When your pastor asked me to come and be with you this morning, neither he nor I had any idea that the Lord would be orchestrating all of these events according to his sovereign pleasure and his good plan for his glory. My family and I have spent the last two weeks at the Wiles helping to administrate a program there for teenagers. called CIT. Many of you have had young people who have been a part of that program. Some of you in past years may have been a part of that program. I have had the privilege of being with that program now for over 15 years, and I am now starting, believe it or not, to see CITers who are the children of CITers that I had. And so, you know, you really start to feel old at that point. I do it with a gentleman named Les Olala. And this year, Les Olala had a grandfather who had a grandson in the CIT program. And I looked at him and I said, you know, you were around doing this program when Noah went through it. So we have been part of this program for many, many years. And one of the things that the Lord has done through that program is not just been in the heart of the young people that come for two weeks to learn about God and to learn about his ways. God has taken that program and built into us and burned into us lessons that we have said so many times to others. And along the way, I could speak for every one of us who does that program. God has just put us through the fire so that we might learn the truth experientially of what we have been teaching for all of these years to young people. And the reason I bring that up this morning is that for the last two weeks, Emmy has been at CIT. She was in our CIT program and we had a wonderful time with her. She was a joy to us, to those of us that were in the program. My wife had the opportunity of doing her interview and we were commenting together as to what the Lord had done in the program, not because of the program, but because of the truth of the program. The program centers around this idea. God is on a mission. To redeem and to restore fallen, broken people to the likeness of his son for the praise of his glory. I mean, the very first thing they hear from us when they come in. After they get their assignments and they come together and we give them a little notebook that they have and we tell them a little bit about the wiles, we start with that statement. God is on a mission to redeem and to restore broken, fallen people. To the likeness of his son for the praise of his glory. And as God does that, as God begins to restore us to the likeness of his son for the praise of his glory, he gives to those people a mission and their mission is to bear the glory of God to people who live in darkness. The book we're in, First Peter chapter four actually has a statement about that. We're going to be in chapter four a bit this morning, but let me just have you flip back two pages in your Bible to chapter two. And let me just remind you of what Peter said to these people that he is talking to. He says in verse nine, you are a chosen generation. A royal priesthood, a holy nation, his own special people that you may proclaim the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. These people that God is on a mission to redeem and to restore to the likeness of his son for the praise of his glory are called out of darkness into marvelous light. And they are to declare the praises of the one who did this. And we told Emmy and all of those that were with her that the mission God has given to them and all of their life for all of their days and all of their ways is to glorify God. And we had a very, very simple definition for that. I know that theologically that is a much, much bigger issue, but we had a very simple way of reminding ourselves of what that meant. It just simply meant to cause other people to come to write opinions and conclusions about God, who he is and what he's like. In an order for God to do that, in an order for God to take fallen, broken people who have been redeemed and restore them to the image of his son, he is going to have to put them through the kinds of experiences that he allowed his own son to walk through. And none of us, as we communicated those truths this week, had any idea what was coming. None of us have any idea what is coming tomorrow. I know that there have been times in my life of suffering, of trial, just like there have been of years. In fact, when we were together last time, we looked at first Peter, chapter five or seven, and we acknowledged that there really are just seasons in our life that we would describe as seasons of care, seasons of anxiety, seasons of trial, seasons of trouble. And I know this, that during those times, particularly when those times are prolonged, when they are extended, When they come suddenly, they have the potential to trip us. But when they are prolonged, when they are extended and when they are unexplained. They have the potential to to derail us from the mission that God has called us to do. I don't know about you, but I know in my own life, as I look back over those seasons and to every life there come those seasons. I mean, you look at the life of Job and Job went through a prolonged, extended period of trial and of suffering that touched every area of his life. His goods, his possessions, his family, his health, his marriage, his friends. I mean, which one of us have not experienced some measure of that? Certainly not to the degree and for the length and to the extent maybe that Job did, We talk about the patience of Job. It has become a byword, even these many millenniums later, simply because it is such a truth. It does happen to us. And when we go through extended periods of trial and we experience them through the circumstances of our life or through pain that comes into our life through God touching our life in some way or perhaps through some betrayal of some close friend or some close personal associate. Those times bring to us incredible questions. We question everything we question, God, we question ourselves, how long can we hear this? How much more of this can we hear? Why are you allowing this? What are you doing through this? What are you going to do about this? And I can remember a particular time in my own journey where I was going through a very prolonged and extended period of questioning with God and the hymn that the Baughman's sang for us. Became an anchor point for me, I remember having that on a CD and I would drive around and I would just Repeat and repeat and repeat and repeat and repeat that song. Because it really does speak to the very thing that my soul does not want to do. It's the very last thing my soul wants to do when God is in the middle of restoring me to the likeness of his son and he uses a trial, an extended, painful, prolonged trial. The last thing I want to do is to be still. The last thing I want to do is to be silent. And I would say to you that oftentimes it's during those periods of time in our lives. And I can speak to this out of my own experience that we are most prone to sinful behaviors and sinful responses. So how does Peter advise us about this? How does Peter talk to us about this? I mean, you're going through this as a church family. You aren't experiencing the trial, perhaps as immediately and as directly as the families that were involved. But there is no question that as a church family, you have been touched by this and you're hurting by this. We have been touched by this and we just knew Emmy for two weeks. Our family has had a relationship with Pastor Phelps and his boys for many years. Our family has been touched by this. It is the nature of the body of Christ, whether it meets in Indianapolis or in Simpsonville, that we hurt together in a time like this, isn't it? I mean, there's just a stillness that sort of comes on us when we hear things like this and. And then there's the reminder in our own lives of things that we're going through and we can immediately connect with people that hurt. Because we have hurt. And for some of you here this morning, you are hurting. And perhaps maybe your hurt is much more private and much, much deeper, but it is equally painful and equally devastating to you. So what does Peter have to say? And I would I would suggest to you that as we look at first Peter, chapter four, we're actually going to end up in verse 10 of chapter five. And so maybe we should look there first. and just see where all of this is going and then work backwards through what Peter has to say. But Peter ends the book with this prayer for his listeners. May the God of all grace who has called us to his eternal glory by Christ Jesus after you have suffered a while, perfect, establish, strengthen and settle you. One of the reasons that we can trust God with the things that make us anxious is because he is concerned about us. Remember, Peter talked about this in verse seven. So what is God doing when we cast our care on him and? In the midst of prolonged suffering, in the midst of suffering that just seems to go on without any explanation, what is God doing? And Peter is telling us here what God is doing. He is perfecting and establishing and strengthening and settling us so that we may be people who have been called out of darkness into his marvelous light, we may be the kind of people who can shine forth the praises of his glory to people who are still in darkness. So as we look at what Peter has to say and you see right away in the middle of the text, Peter acknowledges the reality of suffering and he doesn't attempt to explain it. He just acknowledges That this is how God, or at least a way, a very common way in which God restores people that he has redeemed to the image of his son. He acknowledges the reality of suffering now looking at verse 10, let's go back to chapter four and let's just see what Peter has already said to people that just heard him talk in verse 10. Peter acknowledges suffering, but that's not the first time they have heard him say something about this. Look at verse 12 of chapter four. Beloved, do not think it strange concerning the fiery trial, which is to try you as though some strange thing happened to you. And Peter is telling them this because that is precisely what they are prone to conclude. They are prone to conclude that when a trial or in this case, a persecution fierce, extended, prolonged were to come upon them, that this is unusual, that this should not be the lot of a person that has become the special object of the affection of the father, a special object of affection by means of the ministry of the son. and obtained by the ministry of the Holy Spirit. It shouldn't be the lot of someone who has had all of this direct attention and involvement by every member of the Godhead. How could it be that this would be our lot? And Peter says to people who are prone to think that way, don't think that way. Don't think it's strange. concerning the fiery trial, which is to try you as though some strange thing happened to you, but rejoice to the extent that you partake of Christ's sufferings, that when his glory is revealed, you may also be glad with exceeding joy. If you are reproached for the name of Christ, blessed are you for the spirit of glory and of God rests upon you on their part. He is blaspheme, but on your part, he is glorified. But let none of you suffer as a murderer, a thief, an evildoer, or as a busybody in other people's matters. Yet if anyone suffers, and Peter is assuming that everybody will suffer, yet if anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in this matter. For the time has come for judgment to begin at the house of God. And if it begins with us first, what will be the end of those who do not obey the gospel of God? Now, if the righteous one is scarcely saved, where will the ungodly and sinner appear? And in light of all of this, look at verse 19, therefore, let those who suffer according to the will of God commit their souls to him in doing good as to a faithful creator. So as you read this extended portion of chapter four and then you go back to chapter five, verse 10, and Peter sort of summarily says, now, after you've suffered a while, this is what he's talking about. He is acknowledging the reality of suffering. It is inevitable. It will come. And when it comes, it is excruciatingly painful. He describes it as a fiery testing. It is limited in length. Peter in chapter five, verse 10, when he talked about suffering, talked about it being for a little while, indicating that this isn't going to be the eternal lot of a believer. That the limits and boundaries of the sufferings that God allows into the life of a believer that he is perfecting, that he is restoring to the image of his son have been determined. By him. There is a predetermined boundary to the summary to the suffering, and it is necessary for God's work in our life. And so Peter acknowledges the reality of suffering. And then secondly, he talks a little bit about the reason that God does this. Even though we don't have a full explanation for why God allows these kinds of testings and these kinds of trials to come into the life of a believer. And sometimes those testings come through the circumstances of life that God allows. And sometimes they come through the hand of a persecutor that comes into the life that God allows. But they all ultimately come and are driven by the hand of the evil one who is attempting to destroy what God is doing. And God allows these things to happen, and he has a reason for them. And you can see that reason articulated here in verse 13. If anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in this matter. God is attempting to do a number of things through the suffering that he brings into our life. One of the things that he is doing is he is perfecting us. He is completing us so that we may accomplish our mission. Now, this shouldn't surprise us because this is exactly what he did with his own son. You can see that over in Hebrews chapter five. As we read in verse seven. Talking about Jesus, who in the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and supplication with vehement cries and tears to him, who was able to save him from death. There is no question that when Jesus prayed this way in the garden, he had no doubt that his father was able to deliver him from this. So the writer of Hebrews wants you to understand that when God the Father did not deliver the son, and didn't respond to his prayer for deliverance by delivering him from the death to come. It wasn't because he wasn't able to do that. And you can see that though he was a son, verse 8, yet he learned obedience by the things which he suffered. And having been perfected, he became the author of eternal salvation to all those who obey God. Our older brother, was equipped to do the mission that God called him to accomplish through suffering. It wasn't that in some way Jesus was ever disobedient to the Lord or that he could be more obedient than he was, as you know, from what the Scriptures teach and from what is required theologically of a perfect Savior. The Lord never sinned and didn't sin and wouldn't sin. So whatever is going on here isn't because he needed in some way to become better at obeying God. This was God taking him through these experiences because these experiences were necessary for him to have the context of an obedience that would procure your salvation. And just like our older brother, there are circumstances that are necessary for us to be able to accomplish the mission that God intends to do through the life of a redeemed person that He is restoring to the image of Christ. If He is going to make you look like Christ so that others may see the glory of God, He's going to have to display you in circumstances like Christ's. He's going to have to put you in places of temptation. He's going to put you in places of sorrow and of suffering and of betrayal and of prolonged agony. Why? Because that's where the obedience of Christ was displayed. And if you want to look like Christ, which is God's purpose for you, he is going to put you in places where that Christ likeness can be formed. And Peter says, you shouldn't be surprised about this because suffering is intended to prepare you for the mission that God is on. And that mission is to declare forth his praises. He called you out of darkness and into light so that you could declare the praises of the one who did this. And one of the ways in which God does that is he puts those glory bears right in the midst of the kind of suffering that he allowed to come into the life of his own son. And that brings us really to the third thing this morning, and that is this in first Peter, chapter five, verse 10. Peter reminds us not just that suffering is a reality and that God has a reason for this. He reminds us that God's promise to us has not been invalidated because he has allowed a time of extreme, prolonged suffering to come into our life. If you look at chapter five, verse seven, you're immediately reminded that God is committed to things that he has always been committed to in your life that come under questioning when we go through a prolonged period of suffering or when some great trial comes into our life. We are tempted at that point. I know I am. We are tempted to question God's love and affection for me. How does God really feel about me? And if he really feels that way, why in the world would he allow this to happen to me? I would if it were in my power to keep my own physical children from going through something like this, I would never let this happen to them. So if God is all powerful and he really loves me, if I wouldn't do this with my own earthly children, why in the world is he doing this with me? There must be something that I have done that has caused him maybe to turn his face from me. And I question his affection or I question his ability. Does he really have the power and ability to protect and deliver me? I mean, maybe he loves me. But but for whatever reasons, maybe in this particular trial, he's just not going to involve himself because he can't. And we know that that's not true. Theologically, our brains get it. Our heads get it. We understand it. But somehow getting it from our head down into the fabric of our soul takes time. And sometimes the trial aborts that process. And even though we would never say it this way, we wonder, does God really love me? And if he really loves me. Can he really solve my problem? Or we wonder if God even knows. I mean, we know that he knows, but but is he really concerned? I know that he loves me and I know that he's able to because I've seen him deliver others and I read about it in the Scripture, but somehow he's not doing it for me. So maybe he's just not that concerned about me. And I think if we're honest, when we go through a prolonged trial that is excruciatingly painful, sooner or later, we wrestle with those questions. Particularly when we have children of our own and we know what we would do for them if it were within our power to do so. I mean, I look at things that have happened in my life, just like you look at things that have happened in your life. And one of the things that I constantly ask the Lord is, Lord, please don't put my children through anything like this. Haven't you ever prayed that? The private moment of your life? And it's easy to move from Lord, please don't ever do that to one of my children to saying, Lord, why? Why have you done it to me? And right in the middle of all of that, Peter in verse 10 articulates a reminder now in our Bible, it looks like an appeal and there is a sense in which it is may the God of all grace. Who is called is to his eternal glory by Christ Jesus after you have suffered a while. And then comes the prayer, perfect, establish, strengthen and settle you. But I would suggest that there is a way to look at this in which Peter's articulating not just a prayer, but he is praying in the strength of a promise. This is precisely what he knows God is doing and he is articulating this. I mean, it's actually a doxology here. It's actually a statement that he is making to the reader and he is reminding the reader that this is what God is about in the midst of the suffering. As God perfects you, as God provides the context by which His glory can most be magnified in you and through you, the whole point to this is Peter coming back and saying, now in the midst of God doing all of this work that you may not understand or you may not comprehend, here is an unshakable truth that you can anchor back to. You can come back to this truth and it hasn't changed one bit. Your circumstances may be up and down. Your circumstances may be extremely difficult. Your circumstances may have caused you to ask questions about God. But here is a truth you can anchor back on. God's promise has not been invalidated. And notice how He piles it all up. The God of all grace. I mean, this is how God feels about you. Who has called you to His eternal glory. He hasn't changed one bit on this score. The God of all grace, who sent His Son to redeem you, has called you to His eternal glory. He hasn't changed one bit in His purpose for you. We've quoted Romans 8.28 our whole life, haven't we? uses all things. He works all things together to produce something in the life of the individual experiencing those things. And that individual is identified as someone who has been called according to his purpose. And that's you. If you're a believer this morning, if you are a believer, God's intention for you, God's ultimate Calling of you has not been affected one iota by the circumstances that he has allowed into your life that have created all of these questions about him. Does God really care about me? Does God really know what's going on? Is God really able to take care of me in the midst of all of this pain and all of this suffering and all of this tribulation and even all of this persecution? And Peter's answer is God's promise to you is not invalidated one iota. He is still the God of all grace. He is still the one who has called you to his eternal glory. And he is the one who is perfecting, establishing, strengthening and settling you in all of this. And that really brings us to the fourth thing that Peter wants us to see in this portion of his book. And that is that in the midst of all of this, God's provision has been supplied to me. in the midst of suffering. I mean, if you step back into the texts that we've been looking at and you just let first Peter four talk to you for a little bit. And then you go back and you start at the beginning of the book and you start reading through chapter one and chapter two. And you start realizing that Peter is talking to people who are living during a season of horrific spiritual pressure, horrific spiritual affliction, horrific spiritual persecution. They are experiencing it physically. They are experiencing it relationally. It's as though in the cities where these people live, God has for a time allowed the God of this world The One who has blinded the eyes of men so that they would not see the glory of God in the face of Jesus. It's as though He allowed this wicked one for a season to come and wreak havoc on the people whose eyes had been opened, who had embraced the truth about God by following His Son, Jesus Christ. And it is as though for a period of time in the early church The wicked one unleashed everything that he had against them. And if you think back to the Lord's own prayer in John 17, He said, you have given Me these out of the world and you have left them in the world, but you have protected them from the evil one. I mean, the Lord in His prayer acknowledges this reality. And it is true, I think, as you and I go through life, there are just seasons of times that we go through that are, you know, all frankly, in a certain way, at a certain stage, all of life is difficult, isn't it? I mean, when you're when you're a kid, you know, yeah, you have little difficulties that couldn't really blow up my birthday candles very well. You know, now I'm at a stage where I can't blow up my birthday candles very well either, and it's for a whole different set of reasons. And between those two events, there's a whole lot of stuff that has happened. I mean, you know, you're at a place where your body isn't functioning the way it used to function. I remember saying to someone, you know, when was the last time you climbed a tree? I mean, you used to climb trees all the time when you were a kid. Look at little kids, you know, they have this unusual relationship to trees. If they see it, they want to climb it. I still have that relationship. I just have a little more intelligence now, usually because I can't get very far up. I mean, can you imagine what it used to be like for you and just think what 40, 50 years have done to all of that? And then throw on top of that the suffering that comes because of that that has gone on in your body. Just the aging process itself. And then in the course of 50 years, how much disappointment have you encountered? How much hurt have you encountered? How many things started out that you thought were going to go this way that completely went this way? How much betrayal have you experienced in your life? How much persecution has come to you? And at some point you have to ask yourself, Lord, is this really what you intended one of your children to experience over a prolonged period of time? Because that's not what I would ever do to one of my children. And Peter's answer to that is God does that. Because he has a purpose in all of that, and the purpose is what we saw in first Peter, chapter five, verse 10. He has called people to share his eternal glory. And in order for that glory to be displayed, those glory bearers are going to have to be put in places and put through circumstances where the words that they utter about God are given weight by what they experience in their life before God. And that's precisely what God is doing here. He is in the process of perfecting, establishing, strengthening. and settling us. Those words are are piling up ideas. In fact, as you go through these words and you see what God is doing, Peter's saying now, as you go through all of this, as you suffer for a while, here is what God is doing. He is giving you grace, the God of all grace. He's giving you enablement. And the enablement looks like this. He is in the process of. Perfecting you. He is putting everything right. He is outfitting you. That's the idea. He is supplying what is lacking in your life. He is restoring you. Remember, we said God is on a mission to redeem and restore fallen, broken people to the likeness of his Son. This is partly how he does it. He is in the process of perfecting or restoring you. He is in the process of confirming or establishing you, as Peter says here. After you have suffered a while, he will perfect and establish. The word establishes the idea of confirm. And it is this, as you go through suffering and as you avail yourself of the truth that God has put here, you will become more convinced of who God is and what God is like, rather than less convinced. God's intent is to take the truth of His Word, the enablement of His grace and the energizing of His Spirit, so that as you go through the trial, the truth that you know about God will become unshakably yours. You will be convinced of it. So that no matter what happens to your life, you can stand before others and out of a broken heart, Say, be still, be still, my soul, be still. You can look at people with authenticity and coming out of truthfulness in the midst of a broken heart as you bury a loved one. You can say, I just want you to know something. God is good. And all of a sudden, out of that circumstance, those words that you utter have unbelievable weight. God is convincing you. He is strengthening you. Where am I going to get the strength to live this way? Where am I going to get the strength to utter those kinds of truth? Well, that is exactly what Peter says. God is perfecting and he is establishing and he is strengthening you. That's the idea of an inner strength so that you do not collapse internally by the pressure that is coming on you because of this trial or this affliction. And God is also Securing you, he is settling you. This is the idea that you will not be swept away. I mean, here you are and it just seems like wave after wave after wave and one wave comes and you look around and you're looking this way and another wave comes and Peter says, now, look, if you understand what God is doing, you won't be swept away by this. God is restoring you. God is confirming in you the things that are true about Him. And He is strengthening you internally so that what you believe is actually able to sustain you in life. And He is securing you so that you will not be swept away by this trial or the more that are coming. And that brings us to the conclusion this morning, and that is this, so in light of what God is doing, how does God want me to respond? And we go back Really, the first Peter chapter four. And in verse 19, Peter says, when you suffer according to the will of God, commit your soul to him. There is an internal response that God desires of every one of his children that he puts through the fire, and that is this. He wants them to trust him. This is more than just believing the right things about God. This is entrusting your life. This is entrusting your soul to Him. Lord, I trust You. I am going to keep on committing my life to You. In the midst of all of this, in the pain of all of this, I am going to continue to commit my soul to You. I am not going to say in my heart, well, Lord, if this is how it is, then I'm just not going to stay where I am. A person who understands the truth that Peter's laying out responds in this way. He says to the Lord in the midst of this trial, I don't know what else to do. I don't understand it. I know that you are at work and I am going to continue to recommit my soul to you. And here's what that looks like. When a person really responds this way, he continues to do good. I mean, do you see that in verse 19? Therefore, let those who suffer according to the will of God commit their soul to him. And here's what that looks like. It looks like doing good, doing good in spite of a creator that seems absent, in spite of a love, in spite of a God that appears to have forgotten. Peter says, you keep trusting. And a soul that keeps trusting the good Creator will continue to do good before Him. We have a little song, don't we? Trust and Obey. There's a lot of theology in that song. And that really is at the end of the day, when we stand before the Lord and we stand before in the presence of one another and we are going through excruciating trial, God says to us and we should say to one another in the in the face of who God is and what God is like, trust him. Trust him. What does that look like? It looks like faithful obedience to him. It looks like staying the course. It looks like keeping your hand. On the plow, God has given you. In the furrow, God has placed before you. And so how can I do that? Peter's giving you a chapter and a half beginning in chapter four and going all the way through chapter five, which we've looked at this morning. It's not just it's not just sort of a mental, OK, I'll just kind of screw up my courage and give it another college try. It's simply coming back to anchoring down to the truth that God has said. This is what God said he's doing. And at the end of the day, I will never really follow someone I don't trust in the hard places of life. I really won't follow. In the hard places of life, someone I don't trust. And what Peter is giving us here is not just a method to obey, he's giving us a reason to trust. So let's ask the Lord to help us each. As we go through the trials and the fires of life like you're going through right now as a church. That we would commit ourselves again to a good and faithful creator and do good. Father, as we come before you and as we close our time and as we thank you. For the wise bestowment that you have given us by your spirit in the truth of your word. So that we might navigate. These difficult places in the journey you've placed before us. Lord, we acknowledge that you really are who you say you are. And we come before you having looked at truth this morning and Lord, for most of us, this is not new truth. And this is truth that if we were to sit. And converse about, I think we would all affirm. But in the quietness of our soul and in the midst of its pain and its agony, sometimes, Lord. Our belief needs help. And so we come like the disciples. Lord, we believe. Help our unbelief. And Lord, may our belief as you grow it through your word and by your grace result in a life that continually remains before you faithful in the doing of your will. So that you may receive praise and glory from people that you have brought out of darkness and placed into this marvelous light. And we'll give you thanks for this, in Jesus' name, Amen.