Bible Text: 1 Peter 2:19-25; John 10:11-16 | Preacher: The Rev'd William Klock | Series: The Church Year Sermon for the Second Sunday after Easter 1 St. Peter 2:19-25 & St. John 10:11-16 by William Klock Last Sunday we had a little bit of a history lesson about how new believers were brought into the Church in ancient times—how during Lent they were taught the faith and asked to make a real commitment to Christ and to his Body; how they were baptised at Easter, bringing them into the Body of Christ; how they were dressed in white robes to symbolise their having been washed clean by Jesus; and how they were given candles as a reminder that they now bore the light of Christ as they went out into the world—to be visibly different—to be Easter people who lived new life in the power of the Resurrection.  These Eastertide Epistles and Gospels were selected to teach the Church what it means and what it looks like to live that resurrection life—to be a first course of lessons for those new believers, but also to remind those of us who have been here for a while—to call us back to those first things, those basic things of the faith that we sometimes take for granted or that we sometimes even forget. I think these lessons are especially important for us today—or at least they should be.  One thing that strikes me as I read the history of the Church is just how effective those early Christians were in living out their new life, in holding high the light of Christ in a dark world, and in drawing others to Jesus.  Those first three hundred years were a time of persecution for the Church, and yet the way Christians responded to that persecution, the way they responded to sin and evil in the world, drew men and women to Jesus in droves.  They weren’t perfect.  There were problems in those days.  Plenty of Christians renounced their faith when persecution came, some fought back, but most didn’t.  Most of those Christians lived their lives faithfully, even sometimes to the point of death, and because of them the kingdom grew. But friends, something’s changed since then.  Eventually the light spread so far that people started to equate “Western Civilisation” with “Christendom”.  We had, as much as we can say such a thing is possible, a “Christian society”.  And then we got lazy.  Committing to Jesus didn’t mean what it did in those early days—in fact, for the most part, we didn’t commit to Christ—we were just born Christians.  We held the faith more and more superficially.  And worse, since virtually everyone was a Christian and since we were all born into the Church, we stopped evangelising.  Maybe we sent a few missionaries to darkest Africa or to pagans living on remote islands in the South Seas, but we didn’t do much at home.  And gradually more and more people became nothing more than nominal Christians with no commitment to Jesus, and more and more they simply turned their backs on the Church—and the more who turned their backs on the Church, the more our society became less and less committed to Christian principles and Christian morality.  And now we’ve realised what’s happening, we realise that we’re now in a post-Christian culture—we even now are beginning to experience occasional persecution for our faith, although so far in pretty minor ways—and we don’t know what to do.  The early Christians knew what to do: When you’re in the dark, let your light burn brightly and hold it high!  Draw others to it.  But we’ve lost that.  We’ve let our lights burn down.  They’re dim.  They’re not very effective.  And we don’t really realise how dim they are—probably because there are so few truly bright lights for comparison.  We wonder why people are turning away from our dim light, why they’re not interested.  And so we try drawing them with other things.  We set our lights aside and we try to legislate people into living like Christians—after all, there are still enough of us committed to Christian morality that, at least for a few more years, we have power at the polls and power in the legislature.  But we forget that passing laws that force people to live by Christian standards in public, doesn’t change what they do in private and doesn’t solve their basic problem—they need Jesus.  Or our churches turn to worldly means to draw people in.  We turn worship into a show—“worshiptainment”—and instead of preaching the Scriptures, preaching Christ, preaching that men and women are sinners and that the cross is our only hope—we turn the pulpit into a platform for preaching self-help and tickling itching ears.  Sure, we draw people in, but we’re converting them to programs and motivational speakers—not to Jesus.  We entice people with what Jesus can do for them, but there’s little if any preaching on what we should do for Jesus.  Jesus tells us that to follow him means to bear a cross.  In today’s Church we’re happy to let Jesus bear his cross for us, but there’s little if any teaching on the fact that to follow him, we need to bear our own crosses—we need to follow him in his example of suffering.  Sure, it draws people in, but it doesn’t make them Christians—it just gives them a false assurance that when they die they’ll be okay, when in fact they won’t.  We end up with churches full of people seeking God’s blessing instead of fulfilling their true purpose and seeking themselves to bless God.  Brothers and sisters, what we need more than anything is to be true people of the Resurrection.  We need to let the Easter message sink in and really and truly transform our lives, so that we no longer live as we once did, we no longer live as the world does, but we live for Jesus and we model Jesus to the world around us.  We take our lights—that light of Christ that was given to us in our baptism—kindle it, feed it with God’s Word, feed it with God’s sacraments, feed it with the Holy Spirit, feed it with our fellowship and our love for each other; feed it with the grace of God working in us so that it burns brightly—so that it shows radically transformed lives to the world. Think of all the people that St. Peter influenced by holding his light high and by burning it brightly.  And yet think about what he was like before he was Saint Peter.  He was a simple fisherman, probably a pretty “salty” guy.  Yes, he was a Jew and must have been faithful to some degree before Jesus got to him, but his thinking was very worldly.  It was far from Christian.  When Jesus told him that his mission was to die, Peter was adamant: “No, Lord!  No way, not you!”  When the soldiers came to Gethsemane to arrest Jesus, Peter was the one who came prepared with a sword and attacked one of the soldiers, cutting off his ear.  That was Peter: impetuous, violent, not afraid of a fight.  How many people knew that Peter?  I wonder how many people had maybe been in a barroom brawl with Peter at some point.  And so it seems very appropriate that the words of today’s Epistle come from him.  Look at 1 Peter 2:19-25 and consider the change that people who knew Peter would have witnessed in him.  He says: For this is a gracious thing, when, mindful of God, one endures sorrows while suffering unjustly.  Peter was writing this around A.D. 62 or 63 from Rome.  Since his time with Jesus he had learned something about cross-bearing and about persecution.  He had faced the rabid persecution of the Jews, twenty years earlier he had been locked away in prison by Herod Agrippa.  But he had endured persecution with humility because Jesus had transformed him—it was a work of grace in his life.  The old Peter would have gone to battle—probably got himself killed resisting arrest or knocked heads together in a street brawl in Jerusalem.  But Saint Peter was ready to count it all as the cost of discipleship—the cost of following Jesus.  He was ready to take up his cross and follow his Lord—all the way to death, if necessary.  He writes, literally, “For this is grace”—this is what it means to live your life in the grace of God, not by the desire of the flesh or the way of the world.  You have the example of Jesus before you, showing you the right way to respond—to endure suffering and persecution with humility and grace.  He says: For what credit is it if, when you sin and are beaten for it, you endure? [That’s a no-brainer.  Being punished for sin is just—it’s deserved suffering.] But if when you do good and suffer for it you endure, this is a gracious thing in the sight of God. (1 Peter 2:20) This is where Jesus calls us to be different and that means this is one of those area of life that demands a change on our part.  If we’re willing to suffer graciously for the good we do—for following Christ—our lights are going to shine brightly.  History bears it out; when Christians are humble in the face of persecution, the Church always grows.  The severity of the persecution may vary—there are times when Christians have been martyred for their faith and other times when persecution has been little more than an inconvenience—but Peter reminds us: this isn’t optional; this is what it means to commit to Jesus and to truly follow him.  He just comes right out and says it in verse 21: For to this you have been called,  [This is as much our mission as anything else.  Why?] because Christ also suffered for you,  leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps. [All we have to do is look at his example.] He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth.   [He was perfect in every way.  Jesus never endured a just punishment for sin, because he never sinned.] When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, [Think of him being beaten by the chief priest’s soldiers, being dragged before Pilate, being beaten senseless by Roman soldiers, and then being nailed to a cross while the crowd jeered at him.] but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly.  (1 Peter 2:21-23) It’s not just that we have Jesus’ example to follow.  Is suffering a hard thing?  You bet it is.  That’s why Jesus likens it to cross-bearing.  But Peter also reminds us that we have hope and faith in a higher judge.  Jesus trusted in his Father and so can we.  We know that God has a greater plan for us and for the world.  And if we are in Christ, we should have an eternal, not an earthly perspective.  For the people of the world—the people living in darkness—this is all there is.  You’ve got to look out for “Number One”, you’ve got to protect your rights, because if you don’t get the most out of life before you die, you don’t get another chance—there’s nothing more.  That’s why the cross is foolish to the world.  Why sacrifice yourself for others?  If someone takes what’s yours or steps on your rights, you take them back, you put up a fight!  That was Peter’s attitude when Jesus told him that his mission was the cross.  That was Peter’s attitude when he drew his sword and attacked the soldiers.  But in light of Jesus and his mission and sacrifice, Peter learned better.  Jesus didn’t come into the world to demand what was his or to look out for “Number One”.  In fact, his mission was exactly the opposite: to set the glory aside that was his by right as God and to allow himself to be crucified for the sake of the very people who crucified him—to offer his life for the lives of his enemies.  And now Peter’s calling us to follow the example of Jesus.  Our redemption has already been bought by the once-for-all sacrifice of Jesus, but as we follow his example of self-sacrifice, we bear testimony to what Jesus did.  His death and resurrection brought light to us and by following his example we show that light to the world.  Peter goes on: He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness.  By his wounds you have been healed.  For you were straying like sheep, but have now returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls. (1 Peter 2:24-25) Jesus died that we might live—that we might be made holy—and so he calls us to live to righteousness—to be a holy people.  And that’s why we will face persecution: the world doesn’t like holy people—it’s hated holiness all the back to when Cain killed Abel.  In a sense, persecution is the test of whether or not we’re truly following Jesus. Let me also say: Peter reminds us that suffering is a means of grace.  There are circles in the Church these days that are teaching that suffering and sickness and persecution aren’t God’s will for anyone and that if you’re suffering any of these things, what you’re really suffering from is a lack of faith.  That’s dangerous teaching, but it’s appealing.  It’s infiltrated a lot of churches—including some in our own community—because it tickles itching ears and appeals to our worldliness.  And yet that sort of teaching stops our ears to the voice of God as he tries to get our attention—as he tries to grow us in our faith, to grow us in his grace, and to kindle our lights to burn more brightly.  Isaac Williams put it this way: “We speak of disappointments, of troubles, of enemies, and quarrels; nay, even of death itself, in another manner to that of Scripture. [We think of them as bad things.] For what is sorrow of heart within but the voice of the good Shepherd seeking us? what is affliction but His struggle in order to free and disentangle us from the thorns of the world? what are dissensions and ill-will from without but the means by which He would mould us more in conformity with Himself? what are worldly dangers but occasions of His drawing us more nearly unto His side? and what is death itself to the good Christian but the gathering of His own more securely into His arms, from which nothing hereafter shall ever draw them away?”  It’s not that God wants us to suffer, but that he wants to focus our eyes on eternity and wants us to grow in holiness and in faith, and to learn to lean on him for our strength.  And as we see throughout the Scriptures, suffering and persecution are often the most effective ways for us to learn these lessons.  They are truly means of grace. And if suffering is a means of grace, then we know that God is truly looking out for us as we experience it.  As I said earlier, St. Peter had endured his own share of suffering for his faith and these words of his would be particularly encouraging just a year or two after he wrote them, when Nero would blame the Christians for Rome’s burning.  After the early persecution of the Church by the Jews, Nero’s persecution would be one of the most intense.  Horrible things were done to the Christians in and around Rome, but as they were sent to the arena, or, like Peter, crucified, they could do so graciously knowing that the Shepherd and Bishop of their souls was looking out for them. And we have an excellent illustration of this from Jesus’ own lips in our Gospel—maybe an illustration that Peter had in mind when he wrote his epistle.  Jesus says: I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. He who is a hired hand and not a shepherd, who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees, and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. He flees because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep.  I am the good shepherd.  I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep. And I have other sheep that are not of this fold.  I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd. (John 10:11-16) Jesus isn’t just an example to follow in his suffering.  He’s also our  loving caretaker as his flock faces persecution and suffering—that is, after all, why he gave his life for us!  As I was studying this week, I ran across this beautiful commentary on the Good Shepherd by F.W. Robertson: “Beneath the burning skies and the clear starry nights of Palestine there grows up between the shepherd and his flock an union of attachment and tenderness. It is the country where at any moment sheep are liable to be swept away by some mountain-torrent, or carried off by hill-robbers, or torn by wolves. At any moment their protector may have to save them by personal hazard…Every hour of the shepherd's life is risk. Sometimes for the sake of an armful of grass in the parched summer days, he must climb precipices almost perpendicular, and stand on a narrow ledge of rock, where the wild goat will scarcely venture. Pitiless showers, driving snows, long hours of thirst—all this he must endure, if the flock is to be kept at all. “And thus there grows up between the man and the dumb creatures he protects, a kind of friendship…You love those for whom you risk, and they love you; therefore it is that, not as here where the flock is driven, the shepherd goes before and the sheep follow him. They follow in perfect trust, even though he should be leading them away from a green pasture, by a rocky road, to another pasture they cannot yet see…Hirelings are shepherds, but not good shepherds…they are tested by danger…Now a man is a hireling when he does his duty for pay.  He may do it in his way faithfully.  The paid shepherd would not desert the sheep for a shower or a cold night.  But the lion and the bear—he is not paid to risk his life against them, and the sheep are not his, so he leaves them to their fate…The cause of the sheep is not his cause.” Brothers and sisters, we can take comfort and ground our faith in the fact that we are his cause!  We were Jesus’ cause in life two thousand years ago when he went to the cross, offering himself as a sacrifice for our sins, and we are still just as much his cause now that our redemption is accomplished—even in our suffering.  We were his cause when he made it possible for us to live as light in the darkness and we continue to be his cause as we live as his light—as he works in us graciously to kindle our light so that it will shine brighter. Every Sunday should be a reminder to us of this reality.  As we gather to celebrate the Resurrection—that’s what every Sunday is—he comes to us as our Good Shepherd in Word and Sacrament.  He, the eternal Word of God, speaks to us as we hear his Word read to us in the Scriptures and explained from the pulpit and as he graciously invites us to his Table to partake of his Body and Blood shed for us. Jesus said, “I am the good shepherd.  I know my own and my own know me.”  Those words are fulfilled as he speaks to us from the Scriptures, where he reveals himself, his ways, and his truths to us.  And yet what we do here on Sunday in hearing God’s Word, sets an example that we should all be following daily ourselves as we steep ourselves in the Scriptures.  No day should pass without our reading at least a short passage of Scripture—without our hearing the Shepherd’s voice.  Pious Parsch put it beautifully: “As often as we read the Bible, we should feel like sheep of the flock, lying at the feet of the Good Shepherd.  He knows me, and it is my desire to learn to know Him better and better.”  Can you say that yourself? But at his Table—in the Holy Communion—our Shepherd makes himself known in an even deeper way.  The Word gives us knowledge of God, his ways, and his will, but the Sacrament applies the grace of the Word in a deeply significant way.  The Holy Communion reminds us that our knowledge of God isn’t just head-knowledge—not just knowing about him.  It reminds us that we know him personally—that we’re mystically united to him, our spirits to his Spirit.  He says, “He that eats my flesh and drinks my blood, abides in me, and I in him.”  By his shed Body and Blood he unites us with himself in loving fellowship and so as we come to his Table we should feel ourselves truly the sheep of his pasture.  He feeds us here—feeds us with his grace—so let his grace kindle your light so that it shines brightly.  Let him be your shepherd.  Follow him even though it means taking up your cross. Pursue holiness even though it means sufferings, and let your light burn brightly for the world to see. Let us pray: “Almighty God, who gave your only Son to be for us both a sacrifice for sin and an example of godly life; give us grace that we may always receive with thankfulness the immeasurable benefit of his sacrifice, and also daily endeavour to follow in the blessed steps of his most holy life; through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.”

Bible Text: 1 Peter 2:11-17; John 16:16-22 | Preacher: The Rev'd William Klock | Series: The Church Year Sermon for the Third Sunday after Easter 1 St. Peter 2:11-17 & St. John 16:16-22 by William Klock Today’s lessons dovetail off last week’s as we continue on with this look at what it means to live as Easter people—as people of the Resurrection.  Last Sunday we heard St. Peter telling us that to follow Jesus means to pursue holiness and to be persecuted for it by the world.  And we looked a bit at Peter’s own life so that we could see the amazing change that Jesus had made in his life.  Thirty or forty years earlier, people who knew Peter probably would have laughed if you’d told them that he would write these words about enduring suffering with grace.  Peter was the big fisherman—rough and tough and always ready to take a stand for himself and his friends.  When Jesus said that his mission was the cross, it was Peter who shouted, “No Lord!  Not you!”  When the soldiers came for Jesus, it was Peter who expected trouble and was wearing a sword.  It was Peter who attacked the soldiers rather than let Jesus be taken away to suffering and death.  And now, thirty years later, he writes to his fellow Christians that to follow Jesus is to take up our own crosses—to endure our own suffering, and sometimes even death. What a change!  And yet, brothers and sisters, this is the change that distinguishes the early Church from the modern Church in the West—even from the Church here in the Comox Valley and Vancouver Island.  In those early centuries of Church history, Christians drew others to Jesus in amazing numbers.  They converted an empire to the cross, mostly by being willing to take up their own crosses, by be willing to set aside their own rights and desires and ambitions, and instead, looking out for others—desiring to live by the example of Jesus.  They understood the cost of discipleship, but they were willing to pay it because, as Peter puts it, they had put themselves in the hands of “the Shepherd and Bishop” of their souls.  They were effective witnesses because they were a people truly, visibly, and dramatically reborn in the likeness of Jesus—people like Peter, the rough and tough fisherman, always ready for a fight, who changed his life and took up the cure of souls and eventually was crucified for his faith. They were lights shining brightly in the darkness.  By contrast, our light is dim.  And because our lights are dim, no one comes.  Our churches are too often more obsessed with tickling itching ears and attracting people with worldly, man-centred teaching than they are with truly preaching the Gospel and committing themselves to holiness and to selfless sacrifice in the face of the world.  As Christians we say we’ve entrusted ourselves to the Shepherd and Bishop of our souls, but for all intents and purposes when the world looks at us it still sees people who look for their security in bank accounts, houses and cars, jobs, and the accumulation of worldly stuff.  When they see us, they see people that often aren’t much more holy than they are.  And sadly, they see people who, when their rights are stepped on or who when things don’t go our way, fight back—people an awful lot like Peter before he was Saint Peter.  And the end result is that the Church looks more and more like the world, her light grows less and less bright, she draws fewer and fewer people. Friends, the time is short.  Don’t let us squander it.  In our Gospel this morning we heard those words over and over: “a little while”.  Jesus told his disciples that he was leaving, but not for long.  In a little while he’d be back.  He said these words as part of his farewell address to his disciples, just before he was arrested, and the immediate situation was his death.  He would be gone and they would mourn, but in a little while—just three days—he’d be back and they could rejoice with him in the Resurrection.  But Jesus words obviously refer to more than just what was going to happen that over the next several days.  These words prepared his disciples for his ascension.  He was resurrected on that first Easter morning and was with his disciples in resurrected glory for fifty days, and then he ascended—he went to his Father—and was gone again—and again, they might have mourned if it weren’t for the fact that they knew he would come back “in a little while”.  And as St. Augustine said when he preached on this passage, these words are for all Christians, because we all live in expectation of our Lord’s return, and if it seems like it’s more than just a “little while”, that’s only because we lack eternal perspective—we don’t understand that our time here, even if we live to be a hundred, is nothing compared to eternity.  Even if we wait another thousand or another ten thousands years for Jesus to return, that time is nothing compared to the eternal joys of the New Jerusalem. St. Peter takes up the same theme in the Epistle as he exhorts us to follow Jesus and live truly transformed lives—to witness the resurrection life of Christ to the world.  Jesus encourages us, reminding us that this life, as we struggle with the world, the flesh, and the devil—this life in which we face suffering and persecution, is just for “a little while”.  And Peter tells us: Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul. (1 Peter 2:11) “Be different,” he says.  “Let your light shine brightly even though it means putting up a fight against all the worldly things that pull you in other directions and that would make your light dim. Just remember that you’re a sojourner, that you’re an exile here in this world.  It can pull at you all it wants, but the world’s business is not your own.  Heaven is your business.”  And friends, that why the early Christians were so effective: they knew that their home was heavenly and they made the things of heaven their business.  They focused on the things of the world only so much as they had to.  They took care of business here, whether that was work or family or even their recreation, but they didn’t live for those things.  No, they lived for Jesus and they lived for eternity.  They knew that it’s really his kingdom that matters. Think of Jesus’ own example.  One day a scribe came to him and said, “I want to follow you.”  And Jesus knew that this man wasn’t ready to count the cost.  He told him, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head” (Matthew 8:20).  Even when it came to family—and I think that’s the one thing, even when we’ve put God ahead of everything else in our lives we still often put our families before God—even when it came to family, Jesus knew that his Father’s kingdom was more important.  When his mother and brothers wanted to visit him, he instead put his arms around his disciples and said, “Here are my mother and my brothers!” (Matthew 12:48). St. Matthew tells us that on another occasion, one of the disciples asked Jesus to let him go home to bury his father.  Jesus said to him, “Follow me and leave the dead to bury their own dead.”  Another time he said to Peter, “Everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands, for my name’s sake, will receive a hundredfold and will inherit eternal life” (Matthew 19:29).  Jesus’ point wasn’t that we should abandon our worldly obligations, but that following him truly means putting him first. Again, in Matthew 10:37-39 he says, “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”  How do we shape up to those words in light of our own commitment to Jesus—or lack thereof?  We say, “Well, Jesus didn’t mean those things literally.”  And, yes, we might be right to a point, but how often do we say that and use it as an excuse to justify our lack of commitment to Jesus?  He’s given us a new citizenship and with that heavenly citizenship comes a new mission.  He makes us strangers and sojourners in the world.  But so often we choose to live with a dual citizenship.   We claim heaven as our home on Sunday mornings, but when we walk out those doors, instead of living like sojourners, we take up our full rights as citizens of the world.  We sing praises on Sunday, we commit ourselves to God at his Table, and we go out with that command: “Go forth in peace to love and serve the Lord,” but instead we go out to love and serve the world.  And then we wonder why we find it so hard to draw people into the kingdom of God. Peter goes on in verse 12: Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation. In Peter’s day there were all sorts of false accusations that were made against Christians.  Because we worship only one God—something the Greek and the Romans just couldn’t wrap their heads around—Christians were accused of being atheists.  People heard that Christians ate the Body and Blood of Jesus in the Lord’s Supper and accused them of cannibalism.  Because Christians were truly committed to Jesus and refused to declare the emperor as their lord, they were accused of being disloyal.  The list goes on and on, and so Peter says to them: Even as the pagans around you accuse you of all sorts of evils, making all sorts of false accusations, and even—as we saw last week—as they persecute you for your righteousness, live “honourably”.  Literally, he says, live lives that are good and beautiful.  Why?  Here’s where Peter takes us back to that idea of cross bearing.  I know a lot of Christians—and sometimes you and I are those Christians—who look at sin in the world and who experience persecution for our righteousness and we respond with a self-righteous attitude.  It’s like we just can’t wait for judgement day so that all those dirtbags—all those people who laughed at our faith, all those gays and people having sex outside of marriage, all those druggies, all those atheists—they just can’t wait to see the surprised look on their faces when God judges them and they get sucked straight to hell.  They forget that they’re sinners too.  They forget that at one point they were dirtbag sinners that would be hellbound on Judgement Day too if it hadn’t been for Jesus.  So Peter doesn’t tell us: Live good lives so that you can sit at the right hand of the Father on Judgement Day and smugly gloat at all the people going to hell.  Live good and beautiful lives so that by your example, the pagans around you will see Jesus at work in you.  Shine your lights brightly in the dark so that the men and women will see your light and be drawn to it.  You ought to be concerned for their souls.  When Jesus was dying on the cross he looked at the people gathered around him—the people who had crucified him and were jeering at him—and he cried out to his Father, “Forgive them, for they know not what they do.”  And as we bear our own crosses in the world—as we face the world’s scorn and false accusations—we should have the same attitude that Jesus did, as kingdom people with our eyes set on heaven, our first thought shouldn’t be how our rights are being trampled, but should be on the fact that without our witness, the souls of these people are bound for eternal damnation—eternity apart from God. Peter goes on and gives us a practical example of what this looks like: Be subject for the Lord’s sake to every human institution, whether it be to the emperor as supreme, or to governors as sent by him to punish those who do evil and to praise those who do good.  For this is the will of God, that by doing good you should put to silence the ignorance of foolish people. (1 Peter 2:13-15) It’s was providential that Peter gave this particular example of submitting to earthly government, because this is exactly where the persecution would be coming from in only a year or two.  And yet even before state persecution started, Christians were asking: “Should I submit to the emperor?  If I do, how far do I go?”  The Roman emperors and governors did some evil things.  We think our society is evil and focused on death and violence and sex, but the Greco-Roman world was much, much worse.  And so Peter says to these people, that God’s people aren’t going to change the world by revolting against the government.  He knew this was a mode of thinking that Christians could easily fall in to.  This was what the Jews were stuck on for most of their history: looking for a warlord Messiah who would conquer the Romans and re-establish the old Davidic kingdom.  But Peter understood now that God’s kingdom isn’t about an earthly place or an earthly temple—it’s about his people, his body, his Church.  And so he reminds these people that change happens—that the kingdom comes—not through revolution, but through revelation—through God’s manifestation of himself to the world through his own people. So, he says in verse 16: Live as people who are free, not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil, but living as servants of God. Here’s our problem: Jesus died and through his death he bought our freedom.  But we take that freedom for granted—we take his sacrifice and too often we claim it as our own and then we just stop at that point.  We’re Good Friday people, but we forget that real Good Friday people are alsoEaster people.  We forget that true faith always shows itself in works that are good and beautiful, because Jesus didn’t just die to save us from the penalty of our sins—he also died to save us from our actual sins—he died to make us holy. Peter saw some people who claimed to be followers of Jesus—who claimed to have faith and claimed Jesus as their Saviour—but who weren’t showing that they’d made him their Lord and who weren’t living the new, risen life that true and saving faith brings with it.  They were basically using the salvation that Jesus offers at the cross as a “Get Out of Hell Free” card—“I can do whatever I want now and because I’m a Christian I don’t have to pay the eternal consequences.”  And Peter reminds us, “No.  If that’s how you live, you bring shame on Jesus and his body, you drive people away instead of drawing them in, and ultimately you just prove that your faith isn’t real.” This is one of the mysteries—one of the paradoxes—of Christianity: Through the shed blood of Jesus at the cross we are made free and yet at the same time we are made servants (literally, Peter says “slaves” in the Greek).  Jesus frees us from our sins, but if we’re free from our sins, that means we’re also freed to do what we were never able to do before: to love him, to serve him, and to live a life of truth and beauty, a life of good works pleasing to him.  And that kind of life shows itself—and commends itself—to others as we: Honor everyone.  Love the brotherhood.  Fear God. Honor the emperor. (1 Peter 2:17) “Honour everyone.”  That’s the “Golden Rule”—treat others as you would have them treat you.  As you deal with other people in the world, remember that Jesus loves them and died for them just as he loves you and died for you.  It’s amazing how this works to change our attitudes toward people.  Pray for your enemies and do good to them.  It’s hard to feel self-righteous toward, or to judge and condemn people for whom you’re praying.  Instead, you remember that they’re people who need Jesus in their lives.  It reminds you to shine your light brightly—and all the more brightly the more they trouble and persecute you. “Love the brotherhood”.  Love your brothers and sisters in Christ—love the Body.  Show the world what it means to be in love and fellowship and communion with each other.  Too often people look at the Church and they see fights and splits and people who don’t get along—and that’s shameful.  The first place to witness the love of Christ is right here in his Body. And then Peter says, “Fear God.  Honour the emperor.”  He brings all this back to where he started. Live in this word as sojourners and exiles.  As you live in this world, remember that you’re just passing through—that it isn’t your true home, because your true home and your true citizenship are in heaven.  But remember too that God has given you this temporary mission here for a reason—he wants you to be his ambassadors.  He wants us to show the world what his kingdom is like and to draw others to it, so he says, “Don’t do anything to deliberately offend the world.  Show the people around you respect and honour.  Obey the laws and rules.  But remember that God is your final authority.  If there comes a time when you have to make a decision between obedience to him and obedience to the world, always follow him—but as much as it is possible, be a good ambassador of the kingdom of God and don’t give anyone reason to despise it. This week we were down in Victoria.  It’s tourist season and there are Americans everywhere you go, and as an American I found myself cringing.  There were so many bad ambassadors. These days Americans aren’t the most popular people on the planet, and as an American living in Canada I find I want to be a good ambassador—I want to prove people wrong when they say nasty things about Americans.  But as I walked around Victoria, an awful lot of people were instead proving those accusation true.  Brothers and sisters, as Christians we’re often bad ambassadors in the same way.  People accuse us of being self-righteous, holier-than-thou hypocrites.  Peter tells us to prove them wrong by being good ambassadors, but too often we actually prove them right.  And, brothers and sisters, we prove them right because too often we’re too attached to the things and to the ways of the world. We need to cut ourselves loose from the world.  Again, we need Jesus’ reminder that it’s just “a little while”.  When it’s hard to endure suffering, when it’s hard to endure persecution, just remember that this time is only “a little while”—he’ll be back soon.  And when it’s hard to turn our focus from earthly thing to heavenly things, we need that reminder that the things of earth are also just for “a little while”—they have nothing to compare with the things of heaven—the things of eternity. Please pray with me: Father, in our collect this morning we asked you, “grant to all who are admitted into the fellowship of Christ's service that they may renounce those things that are contrary to their profession and follow all such things as are agreeable to it.”  We ask that again, and we ask that you would remind us that we are here for just “a little while”.  Strengthen us to persevere in the face of suffering and persecution and remind us that because our time here is so short, our best investments are the ones we make in your eternal kingdom. Give us grace that we might shine as bright lights in the darkness of the world and use our lights, we pray, to draw others to you.  We ask this in through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.

"To this you have been called" 1 St. Peter 2:19-25 & St. John 10:11-16 Remember—think about—the way new Christians were brought into the Church in ancient times.  During Lent they…