Do Good for God's Glory

Do Good for God’s Glory

Ever feel like you can’t get ahead. Like the universe is rooting against you? Like as soon as you get your head above water, someone pushes it back under? You just paid off that debt and then realized you owed more on taxes than you expected. Life can be hard. Work can be hard. Relationships are hard. Chuck Swindoll has said - “I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% of how I react to it.” So much of life is not what happens to you but how we respond for God's glory. 

Today's Main Idea: We are Commanded to do Good for God’s Glory

Our text today argues that as followers of Jesus we are called to do Good in three spheres: society, workplace, and for those of us who are married, in our marriages. We are called to be GOOD CITIZENS, GOOD SERVANTS, AND GOOD SPOUSES. 

THIS IS NOT ABOUT MORALISM. It is not about being good enough to get to God. It is about living as God’s people for His glory. For instance, my kids are not perfect. And I want them to be good. But no amount of goodness makes them more my children or less my children. They’re mine and always will be. The same is true if you are in Christ. You belong to Him and your goodness is just about showing who He is not earning your way to Him.  

1 Peter 2:10-12 - 10 Once you were not a people, but now you are God's people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. 11 Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul. 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.

“Now you are God’s people.” Our citizenship is in heaven, we are “sojourners and exiles” in this world. Christians are called to live differently. To stick out from the world. Like light in the darkness or salt on a dish. “Let your light shine that they may see your good works” (Matt. 5:16)

One of Peter‘s concerns is that in the midst of living in a pagan society that the Christians get pulled into the sin and smut of their culture. That though called out of darkness, we still partake of darkness in our lives. (This ought not be so)

Main Idea: We are Commanded to do Good for God’s Glory

We have a longer passage today but these three paragraphs are tied together and part of the same argument. At the heart of this passage is “doing good.” Look at 2:14-15 (“those who do good” and “by doing good”) and now slide your finger down to 2:20, speaking to servants he says “when you do good”, lastly in 3:6, speaking to spouses “if you do good”. 

1. Be Good Citizens (1 Peter 2:13-17)

• 13 Be subject for the Lord's sake to every human institution, whether it be to the emperor as supreme, 14 or to governors as sent by him to punish those who do evil and to praise those who do good. 15 For this is the will of God, that by doing good you should put to silence the ignorance of foolish people. 16 Live as people who are free, not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil, but living as servants of God. 17 Honor everyone. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honor the emperor.

• Good Citizens Honor Authority

• We live in a culture that no longer respects positions. We are intuitively suspicious of all authority and institutions. Show Chart 
• It is not that we are called to blindly trust authority or to not be involved in institutions and seek to be agents of change, but we are called to honor, respect, and obey authority. 
• Don’t get pulled into the muck of a sinful culture. If I surveyed your social media posts from the last six months do you speak in a way that honors the authority God has established? 
• Civil disagreement is one thing, getting pulled into the cesspool and mud is another. 
• God calls us to be good citizens. “Be subject to the emperor” and “honor the emperor”  - This is Emperor Nero (AD 54-68). 
• Why? “For the Lord’s sake” “Living as servants of God.” 
• We honor God by honoring human authority. God has instituted human authority. 
• Notice the qualifiers as well though, we do not blindly obey our government. “For the Lord’s sake” and right before it says to “honor the emperor” it says to first “fear God.” As the Apostles said in Acts, “we must obey God rather than man.” (Acts 5:29)

• Good Citizens Live Righteously for God

• “This is the will of God” - only a few times in Scripture do we hear of God’s will explicitly; this is one of them. “Doing good” - This means obeying the laws, honoring our authority…but it is more than that. 
• Above the Unrighteousness
• “Live as people who are free, not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil, but living as servants of God.” 1 Peter 2:17
• Those who use their “freedom” as license to do evil are not really free, they are still slaves of sin. We are free to do what is right with the right motives. 

• Higher Purpose 

• Let me remind you that Jesus is your king. Your loyalty lies with Him. Your allegiance is with Him. 
• Remember: “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.” - This is who you are - 1 Peter 2:8
• If you are like me you care deeply for our country, our desire is for Godly leaders to be in place and for “righteousness to roar down like mighty waters” (Amos 5:24) in our land. But our hope should not be in America. Our primary citizenship should not be in the United States. We are called citizens of heaven. We are servants of the living God, we are called to as representatives of King Jesus. To glorify Him in how we live as citizens. 
• Is our mayor, the city council, the school board, happy we are under their leadership? Do we honor the leaders who are over us? 
• Peter’s argument here is that how we live as citizens in the kingdom of man can bring glory to God. 

• We are commanded to do good for God’s glory. We do this by being good citizens and we also do this by being good servants.

2. Be Good Servants (1 Peter 2:18-25)

18 Servants, be subject to your masters with all respect, not only to the good and gentle but also to the unjust. 19 For this is a gracious thing, when, mindful of God, one endures sorrows while suffering unjustly. 20 For what credit is it if, when you sin and are beaten for it, you endure? But if when you do good and suffer for it you endure, this is a gracious thing in the sight of God. 21 For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps. 22 He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth. 23 When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly. 24 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. 25 For you were straying like sheep, but have now returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.

• The word for servant here is not doulos, the word translated slave or bondservant, it is oiketēs. It refers to a household servant. This was very common in the first century Roman Empire. (20-30% of the population!). They were part of the household. Farmers, cooks, teachers/tutors, and even doctors. One’s status as a servant actually looked like what we see in modern day employment (we have more freedom).
• “Be subject” - same word as above. Submit, obey. Regardless of character of the master. 
• Again, we live in a culture where “respect is not given it is earned.” So this Biblical principle should challenge us. In the places we work, how do we treat our authority? 
• When they are a bad boss and we still serve honorably this is a “Gracious thing in the sight of God” - it is a gospel moment. When we overcome evil with good. Remember Jesus talked about loving our enemies. Everyone loves people who are nice to them, we can be distinct, glorify God by overcoming evil with good! 

• Embrace Suffering like Christ did 

• The believers in this time were under attack, being slandered as trouble-makers. 
• “When they speak against you” (2:12)
• Put away all malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy, slander (2:1)
• Here in this context “put to the ignorance of foolish people” (2:15)
• “Do not repay evil for evil or reviling for reviling but on the contrary bless.” (3:9)
• One of the greatest lies of our time is that if you are a good enough Christian everyone will love you. We forget the words of Jesus, if they hated me, they will hate you. To quote Paul in 1 Corinthians 1, “the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing.” Don’t let your life be a reason for rejecting Jesus.
• Following Jesus’ example - “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.”
• You might say, "Phil, you don’t know the people I work with. You don’t know the boss I have." Well, planted in this passage is the secret to us living as a servant, following in the footsteps of Jesus. 

• Healed lives look different - The cross transforms us. It is not enough to have an example, we need our hearts washed clean by Jesus Christ. 

• “By his wounds you have been healed” - quotation from Isaiah 53 - Suffering servant
• One of the most misused verses in the Bible. 
• 1. The most important healing God does is a healing of the heart, that allows us to do good! The new birth, new creation, 
• 2. God CAN heal physically. And He does so as a demonstration of his mercy, grace, and power. 
• 3. But our physical healing is not promised in the gospel until glorification. Unless the Lord returns we will all die from something. 
• But we have hope, “Overseer of your souls” - God’s got you! Friends, we don’t need to fear death, disease, persecution, or suffering. “What can man do to me?” 
• We are commanded to do good for God’s glory. We do this by being good citizens, good servants, and lastly Good Spouses…Look at the first seven verses of chapter 3. 

3. Be Good Spouses (1 Peter 3:1-7)

• Likewise, wives, be subject to your own husbands, so that even if some do not obey the word, they may be won without a word by the conduct of their wives, 2 when they see your respectful and pure conduct. 3 Do not let your adorning be external—the braiding of hair and the putting on of gold jewelry, or the clothing you wear— 4 but let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God's sight is very precious. 5 For this is how the holy women who hoped in God used to adorn themselves, by submitting to their own husbands, 6 as Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him lord. And you are her children, if you do good and do not fear anything that is frightening. 7 Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered.
• Now, obviously this point is less applicable if you are not married. But God instituted marriage to be a blessing and one of the ways Christians should be distinct is through gospel-centered marriages. 

• Wives

• “Be Subject” - third time this word is used in this passage - Wives, your gracious submission to your husbands is one of the ways we can demonstrate the gospel. Notice, the husband’s behavior is irrelevant. In the early church many wives came to faith before their husbands. How should they live, married to a husband who could care less about Jesus? Wives make great missionaries! 
• Wives, your heart, your kind response to your husband’s leadership in the home is beautiful to the Lord. God can use this to “win your husband” to Christ!
• Principles here of preferring one another and living righteously apply to friendships and relationships with other family members as well. Paul in Ephesians in a very similar passage follows his exhortation to those who are married with challenging children to honor their father and mother. It is the same way! 
• How are you glorifying Christ in ALL YOUR RELATIONSHIPS? 
• Husbands, “likewise” - in the same way!
• If your reason for not acting like Jesus is something “she does” or something “he does” you are on shaky ground! Husbands, we are commanded here to live with our wives in an understanding way - radical for its time. A society of strong patriarchy, 
• “show honor to the woman” same word “honor everyone” and “honor the emperor” 
• “Fellow heirs with you of the grace of life” - Galatians says similarly , at the cross there is neither male nor female. A difference in roles does not mean there is a difference in value. Husbands, you are married to a daughter of the king. She is royalty. Treat her like it. 
• “Prayers hindered” - God will not bless those who abuse those under their authority. 

Conclusion:

• We are commanded to do good for God’s glory. We do this by being good citizens, good servants, and Good Spouses
• Are you glorifying God in your life? In what ways can you better reflect Jesus in your community, workplace, and family. As a citizen, as an employee, if you are a spouse
• Life is 10% what happens to me and 90% of how I react to it. - let us react in a way that glorifies Christ, let’s live lives that shout eternal hope from the mountain tops, and lets live in such a way to SILENCE those who would seek to accuse us of wrongdoing, of just being a bunch of hypocrites who don’t practice what they preach. 
• Ephesians 2:10 - for we are His workmanship created in Christ Jesus FOR GOOD WORKS which God prepared beforehand that we might walk in them.