Walking in Righteousness - Sunday, July 2, 2023

Amen. Amen. Amen.

As we prepare to come around the table, I want us to be reminded of who we are in crying out loud about Christ and what Christ has done for us. So we're going to sing kind of a shortened version of Who You Say I Am, followed by At the Cross, Love Ran Red. The prayer was lost, but He brought me in. Oh, His love for me. Oh, His love for me. Oh, the sun sets free. Oh, it's free indeed. I'm a child of God. Yes, I am. Yes, He has ransomed me. His grace runs deep. While I was a slave to sin, Jesus died for me. Yes, He died for me. Oh, the sun sets free. Oh, it's free indeed. I'm a child of God. Yes, I am. In my Father's house, there's a place for me. I'm a child of God. Yes, I am. I am chosen, not forsaken. I am who you say I am.

Oh, I am who you say I am. Yes, I am who you say I am. I am a child of God. Yes, I am. In my Father's house, there's a place for me. I'm a child of God. Yes, I am. There's a place where mercy reigns and never dies. There's a place where streets of grace flow deep and wide. Where all the love I've ever found comes like a flood, comes flowing down. I'm in all of you. I'm in all of you. Where your love ran red and my sin washed white, I owe all to you. I owe all to you, Jesus. I'm in a place where sin and shame are powerless. Where my heart has peace with God and forgiveness. Where all the love I've ever found comes like a flood, comes flowing down. At the cross, at the cross, I surrender my life. I'm in awe of you. I'm in awe of you. Where your love ran red and my sin washed white.

Here, I owe all to you. Here, my hope is found. Here, on holy ground. Here, I bow down. Here, I bow down. Here, arms open wide. Here, you saved my life. Here, I bow down. Here, I bow down. Cross at the cross, I surrender my life. I'm in awe of you. I'm in awe of you. Where your love ran back, and my sin washed white. I owe all to you. I owe all to you. I owe all to you. I owe all to you. I owe all to you, Jesus.

I owe all to you. I owe all to you. I owe all to you. I owe all to you. I owe all to you. I owe all to you. I owe all to you. I owe all to you. I owe all to you. It's a powerful thing. If you take just a minute, there's some here that would remember where they were exactly when John F. Kennedy got shot. How many remember that? I'll quit having people raise their hands because then we're doing an age test instead of a memory test. So skipping ahead, how many remember that? How many remember where they were when airplanes flew into the Twin Towers? Got these out of order, but how many remember where you were the day that Challenger blew up? Where you were? How many remember when you were baptized? Where you were?

How many remember where you were when you got married? So the point is, memory is an important thing. Remembering is an important thing. And it's interesting because all through the Bible, through the Old Testament history, you see God over and over again giving the Israelites and different people something, to remember. Even when they were in Egypt and it was time to go out, what did He say? He sprinkled the blood over the doorposts and on the sides so they would remember when the death angel passed over. Remember when they were in the wilderness and they were wandering and one of those miracles we kind of forget about, it's tucked in there, but they come to the Jordan River and it's during the flood season and they got to get across and God parts the water. They walk across on dry land and God says, "You know what? Go down in the river, get 12 stones, stack them up there." So when you come by here you can tell your children what God did. Remembering. Why should we remember? Every now and then I get a post on Facebook that says, "Oh, here's what

you were doing eight years ago." And it's kind of fun. Then every now and then I get a post that's like, "Somebody you've known your whole life that says you've now been friends for eight years." That's always confusing to me. But in our bookcases, in my lifetime, I remember all the different ways we've saved memories via photographs. Not only, but there was Polaroid pictures where you could take a picture and in 30 seconds, there it was. You didn't have to take the film to the pharmacy or wherever and get it printed. We had slides, we had photo albums, we had movies, little eight millimeter movies. Now we have digital pictures, which to me is probably the worst. They're the clearest, they're the best, they're the sharpest, but they're the worst because when I want to find them, where do I go to look? Got 15,000 pictures somewhere, but how do I get to them and where are they at? What does looking at old pictures do for us? First of all, they remind us where we've been. They remind us who we are. They remind us of good times and maybe even some hard times.

But there's something about that that always draws us back to that point in time when that event happened. They bring us back to joy and sometimes sadness. They cause us to reflect on the brevity of life itself. They remind us of what's important in our life, family, friends, and events. We are prone to forget over time. And I think God knows that. And that's why He's reminded us in a very simple way, just like He did with His disciples at the Last Supper when He says, you know, "Eat this bread. Drink this cup. Do this in remembrance of Me." Here is my body, which is for you. This cup is a new agreement. 2 Corinthians 5:17 says, "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he's a new creation. Old has gone, the new has come. All this is from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ." How did He do that? He did that through the cross.

Verse 21 says that. He says, "God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God." When we look back at the cross and what God has done through Christ in our lives, we are amazed. We've been brought from death to life. We see how we look at life in the future and how great and many blessings He has given us. God knows how short our memory we have, so any accusation that once a week is too often to take communion, I think for our simple minds, it may not be often enough, because we're again reminded that this is the body of Christ. The blood that was shed for us, and through that, we truly have the forgiveness of sins and the hope of eternal life. Let's pray.

Dear God in heaven, we just thank you for your love. Thank you for caring for us. Thank you for knowing us in all of our frailties, all of our failings that you see through, and you have declared us righteousness through the blood of Christ. Thank you for this time that we can remember. Be with us as we partake of the bread and of the cup, that we would do so in remembrance of you. Let's take the bread. He says, "For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you do proclaim the Lord's death till he comes." Let's drink of the cup. And I think it's interesting. He puts that in there. We also make a proclamation to the world, and we do this together. So I'm going to learn from my mistakes last week, and I'm going to let Derek run the slides while I read the Bible, and then I'll do the slides when we get into the message portion.

So we're reading a longer section this morning from 2 Peter. I'm going to pick up in just a minute in verse 9. We're going to go all the way to the end of the chapter. It's a long section, and then I want us to spend some time learning from it together. So before we dive into our message this morning, let's read from God's Word. It begins in verse 9. And Peter says this, "Then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to keep the unrighteous under punishment until the day of judgment. Especially those who indulge in the lust of defiling passion and despise authority. Bold and willful, they do not tremble as they blaspheme the glorious ones. Whereas angels, though greater in might and in power, do not pronounce a blasphemous judgment against them before the Lord.

But these, like irrational animals, creatures of instinct, born to be caught and to be destroyed, blaspheming about manners of which they are ignorant, will also be destroyed in their destruction. Suffering wrong as the wage for wrongdoing, they count it as a pleasure in the daytime. They are blots and blemishes, reveling in their deceptions while they feast with you. They have eyes full of adultery, insatiable for sin. They entice unsteady souls. Their hearts are trained in greed, accursed children. Forsaking the right way, they have gone astray, and they have followed the way of Balaam, son of Beor, who loved gain from wrongdoing. But was rebuked for his own transgression. A speechless donkey spoke with human voice and restrained the prophet's madness. These are waterless springs, mists driven by a storm. For them the gloom of utter darkness has been reserved.

For speaking loud boasts of folly, they entice by sensual passions of the flesh those who are barely escaping from those who live in error. They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves of corruption. For whatever overcomes a person, to that he is enslaved. For if after they have escaped the defilements of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are then entangled in them and overcome, the last state has been worse for them than the first. It would have been better for them never to have known the way of righteousness than after knowing to turn back from the holy commandment delivered to them. What the true proverb says has happened to them: "The dog returns to its own vomit, and the sow, after washing herself, returns to wallow in the mire."

This is God's Word. Let's pray. Father in Heaven, I thank You for Your Word, even though at times it is difficult in how it impacts us and how it confronts us. I am thankful that You have inspired this Word to be clear, to be straightforward, and that You are willing to confront the hearts of those who are running from You. That You are willing to warn the hearts of those who are struggling, and that You are willing to reassure the hearts of those who are seeking to follow You with all that they are. So I ask, Lord, according to our need this morning, whether it is a wake-up call, whether it is strengthened as we're being pulled in a million different directions, as we seek to follow You in righteousness, and may Your Spirit be with us as we spend time in Your Word. It's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.

One of the core memories about my grandmother is that she really, really liked puzzles. And one of the things you learn about jigsaw puzzles, specifically, is that it always helps to see the big picture. And so we would always begin, you know, the box sort of sitting up on the table in front of the puzzle, and it helps, right? Because it's this green, right, the green of the grass, or the green of the tractor, is this blue, the blue of the sky, or the blue of the water. And it sort of helps you get the pieces, maybe not fit together right at that moment, but at least in the places where they will fit in that bigger picture. And what I learned at an early age is that with enough force, any piece can fit anywhere, right? Like, you can really just mash them together.

And there is a tendency in Scripture, and in our study of Scripture, that if we are not careful to see the big picture of Scripture, we can tend to mash together pieces in ways that don't fit. And so one of the things that I want us to do this morning, there is so much wrapped up in this text. There is warning. There is a call and a picture of the results and the actions of pride and sin. And there is so much that we can pull out and spend so much time on. But I want us, I think, to see the whole picture and how this fits together, not just with Peter's argument in chapter 2, but how it stands in stark contrast to who we are and what God has done for us as Christians.

And one of the great lessons, I think, that goes throughout the book of 2 Peter is that our beliefs impact our actions. And so we all have experiences. What we believe about something is going to change how we act about it. So if we walk outside just for two seconds and go, "It's not cold," right? We won't bring a jacket with us. And when it may, in fact, it actually be cold or be windy. Or maybe we look outside and say, "Man, it looks so cold," and so we dress for the warmth, or dress for the cold, and so we're bundled up, and we get outside, and it's nice and warm. And so what we believe about what we see impacts how we act about it. And so Peter has written to a church that, first of all, is facing persecution. We see that in his first letter.

And here in the second letter is facing false teachers. And at the heart of the false teachers' belief was that Jesus wasn't going to come back. We'll see this unpacked in chapter 3, but they are saying, "Jesus? If he was coming back, where is he? Why isn't he here?" We don't think he's coming back, and as a result of that wrong belief, they move into wrong actions. And so if you have ever wondered why it is so important for Christians to believe rightly and truly about what God has said, it's because it impacts how we act and how we live. And in this long section that we have just read, Peter is sort of logically, in a well-crafted manner and in an understandable way, defending God's people from these people. Who have believed wrongly and now are living wrongly. And Peter is going to be a little bit passionate about that.

I don't know if you picked that out as we were reading through the text. But one of the reasons that Peter is so passionate about defending God's people is that a long time ago, when Peter was a much younger man, there was a moment where he declared in his pride, "I will never leave you. I will never deny you." And then just hours later, as they come to arrest Jesus, he flees. And standing in a courtyard as Jesus is being led between trials, somebody says, "Aren't you one of those guys who's with Jesus?" And Peter denies. Not just once. Not twice, but three times. And in his brokenness, he runs away. After the resurrection, Jesus will meet Peter on a beach. No talk. And part of Jesus' restoring of Peter is that just as Peter denied three times, Jesus will ask Peter three times, "Do you love me?"

And Peter says, "Yes, Lord. You know that I love you." And then Jesus looks at him and goes, "Feed my sheep." And here Peter, in some of his last words, is not just feeding the sheep, but he's defending them. He's watching out for them. And so if you think Peter is a little heated at some points, he is. It's not sinful. He is looking at the sheep that God has entrusted to him and holding them close and seeking to watch over them. And if sometimes that means you've got to shoot the wolves, Peter is going to do that. And so Peter is a little heated. You can see it in the fact that at one point he calls them a bunch of donkeys. Or actually, he says you're not as smart as a donkey. But then he also calls them dogs. And we might think of dogs as

big and fluffy, or sort of fast in queue. In the first century, dogs were often wild dogs, feeding on trash in the streets, attacking those who they came near. So I want to start this morning with the logical progression of this text, and it centers all around this verse. The Lord knows how to rescue the godly and to keep the unrighteous under punishment. And so Peter's whole argument in this chapter is that God can save the godly from trials, and then he will keep the unrighteous under punishment until the day of judgment. And there's a lot of moving parts in this chapter, but when we hear of judgment, it sometimes does something to our hearts. For example, we might say, "I really don't want that." So when our kids were younger and we were getting ready to order pizza,

they were much younger and much more gullible. It was a fun time. They'd say, "What kind of pizza are you going to order?" And I'd be like, "I'm getting skunk pizza with mushrooms." And they'd be like, "Oh no! We don't want that!" I was like, "You guys really think I'm going to order skunk pizza with mushrooms?" When we hear about judgment, there is oftentimes something in our hearts that simply says, "I don't want that." I don't want to have to face the results of my actions. I don't want to have to think about standing before Almighty God and giving an account for what I have done. And the reaction of our hearts to judgment is oftentimes not good. And we need to understand that Peter is not trying to antagonize, but warn. And when I was learning to drive, one of the things I'm so thankful about is how my dad taught me to drive.

And so he would be driving down the road, right, and he would go, "Break lights," just kind of calmly and gently, right? Kind of pointing out to me that every car ahead of me was stopping, and, you know, being young, and thinking I know everything, and your ears don't quite work when you're a teenager. You're going along, and they go, "Break lights." Somebody's like, "Break lights," right? And it can get through to you. That's what Peter's doing. He starts out sort of gently going, "Hey guys, there's this thing that's coming towards you and ahead of you. You got to be careful." And then he goes a little louder, and he goes a little louder trying to warn and get their attention. And the reaction of the false teachers to Peter's warning is skepticism. And you can sort of sum it up in the middle part of this chapter as they say, "Oh, well, what's God going to do to us?"

And he goes, "Oh, have you heard of the flood?" Where God comes to the world and wipes out all of the unrighteous. Have you heard of Sodom and Gomorrah, where God comes and brings judgment upon the unrighteous? And then their response is almost as if, "Well, God can't get all of us." He may judge some here and some there, and Peter's point is that God knows the difference between the righteous and the unrighteous, and the righteous he will save and the unrighteous will be under judgment. And so now we get to the question that we often face when we are in trouble. And so often times, when we find ourselves in trouble, our first response is, "Well, what did I do?" You see it on the face of your dog who's just gotten in the trash. You sit there going, "Hmm, what did I do?"

You see it when you get pulled over by the police, "Why are you pulling me over? What did I do?" We are very good at proclaiming our innocence and asking others to articulate their accusations. And these false teachers might be saying, "I grant that God can judge. I grant, maybe, that God can separate the righteous from the wicked, but show me how I'm doing wrong." And so Peter is going to show them. He's going to answer their question in great detail. Not just of their actions, but where you end up if you walk down these paths. One of the things that happens often times when we're angry, sometimes it seems like it can just be an angry rant. Right? When you hear somebody who's angry, and they're just sort of yelling about everything, and there's no connection.

Peter's words here, I want you to understand this, because it's so important. They're crafted with care. Peter is not just sort of yelling with no point. In fact, you can see it probably more easily in the original languages, but we get glimpses of it in English. Throughout our text, there's pairs of words. One of the great examples of this is where he talks about in verse 10, speaks about the bold and willfulness of the false teachers. That they're proud, and they're strong, and they're proud of being strong and standing in their own greatness. And then contrasts it with another pair of words as he talks about the angels who have true might and power, but they don't behave as the wicked do. He ties it back to chapter one by talking about the shakiness of foundations. He repeats this phrase, "The wages of wrongdoing."

But my favorite part of Peter's crafting of all of these words with care is in verse 15. He says, "Forsaking the right way, they have gone astray, and they have followed the way of Balaam, the son of Beor, who loved gain from wrongdoing." Have you ever had somebody make fun of your name or change your name around in order to kind of make fun of you? In my senior year of college when we were presenting our senior sermons in chapel, and the professors sort of went through all the students and they picked who they wanted to introduce. And one of the guys who had been in my Greek class with me, one of my favorite professors, was a professor of church history and of Greek. And he had become a very good friend, but he had chosen both me and this other guy. And so he chose this other guy. His first name was Brent. His middle name was Steven.

And if you ever think that people don't behave well when they're just little, it's also true with college. This kid was like, he was like the bad kid in your third grade class, but at college level, New Testament Greek. And so our professor gets up to introduce him and goes through an introduction about how, you know, actual knowledge should be no way of standing in front of you being able to say things, like in kind of a funny way. And he says, "Let me present to you B.S., you know, Brent Steven or B.S., and then gives his last name in front of the whole college." Now I'm in a little bit of trouble here because my first name is Brandon, my second name is Scott, and he's introducing me the next week, right? And thankfully, he didn't rode, right? But there's a way to take people's names and twist them and make fun of them, and what Peter does is exactly that in 2:15.

And it's not very evident in English, but in Greek, he misspells the last name of Balaam. In Greek, it's not "Beor," but he adds an "S" in the middle, and it's sort of an alliteration to the Hebrew word for "flesh." And so he goes, yeah, his dad may have been "Beor," but reality is this guy is a son of the flesh, a guy who chased his own desires at the risk of his own life in every way that he could throughout his life, and he was judged by God. So don't think Peter is just ranting. Don't think that Peter is just sort of saying whatever he wants to say. Peter sat down and carefully crafted a scorching and articulated message against the false teachers, and he wants us to feel the weight of what he is saying.

Not just understand what he's saying, but feel the weight. And so he uses frequent illustrations. In verse 12, he has animals pursuing their instincts. Verse 13, a picture of people partying and reveling in their sin, and to demonstrate their lack of shame, they're doing it in broad daylight. He shows the depth of their manipulation and dedication to sin in verse 14. And he does so with an illustration of their perspective, fishing, and even going to the gym. And so he starts in verse 14 by saying this, that their eyes are full of adultery, meaning they see everything in a certain way. I don't know if you ever read the Far Side cartoons. I know for some of us, that was like a big deal. Like we loved reading Far Side. They're ridiculous and they're funny. One of my favorites was, especially when I was younger and washed my car frequently,

is Gary Larson did a Far Side cartoon that said, "A bird's perspective of the world," right? And it's just everything in our world with a target on it, right? You got the freshly washed car, you know, you've got the kids on the playground, you got the bald guy sitting on the parking lot, and they don't have a target on their head. Peter's point is that these false teachers, see, everybody is having a target on them. Every single person. And it's not a target for doing good or for encouragement, but it's a target for immorality. How can I use every person that I see? How can I use every person that I talk to to gratify the needs of my flesh? But then, he talks about how they entice unsteady stoles, a picture contrasting from chapter 1 where he talks about the steadfastness of our faith.

In the picture there is a fishing hook with bait on it. That not only do they see everybody as a target, but they're pursuing that action. And they're throwing out bait, trying to catch and entice. And then he goes even a little further in verse 14. They have their hearts trained in greed. That word "trained," when it comes into English, it comes in English as the word "gymnasium." You go to the gym, and you lift, and you run, and you work out, and you stretch. These guys are doing so, but with their desires for everything that they can have. Not just financially, but physically and immorally. Everybody is a target. I'm going to trap them, and I have trained for this moment where I can take advantage of them. Peter gives us a very clear illustration, and he reminds us of Balaam and his donkey.

He talks about how there are false storms. There's slavery, and then he ends in probably a pretty picturesque way. What the true proverb says has happened to them. The dog returns to its own vomit, and the sow, after washing herself, returns to wallow in the mire. I don't know that we necessarily need to illustrate that. We can get it from the words, right? Peter wants us not just to know facts, but to feel almost the disgusting nature of them. You see, Peter's purpose is to engage our mind and our hearts with the deep emptiness and brokenness of sin. He doesn't just want to say that it's bad. He wants us to feel that it's bad, and that this is an enticement to God's people. And our text this morning is a lesson in the deep danger of pride. And you see it like this at the very beginning of the text.

Peter says this, "The Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and keep the unrighteous under punishment until the day of judgment, especially those who indulge in the lust of defiling passion and despise authority, bold and willful. They do not tremble as they blaspheme the glorious ones." Pride in this text is manifested by following our own desires rather than submitting to the authority of God. They indulge in the lust of defiling passion and despise authority, and they're doing it not sort of quietly but boldly and willfully. And it's easy to dismiss this pride. And in our world it's easy to dismiss pride, but Peter shows us that pride ultimately is the road to ruin. In verse 11 he shows us that pride elevates us in our own minds to a place that is greater than the angels.

That they are speaking out and they're condemning angels, whether good or bad, Peter's point is that it's not their place, because angels themselves do not condemn. So they've lifted themselves up to a place that is higher than their reality, that pride has life-shattering results. If we continue to walk in the path of ruin that pride brings us to, in verse 12 we begin to live solely in the pursuit of our desires rather than what is good and right. Like irrational animals chasing whatever it is we want in the moment. In verse 13 we lose all shame. And in verse 14 we use others for our own gratification, treating them as prey for our lusts and our gain. We're dumber than a donkey, in verses 15 and 16, specifically spiritually. We might look at animals and go, "They don't have a soul. How can they know anything spiritually?"

Peter goes, "Well Balaam's donkey recognized the spiritual nature of Balaam's actions before the prophet did." And the pursuit of ourselves leads us to a deep emptiness that ends like this. The dog returns to its own vomit, and the sow, after washing herself, returns to wallow in the mire. And in the passages between the empty storms and the dogs and the pigs, Peter portrays this profound brokenness and emptiness. And he says that in fact it will take you to a place that is worse than where you started from. And Peter is referencing back to a moment in Jesus' ministry, where Jesus casts out a demon, and the Pharisees and the Sadducees all began to debate about whether he did this by the power of Satan, or how does that work? Jesus responds to them, but then he tells this parable,

right after the casting out of this demon, that that life that has that evil cast out of it, if it is not filled with something that is good, that evilness, that demon, will wander the deserts and the wastes, and he'll say, "Well, I'm gonna go check on my old home." And as he drives by, he sees nothing has been put into place. It's been cleaned up, cleaned out, swept, remodeled, but nothing has taken the place in that heart. And so he goes and gets a bunch more of his friends, and they all move into that life. And in fact, Peter's words are an echo of Jesus' words. The last state has become worse. And so having lived in pride, it leads you to a place that you never want to be and that you never want to go.

And so what's the point? It's so easy to see texts like this and see them as only being for others. Just a few thoughts, and they're big thoughts, and they're important. Sin is serious. And maybe you might say, "Well, you're just seeing the end result of sin." I'll stop before I get there. Here's the reality: what happens if you can't? Because most of us can't. In fact, I would say that none of us can stop before we get to that end result unless the grace of God intervenes. I remember once driving back from college, and there was a section across the New York State Thruway where there's like 20 miles or more between rest areas, and I knew I was getting low on gas, and so I get on the New York State Thruway, and there's no exits, and there's no gas,

and my gas is like an eighth of a tank, and I was like, "I can keep going. Let's see how far I can go." And then an exit comes, and it's like, "Well, I'm going to stop at the next one. I'm in the zone. I know it's the middle of the night. If I stop, I'm going to be tired." And I go a little further, and it's like an exit comes, and I'm like, "Ah, 10 miles. It's the next one. I can make it." I go by the next one, and then I see that sign. It's like, "Next service is like 35 miles." So here I am. So what I did is I found a piece of paper, and just put it over the gas gauge and prayed, right? If I can't see it, it doesn't exist, right? And I pulled into that gas station on fumes.

That's what sin does to us, right? It puts us in a place where we just, there's nowhere to stop. There's nowhere to turn. We're in too deep, and we keep going and digging ourselves a hole, and the remarkable thing is everybody around us can see what we're doing, but we can't. It is only by the grace of God who comes and wakes us up that we see that reality. And one of the great lies is that it's not that big a deal. Just a little. Do you think these people, painting targets on people for adultery, insatiable for sin, started that way? Do you think that's how they woke up and live? There's a little compromise here and a little compromise there. A little bit of the world here and a little bit there. And next thing you know, they're in this state.

Sin always ends badly. And here's the big one, and one of the great lies in the culture that we live in. One of the biggest lies is that my sin's not hurting anybody. It only affects me. Why are you worried about my life? Peter's pretty clear here that there's no such thing as not hurting anyone else. Right? There's a progression that begins in verse 2. And all the way through the end of this chapter, they follow their sensuality. That's where they start. "Oh, I'm just doing what feels good to me." And next thing you know, they're preying on God's people. And here's the reality that you need to understand. The focus of your heart will become the focus of your life. There is this remarkable contrast between 2 Peter 1 and 2. In the first chapter of this book, we have this continual and repeated focus on Christ.

The Christ is the one who calls us, he transforms us, he equips us, he encourages us, he causes us to grow. And you find that his words are true, and that there is a way richly provided into the kingdom. In the second chapter, look at how it lines up side by side. There's a call. The call to do what feels good, and to do what brings pleasure, and that leads to a transformation. And the next thing you know, we're at the gym, training to satisfy our desires, our pleasures, equipping ourselves to carry them out, encouraging others to do the same. And the foundation of this pride doesn't lead, like the foundation of Christ, to hope and safety, but leads to emptiness, like seeing clouds in the middle of a drought, dying of thirst, and those clouds come and they blow right over you, leaving you more thirsty than you were before.

What you find is that the path of these false teachers is almost the exact opposite of the path of the Christian. In chapter one, chapter one, you're called, you're transformed, you're equipped, you're encouraged, you grow in righteousness, your faith is founded upon truth, and your home is heaven. And in this chapter, sin calls, and sin transforms, and it equips you to do more sin, and you grow in sin. And your home is the judgment of God. Where your heart is, that's where you're going to be as well. I want you to know that there is hope. Probably all of us have been lost at one point or another. We occasionally get folks stopping at the church who need one thing or another, and one of the ones that sticks out so clearly in my mind is this guy rolls into the church with a big old U-Haul and goes, "I need gas."

And I look at it and go, "I don't know that we're equipped to fill your U-Haul with gas." I said, "How much gas do you need?" He goes, "Oh, I just need to get like 20 miles. Can you put like a gallon and a half in?" I said, "No, I can do that." So we go over to the gas station, and we're getting ready to put gas in, and I'm glad I asked. I said, "Where are you trying to go?" He said, "Well, I gotta be in Richmond by noon." And it's like 10:30 at this point. I said, "Where do you think you are?" This is like 2006, before GPS and before a lot of unlimited data. And he goes, "Well, I was on 64, and I was driving down the road, and I saw a sign that said Richmond is like 120 miles away on 64.

And so I just kept following the road, and now I'm here. I've got to be really close to Richmond." And I was like, "Are you really tired?" He's like, "I haven't slept for three days." Like, "I've got to get to Richmond by noon." I said, "I have some really, really, really bad news for you." He said, "You're going to need more than a gallon and a half of gas." Like, and he was almost crying, because he's like, "How did I just..." In his tiredness, and you're in the zone driving, 64 to 81, and I'm almost to Richmond. Next thing, he was here. It's this storm of brokenness that leaves us hopeless. Finish out that story, I was like, "We're going to get you enough gas to get to Richmond, and I'm going to go buy you a map." So like, he got there, I think.

Peter's purpose in all of this is that you would see your Savior. That you would come to that moment where you're out of gas. You're not where you thought you would be. You're not where you should be. And he wants you to see your brokenness. He wants you to feel hope. Remember what the Apostle Paul says? The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners of whom I am the foremost. Peter wants you to see this. To those in the church who are walking down this road of ruin and pride, even in the midst of their immorality, he's saying, "Jesus can save you." To those in the church who are wobbling back and forth, he's saying, "Don't take your eyes off Jesus." And to the Christians,

who are seeking to be faithful, he's saying, "Jesus will strengthen you." Reminding us in our brokenness that we were once dead in our trespasses and sins of this world, in which we once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience, among whom we all walked and lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of our body and our mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. But God, being rich in mercy and because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, has made us alive in Christ by grace. You are saved. Understand that there is one who can bring the dead to life.

One who can make the broken whole. Understand that by running to Jesus, minds are renewed and there is forgiveness and hope. I want you to see that in the midst of the brokenness, stands as a warning to the church to be careful. Stands as a warning to those in sin, that Peter's purpose would be that we would stop living in pride, looking at ourselves, and fix our eyes on Jesus. I want to encourage you this morning, if you're a Christian and you're struggling, that you would turn your eyes to Jesus, that you would see that He's the one who calls you and strengthens you and equips you, that through His Spirit, He's at work in your life, in the midst of your discouragement, and to know that no matter how dark the days are, that the mercy and the grace of God is at work in your life. And if you are in that place where you're

back and forth and struggling, understand there is a foundation that is firm like no other, that God's people stand willing and ready to be with you and help you, that God's Spirit empowers you, that His Word teaches you. And maybe you're like the guy in the truck trying to get to Richmond, and you're just lost. I want you to know that there is one who can save you. Would you pray with me? Father, we thank You for Jesus, and we thank You for grace. I ask that for the discouraged and tired, You would strengthen with Your promises and Your Spirit, with the wavering that You would anchor to the foundation that's in You, to the lost. You would break through the hardness of heart, that You would melt the boldness of their hearts, that You would show them that there is another way to live, that there is a deeper

hope and a better future. Thank You for Jesus. It's in His name we pray. Amen. We're going to go ahead and stand and sing, "All I have is Christ." That should be playing. Where's the, is it muted? Hmm. Well, we might not be singing "All I have is Christ."

That's on the computer. All right, we're going to sing a different song. Some of you, we probably know it. We've sung it a lot. We're going to go ahead and just sing a verse of "In Christ Alone." You can just sing. Amen.

This is the second children's church on the 9th. On the 16th, we're going to have a fellowship meal. We'll have some more details about that next week. So, this is the second children's church on the 9th. On the 16th, we're going to have a fellowship meal. We'll have some more details about that next week. In addition to our fellowship meal, we are working to try to plan a VBS for some of our neighborhood kids and some of our kids here and our friends, the kids that we have as friends. So, I would encourage you, first of all, to pray for our efforts as we do that. Secondly, pray for your role in helping. We're a small church, and we need all the help we can get when it comes to things like this. We'll talk a little bit more about this next week, but also on the 16th, we'd like to have maybe a little bit of a kind of get-together, get a feel for who is able to help and willing and in what ways.

So, we'll have some more details about that as well when we get there. So, I'm going to go ahead and pray and then read from the psalm we begin with, Psalm 62, and then we will sing the doxology. Father in heaven, we thank you for allowing us to be here. We thank you for how you work in our lives. I just ask that you would help us in our focus to focus on you, and not on our strength and on our plans, but on yours. That you would strengthen us and help us. It's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. The verse following the text we read this morning, Psalm 62:8 says this, "Trust in Him at all times. O people, pour out your heart before Him. God is a refuge for us." Praise God from whom all blessings flow. Praise Him, all creatures here below. Praise Him above, ye heavenly hosts. Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.

Hello. Welcome back. I'm joking about you. I love you. You guys do that last song with work. So long, dear. That's your favorite. Mark? Oh, yeah. You're awesome. You're a great player. Yeah. Well, I'm trying to add all these short ones that we have to feel. You can do that extra one at the beginning. He doesn't feel that strange. He wants to get back. Maybe it'll work. So. . . .