1 Peter 1:6-12 Bible Class

This is an ongoing Bible study of 1 Peter. A list of all of the classes can be found here. The outline below was used by the teacher. The audio has very brief glitches at 30:44, 38:37, and 42:02, but the context is still clear.

In this we rejoice

  1. “This” = all that has come before in the letter
    1. Being begotten again, having a living hope, an inheritance from our Heavenly Father, our anticipated salvation
  2. And we rejoice in all of these things despite the various trials we face

Faith refined by trials

  1. Various trials: mockery, disease, torture, death and everything in between
    1. These trials can either build up or destroy our faith, depending on whether or not we hold to God as our source of strength
      1. Destroy: Parable of the soils – shallow roots burn away
        1. Must teach full counsel and not ignore difficult things
      2. Build Up: If we hold to God our faith will be purified by trial
  2. Crucible of faith
    1. Gold is purified by fire and becomes more pure and valuable
      1. Gold perishes while our faith leads to everlasting life
    2. Trials can, if we hold fast to God, be a crucible that purifies our faith
      1. Not a pleasant experience
      2. Our faith becomes more focused
      3. Things holding our faith back, sin and distractions, are removed
      4. We learn to depend on God, not on ourselves
        1. Even mocking: we learn to desire God’s praise, not man’s
    3. Lack of facing trials can lead to complacency if we are not deliberate
      1. We can become spiritually lethargic; spiritual muscles atrophy
      2. In the US this is where we have been and it shows
        1. Persecuted Christians risk their welfare to meet together
        2. We can’t find the drive to meet in a comfortable building
  3. Our purified faith leads to praise, honor, and glory
    1. Often refer to God’s praise, but here to what we receive from God
    2. “Well done good and faithful servant” Matthew 25:20-23
    3. 1 Corinthians 3:14
  4. For a little while
    1. Most people’s have periodic trials, but sometimes it is constant
    2. A lifetime of suffering is “a little while” in light of eternity (Romans 8)

The Lord: Unseen, Present, Returning

  1. They, like us, have never seen Jesus physically
    1. And yet they love him; and yet we love him
  2. Like them, we believe through the testimony and teaching of the Apostles
  3. We experience Jesus’ presence spiritually
    1. Christ dwells in us through the Holy Spirit (Romans 8:9-11, John 14:20)
    2. We partake of the Lord’s Supper, a spiritual fellowship with Christ
      1. 1 Corinthians 10:14-22, Matthew 18:20, Mark 14:22-25
  4. We look forward to Jesus’ physical return
    1. We will receive the culmination of our faith: the salvation of our souls
      1. Note: soul refers to whole person, not some immaterial substance

A Foretold Salvation

  1. Jesus’ death and resurrection, and the Church were not an afterthought
  2. We cannot “unhitch” the OT
    1. While “NT and Psalms” can be useful, it needs to be understood that without the OT we have an incomplete account
      1. The OT sets the stage for Jesus
        1. Mankind’s sin, repeated failure, and promise of deliverance
        2. How can man be reconciled to God?
        3. Who is this promised Messiah and where is he from?
    2. Jesus can only be truly understood in light of the OT
      1. He is the full bloom of the flower of the OT
      2. Jesus points to the OT to explain his ministry
        1. Greater than Solomon / Temple
        2. The Son of Man
        3. The Sign of Jonah
      3. Jesus claims that he is the fulfillment of the OT
        1. John 5:45-47, Luke 24:27; 44
      4. The Apostles point to the OT to explain Jesus and the Church
        1. Jesus and the Apostles’ teachings are saturated with OT references and allusions
  3. The OT can only be truly understood in the light of Christ
    1. The OT is ultimately about Jesus and his kingdom; God’s salvation of man
    2. The prophets wrote in their immediate context, but were writing ultimately about Christ and for his Church
    3. They understood in some degree that they were writing for a future generation who would experience God’s promises
      1. The prophets did not necessarily understand exactly what their message meant (e.g. Daniel)
  4. The OT was written under inspiration of the Spirit of Christ (i.e. the Holy Spirit)
    1. The OT is an inspired account
    2. To doubt the OT is to doubt the testimony of the Holy Spirit

A Marvelous Gospel

  1. We experience the “reality” of the “shadows” of the OT
    1. What the OT prophets looked forward to has been completed, and we experience the results of that gospel
      1. This gospel is the message of the Holy Spirit
      2. To reject the gospel is to reject the Spirit
  2. The wonder of the gospel, the salvation that we get to experience, is something that even angels want to know more about
    1. The gospel message, if we let it, can become normal, but it is anything but
    2. God’s salvation through Jesus is what the OT saints desired to see in their day, something angels desire to know more about, but we are the recipients of God’s salvation through Jesus’ death and resurrection
    3. We should never lose the wonder of the gospel and God’s love
    4. As the angels, so should we desire to know more about God’s salvation