When You Are Under Pressure for Your Faith

1st Peter addresses many themes that continue to be relevant for us today. Written to encourage 1st century beleaguered believers who were under pressure for their faith, Peter under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, calls on those who were being persecuted for their faith to strive to glorify God regardless of their circumstances, painful and deadly though they may be.

While we in Taiwan do not face the kind or level of persecution that the recipients of 1st Peter faced, we need the counsel and wisdom expressed in this Holy Spirit inspired portion of Scripture to face the particular kinds and varieties of faith opposing circumstances that we encounter on a daily basis.

Regardless of how sincere and fervent we may be in living out our faith, non-believers, government entities, society in general and at times even our own families are sources of rejection and resistance that bring much pain and concern to us in this age just as in the time when Peter wrote his letter.

Beneath the leadership of the Holy Spirit, Peter wisely reaffirms for the recipients of this letter their self identities as being eternally valid because their identities are ultimately and irrevocably linked with Jesus Christ and His eternal victory. The vexing painful circumstances of persecution, real though they be, are but temporary, therefore they are to be expected and endured by a faith that looks beyond the immediate traumas and testing with an eye focused on eternity.

At times, pain and persecution can conspire to blur our vision and cause us to lose our spiritual focus. Reiterating the rightful sense of self of each believer as privileged, chosen, holy, and fully accepted as spiritual priests, Peter’s counsel is therapeutic in strengthening and or restoring spiritual vision for believers then and now.

Subsequent to establishing the worth and value of each believer as evidenced by the shed blood of Jesus, Peter exhorts the readers to endeavor to glorify God in the midst of the persecutions they endure by relating as positively as possible to those who were persecuting them. Peter’s Holy Spirit inspired exhortation could be summarized as “Be Who You ALREADY Are!” in every realm of relationships that believers find themselves. We would do well to “hear” this exhortation in our time as well.

Peter addresses how to relate to unbelievers in society at large and includes needed counsel about relationships among family members that we can glean much from. Much of the decline in the quality of family relationships and the increase in family dysfunctionality in our day could be avoided if this counsel was received and acted upon in fact rather than merely being a point of speculation among other competing social theories that lack the necessary dynamism of eternal truth.

In chapter three, verses 8 through 12 Peter then gives much needed counsel regarding relationships among believers as the family of faith. It is noteworthy to be reminded that when Peter says “you” the word is plural in Greek, meaning it is addressed to all believers. All believers in the family of faith are to be mutually sympathetic, mutually loving, mutually compassionate and mutually humble. When these characteristics are actual in fact rather than merely being rhetorical, then all in the family of faith will possess the kind of single mindedness that is translated from the Greek as being like-minded in the NIV Bible.

Responding to the prompting of the Spirit, Peter contrasts the wonderful possibility of verse 8 by contrasting in verse 9 actions and attitudes that are inconsistent and destructive to fullness of life in the family of faith. He even goes so far as to unequivocally call these actions and attitudes evil! Evil because they damage lives and destroy Christian community. Sad but true, there are many instances in church history where the failure to heed this exhortation and differentiate between good and evil in relationships within the family of faith has resulted in damaging both the cause of Christ as well as His Church.

Peter doesn’t hesitate to define evil in verse 9 as being poisonous speech (action) that is abusive and designed to humiliate someone else. It is an action of the tongue that reflects an inner malice (attitude) that flows out of a morally rotten character. The book of James chapter 3 reminds us of the destructive power that the tongue can bring upon others by being set on fire by hell itself.

To be the recipient of such from unbelieving external sources outside the family of faith is to be expected, but the pain of being on the receiving end of such from within the family is extremely painful. Unfortunately some choose to respond to this pain by replying in kind, thus adding fuel to the fire that will destroy Christian community if left unrecognized or unchallenged.

We are called on in this age by this Scripture to face the potential we have to either be a source of blessing to our family of faith or be a curse upon our family of faith. If we choose wisely as counseled by Peter and buttressed by Psalm34: 12-16, we can mutually inherit the blessing of a wholesome life that characterizes a Christ honoring community of faith that validates the message of the Gospel rather than contradicts the life and love that the Gospel brings.

We are called as God’s people to deliberately decide to reject anything that imports destruction and division into God’s family of faith. We are called to deliberately turn away from the temptation to respond in kind to others in the family of faith who may be experiencing a momentary lapse in the correlation between their life and lip, remembering that to respond this way is an act of Grace that is mutually needed by all the members of the family of faith, including ourselves.

Let us remember that the Lord differentiates between righteousness and evil with the appropriate response that each deserves. Let us decide to be those who have God’s approving eye, listening ear and affirming face turned toward us in divine favor! In short, we can choose to have heaven on earth or hell on earth for our corporate Christian experience as the family of God. Let’s wisely choose the best by having righteous and redemptive relationships among ourselves rather than retaliatory relationships that God calls evil, thus glorifying God and denying any foothold or access to the enemy of all that is good and righteous!