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¶ O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out! For who hath known the mind of the Lord? or who hath been his counsellor? Or who hath first given to him, and it shall be recompensed unto him again?For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen.¶ I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God. Roman 11:33-12:2The Family is the central unit of God’s ordained plan for humanity. This does not mean that those who are not married or will not marry are any less important.But we can see that after God created man, He gave him a helpmeet, a more than suitable helper. And in the context of the first family unit, male and female, Adam and Eve not Adam and Steve, God had a purpose for this unit to glorify God.Through the process of sublte temptation through Satanic dialogue and willingness on Adam and Eve’s part, found in Gen 3:1-13, some terrible things occured; things that continue to this day and will continue until God ends time and humanity as we know it. – These things are: doubting the word of God, devalueing the word of God, distorting the word of God, denying the word of God, denouncing the word of God and finally, distrusting the Word of god .The sin of one family member affected and infected the rest of the family and ultimately the entire human race.The same truth is spoken of in James 1:8-16. James reveals to us 5 downward steps in the integrity of man.”A double minded man is unstable in all his ways. Let the brother of low degree rejoice in that he is exalted: But the rich, in that he is made low: because as the flower of the grass he shall pass away. For the sun is no temptation: for when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord hath promised to them that love him. Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man: But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed. Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished bringeth forth death.”James 1:8-15 KJV.Doublemindedness, desire, deception, disobedience and death.This first family unit , by its ordained head, Adam, was responsible for man falling from His perfect position in God’s creation, and then realising spirtual death and ultimately physical death, because God did not receive the glory that was due Him. And because of Adam’s sin, all have fallen short of giving God the glory due Him for He alone is worthy to be praised because of his excellent greatness.This family unit was expected to produce children who would be nurtured in the ways and the admonitions of the Lord, with the express purpose of being a witness to the glory of God, but notice, the fall of Adam occured before there were children.The family as witness for the glory of God begins with the head and then to the mother and then to the children, and take note: that children have no personal witness to the glory of God until they, like any other sinner have been saved by the grace of God.The failure of the first human family to glorify god is no different than our families today, failing to glorify god as we should. Sin is the root cause of our failure, but our failure is not final. the grace and mercy of our lord were avaolable to adam and eve and they are to his adopted children today.However, the same sublte temptation and satanic dialogue to cause God’s true children and families to defect from the sure and pure of word is ever present.Today it does not manifest itself through the lips of a serpent.But, the deliverers of the lies and Satanic dialogues are just as dangerous.It may come in the form of Roman Catholicism, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, Shintoism, Hinduism, Secular Humanism, Mormanism, Jehovah’s Witnesses, or New Age religions and philosophies in its myriad of manifestations.It comes from the host of untruths that we are subjected to in the media, in the workplace and in our schools.We are bombarded with the lies of secularism, behavioral psychology and evolutionary teaching and to some degree you have no control over this attack. There is a disease or a disorder to explain every action of every little disobedient brat and every immoral adult who is immersed in their sinful behavior. There is an excuse or someone to blame it on or a pill to control the symptoms.The world says do not use the rod or you will destroy the child. the world says your sexual appetites are natural animal tendencies, so have it your way. The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye and the pride of life are what you need to be healthy and wealthy and worldly wise, so get your instant gratification, but do it safely and legally when ever it is possible.The world says be full of yourself. Get Self esteem, seek self improvement, discover self actualization.But God says deny yourself, apart from me you cannot do anything of eternal value, and know Me and My will.So brethren, in light of such seemingly overwhelming circumstances, how do families become a witness in this wicked world of condemned sinners? How do we as pilgrims on a temporary journey uphold the eternal truths as God’s adopted children knowing that our Father has provided for us all spritual blessings in Christ Jesus and daily blesses us with benefits? We do it by acknowledging the the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! We do it by not forgetting that For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. “Not only all things in nature and providence, he being the Maker and cause of things, and the preserver and supporter of them … and to whose glory they are all designed and directed; but all things in grace owe their origins to him, as their first cause; they are produced by him, and make for his glory; they all spring from his sovereign will, are brought about by his almighty power, and tend to the glory of his grace; as does every thing in election, redemption, and regeneration: particularly the counsels and purposes of God respecting men… which all rise out of his own heart, without any motive or inducement to them in the creature; are accomplished by his divine power,notwithstanding all the opposition of men and devils; and all issue in his glory, even such of them as may seem to carry in them severity to some of his creatures: and since this is the case, the following doxology, or ascription of glory to God, is justly and pertinently made, and which will be given to him by angels and men to all eternity, for the perfection of his being, the counsels of his will, and the works of his hands, both of nature and grace;” John Gill

A few years ago in Time magazine a feature article was written about phobias.
I first used this to illustrate a point while teaching a Pest Management Seminar and looking for a way to insert a biblical truth into the presentation. At a later date I included it in a sermon on the love of God for His elect. I was re-reading some older notes of mine and I remembered the article.
The Time article provided an in depth psychological discussion stating that large numbers of the US population are afflicted with arachnaphobia, clausterphobia, chemophobia, hydrophobia, homophobia and many more phobias. The most interesting thing to me was that Theophobia, fear of God, was not listed.
Where there is no reverence and awe for God, according to His standards, there is no true love for Him.
Here is love.
Christ came and shed His blood so our sins would be forgiven. And not only our former sins, but our present and future sins as well.
What He did for us in the past provides the grace for the blood to continue to forgive as we confess our sins during our life as believers.
Here is love.
These sins cannot undo what Christ has settled for us in eternity.
Because we were totally unable to come to Him of our own ability, He chose us, without condition and died for us and drew us unto Himself and preserves us forever as His own.
Here is love.
By the Word and the Spirit He enlightens us to what is His will and He enables us, encourages us, and equips us to live according to His will. even as expresses in his prayer of
Ephesians 3: ¶ For this reason I bow my knees before the Father,15 from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name,16 that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man,
17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you, being rooted and grounded in love,18 may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth,19 and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God.
Here is love.
We sin, every day, and it cannot, if we are truly saved, do anything to change our standing with God because we are alive in Christ and Christ is in the presence of the Father and we are risen together with Christ and seated in the heavenly places because our citizenship is in heaven and
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, Eph. 1:3
Our disobedience in our life in Christ only affects our temporal living. Certain benefits are withdrawn and withheld, conditionally. Others are unconditional and we cannot keep them from blessing our lives.
Here is love, not that we loved God but that He loved us.
“But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him. For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.” Rom 5: 8-10 .
Paul in essence says the same throughout Eph. chapters 1&2
“Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” Matthew 22:37-40
These words were nothing new to Paul, the great Old Testament scholar and the apostle born out of time who was taught by Christ.
The love of God is rooted objectively in God himself and the word of God that reveals Him to us and it is subjective experience based on our personal knowledge of Him and personal communion with Him in and through the Word by His Spirit.

There is a George Gerswhin song that immediately came to my recollection as I meditated on I Peter 2:25.
It may seem strange that a secular song would be the first thing to identify with a Scripture verse but it was and Bob’s your uncle.
It has a very haunting and beautiful melody that perfectly underscores the longing of these words in a fallen world:

There’s a somebody I’m longing to see
I hope that she/he turns out to be
Someone to watch over me
I’m a little lamb who’s lost in a wood
I know I could always be good
To one who’ll watch over me

The world has a longing that we do not have. There is someone, although we have not seen him, who we know and who we love and we know he is watching over us. And our longing is in one way fulfilled and yet will be fulfilled in another way when we stand in glory.
We do not have to hope that the one we long for will watch over us. We know he does because he is our Shepherd/Pastor and our Guardian/overseer.
In vs. 25 Peter is again relating to Isaiah 53. This time it is vs. 6
Isa 53:6 All of us like sheep have gone astray, Each of us has turned to his own way; But the LORD has caused the iniquity of us all To fall on Him.
He is our great Shepherd.
Now remember that some believe that Peter’s writing in the original context is to Jewish Christians but he is most likely writing to a mixed group and addressing Jews specifically and Gentiles specifically at certain times, from a historical point of reference.
For you were (either in Judaism or without God) while you had not yet received the gospel, as sheep going astray, from Christ the great Shepherd, and the church of believers who are his flock, and the way of righteousness in which he leads them. You were alienated from the life of God, bewildered and lost in the way of sin, Isa 53:6.
But are now returned, in your conversion to the faith, to the Shepherd; Christ the good Shepherd, Joh 10:11,14,16, who takes care of souls in the way a shepherd cares for his sheep.
And Christ is the Bishop of your souls; the superintendent, the inspector, or, as the Hebrews would phrase it, the visitor, i.e. he that with care looks to, inspects, and visits the flock. This Peter adds for the comfort (as of all believers) but particularly of slaves who are servants that even they, in such a low social status and much exposed to unjust treatment, were under the care and watchful eye of Christ.
But the application suits all who are in this fallen world who by grace come to Christ. We all have sinned and fall short of glorifying God. The returning is to the relationship that was severed since sin came into the world. This is why we speak of reconciliation.
Christ has reconciled us to God. Reconciliation does not always mean that there was a relationship to begin with. For example when talking about reconciling ethnic groups it means to bring together to establish harmony in our society.
But man did have a relationship with God before the fall in the first man Adam, and all who are Christ’s are now reconciled with God. We are restored into a relationship with God.
And in this we have a Shepherd and an overseer. We have someone who cares and watches over us. Rather than singing There’s a somebody I’m longing to see – I hope that she/he turns out to be – Someone to watch over me, we can sing with assurance – Savior like a Shepherd lead us, much we need thy tender care. Jesus Savior pilot me and blessed assurance Jesus is mine.
How great is the grace of God. As we were straying far away from the fold of God it was always God’s intent to bring us into the flock of the Great Shepherd.
Some may be confused about the phrase you have returned to the Shepherd and believe that this was an inclination of a sinner who having decided to accept Jesus into their heart decided it was a good thing to do, but this completely contradicts what Peter has written earlier about the work of a sovereign God in the lives of those who become his people.
They have returned in the sense that they were straying and now have turned to the Christ. They are only returning as part of all mankind who is straying. The turning is because of the grace of God, which has been established earlier in the letter.
As John Gill an early Baptist pastor said “they were returned by powerful and efficacious grace: saints are passive, and not active in first conversion; they are turned, not by the power of their own free will, but by the power of God’s free grace; they are returned under the illuminations and quickenings of the blessed Spirit, and through the efficacious drawings of the Father’s love, unto Christ.
This is the evidence that by His stripes we are healed, meaning of our sins in v. 24.
Our sin caused us to be straying. In one sense all of Christ’s own possession are already His sheep before they are converted. But because we have not yet heard the voice of the Shepherd as it were, we were straying. He comes and finds His own sheep. This is the reason he comes for us, because we are his and as a good shepherd he will go to find his lost sheep.
John 10:11 “I am the good shepherd; the good shepherd lays down His life for the sheep.
Joh 10:27* “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me;
So all we like sheep have gone astray. That is one characteristic of sheep left to themselves. But we have a Shepherd and he lays down his life for his sheep and calls them unto himself and because they are his sheep they will hear and follow him.
But they only can follow him because he has laid down his life for them.
Those who are not his continue as sheep without a shepherd to their own destruction to be plundered and ravaged by thieves and robbers and wolves.
Christ is also our overseer. He attends to us to see that we are progressing as we should. How wonderful is the Spirit Covenant that gives life and all that is needed to live according to that life. How gracious that it is a life that is progressive in the now but completed for us already in Christ and that completion awaits the day of glory. And because it progresses toward that which is already complete there is no killing as with the Letter Covenant. There is full provision for ongoing forgiveness of sins as we repent because we are incurable lovers of Christ. He is working to will and to do of his good pleasure in us and he will complete that good work in us, which he alone began.
How comforting, beyond measure, to know there there is someone Who Is Watching Over Me.

Peter writes that there is something about us that makes us different from other people. We are aliens and strangers.
Now Christians come in all shades of hue and color. We are brown, red, yellow, black and white. We wear dresses, suits, dashikis, saris, sandals, shoes, sneakers and some go barefoot.
We are teachers, mechanics, factory workers, administrators, and salesman.
We live in small houses, larger houses, huts and in prisons.
We like sports and we do not like sports.
In these and in so many other things we are no different from those in the world in which we live.
We are all made in the image of God and until we are made God’s own possession by his mercy and grace we are all the same in our fallen state of sin.
But God has made His own different.
We are to be holy even as He is holy.
Simply put this means that as God is different from all He has created we are to be different from other men.
The way in which our difference can be readily known is by our moral behavior.
The world is an amoral place. It really does not care about morals in an absolute sense and so immorality is very much tolerated, not universally but by matters of degree.
Certain immoral behavior according to God’s standard is tolerated by the world depending on the circumstances of how one is affected by certain immorality. Often, if something immoral by God’s standard has no direct effect on a person in the world, then it will be tolerated, as long as it does not interfere with one’s life.
Often, a Christian sense of morality becomes politicized.
Many moral issues that are biblically based on God’s holiness become the center stage for politics and the morality is really left out. The issue becomes more of a difference of opinion on what rights someone has as opposed to a purely moral issue.
This is how Christians get swept up into right wing politics and the Moral Majority and the Christian Coalition, neither of which were exclusively moral or Christian.
I do not need Rush Limbaugh representing my worldview. If I am Christian and happen to be a political conservative perhaps I agree with Rush on political views, however his world view is not rooted in the Scripture, it is not a biblical world view anymore than Jerry Falwell’s or Pat Robertson’s view is biblical once they make it political.
So what we engage in are culture wars that are really removed from the Scriptures although some appeal is made to the truth of Scripture for the basis of the political process.
We are not called to change the world through politics but we we have a legitimate call to be nation builders through the preaching of the gospel, which enlarges the kingdom of God and His holy nation on the earth.
So Peter is urging to abstain from fleshly kinds of immoral behavior that are proven by God’s word to bring destruction to the soul.
This is what truly makes us holy, different from other people.
We have a deliberate and conscious standard of morality that is based on God’s purpose for us, to be holy as He is holy. Our standard of morality is different than the morality of the world. This is why we are aliens ands strangers; this is why we are different. Aliens and strangers stand out in any community. We will not stand out by our clothes, our work, and our food or our hobbies but we will stand out because of our morality.
This will be outstanding because it is not a priority for the world.
Self-indulgence, self esteem, degrees of hedonism and self-satisfaction are the standard of the world and they are blind to the absolute standards of God and His morality and will lose the war against the soul, which is perpetrated by our very own sinful nature.
And the purpose of this moral living is the glory of God. This is where the real battle lies; it is about the glory of God.
We will be slandered and accused of many things but in the end God will be glorified by how we lived as being different people, as aliens and strangers and as Peter later says as good citizens where ever we are.
The world does not care. It is not a priority. Absolute truth from the One who is the Way, the Truth and The Life means nothing to the world reveling in its heart of darkness.
Was absolute morality a concern for you before Christ saved you? I don’t think so.
By our living according to God’s morality we will be called evildoers, Peter says. We will be singled out as the ones who really have a problem. By upholding and living the truth of Scripture people will call us evil for even daring to say that another person is a sinner and deserving of hell.
You may be the most pleasant and gracious neighbor on the block, but once you have a serious biblical discussion about the penalty for an immoral lifestyle you will be judged by most and perhaps tolerated by some.
Once you inform someone that their child or husband, or wife is not a victim but an active sinner whose own wicked nature is encouraging their self destruction you’d better duck. And if they do slap your cheek, then turn the other to them.
Our job is not to hit back but like Rocky Balboa says in street language that rings true to Scripture, “But it ain’t about how hard you hit, it is about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward, how much can you take and keep moving forward.”
Rocky is talking about winning a fight. We are talking about winning the war, the only one in the end of human history that really matters. John Bunyan called it the Holy War.
I may learn to live from you but only if you are living according to Christ otherwise you have nothing to teach me that will nourish my soul.
Now that does not mean that I should live like a monk and only learn spiritual things.
But Christ is to be the priority of my life. As I learn life skills and trades and other things that are needed to live in the world they need to be a part of my living for Christ. As I use these skills or apply my trade I do it as a Christian. The morality of my life needs to be seen, so that they who will call me evil may one day give glory to God at Christ’s appearing.
The world cares not for the glory of God
O, what a fearful condition
When the heart of darkness rules in man’s life
The end will be perdition
How great was the darkness of my own soul
Until Jesus revealed His light
How unworthy I was
And how glad I am now
That mercy and grace gave me sight (J. Krygier)
We are the light of the world. We are the salt of the earth. It is not just speaking the truth of God’s word that He uses for His glory. That is important because true faith comes from the hearing of the word and Peter later writes:
1Pe 3:15 But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts, and always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you, with meekness and fear;
Peter says in 1 Peter 2:11-2 says that by observing our good deeds they may glorify God.
Our faithful living according to God’s morals does affect men for good. It is part of the process God uses to call His elect unto Himself.
What we say and how we live are both used of God for His glory.
Just as we are to fight against those things that would cause us to demean Christ, those things we should fear that would be demonstrating that we may truly not be what we think we are, we should be waging war against the immorality that will attempt to destroy our living unto the glory of Christ and which will destroy the souls of men who do not know Christ.

The darkness that we were called out from is the very heart of what and who we were. People living in spiritual darkness ruled by a nature that loves darkness because our evil deeds relish the darkness of our souls and the darkness of our souls relish the darkness.
Therefore, we really do not, in our dark condition, see man as he really is.
Darkness is the inability to see: this may sound simple, but as a description of the human nature it has profound implications. Failing to see another human being means failing to understand that individual and not knowing what the real source of their difficulties are. In our darkness we cannot see it.
Our worldview, without Christ, is determined not by the light of absolute truth found in Christ but by the darkness of our own hearts and our depravity and our natural condition as haters of the Light. Having eyes to see we cannot see, in the natural or the spiritual sense.
What did you know and what truth did you really see until God called you out of darkness and brought you into His marvelous light?
The only honest answer is that you saw nothing and knew nothing in an absolute sense.
What you knew of man was distorted although even sinful men can recognize evil for example, but not in the absolute terms of God’s definition of evil.
What ever you saw or knew of God was distorted and overshadowed by human reason and making gods in your own image until God called you from that domain of darkness with a heart of stone and placed you in his kingdom of light with a new heart.
You may have known much about God but knowing him is a completely different thing.
Peter says we once were not a people of God but since we have received mercy we are the people of God. We need to cherish more and more of what that means.
O Christ, in Thee my soul hath found
And found in Thee alone,
The peace, the joy I sought so long,
The bliss till now unknown.

I sighed for rest and happiness,
I yearned for them, not Thee;
But while I passed my Savior by,
His love laid hold of me.

Now none but Christ can satisfy,
None other name for me;
There’s love, and life, and lasting joy,
Lord Jesus, found in Thee.
–Author unknown
As the people of God many will despise you and call you arrogant and call you bigoted and call you crazy to believe that you have some kind of right to be so exclusive about God.
But we have the sure word of God and a changed heart and the ministry of the Holy Sprit that proves who we are by God’s grace and mercy. We do not merely know about God – we know him through Jesus Christ our Lord and we know He knows us, intimately as his very own possession. To proclaim the excellency of our God should be the easiest and most joyous thing that we can do.
His name alone is excellent. We can speak of the excellencies of his grace, of his mercy, of his kindness, of his faithfulness, of his everlasting love and so much more.

Tuesday, Nov 7th is election day in the USA.
It is mid year elections and of course the get out the evangelical, whatever that is today, vote movement is once again moving forward at full pace.The pundits, Theonomists and the Reconstructionists are all waiting to see if God is going to win this election.
What a shallow view of the Sovereignty of God.
Elections are purposed in the divine purposes of God as a means to His ends for the praise of His glorious grace. But they are no more condtioned by any external force that is the government that is a brutal dictatorship and remains so as long as God determines that to be His providence.
I am a Baptist by conviction. In the US we might have been a limited religious freedom country made up of about four major denominations if it had not been for the Baptists. I am an incurable Christ lover by God’s decree and choosing.
I no more want to affiliate with the religious right and the confused doctrines of a Pat Robertson or a Jerry Falwell than I want to be ruled by Sharia Law or anarchy.
My days as a hippie (I am 56) radical are behind me. I stood in front of the state troopers while occupying a student building at a NY State College in 1968. I experienced pepper gas and all the tension of a mass demonstration. I was going to vote for Frodo Baggins in the 1968 election but he did not get on the ticket, so I voted for Eldrige Cleaver and Mark Lane. I am glad that I saw how Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin really manipulated alot of young people and walked away from that long before I was A Chrisitan. But then again in ’68, guys were leaving for Canada and other places during the October draft. I drew a high number but after a few years I gave up my student exemption, and waited for six months to be called. I never was. If the war had continued, I would have been on my way as soon a I left school so I figured. Let’s get it over with and take the risk.
It is wonderful to be able to express my freedom in an election. But far too many Christians in the world suffer daily as they live to honor God in whatever way they can.
American evangelicalism as a whole is a far cry from what true biblical Christianity is.
It would do us well to recall Peter’s 1st epistle.
Peters’ purpose in writing this letter seems to be based on clearly making it known to his readers about the heavenly inheritance. He also follows Christ’s example, if we would reflect back to the Sermon on the Mount and other passages where Jesus guarantees persecution for the believer, to give consolation to the persecuted, and to prepare them for a greater approaching ordeal. Peter exhorts all by letter’s end – husbands, wives, servants, elders, and people to live as good citizens wherever they are, so as to give no reason for the enemy to reproach Christianity or the Gospel of Christ. Rather he would hope that they would win them to it, reminding them that they are established in the faith and others can be as well.
But too often our political Christianity does the opposite in the name of political freedom and we do everything we can to anger the enemy by accusing them of all sorts of nasty things, which they will do by sheer nature and hatred of God.
All Christians, if they rightly consider their calling, must never settle themselves here in this temporal place and kingdom, but see themselves as travelers, sojourners and as pilgrims waiting for the consummation of Christ’s kingdom to come in His person unto the praise of His glorious grace. Jesus taught us “My kingdom is not of this world”. Yes we are members of His kingdom, but it is not of this present world or its system. The kingdom of God is within us and where ever we are there exists the kingdom of God, in small tracts as it were, as we gather as bodies of believers throughout this world. We should live as aliens and many times brethren we are made to be aliens in many lands and many places. We are not wanted. However we are God’s chosen.