The Second Letter of Peter- 5

Subtitle: The Problem of False Prophets 2

2 Peter 2:3b-5.  This sermon was preached by Pastor Marty Bonner on Sunday, August 9, 2026.

Today’s subject connects with 1 Peter 3:19-20.  We preached on this verse on March 8, 2026.

Peter brings up the rebellion of certain angels before The Flood of Noah’s days in order to make the point that false teachers will not get away with their rebellion against the truth of God.

Chapter 2 starts with the point that false prophets and false teachers will be a problem for churches.  However, verse 3 makes it clear that their judgment from God will catch up with them.  Thus, Peter follows this statement up with several examples from the Old Testament demonstrating just how certain the judgment of God is.

In our modern world, science and technology tend t create in us a snobbery towards things in the Bible, i.e., an attitude that we know better than what is recorded.  It also tends to create a myopia in which we only see things that our “greatness” will allow us to see while ignoring (or missing completely) other important things.

We can end up reinterpreting what the Bible says and what the apostles believed because we are smarter and know better.  An example of this is how many Christians follow in the footsteps of the Sadducees before them by denying the existence of demons.  They believe that mental illness was misunderstood and called demon possession in the biblical days.  Of course, this undermines the veracity of the Bible which is supposed to be the very words of God.

The reality of what Peter is talking about in this passage is another area where modern Christians tend to reinterpret so as to make the passage more palatable to our senses.

God has revealed in His Word that there are things in our future that He has been restraining.  Real, spiritual enemies who have been locked up for thousands of years by God will eventually be released upon a world that has rejected Jesus.

This restraining of particular spirits is of a greater nature than the restraints placed on Satan.  Satan is not locked up right now.  Yet, there are limitations on what he can do, as we see in the book of Job.

Only those who read the Word of God and believe it have a true picture of where this world is headed.

Let’s look at our passage.

Peter warns about false prophets and teachers

Their judgment will come (v. 3b-5)

All false prophets will be judged by God.  If we look at a particular individual, that judgment may come quickly or appear to never come at all.  However, all false prophets will find themselves in torments in the grave at their death.  Eventually, they will stand before the Great White Throne of God to receive the judgment upon their wicked actions.  We don’t know when, but we do know their judgment is certain.

Peter parallels the ideas of judgment and destruction.  Their judgment is not idle.  If you imagine a car idling, you may get the wrong idea.  An idling car is a picture of a car that is ready to go.  Whereas an idle worker or an idle officer of the law is a picture of something that is inactive or not operating.  The judgment of God is His decision about the things the people do.  A person who misleads others through false prophecies or false teaching will be held accountable for destroying the lives of others.  They are not “getting away with it.”

Peter also says that their destruction is not sleeping.  This is the same image as the idle judgment.  Their destruction is alive, awake, and coming for them. 

All false teachers and those who mislead others will be destroyed by God Himself.  They have destroyed the lives of people in the now and also destroy their future.  They are one with The Destroyer, whether we think of the devil or the angel king held in the bottomless pit of Revelation 9.  Whoever works with the devil to destroy people’s lives will find themselves participating in God’s judgment that the devil and his followers will be destroyed.

A similar picture is given in the book of Revelation.  All humans must pick a side.  Who is your champion?  Is it the ferocious beast, or is it the slain lamb?  Through the prophets of Israel, God has made His decision clear to all the world.  A day is coming when all the rebels of the heavens and of the earth, angelic and human, will be removed from God’s good creation.

Peter gives an example of God pouring out His judgment in the past.  He mentions God not sparing the “angels who sinned,” but instead casting them down to hell.  Verses 4 through 11 parallel Jude chapter 1.  Both Peter and Jude use the judgment on the pre-flood world and the judgment on Sodom and Gomorrah as examples and warnings to us today.

What is this mention of angels who sinned before the flood and were cast down to hell?  We can piece some of it together with Scripture.  Genesis 6:2-4 states that the Sons of God took wives from among humans and created giant, hybrid offspring. 

It is common today to claim that these Sons of God were actually sons of the godly line of Seth, or that they were human kings.  The problem with this is that the phrase Sons of God elsewhere in the Old Testament is used of spiritual beings and not humans.  Also, it is hard to imagine how the intermarriage of godly people and ungodly people would give rise to giants.

The truth is that until the late AD 300’s most bishops and teachers taught that these were fallen angels.  Over time, it became more and more uncouth to believe and teach such things.

By the way, this is what Jude 1:6 is talking about.  “The angels who did not keep their proper domain, but left their own abode, He has reserved in everlasting chains under darkness for the judgment of the great day…”  Their proper domain was the spirit realm.  Any interactions with humans and the earth would have to be sanctioned by God for His purposes. They abandoned their posts in the heavenlies and interfered with humans on earth for their own purposes in rebellion against God’s.

This is also connected to the “spirits in prison” to whom Jesus proclaimed his victory after his death (1 Peter 3:19-20).

You could say that Genesis 1 through 11 is depicting the fallenness of humanity as not just a problem of human sin.  Rather, at all three points, there is some spiritual interference.  Genesis 3 depicts the devil interfering in God’s relationship with Adam and Eve causing the fall.  Genesis 6 depicts a group of angels who also follow the devil in his rebellion.  Genesis 11 is not as clear, but the fact that Nimrod was trying to build a tower into the heavens begs this question.  What did he really think he would accomplish?  We know from the ancient writings in this area that they used pyramidal structures to serve as a gate or portal for connecting with the spirit realm.  Humanity has a sin problem, but it also has a problem of spiritual entities who are working to separate us from God.

Genesis does not tell us exactly what spirits were imprisoned for their sin.  However, the Old Testament does show God giving judgment and punishments upon these spiritual interlopers.  Genesis 3 actually gives God’s judgment against the ancient serpent, the devil.  Isaiah 14:12-15 also uses the imagery of judgment against a spiritual being.  We see it again in Ezekiel 28:12-17.

It is in the book of 1 Enoch that we have the details filled in for us.  1 Enoch is being referenced by Peter and Jude.  In fact, Jude even quotes from 1 Enoch at Jude 1:14-15.  Let’s be clear that 1 Enoch was never regarded as Scripture.  Just like we would not treat a modern commentary on the Bible as Scripture itself, so the Jews did not treat 1 Enoch as Scripture.  Yet, it represented a commentary on the Genesis 6 event that was in existence at least 200 years before the apostles and Jesus.  It isn’t scripture, but it tells us what is in the minds of men like Peter and Jude as the Holy Spirit directs them to warn us about the reality of the judgment that lies ahead for all who join in league with these fallen spirits.

In 1 Enoch, it is the fallen angels of Genesis 6 who are imprisoned.  God did not spare them.  Instead, He had them cast into a pit and bound there.  Almost all translations of 2 Peter 2:4 say that they were cast into “hell.”  This is an unfortunate translation because it masks the reality of what is being said.

In fact, three different Hebrew and Greek words were all given the same translation of “hell.”  The Hebrew word “Sheol” (Greek Hades) is probably best translated as the grave.  The Grave is a spiritual holding place for the spirits of departed humans.  Jesus pictured it as having 2 compartments in his story of The Rich Man and Lazarus.  One side was for the wicked and sounds a lot like what we imagine in “hell.”  However, the other side was for the righteous and was a paradise called Abraham’s Bosom.

The word translated as hell in our passage today is literally to be cast into Tartarus.  If you know your Greek mythology, then you know that Tartarus was pictured as being as far below Hades (the holding place for human spirits) as Hades was beneath the earth.  It corresponds to the Hebrew concept of The Pit.  In the book of Revelation, it is called the Abyss or Bottomless Pit.  So, the rebel angels of Genesis 6 were chained in the bottomless pit in order to be held until the great judgment day.

Thus, Peter pictures these angels as committed into pits of darkness, being held for judgment.  This is the background to the opening of the bottomless pit in Revelation 9 which allows a horde of scorpion beings to exit with their king being an angel named Apollyon (Abaddon in Hebrew), which means The Destroyer.

Revelation is depicting the end times judgment of God upon mankind as a kind of spiritual copy of The Flood.  Just as flood waters fell upon the earth from the heavens and also shot up as geysers from under the earth, so the spiritual rebels will be pushed out of the heavens down onto the earth.  At the same time, the bottomless pit (Tartarus) is opened, and spiritual rebels flood the earth with a fury.  Both these spiritual beings and the wicked humans they torment will then come under the judgment of God.

Just as these angels were not spared, so too the humans of the ancient world who followed them were not spared.  Those who turn away from God’s ways and follow the powerful rebels will receive a rebel’s reward, aka destruction. 

A judgment of global proportions may evoke fear in those who are righteous.  However, the flip side of the judgment of those who lead others into wickedness is the protection (vs. 5) and the rescue (vs. 7) of those who were spared.

In the flood, Noah and his family were spared.  Genesis 6:5 shows us the effect of the Genesis 6 rebel-angel incursion.  “Then the LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.”  Yet, “Noah found grace in the eyes of the LORD!”  How?  By trusting God in the midst of a world that was falling away from truth into apostasy.

Noah is described as a preacher of righteousness, a proclaimer of following God’s ways and not the ways of the fallen angels and their gigantic, wicked offspring.  Through the wisdom of God, Noah constructed an ark and saved his family.  He is a type of Christ.  Jesus is the Greater Noah who has constructed a means by which all his family (those who believe on him) can be protected and rescued from the coming judgments upon humanity.  In fact, the seven family members represent the whole group of the righteous, however many that will be.

Humans seem bent on rejecting the Father and His Messiah, Jesus.  In doing so, they ally (whether knowingly or unknowingly) with the devil and his rebel angels.  Part of the wrath of the Lamb (see Revelation 6:16-17) will be to stop restraining all the wickedness that the devil wants to bring forth upon this earth.  When the rejection of the love of the truth (that is found in the Gospel of Jesus) is completed, then God will allow these things to come forth.  This will be the final days of the world as we know it.

Let us remain faithful to the Lord.  Let it not be because we imagine this will procure for us a future absent any suffering.  Rather, let us suffer whatever it takes now to join in the glory that is coming for all the righteous!

False Prophets 2 audio

The First Letter of Peter- 11

Subtitle: Our Witness before the World- Part 3

1 Peter 2:21-25. This sermon was preached by Pastor Marty Bonner on Sunday, February 1, 2026.

In his instructions to household slaves leading up to this passage, Peter makes this point.  If you suffer for doing what is right and patiently endure it, there is favor with God.  He now points them (us) to Jesus as a great example of what he is talking about.  Jesus suffered for doing what was right, and he righteously endured it.

Jesus is not just an example to household slaves.  He is also an example to all of us in our situations that may have differences but are essentially the same dynamic spiritually.  We are going to see through the rest of the letter that Peter continually points us back to this example he lays out here.

No matter what relationship may bring us suffering, God’s purpose is to create millions of examples (exhibits) of those who suffered for doing what was right, and yet, patiently endured it.

Let’s look at our passage.

Christ is our example (v. 21-25)

Verse 21 adds the phrase “leaving you an example for you to follow in His steps.”  Think of all the steps that Jesus made in which he could have turned back, but he kept going forward. 

Peter is doing this when he asks to step out of the boat.  Peter made a choice to ask, and then he chose to step out of the boat.  Notice that there is a point at which the results of our decision carry us along, for good or for bad.  It is not that there are no more choices to be made, but that there are tidal forces carrying us.  We tend to warn about the power of consequences, but we should also see that there is a good in it.  The choice to step out of the boat created a scenario in which there was no going back.  He would either walk or sink.  There is a certain good in this.  When we steel our courage and follow in the footsteps of Jesus, we find ourselves in scary places, yes.  But we also find ourselves in places where God shows up to help us through it.  Just that first step to follow his example is often the opening of a whole river of God’s help.

Jesus chose to care the burden of the cross for us, and so we ought to carry our cross for him.  Praise God that He is working in us to help us do this very thing!

Theological liberals love to say that Jesus is only an example of love, i.e., he was not actually paying a price for our sins.  This is an error and contradictory to Scripture.  However, it is also an error to downplay the reality of the example that Jesus has given us.  Of course, this example of trusting the will of God would do us no good if Jesus had not truly atoned for our sin.  But he has made peace between us and God.  He has supplied the Holy Spirit within us to help us do this!

Peter then quotes from Isaiah 53:9, “who committed no sin, nor was any deceit found in his mouth.”  This is a passage describing God’s work through His perfect servant, the Messiah.  Israel had failed to rightly serve God’s purposes.  However, God would bring forth a perfect servant, a suffering servant, who would save Israel and the Gentiles by his righteousness and suffering.

This Old Testament verse uses a word that is generally translated as “violence.”  The word involves doing wrong to someone in a harsh way.  This can be a physically violent act, or metaphorically violent in the sense of brazen and bold wrongs done to another.

When translated into Greek, the translators chose a word that means lawlessness.  Only a lawless person would sin against others in such a bold and harsh way.  The quote in 1 Peter says, “who committed no sin.”  Peter expands the “lawless” translation of the earlier Greek manuscripts to the more general “sin.”  Definitely Christ was revealed to them as not being a violent, lawless man.  However, Jesus was more than this.  He was without sin.  We see Jesus challenging his opponents in John 8:46, “Which one of you convicts Me of sin?”  Of course, the only “sin” they could pin on him was that he a man made himself one with God, which is no sin if it was true.  Hebrews 4:15; 7:26, 1 John 3:5, among many other New Testament verses, agree with this statement of Peter.  The Messiah was a sinless man.  The apostles came to see that Jesus was the only perfect imager of God the Father who had ever lived on this planet.

The second part of this Old Testament quote from Isaiah 53 says that he was free of deceit, or treachery.  There is nothing like suffering to bring out the worst in us.  It is often in our desire to avoid difficulty that we choose a path of misleading people or hiding the truth.

Jesus positively did good things to people, but he also refrained from doing wrong to others.  This is the example that we are called to follow, not because it saves us, but because we have been saved.  I can’t follow Jesus perfect enough to save myself, but I can follow Jesus out of perfect thankfulness for his saving grace.

This leads us into the next descriptions of the character and actions of Jesus.  These emphasize what he didn’t do.

Jesus did not respond with reviling to those who reviled him.  To revile someone is about verbal abuse.  It can be translated to rail against someone.  Any time you see someone spitting mad yelling obscenities and accusations at another person, you are seeing this in action.  In fact, this is a perfect example of the metaphorical violence that Isaiah 53:9 references.  How easy it is to become so angry with such people to begin shouting back at them and responding to them in kind.

Jesus was accused of many things in very unkind manners.  During his trial, he is even pictured as being blindfolded, punched, and in a mocking manner, told to prophesy who hit him.  This was both verbally abusive and physically abusive.  Yet, Jesus did not yell back and say hateful things against them.  When we are squeezed by life, the stuff that is deep within us is generally brought to the surface.  You and I have a history of failing in this area when we are in the pressure cooker of suffering.  Yet Jesus went through it without sin.

If you remember the night of his betrayal and arrest, you will also remember that Jesus showed the disciples how they could follow him.  It would require more than a spirit that was willing.  A willing spirit must deal with its weak flesh through prayer, wrestling with God over His purpose in our life and yielding to Him.

1 Peter 2:23 also mentions that he uttered no threats.  Sometimes threats are empty because we have no way of backing them up.  We may be powerless, but Jesus is not.  Jesus has great power and thus shows great restraint.

Of course, don’t get Peter wrong.  There is a great threat looming over those who reject Jesus.  How you treat him will determine your eternity.  However, Jesus doesn’t threaten people.  He only points out the truth.  During his trial, he found it best to generally not respond to their accusations, taunts, and lies.  Yet this doesn’t change the fact that there is a day of judgment for each of us and for this world as a whole.  God will hold us accountable for choosing our sin over the top of the righteousness of Jesus.

The last thing that Peter points out about how Jesus endured suffering is that he entrusted “himself to Him who judges righteously.”  Persecution doesn’t only affect how we treat others.  It can also affect our relationship with God the Father.  Jesus entrusted himself to God the Father even in the face of death by wicked men.  He could do this because His relationship with the Father only knew Him as trustworthy.  Jesus stepped out of the boat of mortality and put himself into the hands of the Father.  “Do with me what you will, Father!”  God could powerfully stop his persecutors or not.  Regardless, Jesus both knew and trusted the decision of the Father.  May God help us to have such a relationship of trust in Him.

Remember that God is never “on the side of sinners.”  If it looks like they are getting ahead and that it pays to be wicked, don’t believe it.  They will eventually stand before God and despise themselves in His presence.  However, God is on the side of sinners in the sense that He is trying to break through their spiritual blindness.  Our righteous suffering may be the only thing that pricks the heart of the wicked and turns them back from sin.  Can I do that for Jesus?  He promises to reward our service for His purposes, but we have to trust Him with our life.  Yes, they may reject the witness we give, but at least God sees me.  He doesn’t like what is being done to me.  However, if I do this rightly, I can have His favor.  I can remain in the place of His favor.

This suffering of Jesus is more than an example of love and trust.  Verse 24 shows us that Jesus was a sacrifice that provides spiritual healing for us.  In Jesus, God is providing a way for sinners to find spiritual healing. 

We sometimes act like we don’t know what God is doing through us, but we do know in general.  He is showing Himself to the world through us.  We don’t have to perfectly understand all the ways that He is doing that in order to say, yes, to Him.  This is what faith (trust) is all about.

In trusting God, Jesus did something for God that needed to be done if any humans were to dwell with God in eternity.  Without Jesus even the best of humans would be stuck in the grave, unable to enter into His presence.  We may be clueless to what God is doing specifically, but we do know that it has to do with showing others who Jesus is.  Jesus provided for our spiritual healing, but then he uses you and me to bring that spiritual healing into the minds and lives of the lost.  We provide opportunities for them to know His spiritual healing.  Verse 24 explains how his sacrifice does this.

“He himself carried our sins in his body on the tree.”  If you approach this from an Old Testament mindset, you will recognize the importance of this word, “tree.”  This whole thing with sin started with some trees in Genesis three.  The Tree of Life was counterposed to the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.  They chose (we choose) to go after the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil rather than the Tree of Life.  There is something about trees in the word of God that is important.  We see this in Psalm 1.  The perfect Israelite (there was ever only one) would be a Tree of Life that would bring forth fruit rather than chaff.  This ultimate fruitful Israelite would only be the Messiah who is presented in the next psalm.  Blessed are those who put their trust in Him (Psalm 2:12). 

Scripture doesn’t describe the Tree of Life, but the New Testament presents Jesus as the ultimate Psalm One Blessed Man.  Yet the tree on which he provided life for us did not look desirable.  It was a cross.  Everything in our flesh wants to continue to flee to the other tree, but God calls us to embrace this tree of suffering in Jesus.

Jesus took your sins, my sins, in his body (a representative of whomever would believe in him) to the cross.  God’s punishment upon our sin came upon Jesus who was sinless.  Is this fair?  Of course, it is not!  However, it is love.  In Jesus, our sin has been nailed to the cross and punished.

Notice the contrast between the Spirit of Christ and the spirit of this age.  Jesus embraces our death upon himself.  He sacrifices his mortal self in the name of God’s purpose in humanity.  The spirit of this age will sacrifice any number (the more the better) of humans for the sake of humanity.  Those who make the decision of just whom will be sacrificed will never be caught making sacrifices themselves.  Which of these hearts will you choose?

Peter than describes that this was “so we might die to sin and live to righteousness.”  Our sins and the guilt that comes with them have been dealt with by God.  He simply asks me to admit my fault, yield to the Lord Jesus Christ, and put my faith in him.  If we do this, our sin and guilt will be completely removed.  The flesh will still battle us, but it cannot change what Jesus has done, once and for all.  By faith, we can die to the sin that we so easily want to do and come alive to the righteousness that He wants to work in us and work through us.  If we claim that His love is working in us, then we will see it working through us to others.

Peter then quotes from Isaiah 53 again (verse 5).  It is the wounding of Christ that provides for our healing.  This is important because Peter is pointing us to this as an example.  Because of Jesus, our suffering and wounds can do some good, both in our lives and in the lives of others.  My wounds and suffering can point others to Jesus and his salvation.

Spiritual healing does involve the removal of the external guilt of our sin that hangs over us.  However, it is the internal guilt of sin that is harder to heal.  We have to let the forgiveness of Christ and the love of God teach us the better way, the way of Christ!

Peter then ends with emphasizing our spiritual condition in verse 25. He breaks this up into two different stages.  Before Jesus, we were continually straying like sheep.  Notice that this is an allusion to Isaiah 53:6. Led by our fears, ignorance, and desires, we stray away from the Good Shepherd and the grace of God.  “All of us like sheep have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; but the LORD has caused the iniquity of us all to fall upon him.”  This was true of Israel, and it was true of the Gentile nations.  It was true of me, and it was true of you.  This is our helpless state before Jesus came and before we came to know about him.

But now, after coming to Jesus, we are something different.  We are now sheep who are returning, coming back, to the Good Shepherd who is also the Overseer of our souls.  Both shepherd and overseer correspond with what later became role titles in the church: pastors and bishops respectively.  I don’t think Peter is giving any sense of religious title here.  Jesus is the good shepherd in every way that a shepherd is good for sheep.  He is the great overseer watching out against our enemies and for our good.

Doesn’t it seem odd that Peter (one of the sheep) is exhorting the rest of the sheep to be more like the Good Shepherd!  May God help us to follow in the footsteps of Jesus by the help of His Holy Spirit!

Witness 3 audio

The First Letter of Peter- 6

Subtitle: A New Spiritual People- part 3

1 Peter 1:22-25; 2:1-3.  This sermon was preached by Pastor Marty Bonner on Sunday, December 28, 2025.

We continue in this section where Peter admonishes us to be a part of the new spiritual people that Jesus is creating.  He does this through a series of imperatives, or commands.  We have looked at the first three.

1. Fix your hope completely on the grace that will be brought to you at the Second Coming of Jesus Christ (1:13).
2. Be holy like obedient children of God (1:15).
3. Conduct yourself in the fear of the Lord during this time of your sojourn on earth (1:17).

Of course, there are more things that are attached to these three commands, but they are the core points.  Let’s look at our passage as Peter gives some more commands.

Fervently love one another from the heart (v. 1:22-25)

Peter gives them the same command that the Lord Jesus gave to his disciples, particularly in John 13 to 15 on the night of his betrayal.  It is probably fresh in Peter’s mind just how wrong-headed he had been that night.  Yes, he believed in Jesus and was following him.  Yet, his flesh kept side-tracking him from where Jesus was leading.

We are to love one another as Jesus loved us.  On the night of his betrayal, we should first recognize that Jesus had risen and washed their dirty feet, something a servant should have done.  He loved them enough to do the lowest task among the group. Once we have absorbed this lesson, then we can move to the fact that Jesus physically was willing to die for them that they might live. 

Does this sound like something that is easy?  No, it is not!  One of the problems with American society is that we have exalted the idea of “falling in love” beyond any usefulness.  Today, people fall in and out of love without much thought.  They are simply led by the desires of their heart, which are often only lust.  Jesus is talking about a motivation that comes from Jesus Himself, rather than our own heart.  The love that Jesus gave to me when I didn’t deserve it becomes a motivation to give love to those others that he commands me to love.  In this case, he is talking about other disciples of Jesus.  If I have been forgiven much, then I should love Jesus much, so much that I am willing to love his other followers.  This is not a love of feeling, but a love of choice, a love of sacrifice.  Feelings will come and go, some good and some bad, but always we should make the choice to love.

Peter adds that this love is to come from the heart.  Some manuscripts have “from a pure heart.”  Both of these would be true.  There is an intellectual part to this choice to love, but we must not let hypocrisy and ulterior motives lead us.  Our heart has to embrace the decision.  We are not just intellectually seeing the vision that Jesus is laying before us but also capture that vision and making it our own.

We could say that acts which look loving, but are done in hypocrisy, are not truly loving at all.  They are self-serving actions in disguise.

Verse 22 starts off with “since you have in obedience to the Truth purified your souls…”  Peter reminds them of this prior action.  It is not in question, i.e., “since,” but the latter action of loving each other from the heart is in question (at least until we follow through).  The prior action is that they have purified their souls.  This may sound wrong.  Isn’t it Jesus who has purified our souls?  Yes, Jesus is the Purifier of our souls.  However, his work of purification involves the work of putting our faith in the “Truth” of the Gospel of Jesus. 

This is what is meant by “in obedience.”  The Gospel is first good news of what Jesus has done and has made available to us.  However, it is also a challenge.  Will you embrace this Jesus as God’s answer to your sin-sick soul?  Thus, it can be said that we purify our souls when we put our faith in Jesus.  It is understood that we could not do that, i.e., our works of faith would be useless, if Jesus had not done the foundational work of providing the foundation upon which we are putting our faith. 

There is also a work of the internal battle against sin that we are to engage with the help of the Holy Spirit, who was made available to us by the work of Jesus as well.  Like the Israelites taking possession of their inheritance in the Promised Land, believers are to take possession (purify) their souls that have been overrun by the giants and strongholds of sin.

We might not think about it in this way, but Peter says that we have purified our souls “for a sincere love of the brethren.”  The grammar depicts the sincere love of the brethren as a target, or goal, of the purifying.  

Think of it this way.  Jesus commands us to love one another, but my heart is filled with things that make it difficult to obey that command.  I am not enough like Jesus to do it.  However, I have put my faith in Jesus both for salvation and for the strength to war against the lusts that are in my own heart, all of this so that I can actually follow through on the work that Jesus has given me.  If you are going to do the hard work of fighting sin in your life, then follow through with the target of loving other believers.  This is what Jesus would do if he were here in the flesh.

Christians are not hypocrites that pretend to love people.  Instead, we are up front that without Christ none of us would love others.  It is his love for us that is transforming us and leading us in saying, “No” to our flesh, and “Yes” to the Holy Spirit.  We who have followed Jesus have also joined this new spiritual people.  Jesus wants it to be a community of love between one another just as the Father and He have always existed in a community of love between themselves and the Holy Spirit. 

We should not blame our lack of love for others on them.  Of course, we all have things that are hard to love, and we have things that are easy for us “to love.”  Our society has a sense of feeling good when helping others (the poor and powerless, etc.).  However, in our flesh, our target is not high enough.  Making yourself feel good is on the same level as drinking alcohol so that you can forget about your woes.  Jesus wasn’t making himself feel better when he loved us.  He was paying a price so that we could be set free from our sins.  His target was much higher than just his own human feelings.  This is why people can be so “loving” to one group but then spew vile hatred towards others.  Christians are not to be like this.  If someone spews hatred towards you, you are to love them as Jesus would love them.

Peter also brings up in verse 23 that they have been born again.  We should fervently love one another from a sincere heart because we have been born again.  We have been born from above, born of the Spirit of God, born of the will of the Father.  This spiritual life that has begun within us is working to express itself in our life through actions that are inspired by Jesus, by the Holy Spirit.

He goes on to point out that this new birth did not come from an imperishable seed.  This ties back to the phrase in verse 22, “in obedience to the Truth…”  Peter is helping them to see this metaphor that Jesus used in his parables in which the seed represents the Word of God, the Truth.

There are all kinds of seeds of “truth” in this world, but only the Word that comes from God the Father is “Truth.”  What word is planted in your heart and growing there?  The words of this world are all impotent and destined to fail, to perish.  However, the Word of God is imperishable.  Even when we ignore it, it accomplishes what it was sent to do.  Its living principle is not dependent upon us believing it.  Yet, we should believe it if we want to be on the good side of its potency.

This Word of the Lord is essentially the Gospel that they received.  Simultaneously, the Gospel, even all Scripture, is an analog of Jesus, the Son of the Most High, who is the Truth.  To obey the word of God (Scripture) is to obey the Word of God (Jesus Christ).  In fact, we can tie this back to prophecies in the Old Testament that refer to seed, but in this case, the seed is the offspring.  Genesis three promises that the Seed of the Woman would crush the serpent’s head.  Later in the same book, God promises that the Seed of Abraham would bring blessing to the whole world.  We also find the importance of the Seed of David that would eventually come forth to rule over Israel and the Nations.  In Jesus, this promised Offspring (the Anointed One) is also the One who is the Seed (Truth) of God.

Jesus is the Imperishable Seed.  If you believe on him, his imperishable nature will make you imperishable too!

Peter fills out what is meant by this imperishable seed by calling it the “living and enduring word of God.”  God’s Word is living versus dead.  It has life in and of itself because it comes from the Author of all life.  The words of men may make us feel alive, but they will not bear out in the end to be true life.

God’s Word is also enduring.  It remains, or stays, when all else fails and falls aside.  God’s Word remains as a stalwart signpost pointing back to Him, back to life, even as we stand on the cliffs of destruction.

This brings Peter to quote Isaiah 40:6,8. It emphasizes the contrast between humans, who are like grass, and the Word of the Lord, which endures forever!”  Sometimes in Scripture God emphasizes that the wicked are like grass (see Psalm 92:7).  They may look intimidating and substantial to us, but they are here today and gone tomorrow.  Theirs is temporary power, temporary success.  However, the grass imagery can also be applied to all humans (wicked or righteous).  Our time to impact this world is brief and short.  What we do is important, but we will also quickly be gone. 

This may sound cynical, but those who have placed their faith in the Word of the Lord, Jesus, will find that His enduring life is greater than our mortal, grass like nature.  Jesus will not leave us behind.  We have been born again by the Spirit of God because we have believed the Word-Become-Flesh that was sent by God the Father to us.  Though we are perishable in our flesh, the Word of the Lord will raise us up!  We will live because we are connected to the living Word of Life!

All of this is about loving one another.  It may feel like a worthless life, just loving other grass-people.  However, we can trust God and offer it up as an offering of worship unto Him.  We have truly born the grass image of Adam, but we shall also bear the image of Jesus, which is anything but grass!

Peter reminds them at the end of verse 25 that this is what they have received, the Living, Enduring Word of the Lord!  This really is the only thing we have to offer people.  My ideas, my thoughts, are here today and gone tomorrow.  But, when we proclaim the Word of the Lord to people, we give them something that will never fail them!  It is this Life of God that should drive our ability to fervently love one another from the heart as Jesus has commanded us.

Long for the pure milk of the word like newborn babies (v. 2:1-3)

A spiritual person needs to live upon spiritual food.  The Scriptures are our spiritual food because they speak of Christ and are from him.  To read and to embrace the Scriptures is to embrace Jesus Himself.  This spiritual food will enable them to grow.

Peter particularly speaks to them as newborn babies.  Many Gentiles were completely unfamiliar with the Word of God.  When they believed in Jesus, there were many things they did not understand and in fact were too hard for them to understand quickly.  Easier to understand things from God are like spiritual milk.  Newborns exist only on a diet of milk because their stomach is not able to digest more complex foods.

So, what are these easier to digest things of God’s Word?  In short, the Gospel itself is based upon an elementary understanding of God’s Word.  The Creator of humanity loves us.  Our sin has separated us from Him and brought about the pain and suffering we see.  He has sent Jesus to remove that separation and bring us back into a loving relationship with the Creator.  We need to share this good news with others.

Of course, there are things that are harder to digest, or understand.  In 1 Corinthians 3:1-3, Paul expected the Corinthians to be able to eat “solid food” by now.  Though Peter does not address solid food, we might ask ourselves this question.  How do spiritual babies get to a place where they can eat meat?  They do so through a steady diet of milk.  Peter is reminding them to desire the milk of the word, not so that they will remain in that state, but so that they will grow spiritually.  Believers are called to long, to yearn, for the pure milk of the word.

For what are we hungering?  A believer may start out hungering for the milk, but then other things that are not spiritual food draw our attention.  A new believer can become distracted by harder to digest truths that they are not ready to eat, but they can also become distracted by unspiritual food, the philosophies of this world etc. 

Here is another question.  Do adults still drink milk?  Of course, they do.  However, they will not be able to do adult work on a diet of milk.  As you grow spiritually, you are going to need to grow in understanding the Word of God.  This will take time, but it will also take intentionality and focus.  Make sure you are hungering for God’s Word at the appropriate level and not going after supplements that come from the devil, the world, and our flesh.

This spiritual growth is mentioned in verse 2 (“so that by it you may grow in respect to salvation”).  Babies take on the image of the ones by whom they were born.  We ought to take on the image of Jesus more and more.  We should be taking more and more possession of our soul as an inheritance given to us by God.  Our discipleship in this life is important, even though we have a greater inheritance in the age to come.

A person who is listening to the Word of God and being led by the Holy Spirit will grow in becoming more like Jesus.  This is not without difficulty and spiritual battle, but it is the work Christ is committed to doing within us.

Peter lists up front (vs. 1) some of the negative things that we need to battle against within our hearts.  These things not only get in the way of doing everything Peter has commanded so far, but they also get in the way of our desire for the Word of God.

We need to put aside all malice.  This is a general term for any ill-will (literally bad will) that we might have for others.

We need to put aside all deceit.  This is the type of activity that the devil employed against Eve in the garden.  Deceit has an ulterior motive underneath a nice-looking veneer.

We need to put aside hypocrisy, which is putting on an act rather than being sincere.

We need to put aside envy, which is often a source of hypocrisy and deceit.  We envy others when we desire what they have more than what God has for us.  There is nothing wrong in desiring something, but it becomes an idol when we sacrifice relationship with God in order to get it.

He ends with telling us to put aside all slander.  This word is more general than how we use it.  It simply means to speak evil of another person.

These are the things that we need to put aside or take off like filthy clothes.  We saw this language in our study of the Letter to the Colossian Church.  When these things fill our heart, we will not long for the word.  We need to take hold of them and expel them from our heart, but we also dare not let ourselves act upon their leading.

If my heart is not longing for the Word of God, then the response is to start cleaning while asking God for help.  None of us can do these things without the help of the Holy Spirit.

In verse three of chapter two, Peter says, “If you have tasted the kindness of the Lord.”  I don’t think Peter is questioning whether they have “tasted the kindness of the Lord.”  He knew that the Gospel had drawn them into putting their faith in Jesus.  They had even believed in the face of difficulty and persecution, which supports the reality of their faith.  Peter is actually reminding them or challenging them to remember.  Don’t let yourself be sidetracked from the original drawing to the Lord that you had.

To taste something requires you to take it into yourself.  It is one thing to know about apples, but it is quite another thing to eat one.  Taste is about intimate knowledge.  Of course, Peter is talking about spiritual things.  To taste the kindness of the Lord is to hear about it and then to take it into yourself by putting your faith in it, in Jesus.

The idea of tasting the nature of the Lord comes from Psalm 34:8. There, the psalmist refers to the “goodness of the Lord.”  When we trust the Lord, we will no longer only know about Him.   We will come to have the knowledge of experience.  Yes, there are bitter-sweet things that we experience in the Lord, but the Lord works them to the good for those who trust in Him!

God doesn’t just want us to know about Him.  He wants us to know the goodness, the kindness, that He desires to lavish upon us.  He wants us to experience His love by faith.

How does this relate to these mostly Gentile Christians?  God had cast off the Gentiles and handed them over to the false gods that they worshipped.  Yet, now, He was drawing them near to Him like children to a Heavenly Father.  We might accuse God of not being kind when He cast them off (us off), but then, we didn’t experience the wickedness and evil that was happening because of a rejection of His wisdom.

God is good even when He lets us go into the results of our choices.  Even in His judgment, He is bringing us to a place where repentance is possible.  His grace is without bounds, but it will not believe for us.  We must believe for ourselves.  The Word of God helps us to do this.

New Spiritual People 3 audio

The First Letter of Peter- 3

Subtitle: The Joy of Our Salvation- part 2

1 Peter 1:8-12.  This sermon was preached by Pastor Marty Bonner on Sunday, November 30, 2025.

We continue in this letter as Peter has described the great salvation and inheritance that we have through Jesus.  Not only should it cause us to rejoice, but it should also stir up a love for Jesus that is wrapped up in our faith in him.

Let’s look at our passage.

Praise to God for His salvation (v. 8-9)

Peter had just described that they were rejoicing in this salvation in the midst of trials and tests.  They were able to do that because they had faith in God.  Verse 8 commends them for the way their faith led to a love of Christ. 

This is done by placing two statements in a parallel construction.  The first statement is this.  You love him even though you haven’t seen him.  The second is similar.  You believe in him though you do not see him now.  This brings up the issue of our faith and its relationship to what has happened in the past and what is happening in the present.

The majority of those embracing Jesus Christ in the first century did not see his ministry, death, and post resurrection appearances.  Yet, they had come to love the Lord Jesus regardless.

Of course, Peter had seen Jesus in all of these aspects.  He had further seen Jesus glorified on the Mount of Transfiguration and ascending into heaven later.  Peter’s love for Jesus was deep and involved a past relationship with Jesus.  However, these people (like everyone who believes today) did not have that. 

How can you love someone that you have never seen?  It starts with receiving the knowledge that Jesus had done something for you that is both great and unthinkable in its quantity and quality.  To hear that someone laid down their life for you so that you can live is a shocking understanding.  Of course, it will be based upon the faith you have in the trustworthiness of those telling you about him.  Men like Peter, Paul, James, John, and the others more than proved their trustworthiness.  In the face of threats, imprisonments, and even death, they held fast to the testimony of the teachings and resurrection of Jesus.  On top of this, the Holy Spirit did great signs and wonders through them which brings up another side of faith.  The work of the Holy Spirit in the hearts of people helps them to both understand and embrace Jesus in faith.  Of course, this is not a coercion, but an influence that we can embrace or reject.

This is what Jesus was talking about in Matthew 16.  Peter had declared that he believed Jesus was the Christ, the Son of the living God.  Peter didn’t know the fullness of what those words meant, but he did believe.  Jesus commended him but notice what he says.  “Blessed are you, Simon Barjona, because flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but My Father who is in heaven.”  Jesus did not teach his disciples that he was the Messiah.  Rather, he did the works of Messiah and let the Spirit of God teach them.  Yes, they had seen Jesus, but in the end, they were putting their faith in what the Spirit of God was revealing to them.  To see Jesus or not to have seen Jesus is not what is crucial.  What is crucial is that we respond in faith to the evidence that is put before us by God.

Jesus knew that the majority of Christians throughout history would be in the position of believing in something they didn’t see.  The atheist believes that this is preposterous.  Yet, we believe in all kinds of things that we have never seen for ourselves.  It is how we are designed as human beings who don’t and can’t know everything.  Those who believe, without having the benefit of what Peter had seen, would be and are blessed even more.  This is why Peter is commending them.  Their faith in what Jesus had done led them to love him.

Yet, they cannot see what Jesus is presently doing for them.  Scripture tells us that he is seated at the right hand of the Father awaiting the command to take up the kingdoms of the earth.  Yet, he also intercedes on our behalf and sends forth the Holy Spirit for our enabling.  Technically, no one can see this naturally.  Stephen was given a vision of this, but he was being put to death.  Peter did see Jesus ascend into heaven and disappear out of his sight.  So again, believers through the ages have put their faith in a past and present work of Jesus, though they have not seen and do not see it for themselves.  They both believe in Jesus and love him.

I will say that, though we cannot see Jesus interceding and pouring out the Holy Spirit, we can see the effects of this through many powerful demonstrations of the grace of God, both in our life and in the testimony of countless believers through the centuries.

How can you say, no, to such a love?  How can we not reciprocate the love that God has lavished upon us through Jesus with our own hearts full of love for him?  We love Christ not just for what he has given us and will give us.  We love him because his heart is such that he not only gives us things, but he has ultimately given us himself.  His heart of salvation, that refuses to leave us in bondage to sin, was more than willing to pay an enormous price for us.  His greatest gift to us is a relationship of love that we can have with Him!

Verse 8 then describes that they greatly rejoiced with a joy inexpressible and full of glory.  How can one rejoice in the midst of trials?  Faith helps us to see what is on the other side of the trials.

How can it be said that our rejoicing is inexpressible and full of glory?  The glory is that which God attaches to our salvation by His grace.  It is the same glory of Christ who endured the ugliness of this world for our sakes and for the sake of the Father.  When he is revealed to the Lord in all of his glory, we will be at his side in glory as well.  We have nothing but glory ahead of us.  Though this world may heap shame and dishonor upon us, it is to our glory to carry that mocking, ridicule, and even persecution, as he did.  We walk the way of the cross by putting our feet into the footsteps of our loving Lord.  Even if we have the absolute worst experience and have been dealt the absolute worst hand in this life, none of that should matter to us.  What matters to us is what we do with it.  We must pick up our cross, our difficult lot in life, and carry it to the end for Jesus!

The joy of bonding with Jesus in his sufferings followed by glory is described as inexpressible not because we cannot attempt to describe it.  It is simply because our words fall short of the full reality and our vocabulary falls short of the description worthy of his love.  However, it is also because we do not know all the wonderful and good things that God has for us.  “Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man the things which God has prepared for those who love Him.”  (1 Corinthians 2:9). 

Of course, the goodness of God is not just something that is off in the future.  His work in our lives throughout this wilderness is filled with His love, grace, help, and more.  How great our rejoicing will be when we understand all that God has done, is doing, and even yet will do in demonstrating His love for us!

Verse 9 then speaks of the salvation of our souls that we receive as an outcome of our faith.  This is pictured as something that is happening now.  It is not that God is miserly giving us a small portion of salvation over time.  Rather, it is what we spoke about several sermons ago.  Salvation can be seen as something we receive instantaneously at our initial faith in Christ.  It is like a status: we are a person who has entered into God’s salvation.  It can also be seen in the sense that God gives us title to it.  It belongs to us and no one can take it away.

Yet, salvation can also be seen as something that God is doing in us throughout our life.  He is saving us from our past life of sin and our present temptations to sin.  We should think of salvation in this sense as a kind of healing.  The spiritual hurts and wounds of the past take time to be healed.  God uses this life, its trials and tests, to help us heal spiritually.  In that sense, we are daily obtaining the salvation of Christ in our life as we put our faith in him, his word, and the leading of the Holy Spirit.

Of course, salvation does have a completed sense that is in our future.  At death, my soul will be completely healed and saved from sin, and at the resurrection, by body will be completely healed and saved from sin.  I will see Jesus and know him because I will be like him!  All of this because we are trusting Jesus.

May God strengthen our faith.  May we also guard our hearts and be careful that our faith in Christ is not shipwrecked during these trying times.

Praise to God for His salvation (v. 10-12)

Peter takes some time to remind them of the grace of God that we are receiving in these days of Messiah.  In other words, let’s talk about this salvation that you have obtained!

This salvation that we are experiencing is the same salvation that the prophets of the Old Testament sought to understand.  They knew that God promised salvation to those who trusted in Him.  This was in the face of the failure of humanity as a whole from Adam to Abraham and the failure of Israel as a special nation to God.  They were curious in every generation about this salvation.  Thus, they searched the Scriptures that they had at the time, looking for any clues that would give understanding about the salvation of God.  They also inquired of God in prayer about this Messiah. 

Peter describes two questions that they were seeking to have explained.  The first had to do with what person, or manner of person, would be Messiah.  What would he be like?  How will we know him?  What exactly will he do?  And the question would go on and on.  The second question had to do with the timing.  The word for time that Peter uses is not so much about chronology as it is about seasons.  Winter, Spring, Summer and Fall, do follow a clock-like chronology, but they also have a purpose that is for something greater than a particular amount of time.  There is a quality to those periods of time.  Similarly, God has seasons in His dealings with humanity.  Yes, He would save humanity, but it would be done in seasons, seasons that had particular purpose known to God.

These prophets sought to understand the greater arc of God’s purposes through time.  This would help them to understand why Messiah’s coming was so delayed, but also to recognize when his coming was close.

Over time, God revealed a little here and a little there.  Progressively over the generations, from Genesis 3 to Malachi 4, God revealed to them some answers to these questions.  Notice that Peter describes it as the “Spirit of Christ within them.”  The summation of all this revelation is that Messiah would first suffer and then his glories would follow.  Messiah would not just come to be great and make others suffer.  Rather, he comes to reject the things that we think are glorious.  He then ingloriously dies on our behalf, showing us the way.  God’s glory is not like our glory, and if we want to be glorified, we will be quick to jettison the desire for “our glory.”  Our glory is focused on self and does not care for others except for the ways that they can accentuate our glory.  God’s glory is about saving others out of shame and humility and bringing them back into the glory that He made for them.

Now is not the time for us to seek glory.  Now is the time for us to join our lord in his path of suffering, not for suffering’s sake, but for the saving of others who are trapped in sin.  We too have an allotment of suffering before our day of glory.

And yet, this life is not all suffering.  We enjoy God’s goodness in so many ways, but particularly in the fellowship we have with Him and fellow believers.  Even after being beaten and put in the stocks, Paul and Silas lifted their voices in songs of praise to God. How could they do this?  They could do this because they saw the smile of their Lord Jesus and the inheritance that he held securely for them.  They could do this because they knew they were not at the mercy of the magistrates of Philippi, nor a jailer and his guards.  They were at the mercy and steadfast love of God Himself!

So, Peter tells us that the prophets recognized that God was showing them things that they would not see in their time.  Instead, they wrote them down for the generation that would witness and follow the days of Messiah.  They lived faithfully not knowing fully the details of Messiah.  They lived by faith in the Coming Messiah though they did not see him or know fully what he would be and do.  This, of course, is similar in every age, even ours. 

Peter connects these believers to that long chain of the glories of Messiah Jesus which are only continuing today.  He connects them to the glories of the revelation of Jesus that will occur at his second coming.  These are the things that were announced to them by people like Peter who came preaching the Gospel of Jesus.  This was all through the work of the Holy Spirit sent from heaven.

Peter even adds that these are things that even angels are curious to know.  Notice that he puts that curiosity in the present tense.  Angels are not omniscient, though they surely know much more than we do.  Of course, the devil would have a vested interest in figuring out exactly what God is going to do and when, but I believe Peter is talking about the faithful angels, just as he had been talking about the faithful prophets.  These angels don’t understand everything about God’s purposes, but they do their work on God’s behalf ministering to humans who are being saved.  All of the faithful, in heaven and on earth, seek to find these things out.

This brings us to a great section regarding how we are to respond to such great salvation.  Yes, we respond in faith, but Peter is going to get into specifics.

Let me just close by challenging you.  Don’t let the enemy get into your head when you can’t figure out what God is doing.  The devil wants to undermine, to destroy, to steal your faith.  However, God is building your faith and making it a strong bulwark that the enemy cannot breakdown. 

Why does God require so much faith?  Perhaps, it is because He wants us to have the joy of discovery.  We have had much revealed to us about what the future holds, but we have not been given an exhaustive understanding.  It is enough for us to know that God is with us, helping us, and bringing us to a good thing that is better than what we can do for ourselves.  If God be for us, who can be against us?  Or, even better, what does it matter who is standing against us?  We can have the same joy that David had on that day that he grabbed the stones by faith and went out against Goliath.  What are you doing today, Lord!  Let’s go find out!

Joy of our Salvation audio 2