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Well, we are continuing in Peter, and we're going to dive right into the Word of God, 1 Peter chapter 3, and we're going to read from verse 18 to 22. How many are excited about the Word of God? Amen? Yeah. Man, the entrance of your word gives light. And how many know we needed light? We were in the darkness, weren't we? And Jesus came through the word of God and the power of the Holy Spirit, transferred us from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of his light, and now we walk in the light, as he is in the light, and we have fellowship one with another. First Peter chapter 3, verse 18. For Christ also suffered, once for sins, the righteous for the righteous, for the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit, in which he went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison, because they formerly did not obey when God's patience waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through water. Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body, but as an appeal to God for a good conscience through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God, with angels and authorities and powers having been subjected to him. Amen. And Lord, we thank you for your word, and we pray right now that you would bless, bless us, speak to us, let your word shine upon us, save us, redeem us, heal us, and we pray, Lord, that we can see your word and be transformed by your word today. We don't want information, God. We don't need any more information. We need the word of God through the power of the Holy Spirit to transform us and change us from the inside out. And we pray, O Lord, that we not only walk out of here informed, but we'd walk out of here transformed, changed. For all eternity, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen and amen. Life can be overwhelming at times, can't it? And we see as uh we see the day approaching, the Bible says that in the last days there will be people always learning, but never coming to a knowledge of the truth. There'll be people that stick to their narratives and stick to their quote truths without accepting the truth of the gospel or the truth of God's word. Then there are people that the Bible says, because of lawlessness, the love of many will grow cold. There is lawlessness in our society, isn't there? The Bible says that men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, abusive, uh boisterous, they'll be slanderers, they'll be accusers, they won't walk in the love, in the way of the Lord. And Peter is addressing the churches in the area of Turkey, and he's telling them listen, we have to stand for Christ, or else we will surrender to the enemy. Amen. We have to stand for Christ. So Peter was writing to Christians facing persecution, rejection, and suffering. They might not have been uh being put to death at this time, but they were harassed, they were ostracized, they couldn't find work, they were considered outcasts, and that's not a good feeling. We prayed for a little girl that felt that today, didn't we? Ostracized and and uh in outcast. Nobody likes that feeling, but this is what the church was going through with these dispersed believers. They were harassed for their love and trust in Jesus. And friends, let's make no mistake about it. There's coming a day when all of this uh all of this good time rock and roll religious stuff that's happening in our society for good will turn, right? The Bible says that there will be many that will fall away in the end times. We have to know that the trajectory of our faith is going to last through hardship and pain and persecution, and we need to all be able to stand alone in the midst of being ostracized, humiliated, made fun of, persecuted. History tells us that Nero began his merciless persecution, torture, and killing of Christians just nearly probably two years after Peter's letters were written to the churches. Historians tell us that Peter was crucified upside down, possibly only a few months to a year or two after his letters to the churches. So Peter knew what he was writing about. And this is the beauty of God's word. He prepares us ahead of time for what's going to happen through his word. Isn't that true? Peter was crucified upside down because he did not feel like he was worthy to die as his savior. And that's a beautiful, beautiful thing. These folks, these churches that Peter wrote to needed assurance that suffering is not the end of the story. Have you ever felt that there's no way out? What I'm dealing with is going to be with me all the time. There'll never be any change, there'll never be any transformation, there never will be any hope. Today we need that assurance that Jesus is our hope, Jesus is our peace, Jesus is our life, Jesus is our all-sufficient one, and Jesus will see us through. Amen? Through this passage, Peter points them to Christ's journey from suffering to victory, from suffering to glory, and reminds believers that the same God who carried Noah through the flood will carry us. Amen? To be with him, to save us from judgment and wrath, and to be with him forever and ever and ever. Because we are sons and daughters of God, because we are in Christ, our lives are hidden with Christ in God, and that means that we are secure today, friends. You might not feel like it. But man, if you accepted Christ in your heart, you are sealed, branded by the Holy Spirit, and he says, You are mine. Isn't that a wonderful, wonderful feeling today? To have Heavenly Father look at you and say, You are mine. You are loved. You are appreciated. I sent my son to die. Amen. What a great God we serve. He wants uh Peter wants to remind them not to be surprised nor discouraged about suffering and adversity. It will come. It will come. And Peter's offering encouragement to his suffering readers because any suffering they might endure for Christ pales in comparison. Listen to this, pales in comparison to the glory that will be ours when we see Jesus face to face. Amen? What a great day that's gonna be. When we bow our knee before our Lord and say and Savior and have him say, Come on in, well done, thou good and faithful servant. Come on in and relish in the beauty and the wonder of the kingdom of God forever and ever and ever. Listen to this. It pales in comparison. Our suffering and our adversity, it pales in comparison to his glorious suffering in our place. We can never ever make light of the fact, and we have to respond to this daily, that the God of creation, the perfect, just righteous God, stepped off his throne in majesty and splendor, born as a child, lived a sinless life, preached the gospel, healed many, was misunderstood, misrepresented, and died a cruel and humiliating death on the cross. Guess what? For your sin and for mine. Every day we should wake up and realize, because the Bible tells us, we come boldly to the throne of grace, we receive mercy. Aren't you glad for mercy? Mercy is not giving you what you deserve, mercy. And then we find grace, we find that unmerited favor with all the things that God gives us in our time of need to see us through and to give us supply so that we can be with him. But consider him who endured such hostilities against himself, God in the flesh for us. It should make all of us fall on the floor in humility and praise. Amen. Thinking about a holy, righteous, sinless, pure God dying on a cruel cross for us. Blows our mind. Listen to this. Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or faint-hearted. In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. But guess what? Jesus Christ shed his blood, so you don't have to shed yours. Amen. Oh, what a great God we serve. So although most believers will not be martyred, they'll be called to suffer for Christ and can take heart that even as he triumphed over the sufferings of the cross, we too will eventually triumph over whatever suffering and persecution and hardship and agony and pain that we might have to endure. There is a Greek scholar, A.T. Robertson, that says the example of Christ should stir us to patient endurance. And isn't that true? Patient endurance. You can talk to Denny about running. He ran all his life. He's a maniac, okay? He goes to the gym. I call him the warrior, because he works out like a like a fiend. And he puts me to shame. He's ten years older than me. So he humiliates me every time I go to the gym. But I say, thank you, Lord. But if you talk to Denny, as he ran all of his life, ran marathons, there's this thing called the second wind. Amen. A lot of runners quit because they feel the agony. They feel the agony of defeat. They feel the pain in their body and they stop running. And do you know that most Christians experience this as well? You just don't want to keep on going. Is it worth it to serve the Lord? Is it worth it to be humiliated? Is it worth it to be persecuted? Is it worth it? But as you trust in the Lord and trust in the word of God, as you keep running the race, amen. All of a sudden that second wind kicks in where there's health and there's wholeness and there's an ability to keep on running the race that Christ has given you, the second wind. I thank God for the second wind. Amen? The power of the Holy Spirit to renew us, to restore us and redeem us. And you know what? Yes, I am. I'm gonna do that again. All right, let's say it in three seconds. We are renewed, we are restored, and we are redeemed. Here we go. One, two, three. We are renewed, we are restored, and we are redeemed. Amen. Redeemed. Praise the Lord. God is good. Listen to this. All the time. Amen. God is good. All the time. All right, we're not going for the Guinness World Book of Records, okay? We'll stop right there. Listen to this. Listen to this verse. The Apostle Paul wrote to 2 Corinthians chapter 4, 15 to 18. For it is all for your sake. What was Paul talking about? All the beatings, all the imprisonments, all the floggings, all the shipwrecks, all the snake bites, all the being let down in a bucket over a wall. I mean, all of this stuff he went through for your sake, the church's sake, so that as grace extends to more and more people, it may increase thanksgiving. And here it is, friends. Why do we do this? Because we want to live our lives for the glory of God. We want to feel his pleasure. We want to feel him look down on us and say, Well done. Good and faithful servant. We want to feel his blessing, feel his favor, and feel the anointing of God upon our lives. That's why we do it for the glory of God. Are you living your life for the glory of God today? Are there words that you've been saying that dishonor God and dishonor the church? Are there actions that you're taking that dishonor Christ and do not bring glory to God, but bring glory to the enemy of our soul? Are there attitudes that you're having right now in your heart and life that are contrary to the will and the way and the work of the Holy Spirit in your life? Stop it. Amen? And allow the Lord to change your heart. Listen to this. Though our outer self is wasting away. Now Mike does not look like he used to look like 30 years ago. You know why? Because we are wasting away. Our outer self is. Sorry, my God. Okay. How do you know? Though our outer self is wasting away, listen to this. Our inner self is being renewed day by day. Isn't this the beauty of God? Amen? Man. As we look in the mirror, there is decay. As we look into our heart, there's renewal. There's restoration. We're being changed into the image of God, conformed to his image and transformed. For this light, momentary affliction. Now, this is Paul talking. Paul went through it, didn't he? He suffered great hardship and pain, beatings, imprisonment. And he's calling his life that he and all these things that he went through these light and momentary afflictions. So what are you going through? Light, momentary afflictions. It's preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison. Today we experience the presence of the Lord in this place. As we were worshiping the Lord, we felt his joy, we felt his love, we felt his grace, we felt the stirring of the Holy Spirit telling us we can make it. Amen. That we are his, that everything's going to be alright. That when we die, we'll see him face to face without a shadow of a doubt. We have that blessed assurance today. And this is the beauty of serving the Lord and experience the glory of the Lord. But this is just a deposit of what we'll experience when we see Christ face to face. All the wonders and the joy unspeakable and inexpressible of being in his presence. Amen. That's why when we gather together, friends, we want to we want to individually do our part to surrender our heart to the Lord so that the Lord can move and have his way in this body and minister to folks and move and have his way. Amen. Healing, deliverance, tearing down strongholds, blessing each other. And this is the beauty, the beauty of it. Preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison. As we look not to the things that are seen, but to the things that are unseen. Kind of weird, isn't it? Kind of weird. But once we've entered into the kingdom of God, these things right here don't tell us the story. The eyes of our heart tell us the story. Amen? The word of God tells us the story. Now I went to the eye doctor this week because uh I've had these for about a year and a half, two years, but my eyes are getting a little bit more blurrier. And uh great doctor did a wonderful job, gave me a prescription. Friends, listen, because we're in the world, our eyes get blurry to the reality of the truth of God. We don't walk by sight, we walk by faith. And then we can change our eyesight to looking at the temporal and the transient and look at the things that are eternal, look at the things that are infinite, look at the things that Christ has done for us before time began. We can see a wonderful, wonderful potential and purpose and passion for our lives. Amen. Every time we wake up in the morning, instead of saying, Oh my God, another day, we can say, This is the day that the Lord has made. I'm gonna rejoice and be glad in it. Amen. Man, this word rejoice is a wonderful word. It has the sense of leaping and dancing. Rejoice in the Lord always. And again I say rejoice. Woo! Amen. Leaping and dancing before the Lord. There was that dude that Jesus healed, that was healed by Jesus. And what does the Bible say? He was leaping, he was dancing, and he was praising the Lord. Friends, we've been healed. Amen. Mind, body, soul, and spirit. We should be leaping, we should be dancing. We should be expressing ourselves in such a wonder that gives God all the glory. Amen. Christ suffered once for us, suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God. Isaiah 53, 6 says, All we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned everyone to his own way. And here it is, friends, the beauty of salvation. Spoken 750 years before Christ's death, burial, and resurrection. And the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. Let's just have that rattle around in our mind and heart a little bit. Amen. The iniquity of us all that he has taken. Leviticus 16 talks about on the day of atonement, the priest would gather two goats. Firstly, he would make sacrifice for his own sins, dress in the holy garb that God has prepared, and he'd take two goats, one he would sacrifice at the altar, and the other one he would lay his hands on it, lay his hands on it, and confess the sins, the rebellion, the wickedness, the transgressions of the people. And then he would take that goat, which was referred to as the scapegoat, and let it out into the wilderness, as far away from the people as it can get. And doesn't this speak of what Christ has done for us, friends? He is the sacrifice. He went outside the city, crucified, took our sins, and now he is our high priest, and now he takes our sins away from us as far as the east is from the west. Amen. You can't pull back your sin. It's gone. It's gone. And we thank God for his wonderful work and suffering. Romans 3, 19 to 26. Why don't you turn over there in your Bibles? Romans chapter 3, 19 to 26 says this now. We know that whatever the law says, it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God. And friends, isn't this why the law was presented to us? So that everyone, man, woman, and child, would realize that they are lawbreakers, that they cannot in and of themselves keep the law. For by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes the knowledge of sin. But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the law and the prophets bear witness to it. Jesus said that. You study the word of God, but don't you know that the law and the prophets reveal me? The righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe, for there is no distinction. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood. Now that's a fun word to say. Let's say it all together. Ready? Propitiation. Propitiation. That's a five syllable word. That's a big word right there. Amen? Propitiation, which is the atoning sacrifice by his blood to be received. Received by your good works and charm. No, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. Beautiful revelation of the righteousness of God. Amen? Aren't you glad that you don't have to bring your filthy rags to God and say, please accept me? No. He who knew no sin became sin for us, so that we might be the righteousness of God. We are the declared righteousness of God by faith in Jesus Christ. His blood has cleansed us from every sin. Once and for all, the sacrificial death of Jesus. Hebrews 10, you can read it at home. Talks about the sacrifices that were done daily in the temple. It said that there was blood that ran in the streets because of the sacrifices. And every time people saw the blood, they realized that they were sinners. Jesus came, sacrificed himself once and for all, the sinless Lamb of God, the perfect God, perfect man, lived a sinless life, fulfilled all the righteous requirements of the law, died once, all-sufficient, all-powerful, all-authoritative work of Jesus Christ, has sealed our salvation once and for all. Amen? When he said it is finished, it is paid for. So he lived in every point like as we are, was tempted, yet he was without sin. Why did he have to come and live and not just come in a body and then die? He came to live a sinless life to show us that in all points he lived his life like us, tempted, but yet without sin. He had to go through the process of suffering, the Bible says, so he could leave us an example. He learned obedience through the things that he suffered. So, what are you learning today through the things that you're suffering today? You're going through adversity. I sit down with a lot of people with a lot of pain, a lot of suffering, a lot of sin, a lot of adversity. And you know what? The Bible says that God works in everything for our good as he conforms us to the love of God and the purpose that he has set before us. So what are we learning? We're learning to trust him, or we're learning to hate him? Are we learning to reveal our heart to him or are we running away from him? Do we trust him in all things, knowing that he's working all things together for good to those that love God? He's working everything in your life today for your good. You've got to trust him. He's a good God. He's a knowledgeable God and he knows you and he wants to reveal himself to you. Amen. Did you know that Fiorella LaGuardia was mayor of New York City way, way back? And we have LaGuardia Airport. He sometimes he presided as a judge in night court, and in one case a man was found guilty of stealing a loaf of bread, and back then he pleaded that he had committed that theft to feed his starving family, and LaGuardia shouted out, The law is the law. I must therefore fine you ten dollars. Not bad. Not bad. When the man sadly confessed that he had no money, the judge took ten dollars out of his wallet and paid the fine. He asked each person in the courtroom to contribute 50 cents to help this man. That's called mercy and grace. Amen? God's justice and God's mercy was fulfilled in love on the cross. Amen. Judgment was put on Christ. Mercy and grace was given to you. And that's what we relish in today. That's what moves us. It moves us today. It's a message so plain that even a child can understand it. Jesus took my place and died instead of me. But the truth is so awesome that the wisest of human beings can't fully fathom its meaning. The Bible says Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust. In the olden days, you couldn't just walk into a king's presence and say, yo, dude, hey, yo, King uh Jehoshaphat, how you doing over here? You doing good? No. We would have to be introduced. We would have to go be, we would have to have go through a process of introduction. And friends, we cannot walk into the Father's presence unless the Son brings us there. Amen? And the Son introduces us to the Heavenly Father. And as we accept Christ as our Lord and Savior, we are heirs of God, co-heirs with Christ. Jesus becomes our elder brother, and God Almighty becomes our heavenly Father. Amen. What a family. What a family that he gives us. There's a wideness in God's mercy, like the wideness of the sea. There's a kindness in his justice, which is more than liberty. The debt has been paid, friends. Christ was put to death, but made alive. We give this uh illustration a lot. The child sees a caterpillar enter a cocoon and assumes it is dying. Everything appears still and lifeless, but inside, transformation is taking place. Amen. You might look at your your life and think that you're dying, that you're failing, that you're weak. You might look at another person and think that they're failing. They're dying. They have a cocoon around their life. But what looks like an ending becomes a beginning. Amen. The cross was not Christ's defeat, it was the doorway to resurrection victory. And now he who overcame tells us that we are super hyperkinea. We are more than overcomers. Aren't you glad for that today? There's not a lot of gladness in this place, okay? That was that was not too glad. Aren't you glad today that you are more than overcomers? Amen. Right? More than overcomers. We're not just overcomers. We're more than overcomers. Not in our flesh, not in our ability, not in our capacity. But because Christ has won the victory, and now we walk behind him as the triumphant King of kings and Lord of Lords. Amen. Walking in victory, walking in power, walking in the ability of the Holy Spirit to see us through all things. Verse 19. It's one of the hardest verses in the Bible. Strange verse. Peter writes about Paul that Paul has some weird things that are hard to understand. Well, Peter, look in the mirror. When you read this, verse 19. It says, In which he went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison. Refers to what some people think the sons of God, daughters of men. There have been several suggestions as to who the sons of God were, and their children grew into a race of giants. Sons of God saw the daughters of men, Genesis 6, that they were beautiful, that they took wives for themselves of all whom they chose. They were giants on the earth in those days, and also afterward when the sons of God came into the daughters of men and they bore children to them. Those were the mighty men of old, men of renown. Three primary ideas about this scripture. They were fallen angels. They were powerful human rulers, despots that took women and married them, kidnapped them. They were godly descendants of Seth, who intermarried with wicked descendants of Cain. Whatever you believe that they are, Jesus Christ proclaimed to them the victory that he won on the cross. Amen. Now, let's flip over to Colossians. And in Colossians, I believe, it says that God, through Christ and his death, cancelled our debt with all its legal authority and made a spectacle and put to shame all the authorities and the powers and the dominions of Satan. He won the victory. Amen? And it's like it's like when I was in school and someone wanted to fight me, and I fought him and I won. I'd stand over him and say, See, I told you. Right? See, I told you. Right? Man, this is what Jesus did to the enemies. He stood over him and said, See, I told you that I would win the victory over sin, shame, death, and condemnation. And I'd seal the deal that you would be victors and overcomers in Jesus' name. This is a beautiful, beautiful verse. You can study that on your own. But here's the thing, friends. Let's keep the main thing, the plain thing, and the plain thing, the main thing. Now, when some people read this scripture, they forget about verse 18 that Christ died for us, the righteous for the unjust. And we go down to this verse and we get all in our minds speculative thoughts about this. We want to keep focus on the gospel. Amen? The gospel of Jesus Christ, and that He has proclaimed victory over sin, shame, death, guilt, your weakness, your insufficiencies, your inadequacies. He has won the victory. And if we go back to 1 Peter chapter 3, we can see this beautiful revelation. While the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through water, baptism which corresponds to this now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body, but as an appeal to God for a good conscience through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven. The Bible says elsewhere he's seated at the right hand of God. And it says it here too, is at the right hand of God, with angels, authorities, and powers having been subjected to him. That means, friends, that all the works of the enemy against your life has been defeated. Amen. If you think you're being ostracized for your faith, think about Noah. 120 years to build the ark. Made fun of, ostracized, humiliated. What did he do? He just kept building. Amen? Because he knew what the word of the Lord said. We have to keep on, keeping on, don't we? We got to keep running the race. Paul says, listen, and I am in a fight, I don't eat the air. My strikes strike with power. And this is the beauty of our situation with the Lord. He is our conquering king. Noah's Ark is a picture of salvation. The flood was both judgment and salvation. Amen. And just as Noah was brought through into salvation, Jesus Christ has won the victory and has brought us through. Amen? Took the wrath and the judgment for our lives and placed upon him so that we might be saved. And you notice in the ark, there was one door, and God opened the door and he closed the door. Jesus said in the New Testament, I am the door. Amen. Let's trust Jesus in all of our heart today. Bless him and give him our lives. Surrender to him. He's got a battle for you to win. Amen? You got to get in the fight. We run to the battle, because the battle is the Lord's. We stand still and we'll see the salvation of our God. Amen? Worship team, come on up. We thank you, Lord, for all that you do in our hearts and lives. We bless you today, Lord. We thank you that we can trust you. We thank you, Lord, that when we're suffering, we can look to you who had suffered on the cross so humiliatingly. You suffered. Your blood was spilt so that we could be free. And now we worship you, Lord. We surrender ourselves to you. And Lord, whenever we're in suffering, whenever we're in hardship, let us not have a mindset that focuses on the hardship or the pain. Let us have a focus that focuses on our suffering Christ and everything that He's provided for us. Bible says every spiritual blessing is ours through Christ Jesus in heavenly places. All the blessings of God have been won on the cross. When Jesus was resurrected, he sealed the deal. And now he wants to minister to our hearts. What you need today to see you through your suffering, your pain. God can be all in all. God can be your all-sufficiency. God can come down in the midst of such storms and keep you in the eye of the storm with his peace. Where there you'll see the sunshine of his great love and light. And God, again, we give you everything that has been hindering us from running the race. We thank you, Lord, as Hebrews 12 says, we thank you that we look to Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who endured the cross, scorned the shame, so that we might have salvation and deliverance today. We trust you, Lord. We put our faith in you. We give you all things. We surrender to you today in Jesus' name. Amen.