Old Sandals

1 Peter 5:10
But may the God of all grace, who called us to His eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after you have suffered a while, perfect, establish, strengthen, and settle you.

The God of all grace. The God of all people. The God of all worlds. The suffering God. The compassionate God. The glorious God.

I Peter 4:16
Yet if anyone  suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God.

Theology is dry to the same degree it is Not Christ-centered. He is Abundant Life.

1 Peter 3:18-21
For Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God…[as] in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared,…eight souls were saved through water. There is also an antitype which now saves us—baptism— through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

This is certainly a difficult passage.  Perhaps this is what it means:

1. Christ suffered and died once for sins, the sins of the whole world.
2. We are saved by the grace of God, through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. This salvation is given to us in baptism, which is an antitype.  Noah was saved out of the waters of the flood. The ark was God’s means of grace.  We are saved in the waters of baptism, which is for us a means of grace.

1 Peter 2:24
Who Himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live for righteousness—by whose stripes you were healed. 

When the Apostle Peter says here that he bore “our” sins in His own body on the tree, whose sins was he referring to? The Apostle John’s answer is straightforward, “…not for our sins only, but also for those of the whole world.”

The Council of Quierzy (Northern France, 853 A.D.), in condemning the teachings of Gottschalk, summed it up this way:

“Just as there neither is, was, nor will be any man whose nature was not assumed by Christ Jesus our Lord, so there neither is, was, nor will be a man for whom Christ did not suffer, although not all are redeemed by the mystery of His passion…, because the goblet of Christ’s blood for the salvation of men, which was prepared… has indeed in itself the power to benefit all; but no one is healed except those who drink from this goblet.”

I Peter 1:8
Whom having not seen you love. Though now you do not see Him, yet believing, you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory.

The apostle Peter, who had seen the Lord both before and after His death and resurrection, here encourages the believers that their love for the unseen Christ
is genuine, as is the inexpressible joy that it generates in their hearts.

If it is inexpressible and full of glory now, what will it be in heaven?

James 5:8
Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand.

It has often been said, “The Lord is coming back in my lifetime, or else I’ll die and be ushered into His presence, but either way it’s soon, very soon.”

My Mom and Dad used to say this, as did their godly parents before them. How many saints   down through the centuries!

Establish your hearts. Don’t fool around. Get ready. Stay ready.

James 4:4
Adulterers and adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God?

Spiritual adultery. We belong to Christ. We are His bride. What an exalted position! What a privileged relationship! What a high calling!

James 3:17
But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality and without hypocrisy.

Jesus Christ is the Wisdom of God, the wisdom from above. He is the image of the invisible God and the fullness of the Godhead dwells in him. This means that God Himself is pure, peaceable, gentle, etc.

God is Light; in Him is no darkness at all.

While we cannot fully reconcile God’s sovereignty with man’s liberty, or God’s infinite justice with his infinite mercy, when in eternity these things are fully revealed to us, it will all be glorious beyond our present, finite ability to imagine.

James 2:21
Was not Abraham our father justified by works, offering up Isaac his son upon the altar?

Abraham wasn’t justified because he was a “good person” who went around doing good deeds for people.  He was justified by faith, a faith manifested when he willingly offered up his own son Isaac upon the altar.

A faith that does not result in obedience, or at least a desire to be obedient, is a dead faith.

James 1:5
But if any one of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all freely and reproaches not, and it shall be given to him.

It would not be consistent with the character of God—as fully manifested in Jesus Christ, who “gave himself for us”—to hold back anything.

God is not stingy with his wisdom. He gives liberally to all who ask. He is not stingy with his love. He pours it out, “sheds it abroad” in the hearts of those open to receive it.

He is no respecter of persons.