That We Might Follow His Example | Andrea Heck

Well, many years ago, one of my brothers came home from work quite frustrated by what he perceived to be unjust treatment and unreasonable expectations by his employer. So he asked my dad, my dad was an elder in our church at the time. So he asked my dad to help him find all the verses in the Bible about servants and masters so he could go to his boss who was a member of our church and prove to his boss that he was sinning and how he was treating his employees. So my dad listened and then he agreed to help my brother. So the two of them sat down with a Bible and they went verse after verse, all the verses my dad could think of related to this situation. My dad wisely did not offer any commentary. He just simply took my brother to the word of God and let the word of God do the talking. He didn't instruct. He didn't admonish. He simply let the word of God speak. Well, it wasn't long before my brother came to realize that the word of God has much more to say to servants or employees in our context than it does to masters or employers. And it isn't that God's word is silent about what God expects of masters. It's that God is much more concerned that his people live in a manner that is consistent with the example of Christ who was our suffering servant. And because the vast majority of people work under some kind of superior, the vast majority of the scriptures that are related to the workplace are addressed to servants, to those who are serving under the authority of another. Our culture operates in a very different way than say ancient Roman culture did. Um, and yet the principles that we find within God's word that are related to the workplace transcend cultural differences of all kinds. And while our culture prizes individual rights and urges us to do everything in our power to demand those rights, the Bible actually paints a very different picture of what a Christian employee is to live like and how he relates to his superiors. The scriptures give us ample instruction on how we ought to conduct ourselves in the workplace, but they also set before us the example of our Lord Jesus Christ in submitting to earthly authorities. And the passage that we're going to look at in this session is specifically written to servants in regard to how they relate to their masters in the workplace. It's specifically related. It's specifically written to servants in a Roman culture. But the principles that we find contained in these verses apply equally in any context in which you and I find ourselves operating under the authority of another. Whether that's our parents, whether it's our husbands, our employers, our church elders, it doesn't really matter what the authority is. These scriptures show us what it means to follow the example of our Lord Jesus Christ. They show us what it means to willingly submit because they show us how Jesus willingly submitted himself to the will of the father. How he endured unjust treatment at the hands of earthly authorities without sinning. And how he entrusted himself to the one who would someday judge those earthly authorities with righteousness. So, we're going to find ourselves in 1 Peter chapter 2 looking at verses 18- 25. Let me read those verses for us. Peter says, "Servants, be subject to your masters with all fear, not only to those who are good and considerate, but also to those who are crooked. For this finds favor if for the sake of conscience toward God a person bears up under sorrows when suffering unrighteously. For what credit is there if when you sin and are harshly treated, you endure? But if when you do good and suffer for it, you endure, this finds favor with God. For to this you have been called since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example that you should follow in his steps. who did no sin, nor was any deceit found in his mouth. Who being reviled was not reviling in return. While suffering, he was uttering no threats, but kept entrusting himself to him who judges righteously, who himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that having died to sin, we might live to righteousness. By his wounds, you were healed. for you were continually straying like sheep, but now you have returned to the shepherd and overseer of your souls. In this passage, we will have four parts that we will consider. The first, and you should have these in your um your program, the command we must obey in verse 18, the commenation we receive in verses 19 and 20, the calling we must embrace in verse 21, and Christ's example we must follow in verses 23- 25. So, it will be helpful for us to consider the context in which these verses are placed. Back in verse 13 of this very chapter, just a few verses before our verses we're looking at this morning, Peter said, "Be subject for the sake of the Lord to every human institution." That is the overarching command that is governing this entire section of Peter's first letter. This section deals primarily with submission or being subject to authorities. And this section of his letter actually begins in chapter 2 verse 13 and extends all the way through chapter 3:12. And Peter addresses various different spheres of life in which we need to submit to earthly authorities. And so this is the command that governs this section. Be subject for the sake of the Lord to every human institution. And immediately after giving us that command in the verses 13 through uh 17, Peter um commands us to submit to the governing authorities, the civil authorities if you will. That's the first sphere of life in which Peter says that we are to submit or make ourselves subject to. In this section verses beginning in verse um 18 and going all the way through verse 25, Peter moves on to another sphere of life in which we are to submit by saying servants be subject to your masters with all fear. Now the word that Peter uses here servants is a term that can be used in a couple of different ways. It can very strictly refer to household servants. It's actually a different word than the word slave. Most of Paul's letters, he uses the word slave or bondervant. This is actually a different word that Peter uses here. A slave is one completely owned by his master. No rights whatsoever. A servant is more like what we would think of as an employee. They work for a wage. But the word servant, this particular Greek word can also be used as an overarching like category that includes both slaves and servants. Peter is probably using it in that broad sense to refer to anyone who is employed by another. So slaves in the truest sense, but also servants in that sense. So this category um of people slaves and servants um in within Roman culture would have been probably the majority of the population. So Peter's audience most of them if not all of them are going to fall within this category of servants. Okay? So he's already told them you have to submit to the government. Now he's saying you have to submit to your masters. And they're all paying attention at this point because that's nearly all of them if not all of them. What the master called for Peter is saying a servant is required to do. You subject yourself to your master. Now because these servants would have been serving within the households of their masters, they would have been in constant contact with their masters and their families. very little space, very little respit, no personal space, no me time. This would have been the majority of Peter's audience. And since the majority of the population of the Roman Empire consisted of servants and slaves, it is fair to assume that the majority of Peter's audience is servants or slaves. In our particular cultural context, we don't have servants and slaves in the same way that Roman culture did. But the principles that are laid out here do apply equally in our context. We can't say that a servant or slave is the same as an employee. But the principles laid out for servants and slaves are the same as they are for employees. We have some freedoms that servants and slaves did not have. But Peter is still saying be subject to your masters. That is be submissive to them. To be subject or to be submissive, your translation might say, is to arrange oneself in an orderly manner under the authority of another. Now, you could look at this scenario and you could think that these servants, well, they don't really have a choice, right? I mean, they just have to do it. I mean, they're essentially the property for slaves. They were the property of their masters. And these masters were in Roman culture given almost complete freedom to treat their servants however they wanted. This term master, it means one who has actual ownership and uncontrolled power, especially over slaves. Masters were just free to do whatever they wanted. We have labor laws in our country. No such thing existed in Roman culture. And so really, if you think about it, that is the very reason that Paul often referred to himself as a slave of Christ. He used that term because he understood Christ to have complete and total ownership of him and authority over him. It's an appropriate word to describe a believer, a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ. We are his slaves. So Peter is saying here you you put yourselves in an attitude of submission. You subject yourself to your masters. They might have earthly authority. You might not have any earthly rights, but you still have control over your attitude. You have control over your choices. You have the responsibility to put yourself in that place of submission rather than having it forced upon you. In fact, he says that we're supposed to do this with all fear, which is really the meaning. It has the meaning of respect. Right? Back in verse 17, just before this section that we're looking at, Peter told us that we are to fear God and treat all people with honor. That would include our earthly masters. No exceptions. All people. If you think about it, proper fear of God is going to drive us to treat all people with respect, including the kind of respect that is due to those who are in authority over us, whether it's in the workplace or anywhere else. But Peter is also realistic here, right? He knows that not all masters are easy to submit to, to be respectful toward. He he understands that. And so he clarifies this statement by saying not only to those who are good and considerate, but also to those who are crooked. He's contrasting those who are good in character, who are reasonable and fair and just, who treat their servants with gentleness with those who are wicked or cruel. This term crooked, it comes from the Greek word from which we get our English word scoliosis, right? a crooked spine. We understand that, right? Your translation here, it might use the word harsh. Um, and while it may may be true that a crooked master is harsh, that's really not the idea that's being communicated here. The term really means crooked, contrary, obstinate. And of course in English, right, to call someone crooked is to imply that they are unjust, deceitful, wicked, perverse. We understand that, right? We call people crooked. And Peter is saying, you have to submit respectfully to these masters, both the good ones and the crooked ones. Now, this is the point in his letter when the objections would begin to be freely coming his way, right? Like, uh, Peter, you got to be kidding me. No way. I'm free in Christ. Why do I have to submit to crooked masters? Submitting to good and gentle masters is easy. Submitting to crooked ones is incredibly difficult. And yet in reality, our willingness to submit isn't tested under the authority of good masters. It's not tested under gentle and kind and compassionate employers. Our willingness to submit is tested under the treatment of harsh employers, crooked employers. It's tested when everything in us feels the weight of our employers injustice. And that's Peter's point when he gets to verse 19. He's given us the command that we have to obey in verse 18. And now he gives us the commenation we will receive if we obey this command. He says, "For this finds favor if for the sake of conscience toward God a person bears up under sorrows when suffering unrighteously." The challenge of maintaining respectful submission to earthly masters in the face of unjust treatment, Peter says, brings us the commenation of God. Where the LSB, this is that's the translation I'm working. It says finds favor. Your translation might say something like it is a gracious thing or this is commendable. It's the idea of earning the commenation of someone of finding favor in their sight. And so Peter is saying here that to respectfully submit to these crooked masters is to find favor or to bring about the commenation of God. Obedience to God always results in finding favor with him, but especially so in the context of difficult circumstances. We actually talked about this yesterday, right, when we spoke about the praise and the honor we will receive if we faithfully carry out our responsibilities as followers of the Lord Jesus Christ. Our motivation ought to be pleasing God, literally finding favor in his eyes. We ought not to concern oursel with the way our fellow employees think of us or how our masters think of us. We ought to concern ourselves only with what God thinks of us and of our conduct in the workplace. But as Peter makes clear here, this is commendable only only if we bear up under this harsh treatment in a patient and God-honoring way. He puts it this way. If for the sake of conscience toward God, a person bears up under sorrows when suffering unrighteously. To bear up under sorrows is to endure it or to persevere under the weight of it. Think of holding up a heavy burden on your back. Peter clarifies that these sorrows, they aren't just the sorrows of life. They're the unjust treatment that we receive at the hands of cruel masters. In this case, he calls it suffering unrighteously. And Peter says, "We find favor with God when we patiently bear up under this unjust treatment specifically because of conscience toward God." The ESV translates that as when mindful of God. Right? Such suffering is only commendable if it is endured because of one's conscience, one's mindful, reverent fear of God that has led them to behave as they have. One pastor puts it this way. He says it should be of little consequence to believers what their circumstances are in the workplace. Whether they are chief executive officers or custodians, whether they receive a sub substantial pay raise or settle for a salary cut so the company can stay solvent. The factor of overarching significance is that they maintain their testimony before the watching world of sinners. And in the workplace, that occurs when believers labor with an awareness of God's glory. A constant awareness not only of God's presence, but also of his sovereign control over the affairs of our lives leads us not only to fear him, but also to remain steadfast and patient under trying circumstances. We actually see this demonstrated in the life of Joseph, right? back in Genesis, he endured cruel treatment at the hands of his brothers and then of course over the years, you know, as he was falsely accused of things. But in Genesis 50, when Joseph is answering his brothers regarding how they had once treated him, he says to them, "As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good. in order to do what has happened on this day to keep many people alive. God is actively controlling our circumstances, including the harsh treatment of crooked masters. And he's actively using those circumstances to bring about his purposes in the world and in our individual lives, making us more and more like Jesus. and also using our testimony to bring others to himself. But Peter helpfully cautions us here. He says, "There is no credit if when you sin and are harshly treated, you endure." It will not bring us the commenation of God to endure the discipline of our employers, if it comes about because of our misconduct or our irresponsibility. In Peter's day, that would have come about by a servant literally being beaten for his faults. Some translations render it this way, being when you are uh my translation says harshly treated. Yours might say when you're beaten for your faults. In Peter's day, masters were at liberty to beat their servants who failed to do what they were called to do. They could beat them even if they did the right thing. It is not going to earn you and me the praise of men if we fail in our responsibilities or we willfully refuse to do our responsibilities and then patiently endure disciplinary action leveled against us. This sentence here is a rhetorical question really. I mean even pagans understand that there isn't any commenation in getting what we deserve. If we do not conduct ourselves as our employers require of us, then the consequences that come about as a result of our failures are justified and expected. But Peter goes on to say, "But if when you do good and suffer for it, you endure, this finds favor with God." If we are doing what is expected of us, if we are maintaining a Christlike testimony before our masters and before our co-workers, and if we endure the sorrow of unjust treatment, whether specifically because of our doing good or simply because our master is just crooked, patiently enduring that kind of treatment is commendable before God. It finds favor with him. Now to endure means to abide under. One commentator says it depicts a patience that grows under trials and testings. This means not giving into the temptations that come with our suffering. Not giving in to the temptations that come in our suffering. 1 Corinthians 10:13 and 14 specifically addresses this. We read there that no temptation has overtaken you, but such as is common to man. But God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide a way of escape also, so that you will be able to endure it. Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry. This word temptation, it's the same word we talked about yesterday that can be translated as test or trial or temptation. Every trial, including the unjust treatment by our workplace superiors, is an occasion for temptation on one hand and obedience on the other. This Greek word, right, can be translated in all those ways because they're all sides of the same coin. They're really the same thing. There's no temptation. There's no trial. There's no test that we face that is not common to man. Oh, it might not be that every single person has endured exactly the same kind of test. But broadly speaking, yes, we all have and lots and lots of people have experienced what we have experienced. Every single temptation that you and I face has with it by God's sovereign design a way of escape that we might be able to endure the temptation and come through it without sinning. And Paul specifically tells us in this first Corinthians passage what that way of escape is. He says, "Flee idolatry. Flee the temptation to put yourself on the throne. Flee the temptation to insist on your own way, your personal rights, your selfish desires. Those are the temptations that come when we are harshly treated in the workplace. But this enduring, this abiding under, it also means not only that we flee that temptation, but that we also persevere through this kind of treatment without grumbling or disputing, without murmuring or complaining as Philippians 2:14 commands us. We ought to refrain from grum grumbling about our bosses. I know we all go home and we think, "Oh, it's okay to grumble to my spouse about my boss." We are to do all things without grumbling or complaining. And that is not respectful treatment of our bosses. The command doesn't say, "Don't complain about anything except your boss or except your company." It says all things. All things. And Peter's telling us this kind of response finds favor with God. But all of this really begs the question, why does it find favor with God? Why suffer patiently? What is the purpose? Why would God command this? Well, Peter says in verse 21 that we have been called to this. This is the calling that we must embrace. He says in verse 21, "For to this you have been called since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example that you should follow in his steps." This is our calling. This patient endurance of unjust treatment is what we've been called to. This term called, it's used lots of places in the New Testament and it is used to speak of our call to salvation. The scriptures over and over again speak of salvation as a calling from God. But that calling isn't only a call to be saved from our sins. It is also at the exact same time a call to follow after Christ, to submit to his rule over our lives, to walk just as he walked. In Luke 9:23, Jesus said, "If anyone wishes to come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me." And then in Philippians 2, which tells us that we are to have the mindset of Christ in considering others more important than ourselves and in putting their interests before our own. It tells us that Jesus humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. The call to salvation is a call to die to self, to willingly suffer on behalf of Christ in his name and for his cause. Paul told Timothy, we talked about this last night in 2 Timothy 3:12, that all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. This unjust treatment should not surprise us. It's part of following Christ. Several years ago, I had a conversation with one of my boys. This was prior to him. He was wrestling with the gospel at this point. And he said, "I know that choosing to become a Christian will mean that some people won't like me. And I am scared of what that will mean. When I was in college, I spent a summer in Ethiopia on a missions trip and met a young Ethiopian man who um our bus driver was a was a believer. And this young man was his helper. And he was explaining to us that this young man, he believed the truths of the gospel. But because he knew that embracing Christ would mean that he would be shunned by his family, he refused to convert. who's simply unwilling to lose his family for the cause of Christ. This call to salvation, this call to die to self is a serious one. It's a costly call. It's a call to suffering if we're really honest. And it's true, not all of us are going to suffer all the time or all to the same extent, but at some point and to some degree, all genuine followers of the Lord Jesus Christ will suffer persecution for their faith. But Peter tells us that we should do so because Christ has suffered for us, leaving us an example that we should follow in his steps. And when Peter says that Christ suffered for us, he means that Christ suffered in our place or in ourstead. His suffering, his death on the cross, provided for our redemption. He acted as our substitute on the cross. He took our sins and he bore their penalty in our place. Theologians call this substitutionary atonement. By his substitutionary death, dying as our substitute, Jesus satisfied the wrath of a just God and thereby reconciled us to God, making us at one with him. Did you know the word atonement means at onement? It makes us at peace with him. reconciles us to him. Jesus did this as our substitute. But he also did this, Peter says, leaving us an example that we should follow in his steps. Our suffering doesn't provide any kind of atonement. We don't suffer in anyone'sstead. We don't suffer in our ownstead. But our suffering does parallel Christ's in this way. Jesus suffered at the hands of unjust men. And believers, followers of the Lord Jesus Christ, acting uprightly and without sinning, also often suffer at the hands of unjust men. And so Jesus's suffering then gives us a model for how we ought to respond to unjust suffering. This word example, it's important for us to understand. One commentator helpfully explains. He says it literally means to write under and it carries the idea of handwriting to be copied by a school boy. The copy head was placed upon the child's exercise for the child to imitate including all the letters of the alphabet. Think tracing letters in primary school. Those of you who have homeschooled your children or taught in a classroom, you know what this is like, right? You're teaching children to form those letters. They're tracing them, right? He says the the same commentary commentator says here the references to Christ. He is the pattern which the Christian is to reproduce in every stroke of every letter until his handwriting is like that of the masters. To follow in his steps literally means to follow close upon and it literally means to follow as closely behind someone as possible. When your children were little, did they ever walk right behind you stepping on your heels? That's kind of the idea. So this phrase in his steps, one definition says it refers to the footprints left in the soil or to a trail caused by such impressions. It is the trace left by someone's conduct or journey through life. A trail for others to follow. Where I grew up in the foothills of the mountains, we often were up playing in the snow. I know you guys probably don't get a lot of snow here in Florida, but often when the snow is very, very deep and you are trapesing through the snow, you will try to put your foot right where someone else's foot was because it's easier than blazing a new path through the snow. That's the idea here. Putting your foot exactly where Jesus's foot went. So Jesus's example of patiently enduring wrongful treatment is the pattern that we are to copy in as exact a way as is possible. It is the footprints left for us that we are to place our very own feet in. This is what it means to be a Christian to pattern ourselves after to follow in the footsteps of Jesus. And Peter lays out this example for us in verses 22 through 25. Christ's example that we must follow. Now, in these next several verses, Peter is borrowing on the language of Isaiah 53, a chapter that is affectionately known to us as the suffering servant passage. And he's using these illusions to focus our attention on the specific ways that Christ has set this example for us. He says that Christ did no sin nor was any deceit found in his mouth. That is Jesus was perfectly righteous without sin of any kind in thought, word or deed. And while we certainly will never be able in this life to be without sin of any kind, we can by the spirit's enabling aim to live in holiness and righteousness before God and before others. And in this context, specifically those who are in any kind of position of authority over us, Jesus is our example of living in righteousness and yet still suffering. He is our example of not only not sinning prior to his suffering, but also not sinning in the midst of his suffering. And how did he do this? Well, Peter tells us in verse 23, he says of Jesus, who being reviled was not reviling in return. While suffering, he was uttering no threats. To revile is to heap abuse on someone. It is literally railing against them. So, while others did this repeatedly to Jesus, it was his continual practice not to revile in return. The sovereign Lord of the universe had every right to call down judgment on his revilers in his holiness. That would have been perfectly justified. But he didn't. He didn't because it was his intent to go to the cross. It was his intent to provide us an example of how we ought to respond to reviling and suffering by showing us what not to do and what to do instead. Rather than responding sinfully and retaliating, Jesus kept entrusting himself to him who judges righteously. This word entrusting, your translation might say committed. He kept committing himself. It means to deliver over something to someone to keep, usually to the handling of a judge. Entrusting something to a judge for safekeeping. And the idea here is that Jesus just kept entrusting himself, kept committing himself to God, the one who judges righteously. Jesus understood that while his abusers had judged him unrighteously, the reality was that God the Father, the righteous judge of all the earth, would someday judge his abusers with perfect justice, perfect righteousness. In Romans 12:1 19, Paul tells us that to ne we are to never take our own revenge, but instead to leave room for the wrath of God because God has said, "Vengeance is mine. I will repay." So like Jesus, you and I have the promise that God is the righteous judge both of our conduct and the conduct of those who treat us unjustly. Whether it is in this life or it is on the day of judgment, someday perfect justice will be fulfilled. And the righteous, those who have put their faith and their trust in the Lord Jesus Christ alone, they will be vindicated and they will enjoy the blessing of God for eternity. And the unrighteous, those who have rejected Christ and rejected his followers, they will finally experience the wrath of God in all of its fullness. In these three ways, Jesus is our example. He suffered without sin. He suffered without retaliation. And he suffered with continual trust in God's perfect justice. But Peter isn't content to simply lay out this example for us without explaining what it is that makes it possible for us to be able to pattern our lives after the example of Christ. He says of Jesus in verse 24, who himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that having died to sin, we might live to righteousness. The purpose for which Jesus bore our sins in his own body was so that we would die to sin and live for righteousness. This phrase having died to sins. One commentator explains that it means having ceased to exist for the sins. He says it speaks of the action of God in breaking the power of the sinful nature in the sinner as he puts his faith in Christ as savior. This phrase to live for righteousness in contrast to that phrase means to live in active obedience to be governed by and driven by righteousness. For those who have put their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, who have submitted themselves to his lordship on the cross, God treated Jesus as if he had lived our life, imputing our sin to him. And having imputed our sin to Jesus, God then imputed to us the righteousness of Christ. He treated us, those who would someday believe in him, as if we had lived Jesus's perfect sinless life of righteousness. 2 Corinthians 5:21 plainly states, "He made him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf so that we might become the righteousness of God in him." God traded our sin for Christ's righteousness, punished our sin in the death of his own son, reconciling us to himself. Jesus's death satisfied the justice of God, allowing you and me to be forgiven and to be given Jesus's own righteousness. God now looks on us as if we had lived Jesus's life. The record of our sins has been done away with. Sin no longer has power over us. And though we remain until we die in these sin tainted bodies and we continue to battle the temptations that our flesh still presents to us, we are no longer under the dominion, the ruling power of sin. We don't have to continue in sin. In fact, because we've been given new life in Christ, we are no longer driven by the desire to sin. We are no longer slaves to sin. Romans 6:es 3-11 say, "Or do you not know that all of us who were baptized into Christ into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? Therefore, we were buried with him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we so we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have become united with him in the likeness of his death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of his resurrection, knowing this, catch this, that our old man was crucified with him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin. For he who has died has been justified from sin. Now, if we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him, knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, is never to die again. Death no longer is master over him. For the death that he died, he died to sin once for all. But the life that he lives, he lives to God. Even so, consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus. Why? Because as Peter says, by his wounds you were healed. What an interesting thing to say. By his wounds you were healed. These servants, these slaves to whom Peter is writing were likely beaten and whipped by their masters. And Peter says to him, "By Jesus's wounds, by his beating and being whipped, you were healed." Jesus's physical wounds have brought about spiritual healing and ultimately someday physical healing for all who put their faith in him. because he endured the wounds inflicted by Roman soldiers on our for our benefit. We can endure the wounds of unjust treatment with hope. Because in a in the in an ultimate and eternal sense, Jesus's wounds have actually served to heal us. Now, lest there be any confusion, allow me to clarify this. Peter is not saying that Jesus's wounds have eradicated all disease among those who put their faith in him. A casual glance around us shows us that disease is still rampant. I mean, look at me, right? I've had a cold all week. I lost my voice. My knees bumped. Like, plenty of disease still rampant. But one one pastor helpfully explains to us what it means that by Jesus's stripes we're healed. He says, "Dise and death cannot be permanently removed until sin is permanently removed." And Jesus's supreme work, therefore, was to conquer sin. In the atonement, he dealt with sin, death, and sickness. And yet, all of those things are still with us. When he died on the cross, Jesus bruised the head of Satan and broke the power of sin. And the person who trusts in the atoning work of Christ is immediately delivered from the penalty of sin and its consequences. The ultimate fulfillment of Christ's redeem redeeming work is yet future for believers. Christ died for men's sins, but Christians still fall into sin. He conquered death, but his followers still die. He overcame pain and sickness, but his people still suffer and become ill. There is physical healing in the atonement just as there is total deliverance from sin and death in the atonement. But we still await the fulfillment of that deliverance in the day when the Lord brings the end of suffering, sin, and death. Jesus's suffering has brought about our spiritual healing. And someday when the one who judges righteously comes to judge the world, his suffering will also bring about our complete physical healing when we get new bodies. Why? Peter says, "For you were continually straying like sheep, but now you have returned to the shepherd and overseer of your souls." You know, when Jesus saw the multitudes, he had compassion on them because they were like sheep without a shepherd. He willingly endured those stripes because he was driven by compassion for our hopeless condition. We were wandering. We were without direction. We were destined for eternal death and separation. and he intentionally, willfully endured the hatred and the reviling and the scorn and the beatings and the scourging and the crucifixion so that we might be reconciled to him. It is that kindness of God that leads us to repentance that causes you and I to stop going in the direction that we're going away from him and to turn around and run hard after him. It is his kindness, his willingness to die for us and then draw us to himself that prompts us to turn to him. And while he is the righteous judge of all the earth for those who love him and enjoy the blessings of his salvation, he is also the shepherd and overseer of our souls. With a tender care, the wise leading of a shepherd and overseer, he has rescued us from ourselves, returned us to himself, carefully and tenderly and authoritatively, feeding and protecting and guiding and nurturing and leading us so that we not only remain in his care, but we thrive in it. He is our shepherd, the overseer of our souls. We can patiently endure unjust treatment. We can entrust ourselves to God because he is our judge and because he's our shepherd and overseer. He is using our suffering to work in us to sanctify us to make us more and more into the image of his son. And he's using our suffering as a testimony to our employers and to our fellow co-workers and to every other authority figure over us. Are you patiently enduring unjust treatment? Are you entrusting yourself to the shepherd and overseer of your souls? Is he your shepherd? Is he your overseer? Are you allowing your suffering to have a sanctifying effect on you? Are you seizing the opportunity to suffer at the hands of others in such a way that it gives testimony to the work of Christ in you? By our conduct and by our speech, we can adorn the doctrine of God, our savior, making him beautiful and winsome before the world. Or we can scorn the doctrine of God our Savior, giving validity to the accusations that get leveled against us. Our conduct before a watching world is tremendously powerful. Our unbelieving co-workers, our unbelieving employers all around us are watching. They're watching to see if we really believe what we say we believe. our children and grandchildren and friends and neighbors. They're all watching how we respond to the way that we are treated. And they are learning by our example what it means to be a Christ follower. And they are either being enticed by our example or they are being repelled by it. What a joy it would be to stand before God in the presence of our former employers, crooked employers, knowing that by our faithful conduct and our willingness to suffer patiently, we had the privilege of being used by God to bring them to faith in Jesus. We are to submit to our earthly masters because in doing so, we present to them a living, breathing picture of Jesus. We are to submit to every kind of authority that the Lord puts over us because we are presenting to them a living, breathing picture of Jesus. This is the lesson that my brother learned all those years ago when he began to search the scriptures that it is both our responsibility and our privilege to present to the world around us the humility and the patience and the forbearance of Jesus. Pray with me. Father, we are so grateful that we have within the pages of your word the example of our savior. We've never seen him. We won't see him till we go to glory. But we love him and we trust him. Our hearts are overflowing with joy in him. And we have in him the example of how we ought to live. You have not left us without ample instruction for how we ought to live before the unbelieving world. Oh Lord, would you help us? Help us to follow your example, to trace the pattern of your life exactly as it is, to follow as closely in your footsteps as is humanly possible. Would you give us grace, Lord? Enable us. We know that on our own we could not do this. And if we're trying on our own, we will fail miserably. But by your grace, by your enabling, we can walk in obedience and we can present to the world a living, breathing picture of Jesus. Oh Lord, help us to follow in our Savior's example. We thank you that you will do these very things that we're asking because of your son. Amen.