Please Click Here For Sermon Video
At the beginning of the Lord’s Prayer we pray “Your kingdom come. Your will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven.” We pray for God’s reign to come to Earth, not the other way around which would be to get us off of Earth into Heaven. Bringing his reign to Earth is what God was up to when God the Son became human as Jesus. He became a sinner just like each of us. That may be hard to hear, but if he didn’t, there is no such thing as salvation. He was a sinner who struggled with it every minute of the day but he did not sin. He lived faithfully, that faithful life that is impossible for us to live no matter how hard we try. He bore sin-filled human being to the cross where it was judged and put to death ONCE and FOR ALL. With his resurrection, human being was changed in that we share in his new human being through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit who is working in and among us, remaking us and helping us to become more like Jesus until he comes and all things are ultimately healed and made new. This is God’s reign coming to Earth, becoming on Earth as it is in Heaven. The followers of Jesus exist as the new amidst the old, the new life of Christ growing amidst the old and dying sin-diseased humanity. Humanity being transformed by the Holy Spirit into the image of Christ on Earth is the Gospel – by grace through fidelity the reign of Christ comes to earth from heaven.
Unfortunately, when the Roman Empire co-opted the Christian faith beginning in the 4th and 5thCenturies, the Holy Roman Empire through the decree of Emperors, Kings, and Popes claimed itself to be the reign of Christ on Earth and thus supplanted the Kingdom of God. The Gospel of new life in Christ ceased to be proclaimed and was replaced by a coercive gospel that told us to be good citizens submissive to the will of Pope, King, and Church or go to Hell instead of Heaven when we die.
With this usurpation came a switch in our understanding of the direction of salvation that plagues the church today. No longer do we envision God’s Kingdom, the Reign of Christ, coming to earth from heaven and ourselves as faithful followers of Jesus playing a crucial role in that. Instead, we are preoccupied with how do I, the individual, get from Earth into Heaven when I die – that’s if we’re preoccupied with questions of faith at all because Western Christians got burned out trying to be faithful in a world where the Church and the State have done and still do horrible things in Jesus name that far outshadow the good we do. The Gospel ceased to be the new life in Christ coming amidst the old and instead became simply a coercive vehicle for escaping the eternal consequences of the old life at the moment of death.
That said, our reading from 1 Peter deals with the practicalities of living the new life in Christ amidst the old sin-diseased life in the hopes of transforming the old. The overarching basic point is that Jesus himself serves as our primary model for how to live the new amidst the old. The effect of the Holy Spirit living in us making us to share in Jesus' new resurrected life is that we now feel a loyalty to him and a compulsion to strive to live as he lived. He lived righteously and he lived honourably, subjecting himself to the powers that be even though they had no power over him, and he suffered sacrificially and died for it. Accordingly, as he suffered for doing good in this sin-distorted world, so will we. In the end this will bring glory to God and perhaps convince a few that God’s reign is coming on Earth as it is in Heaven.
But one needs to be careful, the boundaries that are in place as cultural norms in the community in which we live need to be respected. Disregarding or dismissing them will bring persecution on oneself and the Christian community by being brazen. And so, Peter says at verse thirteen, “For the Lord's sake accept the authority of every human institution.” One view about the ordering of society that is presented in the Bible is that societal authority originates with God as a gift from God for a peaceable society in God’s image. The image of God is a community thing. Marriage, family, government; all these orderings are a gift from God. Living righteously in these orderings should result in a just and peaceable society, but unfortunately, sin has mucked up the way we relate to God and one another, corrupting it totally. Instead of an ordered harmony among people that glorifies God, people use these orderings for the pursuit of their own pleasure and gain.
Peter’s insight into how to live the new life in Christ is that if we each pattern ourselves after Christ’s way of life, the human institutions of order in society should begin to reflect Christ to the glory of God resulting in harmony, justice, and peace in society. Peter sums it up when he says, “have unity of spirit, sympathy, love for one another, a tender heart, and a humble mind” this approach to life by individual Christians is our participation in God’s will to heal the sin-diseased state of human society. Peter addresses civic life and the household here, but for sake of time, I’ll just deal with the household.
In Peter’s day, much like our own, the household was the basic building block of human society. The typical household consisted of a husband and wife, children and household servants. Unfortunately, the way Peter words his thoughts about marriage has largely been misunderstood and misapplied over the centuries. His telling wives to subject themselves to their husbands' authority has unfortunately too often been used for the subjugation of women. But, if you dig a little deeper, you find Peter is saying quite the opposite. He sees men and women as equal in God’s eyes as we are both inheritors of the gracious gift of life and new life in Christ.
The church believes that marriage reflects the relationship between Christ Jesus and the Church. A husband’s authority is like Jesus' authority and is based on the principle that in weakness there is strength. So, a husband is to lay down his life for his wife and family sacrificially serving them in love as Christ served his disciples when he washed their feet. Husbands should listen to and be understanding of their wives, bring honour to them, and not make them feel degraded or ashamed by making them serve his own needs. Peter’s word to wives is for them to like-wise serve her husband.
Peter is not giving us a mandate for spouses to stay in abusive marriages. Marriage is the basic building block of human society. It is a holy institution. Therefore, those who enter into the covenant of marriage are to honour Christ with it, indeed, use it to give testimony to Christ Jesus. When those in marriage carry on as if they were not married, it destroys the basic rubric of human society. Furthermore, it is just as damaging for those not married to behave as if they are. God gave us the bond of marriage to order the relationship between men and women in his creative love. So, we keep it holy for Christ’s sake.
In summary, in, through, and as Jesus Christ by the work of the Holy Spirit God has given the means for humanity to come to a new, healthy, peaceful, and just unity in the image of Christ. We Christians are called to live in this new order known as "in Christ" in the midst of the old until Jesus returns to make it complete. Therefore, pattern your lives after Christ Jesus. Live honourably and honour everyone. “Have unity of spirit, sympathy, love for one another, a tender heart, and a humble mind” especially in your homes. Amen.
