detail in II Peter. Now verse 9, he says, I want you to not only be awake, but I want you to resist him steadfast in the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ. As Jesus withstood him, not only when he was tempted, But all the way from Jesus' birth until His death, Satan hounded Him, continuously. He hounded Him by Herod the Great when He was born. He hounded Him by Herod Antipas as He grew. He hounded Him by His disciples. And eventually hounded Him all the way to Gethsemane. But thankfully Jesus chose the cross rather than calling for 12 legions of angels. So how do we resist him? We resist him in the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ. The word resist means to stand against. James, the half-brother of our Lord, would write, therefore submit to God, resist the devil, and he will flee from you. That's precisely what Jesus did in Matthew 4 and the other passages in the Synoptics. Draw near to God and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners. Don't think because you're saved that you're not a sinner. You still are a sinner, a saved sinner, but you still sin. Purify your hearts, you double-minded. Don't be hypocritical. Lament, mourn, and weep. And then he adds, same thing Peter says, humble yourself in the sight of the Lord and he will lift you up. So not unique to Peter, the writings of Paul, the writings of James, the writings of John. And why will he lift you up? Because we have a divine advocate. Thankfully, Peter moves from a devouring adversary to the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's how he closes out this beautiful epistle. Peter has written five chapters. Now, there were no chapter and verse divisions when he wrote I Peter. He has written five chapters and he has done so with wisdom. Peter is now an aged man. He was a young whippersnapper when the Lord was on the earth, not so much now. And so Peter had to learn, as we all have to learn, that we need to look and be, and follow the wisdom of God, we need to look and follow the patience of God. And so Peter had learned these things. Go back with me, if you would, to chapter one again, chapter one, verses one and two. And Peter had opened this particular epistle of his with three things that are true of every born-again believer. Verse one, Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ to the pilgrims of the dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia. elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father in sanctification of the spirit for obedience and sprinkling of the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Three things that are attained by every born-again believer once we become born again. Number one, we realize we've been chosen by God the Father all the way through the Bible. Secondly, we've been sprinkled by the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. No forgiveness without the shedding of blood. That blood must have been shed and it must have been divine blood from our advocate in order that we be forgiven. And thirdly, he says that we're sanctified, that we grow in grace. We don't remain where we were when we were born again. When I was a child, Paul said, I spoke as a child, fought as a child, did as a child, but now I'm a man. And I'm manned up. I've cowboyed up, so to speak. I'm a man. And so that sanctification is one of the great gifts that God the Father gives to us in following through his word. We have a divine advocate. Next slide, Brother Logan. As we've read here, he writes to a dispersed and an accursed people. He recognizes that they were exiles, just like he was. Peter's now in prison. Peter's aware, he is alert to the fact that the great storms, that there are great storms that are brewing. He would be part of that great storm. For after he writes 2 Peter in very short order, he and his wife are crucified. And Paul is beheaded. So the devouring lion is rearing his ugly head and baring his teeth. Trouble is fermenting in the Roman Empire. And it's led and will continue to lead to suffering, even death for some. Peter was well aware of this. He challenges shepherds because they are to oversee the flock of God. And he challenges sheep to humility. Verse six, he understands that humility prefaces God's care for those that are dispersed and for you and I here at Flat Creek. He removes cares and anxieties because that's what God does. He doesn't save us and leave us to ourselves. One of the great reasons for being in the house of God is the fellowship that exists, but that does not exceed the preaching and teaching of the Word of God. It is part and a result of the preaching and teaching of the Word of God. Peter knows that there are many that are anxious because of this impending doom that's taking place. But he doesn't want them to be derailed. Be sober-minded, be vigilant. And we have an adversary that is attempting to frustrate the Almighty. But he says, I'm here to tell you that ain't gonna happen. How do we resist and overcome the adversary? Well, by grace, by the grace of God. He begins in verse 2, which we've just read, of chapter 1 with grace, and he ends with grace. Similar to the writings of Paul, who begins with grace and closes with grace. In verse 10, there's the acclamation for our suffering Savior in God's grace. And that's what he says, let's read it. But may the God of all grace, who called us to his eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after you have suffered a while, you're gonna share in the same sufferings of your brotherhood, that he perfect, that he establish, that he strengthen, and that he settle you. Karen Jobes in her commentary writes this about the verse 10. She says, if the cause of Christian suffering cannot be avoided without renouncing Christ. And the threat of suffering is always present throughout the eternity of the Christian life. It never ceases. And in Peter's day, it was intensifying. And as I look at our world today, I'm not so sure that the same thing is not taking place. An intensification of threats for suffering. Grace is gifted to believers. We didn't earn it, never shall earn it. It comes from the hand of God through the person of Jesus Christ and he mentions four verbs here. He says, the Lord will perfect you, he will complete you, he will restore you. How do you resist? with the understanding of these four verses. Secondly, he's going to establish or he's going to confirm your faith through his grace. Number three, he's going to strengthen you. And then, number four, he's going to establish you with a firm foundation. The New King James uses the word settle you. When you talk about a sober mind, And you talk about the confusion of the adversary. One of the things that is in our arsenal with humility is the fact that we are settled by the peace of God. He closes with the peace of God in verse 14. Do we have the peace of God this morning? Peace of mind that God's grace not only is able to save but is also able to deliver us regardless of the circumstances that may exist. That's why Peter is writing. Grace is gifted to believers in these four verbs that we've seen. Let's look at them somewhat in detail. Next slide, if you would, Brother Logan. These four that you see here provide this rising crescendo. Peter now is, it's in his doxology. And this crescendo speaks to Peter's heart because he knows that his God will bring about the consummation of all things in God's own time. He brings about the consummation for His glory, and He brings about the consummation for our Now, 2,000 years ago, Peter thought, John thought, James thought, Paul thought, Jesus was coming soon, and he is. In God's time, because there's no time with God. But Peter died. He was martyred. Paul died, he was martyred. John died of old age. James, to our understanding, also died of old age, and others. And Peter uses that great phrase, the God of all grace. Grace meets every need. Even needs that we don't know we have. It meets every need. It enables us to prevail in all the conditions that the adversary may throw at us. He says, God's gonna perfect you. He's gonna complete you. He's gonna restore you. This means to put in proper order, to make right. So we've had Thanksgiving. And some of you had, perhaps you had a very formal table and everything was done properly in an order or for that particular application. We have Christmas coming up, we have all these things. We've celebrated weddings here for a number over the years and we have a wedding here in about six months with Wyatt and Lauren. All these things, perfect, established, aligned. That's what God does. He writes us back to him. Reconciled is the theological term. Peter had experienced the Lord entrusting him in his purposes, in the purposes of God's proper order. Peter, you've been a fisherman. And now I'm going to make you and the other disciples fishers of men. That's your proper order. And Peter, you've tried to debate me about this, but I'm sorry, but I'm your Lord. I win, you lose, but because I win, you win. God's proper order. and making the many, many wrongs that he had committed right. The word perfect there, or complete and restore, mature, it can also be translated. There's no perfection in this life. So we need to remember that. But what God is doing is completing us in his son, Jesus Christ. It's similar to a doctor. You might break a leg, break an arm, break a finger, whatever. And so the orthopedist set a broken bone. Gordon would understand this with his hip replacement. Others of you would understand this as well, having had those types of surgeries. Okay, the setting, the writing of how the body is designed. And so the body, of course, is the most complicated organism in the universe. And so they set the bone. And that's where we were before we met the Advocate. We were broken. We were sinners. Desperately lost before we met the Advocate and his desire to perfect us, to complete us, to restore us. God's grace, Peter says, even while you are suffering, and he mentions that twice in these closing verses here, he will complete you, he will perfect you, he will set us right. This world is not the final station of our hearts and souls, thankfully. We should expect to suffer. But suffering because we have trusted Christ alone and faith alone is not the world as God made it. And he will, we know, restore and create a new heaven and a new earth. Secondly, it says he's going to establish or confirm us. Grace turns the sinner's hearts toward God because he cares for the lost. That's grace. That is the tugging in your heart of the work of the Spirit of God because you know that God loves you in spite of who you are. And he searches for the wayward sheep in the parable of the 99. He lifts them to a firm footing. He establishes, he confirms them. The gospel provides the truth. The unadulterated truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth, so help us God. And confidence to remain firm and unchanging. He matures us, he confirms us, as it's said here, he establishes us. Next slide, brother. In Luke's Gospel, just hours before Jesus was betrayed, Jesus told Peter that Satan desired him. And he said, I prayed for you, Peter. Isn't that a marvelous thing? I prayed for you, Peter. How wonderful is it that our advocate would pray for us? He would make intercession for us. You think the devil's gonna do that? You think your lost friends are gonna do that? You think addictions are gonna do that? Then you don't understand God. I prayed for you that your faith should not fail. I want to establish you. And when you have returned to me, prophecy, when you've returned to me, Peter, strengthen your brethren. Peter, I want you to confirm your love for me by shepherding the other sheep. You're not gonna be a fisherman anymore. You're not gonna debate with me anymore, Peter. You're gonna shepherd the other sheep because you have been humbled. Third word is strength, literally. A bodily vigor, pumping iron, getting buff, getting strong, looking in the mirror, Making sure that your stomach is not falling anymore than it already has in the 50, 60, 70 years that you've lived. Found only here in the New Testament. Grace strengthens us through the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, and how is that attained? Word of God. That's what we desperately need. cultures, and I speak of this, the American culture, the Western culture, that permit Christian suffering due to the faith, due to their faith, place the believer in positions of perceived weaknesses. That's why Satan appears as a lion, that we must trust God. We will have to, we must trust God that when Jesus returns, and he will, He's going to vindicate his name, and when he vindicates his name, our names will be vindicated. He's going to strengthen you, Peter. He's going to strengthen you, Flat Creek. And then finally, he says, I want you to be settled in your minds. Grace is the buttress for stability. They, in fact, yesterday just celebrated the opening of Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris. That was destroyed, a lot of it destroyed by fire about 2019, about five years ago. and all the work that has gone into restoring them. The buttresses that were added years after the cathedral was built, the flying buttresses that hold the walls up, they had to go back through and reestablish the strength of those. And so we are reminded that the word is found in Psalm 24. The earth is the Lord's, the fullness thereof, the world and all who dwell therein. He has founded it. He has settled it. He has placed it on a firm foundation and he has established it upon the waters. So is our life, for those of us that know the Lord Jesus Christ, securing the foundation of a building. This is to all buildings settle, and over time, there's shifting of earth and whatnot, so an architect and the engineers will ensure that even though they do settle, it doesn't impact the way the building is constructed. It's used to encourage believers to build their faith on the solid rock, which is Jesus Christ. Let's look at verse 11. To him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen. Peter breaks into a doxology. The Pax Romana, the peace of Rome, ruled the empire. But the adversary was alive and well. He was viciously roaming about. seizing peace from believers and devouring them. I want you to be settled in your mind. And the way to be settled is understand that God has the dominion forever. Not the devil, the triune God. Next slide. Rome for a time had tolerated these Christ fools, and that's what they were called. But eventually they moved to annihilate Christians. And they did a fair job for about 100 years. And Peter was well acquainted with the adversaries, not only the devil, but those that were his minions, human minions in the Roman Empire. He knew that suffering would flush out false confessions, false professions of faith, and strengthen the faith of true believers because of the grace of God. He understood that. The God of all grace is the one and only Savior. The Holy Spirit issues a call, he convicts, he converts, And we respond to Christ because of God's amazing grace, knowing that he cares for us. Now, there's a little sidebar here. We need to be very careful with the way our thinking is when we are parents and grandparents. Remember that we do not issue the call to salvation. God does. There's a movement afoot today called messianic parenting, which teaches that if parents do everything right, in other words, they live well, they love well, they read Bible stories well, they're cool with their teenagers and so forth, then all will be well in the end. And that's morally therapeutic deism. That's not what the Bible teaches. We forget that our performance is always more flawed than we imagine. And that our performance and our kid's performance does not save him. God saves sinners. We must do these things. We must live well, love well, tell Bible stories and devotions well. I don't know, not so much with being cool with our teenagers, but you need to parent, obviously. Grandparents ought to be cool with their teenagers. You need to parent. But we must do these things to rely upon the means of grace, to speak to our children and grandchildren. primarily the preaching and teaching of the Word of God. This preaching and teaching must focus on the vindicated son of God who arose from his, that should be grave, not grace, but arose from his grave and his death. We're to do what we're required to do, responsible to do. We're to pray and we're to trust God to save. And we must do these for the entirety of their lives and our lives. Robbie and I talk often of, next slide if you would, brother. We talk often of missing our parents. My dad's been with the Lord 30, almost 34 years now. Mom, yesterday, yeah, yesterday, been gone for nine years. We miss them, and we share that with each other. Who's gonna pray for you once your parents are gone? I need that. You need that. Once your grandparents are gone, say, know the Lord, know the Lord, be the Lord. He's going to pray for you. I know my wife, I know Robbie prays for me, I pray for her. I trust our children pray for us. I trust our grandchildren, church, so forth. But these are the things that are to remind us that God saves and we must trust him in the appeal to the true grace of God. Revelation 12. Then I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, now salvation and strength in the kingdom of our God, the power of his Christ has come. For the accuser of our brethren who accused them before our God day and night has been cast down. Doesn't sleep. They overcame him by the blood of the lamb, there it is. And by the word of the testimony. and they did not love their lives to the death. Therefore rejoice, O heavens, in you who dwell in them. It's gonna be a great revival at the end of time. Rejoice, heavens, not earth, in you who dwell in them. These last verses, he tells us about appeal to the true grace of God, and he closes with a gracious benediction. Chapter one, he says, he begins with the pilgrims of the diaspora, if you want to pronounce it that way, and closes with, here, the elect, together with you. He mentions the elect according to the foreknowledge of God and closes with the elect together with you. He mentions a man by the name of Silvanus. He's thought to be the one that bore the letter across the sea to Asia Minor to the house churches that Peter was writing to. And he's mentioned in the book of Acts, he's mentioned a couple of times, as a matter of fact, in Acts chapter 15, it pleased the apostles and elders with the whole church to send chosen men to Antioch with Paul and Barnabas, namely, Barsabbas and Silas, Silvanus, leading men among the brethren. If you drop down a few verses in chapter 15, it says, now Judas and Silas, Silvanus, Themselves being prophets also exhorted and strengthened the brethren with many words. They preached. And after they had stayed there, they were sent back with greetings from the brethren to the apostles. Go back to Jerusalem and tell them what's going on here, okay? However, it seemed good to Silas, to Silvanus, to remain there. And we think possibly this is where he met with Peter and began his travels with Peter. So he calls out Silvanus, this man that loved the Lord and apparently was gifted to preach as well. Next slide. This is the last slide. Out of 200 and what we got here? No, actually more than that because I cut it in half. He says, she that is in Babylon. So there are generally two conclusions to this. We know that Peter's wife was with him. It's always good to have your wife with you. And the she could reference Peter's wife. or the she could represent the church at Rome. And the church is mentioned, she's talked about as the bride, church at Rome. Well, both fit the verse, so I'm not gonna be hard-pressed to choose one or the other. Peter's wife was with him. In fact, Peter in just a few months, maybe a year or so, would watch her be crucified before he died. Peter's wife was with him, and she was part of the church in Rome. In Babylon, those that are in Babylon elect together with you. It's considered a reference to Rome. Babylon could be any unrepentant sinner. not only in the Bible, but unrepentant city, rather, across the globe. It's a reference to Rome. And then he talks about Mark. We're studying, we just began studying, Brother Terry, Kelly's opening up the gospel of Mark to us, and we just began studying this in our Sunday school class. But Mark is, Peter says, is my son. Now obviously he wasn't his physical son, but it's commonly thought that certainly Mark was aided by Peter. He was discipled by Peter. We know that Peter helped him with the writing of the gospel. And we also know that there is a chance that Peter was Mark's spiritual father. In other words, he led him to a saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. Mark is now faithful. to Peter and to Paul. Paul has said, leave John Mark there in Asia. He's not profitable to me. But now, Peter has said, Mark is with me. And we know that Peter and Paul probably were imprisoned about the same time in Rome, so he was with Paul as well. He endured, he persevered through perilous times with Paul and Peter. And he closes out, verse 14, greet one another with a kiss of love. Peace to you all who are in Christ Jesus, amen. Display your humility, your fellowship in suffering, your participation in the flock of God because this is the true grace of God. Not preeminence, not performance, perseverance. Stand firm in it. And so he closes, if I could paraphrase by saying, what I'm actually saying to you is this. What I've provided for you is a record of the true grace of God, these five chapters. Make sure you stand firm in it because you got an adversary. We have an almighty God, but we also have an adversary. To God alone, sola deo gloria. To God alone be the glory for the writing of this great epistle to teach us how we are to live with God.