We're tired. It's amazing what a little bit of sleep deprivation can do for you. 1 Peter chapter 1. We're going to be here a long time. I just want to read verses 3 through 5. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. To an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God's power are being guarded through faith for salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time. Now, last week we looked at the reality of God our Father. And what we're going to talk about today is going to really just be a continuation of that. And that we see that God, according to His great mercy, and when you see mercy you need to understand that that is inclusive of the love of God. God is not giving mercy to some and love to others. The mercy of God is His love. The mercy of God is the love of God to give Jesus Christ, His Son, on behalf of His people, that they may have eternal life. And so God's love for us, God's love for us, sets us into a place where we are His children. We are no longer born of the world, but we are born into Him. We are no longer of this world, but we are in it. But we are part of a new kingdom. We have been remade. And I'm going to talk about that a little bit this morning. And so we see that we're born again. We're born into the kingdom of heaven. We're born into Christ. And that's a spiritual thing, as we'll see. And the reality of that is that we have a living hope. So the hope then, what we see in being born again, and that's sort of the focus today, is that we see at the fall that the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus. We see Adam and Eve being cursed. We see death coming into the world because of not trusting the promises of God. But the absolute sovereignty of God in that entire exchange was that he may be seen, his glory, as a redeemer of his people by putting himself in between sin and righteousness. He who knew no sin became sin that we might become the righteousness of God. And so through this new birth now we have something that is not death. We have something to look forward to. Everything we have on this earth, every relationship we have will not be the same in eternity. It will be better. So don't be long-hearted about the idea that things aren't permanent. That's the reality of everything in this world is that it's impermanent. We do not long for that which is here. We long for that which shall be in a spiritual sense. And because the promises of God are true, we know that one day it shall also be physically manifested for us. So we are born with an inheritance, just like a child who receives an inheritance at the death of their parents, we receive an inheritance. And that inheritance has been sealed through the death of Christ, who is now alive, and we are found in Him alive. No longer is the wage of sin, death, our lot. But eternal life is our lot. And so we'll really start unpacking this more and more every single week, but I want to focus on this teaching of being born again because we see it everywhere. We hear it everywhere. During westward expansion, we saw a big push for open air evangelism coming from England and then over to the colonies. And George Whitfield was one of these guys, historically, I don't know if you know much about history, but if you do, you understand that he was one who came up and down the eastern seaboard and he preached in every large town, what we would call the major cities now. Every tiny little town, major town in the colonies, he preached. And his message was a little bit different. Instead of just preaching what was normally heard, the open air preaching was the emphasis that you must be born again. You must be born again. So from that point until now in history, and then the resurgence back in the 1950s, and we won't get into all that, but it became sort of a mainstay. And so we've heard it our entire lives, especially Southerners. You must be born again. Jesus even says that in John chapter three, when Nicodemus is baffled, you know, this foundational dialogue between this teacher of all Israel and the Son of God, Jesus introduces this concept of being born again in a way or being born above in a way that baffles this theologian. The theological nuance here is that there is a necessity of spiritual rebirth. Jesus says, you must be born again. Now the frustration there is that what we have heard out of the mouth of Jesus, what Nicodemus was told, in his human mind, he is thinking to himself, how can that be done? What must I do? How can I make myself born again? And he says so in such a way, he says, am I to go back into my mother's womb and come out again? The absurdity of that question shows the impossibility of that comprehension. And Jesus makes it very clear that this rebirth is not physical at all, that it's spiritual. And it's a spiritual transformation, a renewal, a regeneration initiated by the Holy Spirit and it underscores the divine origin of the entire teaching of regeneration and the new birth and being born again. Emphasizing that this is a work of God beyond human capability and beyond human understanding. So let me say that in the onset. Is that what we are going to talk about and what we are talking about is beyond human understanding. So all we can do is take the little nuanced expressions of scripture, four, five, six, seven, eight, maybe nine of them, and just sort of see what they say. And then from there, we cannot create a system of the doctrine of regeneration and just go, we figured it out. The point is we can't figure it out. We can't figure it out. We're not going to be able to figure out when and where and how and at what opportunity people are born again. The Bible doesn't give us that prescription, yet it is a fool's errand for us to continue to try to devise the reality of what that looks like and what's necessary for it. And I have friends and loved ones and family and enemies who are laboring over that very question as we speak. How do I know that I'm born again? and theologian and pastor and parent and grandparent throughout the ages have always answered that question and in some way put the emphasis on what we do rather than what Christ has done. Rather than what Christ has done. In Titus chapter, we've heard about John in John three, three through seven. You know, Jesus is very clear. You must be born again. It is of the Spirit, He says. It is not something that happens. Let's go there. Let's read that. We're going to go to several different places today. He says, truly, truly, in verse 3, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus asks, how can a man be born when he's old? Can he enter a second time in his mother's womb and be born? Jesus answered, truly, truly, I say to you, truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I say to you, you must be born again. And Jesus using a natural element, a natural occurrence, a natural experience. As you see the wind, it blows where it wishes and you do not, you hear it sound, but you do not know where it comes from and you do not know where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the spirit right there. That very phrase teaches us we have no business trying to nail down the doctrine of regeneration. We have no business trying to put the template over other people and say, oh well, you don't quite fit the mold. Because Nicodemus had that question. He says, how can these things be? Verse nine. And Jesus answered him, are you not the teacher of Israel? Are you not the teacher of all of Israel and you do not understand these things? What is it showing? It's showing that there is no amount of study No amount of study that will apply these things to your soul. Jesus says again, truly, truly, I say to you, we speak of what we know and bear witness to what we have seen, but you do not receive our testimony. If I told you earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you heavenly things? No one has ascended into heaven except he who descended from heaven. The Son of Man, speaking of Himself. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, and I'll impose the whole point here, for the salvation of God's people to rest in His power. So must the Son of Man be lifted up that whoever is believing in Him will have eternal life. So you see, it's about what God brings to us. It's about what God does in us. That we rest in the simplicity of grace, in the simplicity of the power of God, without parsing out the details of the doctrinal intricacies. Literally resting in a disposition of hope. I'm going to regret what I'm about to say, but I disavow the idea, I disavow and dispute the idea that one must have a prescribed, explicit expression of gospel truths to a minimum standard of man in order for God to rebirth them. I find it somewhat demonic to impose that. And what I have not said is that there is a false gospel that saves, and what I have not said is that the gospel doesn't matter, and what I have not said is that truth and theological things are not important, but what I have said is what Jesus says. Are you not the teacher of all Israel, yet you do not understand these things? If I tell you earthly things like studying and knowing and acknowledging and apprehending, and you don't understand them, how in the name of me are you going to understand Heavenly things So what's gonna happen for you is that you have to understand that's what Moses did in the desert to say y'all are dying Because the wages of sin is death Look at this little bronze serpent and live You've got to look at the Son of Man and live And then the question is begged who is the Son of Man that's why we have the Gospels and And we have no business imposing evangelistically the letters of the New Testament on an unsaved person. The story of Christ is sufficient. The gospel of John is sufficient. Any part therein is sufficient. For God is in the business of awakening his people to the trusting of his promises. And bringing them into himself and making them his. being born again into the unity of Christ. In Titus, Paul begins to talk. In the verse 5 of chapter 3 of Titus, it talks about the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit. And it talks and specifically deals with this idea that there's this spiritual cleansing and rejuvenation, emphasizing that God the Holy Spirit imparts new life. And it's a radical transformation, and it's an inward transformation of the mind. Many people believe the propositions of the New Testament, but it doesn't make them born of God. What makes us born of God is God himself. And some of the evidences of that ebb and flow, and so we can't even put our hope in our rebirth. You understand that, beloved? Our hope can't be in whether or not we're regenerate, or whether or not we have the right faith, or whether or not we know the right things. God given spirit life is like a child when you say tomorrow we'll have eggs for breakfast and they wake up expecting eggs and would be shocked if they weren't there. Or waking up today and yes the clocks have changed but the time has not. And the sun didn't come up. That's as simple as life is in Christ. And everything else is added unto us. We saw in this section of 1 Peter, for weeks we looked, the setting apart of the spirit, the sanctification of the spirit, the cleansing of the spirit, the righteousness that comes by the spirit, the being born again by the spirit. It is a work of God. And this inward transformation, this inward rest, this inward hope, it speaks to everything that we are and to every aspect of our life and every relationship that we have. And we become unified with Christ, and in being so, we are unified with others. But it doesn't mean that we have become disunified or ununified or disjointed with the world around us. And I'm going to talk about that as well. Another way of looking at regeneration, Ephesians chapter 2, Paul points to the rich mercy and the great love of God. It's the same story over and over again. That God's love is the motivation behind causing belief. He uses the phrase, we are alive together in Christ, even when we were dead in our trespasses. Theologically, this includes the concept of grace as something that cannot be earned or obtained, that it is the favor of God, that is the love of God. and that regeneration is a communal experience. I want you to hear the way I'm saying this. Regeneration is a communal experience that connects believers with Christ and connects believers with each other in a new way, a new life, a new spiritual sense. It's why we fight so hard sometimes. in so many areas of the faith, because the world in which we live, and I don't even want to say so-called, but the culture of believing, the culture of Christianity in these United States is everything but unified. And there's some buzzwords in the world today that just sort of get you in trouble, but you know what? We can't worry about other people's triggers when it comes to speaking things that need to be said. And I think we need to understand that the gospel and its power to create in us a spiritual connection to God and to one another implicates the idea that we are able to have a spiritual connection with other people who are not in Christ, not in the same way. I read out of Matthew before Matthew 6 and 5, I read half of 5 and then most of 6. And Jesus talks there, He says, you've heard that it was said to love your, excuse me, He says, love your neighbor and hate your enemies. You've heard that it was said, you've been taught that, theologically, that you are to hate your enemies and to love your neighbor. But I say to you, Jesus says these things, I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you so that you may be children of your Father who is in heaven. Now that doesn't mean if you love your enemies then you become a child of God. What he's saying is that you live out your Inheritance you live out your adoption you live out your role you live up to your name. Does that make sense? Then he goes on and talks about forgiveness he says even the wicked love Can you love the way Christ love your love must be perfect as your father's love is perfect Regeneration, the new birth, it creates a unity. But sometimes we can't put our finger on it. We can't understand it. It just exists. It's happening around us. We learn and grow from the experience. Paul, teaching to the church of Corinth in his second letter, verse 17 of chapter 5, talks about the Christian The child of God being a new creation. Now, how many times have we heard that? I'm a new creation. The old is gone. Behold, the new has come. Now, what we've done in our theological circles is we've created a law, and it's a doctrinal law and a practical law. The lawyers need to be here to help make sure I'm saying this correctly. In which we subject other people to and say, okay, If you are a new creation, then these things will be evident in your life. Your life will be new, your mind will be new, your head will be new, your hands will be new, your eyes will be new, until they're not. And so as long as we're looking inwardly, that's what I like to call navel-gazing, is looking at ourselves. As long as we're looking inwardly, we're not absolutely, at that moment, resting outwardly in Christ. As long as we're looking at ourselves and saying, well, I know that I'm a believer because of X, Y, and Z, or that I'm growing, or the Spirit of God is within me because of this or that or the way I feel, I know these things are true. Well, your brain can trick you. Our rest is a disposition that is given by the Spirit that the truth of things and the evidence of things assist us in, but they cannot be the object of our hope. And I don't know about you, but if you've read the Bible at all, you realize that the heroes of the faith, men and women, children and adults, aged and young, are doing a very poor job of meeting the standard of perfection. As a matter of fact, I would say that everyone listed in the narratives of scripture have done the worst job of living their lives, as an example. of faithfulness. So, to what comparison are we finding our hope? And the only comparison that we have is that of God Himself. And if we say that we are as He is in the real sense, then we have really misunderstood how to look at ourselves. But if we are saying that we are as he is because he declared us so, then we understand there's a deeper love here than we can put our finger on. That's how we really love one another, beloved. We love one another by seeing each other through the best of eyes. And as Christians, we love each other by seeing each other through the eyes of righteousness. Don't love someone because of what you hope they will become. Love them for who they are. For God has loved you in that way. The old life of sin is replaced by a new life in Christ, it's true, but it's a spiritual reality. Now does that spiritual reality speak to our life? Absolutely. In every way, in every way. In Romans 6, Paul uses the metaphor of baptism, talking about how we're united with Christ in baptism, in his death and in his resurrection, being found immersed. The word baptized means to be put under. So we've been put under the water in a way that Christ has been put under the water of death and righteousness and judgment and justice. It's a symbol, it's a metaphor. And then we come out of the water, it's a symbol of when Christ beat death, because he was not sinful, so death had no warrant on him, could not hold him. This is a very particular aspect of regeneration. We are co-resurrected with Christ to walk in newness of life, is what we say when we come out of the baptismal waters. We've been buried with Christ in baptism, raised to walk in newness of life. This newness of life, yes, will include maturing and growing and transformation of our attitudes, our actions, our affections, all the other A's that we could come up with. And we do see changes until we don't. And then we do very well until we're not doing well. And we walk really good until something, whatever that straw that finally tips the balance puts us over the edge. And what does the world say? What does the Christian world say? Well, I never did think they were truly Christians. Yeah, I knew something was wrong. You ever heard that? Well, I knew something was wrong. Something was off. Here's a newsflash. Go look in the mirror and say, you know what? Something's off with the guy I'm looking at. Because there's something off with all of us. We just might not know it yet. We need to put our eyes on what Christ has made us. We've been born again to walk in a resurrected promise. We are no longer enemies of God, but children of God, friends with God. I mean, this fights against history, doesn't it? It fights against the puritanistic idea that, you know, we're still the worm. And that we're gonna grovel at the feet of our Father. We're not. And it feels blasphemous, doesn't it? It feels blasphemous for us to call God, which is not even His name, It's what he is, Elohim, the highest of all things. And every language under the son has a word for God. To call him daddy. And even that word now has been ruined by son. It's a sad day. When we can't walk bold into the home of our father and our mother and sit down and be loved. And that's exactly how we should look at our relationship with God. He has born us anew that we can be His righteousness. Then we have that calling because of who we are, because of this unity in Christ, because of this new relationship, this new righteousness that is not ours, but it's been credited to us, we now can see through eyes that can be transformative, that do have the implication. We can see the implications of being born again and that we have a calling that reflects the reality of our new identity in ethics and morals and life and love. and in every relationship. Because, beloved, I don't care how you shake it, this world is about relationships. All of it. Nothing you do. Well, I do everything online. There's another person on the other side of that online. And the only reason that you do business online is because somebody wants to make money for the pockets of somebody else that they love to feed them, to take care of them, to have time with them. Everything is about relationships. In the Old Testament, God, through the prophet Ezekiel, promises a new heart. And it anticipates this new covenant, this inward transformation, moving from this external adherence to the law to an internal motivation and capacity to follow God's statutes by faith. In Romans 12, verse 2, talks about the renewal of the mind, the renewal of the mind. So we see all these things, and there's several other places in Scripture, but if I went everywhere, we'd intersect in some areas that begin to make us lose our focus. You must be born again. And beloved, we sit here as a born-again people. How do you know? You know. The worst thing you can do is try to figure it out. The best thing you can do is rest in the promises of God. And when you do doubt, rest again. It's okay to play the game of I don't know. It's okay to have a season and even binge that season. 40,000 episodes, if you want, of Am I Really a Child of God? Go ahead. But at the end of the day, even when you get to the final cliffhanger and it says, you're not even saved, and it goes off, dun-dun-dun, you better go to bed and rest. And you better rest in Him. Because this is your only hope. And the crazy thing is, your ability to rest is not your hope. It's something He gives. And He gives it sometimes in peace, and He gives it sometimes in pressure. Whoever you are, you can rest. And it's why relationships are essential to the Christian faith, essential to the world, essential to life. Jesus is not just being cheeky in the metaphors he uses when he says, I am the bread of life and the living water. Even scientists and all the great neurological realities that we know about the chemistry of our bodies and brains is fascinating. Even the staunchest of agnostics and atheists who can parse the periodic table for everything that goes on in the human mind can only say this about love. and they say this, it is eternal and it transcends life. All of them. We cannot understand it. Regeneration, as we've seen, is a work of God's mercy. It's not earned, Titus 3, 5. We've seen that it is is what makes us able to see and to enter into the kingdom of having, John 3. It is something that we cannot understand, nor should we try to understand. We should just accept these little nuanced revelations. We understand that it results in us becoming a new creation, and what that looks like is that we are now in a different place with God. And it does have an impact on our reality, but not perfectly. And so here in 1 Peter 1, verse 3, it says we have a living hope through regeneration, through the new birth. We've been born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ. It connects us as believers to the reality of the resurrection, making spiritual birth a source of hope. How am I going to be a child of God? How am I going to do this? How am I going to be faithful? You're not. God is faithful. You have a living hope in Christ. He is alive. You see how it takes the emphasis off of us and puts the emphasis completely on Christ. So the onus of salvation is not on us, it's completely on Christ. The hope of salvation is not on what we do with what Christ is or who he is, but on what Christ has done with us in our sin. And what does that do for us? It does everything. In my mind, it does everything. There's some application that I have that I think is not something I haven't said already in this teaching, but we need to be reminded of it. Look what that's teaching. Because we are children of God, because of the love of God, we can embrace a hope-filled outlook of life. Now if I'm completely honest, and I'm going to be more so than I've ever been in my life, this world is not worth much. This life is not worth much. And in comparison, when we see all of the pain, You hear me talking for years about rest, rest, rest. Sometimes that desire for rest is fueled by just the absolute suffering that we endure internal, external, and observationally. It's overwhelming. And so every good, faithful Christian has in some sense what psychological people would say have suicidal ideation, which is like, I don't want to die, but if I did, I would be upset about it. And I think that's okay. I think it's healthy. I think it's normal. But it's no way to live. A better way to live is knowing that we, as a child of God, when God is ready, will take us to Himself. But until He is ready, He has a glorious purpose and promise for our joy. And so we ask the question, then, why am I not joyful? Well, that's why Peter wrote this letter. Peter wrote this letter so that these people who lost everything and everyone and every freedom and possibly their own lives, had no idea what they would eat tomorrow, could rejoice. But that rejoicing, that joy, sometimes was inexpressible. Sometimes it was just like this new birth, it just, I get it, there's joy there, there's hope there, but I just don't, when I open my eyes, it's no longer. Being born again instills a living hope that influences how we look at our present life, at the future of this world. And this hope is grounded in the eternal reality of the resurrection of Christ, which empowers us as believers to face this life every single day. And not just face it and go, oh, I don't know that I'll make it. Face it with confidence and face it with resilience. You know what I've learned? Finally, I hate to even say this, because God's like, you don't learn enough, let's give it to you again. I've learned that God, in His mercy, allows us to be resilient. That means we do bounce back. And it's been my experience that that resilience, while it may not be The best place in our emotions or our bodies or relationships, it is better than it was in our hope. For me, joy is no longer a feeling. It is not an emotion. It can be. It can produce emotion. Joy is a settled place of rest and satisfaction. I pray you don't lose sight of it once you see it. But that takes discipline. And when we do lose sight of it, we just have to know that while we can't see it and we're not going to want to see it and we refuse to acknowledge that it will be, we will come out on the other side of it. and we will be made new and be shown who we are, and we will be at rest. And it may, and I pray, oh God, I pray so much that the season of rest, when we find it, will be longer. Lord, give me five years, give me 10 years, give me five minutes, whatever it takes, longer than I had before. So we are born again, we can embrace a hope-filled outlook. We can also live out this new identity. We can live it. We can get up off our chair. We can get up off the bed. We can get into the world. We can go to work. We can relate to our family. We can invest in our marriage. We can encourage our neighbor as new creations. We can live as new creations. What does that mean? We live in a way that reflects Christ. What is Christ? Is Christ walking around happy all the time? Nope. Was Christ walking around saying, Father's good all the time and all the time? No. Sometimes Jesus was broken beyond words. Sometimes Jesus was fearful. and unable to move. Sometimes Jesus was hungry and couldn't function. Sometimes Jesus was angry and needed to speak up. Sometimes Jesus was embraced and loved and many times he was hated. Sometimes Jesus, I won't say doubted, but it certainly looked like doubt to me. If nothing else, it was anguish. Many times Jesus was not OK. But he was never hopeless. He was never without promise. Christ rested in the promises of his father. and we are born into this family, and all these promises are ours. I want to say that again. Christ rested in the promises of His Father, and we now, by the Spirit of God, are born into this family, and all of the promises of Christ belong to us. What's that mean? Well, we gotta go beyond it. Jesus was tempted to sin, but He never did. Everything Jesus did, even when He was angry in how He spoke, when He was sarcastic, when He was a little bit cheeky, when He was downright harsh, was never wrong. We can't model that because we don't know the hearts of people. And so there's something that we have to do that's because of who we are in Christ that Christ didn't have to do. And that is that we have to constantly be inundated with the reality of our guilt and our shame and our shortcomings and our desires and our passions and our longings and our, all that stuff. And we're in this blender of trying to make all this stuff come out some type of smoothie that's palatable on the outside. But we've got to let go of that. We've got to let go of what we did this morning, what we thought before we came in here, what we did last week and last year and 10 years ago and 20 years ago and 30 years ago and 40 years ago. We have to let go of that continually presence in things that constantly cause us to feel guilty and unworthy because Christ died for it. And part of being a new creation and being adopted into the child as a child of God is that we are worthy because of Christ to be here. We are worthy to be loved by God because He said so. He set us right. We have to let go of our attitudes. We have to do things and put in discipline sometimes to help overcome certain sins that characterize our flesh. And in doing so, or in order to do so, we must embrace the virtues and the values of the Kingdom of Heaven. And oh my goodness, I could just stop here, take a sip of water, and start a whole new message on what are the values of the kingdom of heaven, and I can show you what they're not, and that's the values of American Christianity, and American politics, and American culture, and American nationalism. So we'll just set that aside. They have nothing to do with Christ whatsoever in any way. And every talking point therein has nothing to do with it. Where do you see that in the Bible? You just don't see it. These people are in, have been dispersed from society, from country, from kinsmen. There is no such thing as a nation of God, much less one under God. Never has been. So let's live it out. Not adopting what other people say living as a Christian is, but what Christ's word says. That's why we're here today, that we may be trained to do the work of the ministry. You realize that everything that I teach in this pulpit is supposed to encourage you in your personal reflection, in your personal worship, in your personal life, that you may impact the lives of those around you from the most intimate relationship out to the broader ones. And doing the work. Loving and serving. and finding fulfillment therein. And when we get this new identity and begin to live it out, it helps us to cultivate our relationship with our Father. We have a new heart, a new spirit, and the knowledge of this prompts us to cultivate a deeper relationship with our Father. Now here is where the rubber hits the road. or the windshield, depending on how we're doing it. If we're not disciplined in prayer and scripture, to some degree, none of these things will be added unto us. To seek the righteousness of God, by definition, is to seek after Christ, to long after Him. Beloved, it's not easy. The first thing to go in my life is my prayer life. My prayer life becomes a work of the Holy Spirit. Things to mind, I pray, things to mind. But the formal, sit down, wait around, let's pause a minute, praying, psh, gone. And when that goes, The reason it goes, and then the cause of it, it's a double-edged sword. Then the Bible intimacy goes. I don't want to read the love letters God's written to me. It happens. But when we embrace this, being His child, when we stay in the discipline, then the discipline grows. And it's not something we're obligated to. It's something that we need, and it's something that we want. The greatest transformation in anything in life is to take a chore and turn it to a treasure. You need to look at one another as treasure. The hardest thing to swallow in our soul is when we know that we're looked at in such a way that causes other people pain. Guess what, beloved? That's life. And there's going to be some times when we are very unlovable and people are going to love us through gritted teeth and clenched fists. And they're going to serve us and shove that meal under the door as if we're in a prison. I hope you choke. Enjoy your food. I mean, you know. But ultimately, when we grow in our relationship with our Heavenly Father, we will temper. We will soften. and we will learn to serve and love others. That's what the new birth will do. It will overflow in acts of love and service to others. It will demonstrate the love of Christ in tangible ways, tangible ways. And then we as Christians, as children of the Most High, will impact our community as we reflect the transformative power of the gospel. The final two things that this will do for us, as I've already said, it'll foster resilience through our trials. As Peter writes this letter to these Christians who are facing extreme persecution, the hope that comes from knowing that they are born again provides a foundation for this resilience, a place of standing. Isn't that the hardest thing in life when we suffer is we don't know where to stand, we don't know what to do? Sometimes we don't know if we have a place. But knowing that we're born of God, that's our place. We are His, and nothing can change that. Nothing can change His love for us. Nothing can take us away. We can't take ourselves away from the love of God. I don't care how many fists we put into the air, how many curses that we spew. We can't take ourselves away from Him. We will endure the trials. And here's the reality, beloved. Learn from me. You can't function taking care of everybody and thinking that that's what God's called you to do without taking care of yourself. Because God may make you sick and put you in the bed for months. And when you stand up, you might pass out in pain. Or He may kill you. I'm saying that sort of cheeky. He may put you in a place where you can't be the hero. And when we're not in the place where we can do, God will do greater things. When we have all these responsibilities, all these obligations, all this service, all this stuff, because sometimes it's the other side, and we're serving and serving and serving, and then we find our identity in serving, instead of our identity in our new birth. And then God says, okay, it's enough of that. Now it's your turn to be served. Now it's someone else's turn to learn. Now it's someone else's turn. Now it's your turn to understand the love of God through the hands of others. Now think about that. Because sometimes when I and I say that, because sometimes I preach about service and love and everybody goes, oh, yeah, I got to do better. And they roll up their sleeves and then they burn themselves to the ground. And then they love and love and love and they get hit or slapped or stabbed. And there's no appreciation that resentment sets in. And we've all been there. And it's not just in the church, it's in the home, it's in the community, it's with family. It's in the workplace. But we can only endure while we rest in the promises of our Father. And what does that do? It restores our joy. How? It puts our eyes on the promise of this inheritance. What is eternal life? The promise of God. This living hope from being born again is not only for this life. but it anchors our heart in the promise of eternal life. So we're in this flux. Peter, I mean Paul, oh, I just want to go be with the Lord. It would be so great for me, but it would be better for you if I remain and suffer for the sake of your joy. Because this life is light, momentary affliction in comparison to the eternal weight of glory. The eternal weight of glory. And beloved, this applies to our marriage, to our children, to our family and friends, to our neighbors, to our church, to our community, to everything. Everything that we do, everything that we are. This identity, this promise, this hope, this power is ours to apply. But there's one that I didn't say, that I have said, but I want you to see, it applies to ourself. The missing link in most of our lives as Christians in this culture, especially my generation, is that we do not take care of us. And then when we finally figure out we need to, we burn it all down. Model the life of Jesus. There's a thousand invalids. He rescues one, vanishes. There's thousands of people being fed. They all want to talk to him, get their Q&A, get their counseling on. Poof. The disciples don't even know where they are, where he is. Remember? And then Jesus teleports them across the sea. Three and a half miles to go. And immediately they're on dry land. We didn't know, where did you come? You're not looking after me because you want me. You want what I have. You want to get full again. You want a meal. You don't want the bread that I am. That's John 6. Do not labor for the bread that perishes, but labor for the bread that endures to eternal life. That includes living out self-care in the faith. Renew your mind. You can't renew my mind. You can't change my mind. You can't know my mind. Your head would pop off. Because I have a hard time keeping mine on because it's so squirrely sometimes. Take the time. Make the discipline. Know that Christ is your righteousness. He is your hope. He is your life. And nothing can separate you from his love. Rest in that, beloved, because as of next week, we're going to get wound up again. Let's pray. We thank you, Father, for the simplicity of grace. The simplicity of hope. The good report of Jesus. Lord, help us to just be still. To be still. And to know You are the Most High. To know that You are our Father. To know that You have promised us life. Lord, give us the strength to endure. Give us the discipline to be resilient. Give us the joy of our eternal hope. As we take the table today, Father, help us to remember what Christ has done so that we may serve others. In His name we pray, amen.