Living in Exile--a sermon from 1 Peter

Living in Exile

He was probably around 12 years old when he lost his home his family and his freedom. He was taken as a slave and forced on a long march across the desert to a strange country. It was a nightmare. Foreign soldiers everywhere, dust, swords, horses, screaming women, dying men, fire, the smells and sounds of death. The city he grew up in was burned with fire. All his familiar playgrounds became piles of rubble. We know that he was a prince, a member of the royal family. Royal families do not fare well when wars are lost and he probably witnessed the death of his parents and older family members before being carried away in chains. He was taken to the palace of his peoples greatest enemy. The people that Hebrew mothers mentioned when they wanted their children to obey. “You better obey your mother and fetch some water or the Chaldeans will come and get you.” Now they had really come and got him. There was no home anymore, no mamma, no temple, no palace. The future looked as dark as it could be. Hot tears dried instantly on his 12 year old cheeks during that long long long walk through the hot desert. In one moment he had lost everything. When he arrived on the other side of the known world he was placed in the care of the king’s chief Eunuch. We do not know what physical terrors awaited him in the palace but the possibilities are not pleasant. The king knew how to ensure that all children born in the royal palace had been fathered by him alone. It is very possible that any budding dreams of a wife and family were also taken away from the young Daniel after his arrival in Babylon. To be quite blunt. His placement among the kings eunuchs suggests physical scars as well as emotional ones. All of this at the tender age of twelve.

Our Text today comes from 1 Peter. It is a text about suffering. Last week we talked about how Jesus’ victory over death means that we can live victorious lives today. Jesus’ exalted place in heaven means that we have access to his power. And most importantly, His Spirit with us means that we are with Him, and with His Father. Heaven is open to us. Heaven comes to us through Jesus and the Holy Spirit that he sends. This is all good news! But what about when we can’t hear the angels singing? What about when we feel all alone? What can we do, how can we keep believing when the past is a nightmare and the future is dark. When we, like Daniel, become victims of violence, hate, greed, and circumstances. If Jesus promised to send heaven to us, why do we sometimes feel like we’ve woken up in hell?

I know that there are some in this room who have buried children, parents, spouses, and best friends. I know that there are some who have battled with death themselves. Some of you have experienced rejection, betrayal, addictions, abuse, violence, depression. Maybe there was a time when tomorrow has looked so dark, the pain was so hard to bear, that you considered ending it all. Maybe you are carrying pain today that you don’t dare to let anyone see. I do not know all of your stories but I am sure that what I have told you about yourselves is true. I am sure because we live in a world where suffering is so common that it is unusual to meet someone who has not suffered. I have a professor who says that everything about our world is broken. It seems like a good description. When I started reading the text for this week and thinking about the topic of suffering in the Christian life I realized I am not qualified to preach this sermon. I have not lived long enough to have answers for all the difficult questions we ask when we are hurt. So I went to the Bible looking for role model who can teach us how to live successful, abundant, heavenly lives, right here on earth. Right in the middle of brokenness and suffering. What I found, was Daniel.

Daniel’s story starts out in tragedy. Ripped away from childhood at only twelve years old and forced into the service of an enemy king. It has all the elements of a tragedy. We expect to find Daniel afraid, depressed, and bitterly silently rebellious. But instead Daniel acts honorably and courageously. He refuses to be shaped by anger, revenge, or fear. He insists on honoring his God above the king and yet serves the Babylonian king better and more faithfully than any of his other subjects. Daniel is not only successful. He is powerful. His self-control and wisdom make him the most powerful man in the most powerful nation on earth. Surrounded by conspiracies, jealousies, false Gods, and the oh so human impulse to get even with those who have wronged him, Daniel is solid. Three kings rise and fall but Daniel is not moved. Daniel is not a subject of Judah, or Babylon, or Persia. Daniel is a subject of the kingdom of God. And he brings the kingdom of God wherever he goes, even into the royal courts of Babylon. Daniel’s life becomes a mirror through which three different kings are measured and revealed for what they truly are. Daniel’s story is a story of hope in hopeless circumstances. Success at the end of human resources. Power out of complete powerlessness. Daniel’s story is a story of victorious living, free living, abundant kingdom of God living—incredibly demonstrated in the most unlikely and unfriendly of cirucumstances, in Babylon. Daniel teaches us how to live in exile.

Now let’s consider another story… This is our story.

When everyone first heard about the fires they shook their heads. Soon the whispering began, “they say Nero ran out of land to build new cities so he decided to rebuild the old ones.” “I think he couldn’t stand the thought of not having his name on every building in Rome.” “of course he’ll put a huge mausoleum right where the skilled workers houses were.” “Did you hear how many people died in the fire. It was in the middle of the night wasn’t it.” The whispers began to get louder as the whisperers became bolder. In a few weeks people were speaking openly on the streets about how the crazy emperor had burned down Rome so that he would have a building project. Nero was not pleased with this. He needed someone to blame, a sectarian group strange enough that people would be inclined to believe rumors about them, small enough that they would not be too much trouble to destroy, and poor enough that their loss would not effect the Roman Economy. He chose Christians.

It’s not likely that the majority of people believed the emperor’s accusations but they were glad that the shows in the ampitheater had gotten more interesting. They went to watch Christian captives fight for their lives and eventually be torn apart by lions, wolves, and half starved dogs. They gladly directed all of their anger at the injustices of the emperor toward the strange Christians with their strange God and they felt better. If the emperor burns down Rome you can’t do anything about it. No one likes to feel helpless. But if you try to believe that Christians burned down Rome you can go to the ampitheater, see the villain, yell curses at him, watch him die, and then go home feeing powerful, like justice has been done. So Nero’s plan worked. Hating Christians became the popular thing to do. It was during this time that Paul was beheaded in Rome.

Persecution came as a shock to the Christian churches. They didn’t have long to mourn for their beloved leader Paul before they were fleeing for their own lives. Believers who had never even been to Rome were being drug into courts all over the Roman empire. It was absurd to implicate them in the Roman fire but nobody cared anymore about why. They were charged with being Christians and Christianity was illegal. Killing Christians had become national policy.

Most of the time when tragedy strikes it takes us by surprise. We weren’t expecting it. The first question we are likely to ask is “why me?” “What did I do to deserve this?” There is usually no answer to this question and the next question to follow is equally unanswerable “Why did God allow this to happen?” It is at this point, with too many questions and not enough answers, that we are most likely to give up. Some people give up on God and become atheists, or even worse, angry theist who believe in God but hate him. Some give up on themselves. Some commit suicide. Others act out a living death everyday. They get up in the morning, walk to work, eat, sleep, but inside they are already dead. There is nothing behind their eyes. There is no more hope left. But then there are others who manage to hang on to faith. They trust a God they can’t see, live without answers, walk on in the darkness, and miraculously transform their captivity into a tribute to freedom. How do they do it? How did Daniel do it? The same problems and questions present themselves to us. How can we live heavenly lives in the middle of hellish circumstances?

It was during the persecution under Nero that Peter wrote his first letter. It was addressed to the churches scattered around the area of modern day Turkey. His letter is a carefully composed instruction manual for Christians on how to live Daniel lives. The letter carries a very interesting postscript at the end 5:13 “ The church at Babylon, which was chosen together with you, greets you;” For seventy year the nation of Babylon held God’s people in captivity. During that period Daniel stood as an example of holy living in exile. Five hundred years later Peter addressed his letter of encouragement and hope to the persecuted Christian church “from Babylon.” And only a few years afterward, John wrote his “Revelation of Jesus Christ” from the prison Island of Patmos. It is in that book that we read the dramatic description of the final fall of Babylon. They all seem to be saying to us. Babylon is not a nice place to live. It is a place of pain. It is a place of suffering. But don’t worry. Don’t be afraid of Babylon. It is a place to practice kingdom of God living. Our exile will not last forever. Babylon will fall. We are citizens of an eternal kingdom, the kingdom of God. What can Babylon do to us?

Peter puts it this way…

3:13 Who will do you any harm if you keep your minds fixed on the One who is good? (many translations read “if you keep your minds fixed on good” but the One who is Good is a common name for God in the Bible and is a very legitimate possible reading of the original Greek.) Christians after all are not those who memorize rules for good behavior and constantly rehearse them but people who follow and constantly look up to a God who is good. Goodness in the Bible is never an abstract ideal. It’s not even a behavioral standard to strive for. It’s a person we can know. God is good.

14 But if you do suffer for the sake of righteousness, you are blessed; this is a repetition of Jesus’ words “blessed are those who suffer for the sake of Righteousness for the kingdom of heaven belongs to them.” It seems a very unlikely thing to say and we are not even sure at first if it is really helpful. Who likes to be told to be happy when they aren’t and there in nothing in their circumstances to suggest that they should be. But Jesus did say that there is a special blessing for those who suffer. In fact, he said that the kingdom of heaven is theirs. Greek verbs have many complicated tenses and he could have very easily said, “the kingdom of heaven will be yours (after you suffer faithfully)” but he used the present tense. “The kingdom of heaven is yours.” So there is something about the nature of suffering (if it is done for the sake of righteousness) that brings us into the kingdom of heaven today. If there is a reward to be had for those who respond to suffering with faith, how can we ensure that we respond correctly? have no part in their fear (do not fear what they fear) and do not be troubled; The words fear and worship are often used as synonyms in the Bible. There is a reason for this. All pagan religions are driven by fear. We try to appease the things we are afraid of through worship. If we fear poverty we will worship wealth. If we fear pain or death we will worship self-preservation. If we fear helplessness, we will worship power. There are many Gods in Babylon but if we want to learn how to live as citizen of heaven in exile, the first step is to not fear Babylon’s Gods. We serve one God. He is not the God of money or power or comfort, He is the king of the whole earth and he alone is worthy of our fear and worship. The God’s of Babylon are nothing. Not only are we told not to be afraid of them, we are told to not even be distracted or disturbed by them. Instead…

15 But give honour to Christ in your hearts as your Lord (lit: make Christ holy in your hearts) Of course Christ is already Holy. There is no way we can make him more or less holy. But our behavior can influence the way others see him. The way we live can reveal the Holiness of Christ or conceal it. When we worship God alone, and speak of the holiness of Christ those around us will notice. They will begin to ask us why we do not worship the Gods of money, power, or comfort that are so popular in Babylon. They will want to know what makes our God so Holy that we worship him with all our hearts. When Christ is honored in our hearts and lives people will notice; and be ready at any time when you are questioned about the hope which is in you, to give an answer in the fear of the Lord and without pride; When people ask us why we do not serve the God’s of Babylon it is not the time to preach a passionate sermon on the evils of idolatry. We are to answer with gentleness and humility about the hope that is in us. This is not a doctrinal dissertation. This is a personal testimony. We should be able to say, this is what God has done for me and this is why I serve Him. The remarkable thing about Babylon is how many times we find God there. It is often those who have spent many years in exile in spiritual Babylon who love God the most and speak most passionately about what He has done for them. Rather than weakening our faith, Babylon, often makes us stronger. It is there surrounded by the fears of loss and death pain and loneliness that we learn to not be afraid and to honor Christ in our hearts. It is there that we become powerful witnesses to the holiness of God.

When we find ourselves in Babylon we can know that we are in good company. Many heros of the faith have been here before us. Christ himself has been here. We read in verse 18 Because Christ once went through pain for sins, the upright one taking the place of sinners, so that through him we might come back to God; being put to death in the flesh, but given life in the Spirit;…

22 who has gone into Heaven and is on the right hand of God, angels and authorities and powers being made subject unto Him.

It was through suffering, innocent suffering that Jesus opened up heaven to us. Therefore, Peter says. We should not be surprised if as followers of Jesus we find that life sometimes leads through very dark valleys. Jesus has been here before us. He knows this road. He can lead us. The path leads through death itself but we should not be afraid because we know that resurrection and eternal life wait on the other side.

Finally 1 Peter ends with this advice..

19 Wherefore let them that suffer according to the will of God commit the keeping of their souls to him in well doing, as unto a faithful Creator.

Chapter 5

6 Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time:

7 Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you.

8 Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour:

9 Whom resist stedfast in the faith, knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren that are in the world.

10 But the God of all grace, who hath called us unto his eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after that ye have suffered a while, make you perfect, stablish, strengthen, settle you.

11 To him be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.

In this passage Peter makes a number of incredible claims.

Firstly that suffering may actually be “according to the will of God.”

That we should therefore submit to unexplainable tragedies and dark Babylon moments in our lives and part of God’s will for us.

That we should continue to trust God to lift us up and fulfill his promises to us in His time.

That in the meantime, that means, in the very moment of pain, we can drop all of our burdens and throw all of our worries on God because he cares about us.

That faith is the weapon we must use to resist the temptations of the devil (temptations to run away, temptations to become angry, temptations to stop trusting, temptations to give up.)

That we are not alone in our sufferings but that suffering is an experience familiar to all of God’s people.

And that finally we can be assured that after our trials are over we will find that God has made us more complete, more established, and stronger than we were before.

The story of Daniel shows us that it is possible to serve God in enemy territory with the odds stacked against us and the pain of fresh wounds sitting like a ball in the back of our throat. The first letter of Peter gives us some practical advice and reminds us that Babylon is not a permanent state. Suffering will not last forever. Of course we do not have the time here to mine the deep resources of 1 Peter. There is more gold there than you can carry away at one time. It is a place to continue coming and digging with years and years of riches waiting to be discovered. That is what I hope you will do. That is what I intend to do. When bad things happen to good people for no reason let us remember that we are not home yet. We are still in Babylon, and these things happen in Babylon. But let us not live like beaten slaves. Let us take our lessons from Daniel and Peter. Let us live as free citizens of the kingdom of heaven trusting that our lives will bring Glory to the God who has made us free and that anything he permits to come to us will only leave us stronger.