Surprising Submission, Part 2

Let's face it, we naturally show respect to the manager who's easy to work for. We naturally submit to the supervisor who seems to appreciate our worth. We naturally submit to a boss who doesn't put on us more than that for which we volunteer. Look, you don't need a command to do that. You don't need a command to love the loving, to respect the respectful, to work hard out of appreciation for those who appreciate you. You don't need help with that.

You don't have to write to any of us about that. One of the hardest things for parents to face might be the times when we perceive that our children are treated unfairly. We want to rise to their defense and correct the injustice we perceive. How about in your life? Have you found that people always treat you fairly?

Probably not. So, while this is hard, it might be better to train our children to know how to handle unfair treatment instead of training them to always expect fair treatment. At least Stephen Davey thinks so. And that's part of what he's teaching in today's lesson called Surprising Submission. This is Wisdom for the Heart. Today we bring you the conclusion to the message that Stephen began last time. Imagine Peter writing this letter to churches where a household slave would be the pastor-teacher and the master would be a member of the church. That we know from history this occurred. Callistus, one of the early church leaders, was a slave. Perpetua, an aristocratic woman in the early church was still a household servant.

She became a martyr for her faith about a hundred years after Peter wrote this letter. It's going to be the gospel, by the way, and the truth of the gospel that will create a brand new culture. The culture in here is different than the culture out there, and it ought to be. We don't conform in here to that out there. We don't get our cues in here from that out there.

This is a new culture. But by the way, that atheist or that professor who loves to tell you that the Bible justifies slavery because of texts like these doesn't understand that slavery in first century Rome was different than the 18th century. The slavery or the servitude that Peter is addressing would not be the people who were bought, abducted and bought and sold against their will.

They were not kidnapped by their own countrymen many times and then sold to other nations. In fact, let me have you rethink this issue just a little bit. In fact, I thought about just doing a whole sermon on that. Had the Bible been followed in Great Britain and America, the kind of horrific slavery we think of today, if they had followed the law of Moses would have never ever taken place.

Listen to a text. You might jot down the verse in the margin of your Bible if you want to go back into the law of Moses. It's stated in Deuteronomy chapter 24 and verse 7.

Listen to this. If a man is caught kidnapping any of his countrymen and he deals with him violently or sells him, that man shall die and you shall purge this evil from among you. According to the law, beloved, God made it clear that the buying and selling of human beings, the kidnapping, the abducting of human beings was an evil deserving of capital punishment. What about the New Testament?

Well, if you look at the record, you discover Paul on one occasion is listing, I mean, all sin is sinful, but he lists sort of, you know, some really bad ones. Right in the middle of the list in 1 Timothy chapter 1 and verse 10, he mentions enslavers, those who kidnap or abduct against another human being's will for the purpose of enslaving them. So slavery or servitude as we think of it in the 18th and 19th centuries existed, beloved, it existed not because of the Bible, but in spite of it. And it will be Christians on both continents who will take the Bible and clearly teach it. And wherever the gospel to this day, because guess what's happening around the world today? Slavery in the form of abduction and kidnapping. In fact, in his book entitled How Christianity Changed the World, Alvin Schmidt recorded how the transforming truth of the gospel in those countries where it is allowed to prosper ends this evil.

He says, the countries that will not accept it will continue it or hide it. He summarizes that the African nation of Ethiopia, in Ethiopia, slavery was finally outlawed in 1942. In Saudi Arabia, slavery was finally outlawed in 1962. And slavery was finally outlawed in India in 1976. By the way, the greatest offense occurring in relation to this kind of slavery, this kind of kidnapping and abduction is taking place and the media won't report it. It's happening in Sudan where already 3 million slaves have been killed.

Why? Because they're Christians being sold to their countrymen who are Muslims. It will be the revolutionary transforming truth of the gospel that will change the presuppositions and the institutions of our world. Let me make one more important observation so that we can understand this text, which does not defend that kind of chattel slavery as we call it. Peter doesn't even use the normal word for slave here.

He uses a word found only three other times in the New Testament and it refers to household servants, what we would call domestic servants. And while they didn't have the rights of Roman citizenship, depending on their household, they might receive an education. They could even purchase property.

They might enter a profession such as music or teaching or medicine. They could represent their household in a number of ways depending on the benevolence of that household. I mean, think in your mind of a different kind of context. Think in your mind of the household staff of Downton Abbey, okay, where they do all the work and the family of the house spends all their time all day drinking tea and changing clothes.

Have you noticed that's all they do? Get that picture in your mind. That's Rome. This was in some ways like Joseph. He was abducted and yet he entered a culture where he rose to be the household administrator for Potiphar. However, like Joseph in the first century, a servant, even a household domestic servant, still had no legal standing. His world could change at the whim of his master whether brutal or benevolent. And Peter is going to address the employees of both scenarios.

All right, let's go back to the basic command. Servants, verse 18, be submissive to your masters with all respect. Now, with that culture in mind, the text is easy to apply to every one of us in the 21st century in a free country because as so many point out, this has to do with a relationship in a free country like ours of an employee to an employer which is really bad news because now we can't talk about something happening way back there.

It's happening to you right now and it has to do with your response and mine today. In fact, the point could be made, so I'll make it, that if a servant without personal rights or benefit packages in the first century was commanded to show deference and respect to his master, what excuse do any of us have to disregard or disrespect or disobey those in authority over us with all of our benefits and freedoms? Now, maybe you're saying to yourself, I don't like the direction this is going.

All of a sudden, I wasn't expecting this. And besides, Stephen, you obviously don't know anything about my boss or my supervisor or my teacher. You have no idea how absolutely utterly unreasonable they are. Peter knew you'd be thinking that, verse 18, be submissive to your masters with all respect, not only to those who are good in general, but also to those who are unreasonable.

He closes the loophole. The word for unreasonable is scolios, which means crooked, hard to deal with, bent, like scoliosis, we use it, of the spine. It's hard to live with.

It can cause difficulty. That's what he's talking about. Let's face it, we naturally show respect to the manager who's easy to work for. We naturally submit to the supervisor who seems to appreciate our worth.

We like working for them. We naturally submit to a boss who doesn't put on us more than that for which we volunteer. Look, you don't need a command to do that. You don't need a command to love the loving, to respect the respectful, to work hard out of appreciation for those who appreciate you. You don't need help with that.

Peter doesn't have to write to any of us about that. What's not so easy is for you right now to know, and maybe you'd like me to know, but you know and you feel like you're trapped. Perhaps at this moment, it's what's going through your mind. That's how you feel about your job. There's no respect for you.

You're constantly belittled. In fact, you might be serving a boss whose entire thinking patterns are just bent. I mean, you're wondering why in the world that he or she ever arrive at that position, they can't think straight.

They're crooked. I read one author who now is a pastor, but he recounted the time when he was going through college and he served as an assistant in a hotel to the man who supervised all the food operations. His name, the boss, was George. George was hardworking, but he was loud.

He was critical. He was abusive verbally. He played favorites. He divided everybody between either great friends or terrible enemies.

There was no in between. The baker in this particular hotel was evidently one of his enemies. He didn't know why. Probably she knew more about food than he did, but at any rate, she did nothing that could ever please him. One day, he writes, she made apple cinnamon pancakes and George sent his assistant, this man is now a pastor, this young man, to bring some batter for him to taste and approve. He tasted some of it and then said, send it back. It's not sweet enough. So I ran back to the baker and she added some sweetener to it and I ran it back to George. He tasted it and then he thundered. It's too sweet.

Send it back. The third time, she stood there and fumed and she knew what was going on. He said, I watched her just shake an empty container over the batter and wave the spoon in the air over her head and then hand it to me and sure enough, I sent it back and George said, now, it's perfect. Maybe that's your boss. Maybe that describes him or her. I hope, beloved, it doesn't describe you because I know I speak to many who are employers. What makes a mark for the gospel is living out this text with surprising submission to a man like George.

This is surprising submission. This is the kind of work ethic from the first century to the 21st century that will do more for the transformational power of the gospel to advance than a thousand gospel tracts you'll leave on your boss's desk or a thousand invitations to church. You're working out there in a world, by the way, and you know it, it treasures independence and autonomy and the demand of personal rights. I mean, people can find their lawyer's phone number quicker than a verse of scripture, right? They love to criticize the authority.

Whoever it happens to be, it doesn't matter. That's the authority. So we're always against them. The workforce, as you know, is filled with complainers, demanders, people arguing over their assignments and the question that Peter is not allowing any of us to skirt is, are we one of them? So you happen to know right now as I'm preaching through this text, you know who it is in your workplace who's always chasing the promotion, who's always asserting themselves, their idea of putting their best foot forward is kicking you out of the way. They're always undercutting the other employees. They're always criticizing the management. You know, they're constantly self promoting, self applauding.

The favorite topic of conversation is the deal they made, how great they are to the company, how dead this place would be without them. Has it ever occurred to you that we might be doing that with our children, setting this kind of environment, complaining when they don't get put at the head of the line, you know, following up on all their complaints? You know, do you like your teacher, honey? I mean, if my parents had asked me that question, do you think I would have ever said yes, I love them?

No. Following up, calling that teacher because they didn't give your child a better grade. Getting onto that coach because they don't give your kid more playing time. Getting upset with the school drama teacher because they didn't give your child a better role in the school play.

My child should have been Hansel or Gretel. Instead they're a sunflower over there with all the sunflowers. Or worse yet, they're a vegetable.

I mean, that'll warp them. You're teaching your children to grasp for the wrong glory. You're setting it up so they'll never see beyond all the politics. They can't be treated unfairly. They have to assert their rights.

You're setting them up so they're gonna grow up and not know how to demonstrate submission and respect to those in authority, whether it's a coach or a teacher, even if they might be unkind or unreasonable or unfair. Learn servants, those under authority, how to demonstrate respectful deference and humility on that playing field or in that classroom or in that boardroom or on that job site. I mean, this is going to be, do you realize how surprising you will be?

How different. They know you didn't get promoted and they know you deserved it. And yet you responded with respect and grace.

Peter hints at the resource, by the way, that makes this surprising submission possible. Verse 19, for this finds favor, that is for this is commendable, if for the sake of conscience toward God, a person bears up under sorrow when suffering unjustly. How are you gonna bear up under the sorrow of suffering unjustly? Notice your conscience is turned toward God. Construction here can be understood to mean that the believer is able to bear up under sorrow because he is conscious of God. I like that understanding. You could render it because he is conscious of God.

In other words, you are conscious of the fact that your boss is not George. It's God. And notice you bear up under the sorrow, that compound verb conveys the picture of something sustaining a weight that's placed on it, not succumbing to the load. It bears it.

How? You are working under that load. You are submitting to that load with an awareness of God's presence. You are carrying a load realizing he is carrying you. Don't miss it. You are suffering.

And I don't want to trivialize it by, you know, the sunflower thing. You are suffering unjustly. It's undeserved. It's unfair. It's unwarranted. It's unjustified.

That's when submission becomes really surprising. Might I add, Christ's light, because that's where Peter is going to eventually take us. For our study today, notice verse 20, go there, for what credit is there if when you sin and are harshly treated, you endure it with patience, you know, sort of tongue in cheek, probably, you know, a little chuckle. This is in contrast to suffering unjustly.

It's one thing Peter writes to suffer unjustly. And it's another thing to be punished for wrongdoing. Don't say, oh, I'm being persecuted. Listen, when you get pulled over for running a red light after church today, that's not persecution by the state of North Carolina. Okay? You're not suffering for your faith just because church and the speeding ticket happen on the same day. Okay?

You can't connect those. There is a big difference between persecution for doing the right thing and punishment for doing the wrong thing. If your supervisor is always getting onto you for being late, doing a poor job, poor quality, having a bad attitude, that is not persecution.

That's just punishment. That's a fair evaluation. In fact, he writes in verse 20, notice what credit is there in that. The word for credit is used only here in the entire New Testament. And it's a word that signifies a fair evaluation, a good report. So Peter's basically saying, listen, you don't get credit. You don't get a good report when you make a nuisance of yourself. You don't get a good report when you're lazy or sloppy or tardy or you're resentful. You don't get credit just because your boss noticed, you prayed, you know, before you ate your lunch.

Doesn't work that way. In fact, if that describes your work ethic and attitude, let me encourage you to stop praying in public before you eat your lunch. Be far better for the advancement of the gospel if your boss never saw you bow your head. Try to represent God in 10 seconds to somehow make up for the fact that you're not representing him well from nine to five. Keep your Christianity a secret. There's no credit. There's no good report. It doesn't help anything.

It certainly doesn't help Christianity. Notice verse 20, but if when you do what is right and you suffer for it, you patiently endure. See that? That's for the person who tomorrow is going to go to the job site and you know you're the butt of the jokes. You know you're at the other end of all the innuendos. You're the result of the smirks. You're the holy Joe. You're the one who was in church. The boss will play favorites and you'll never make it. He resents your testimony.

And all of it's traced back implicitly to the one you do represent with a good attitude and a respectful demeanor and even that keeps you from joining in with the other employees because they don't appreciate that either. But without any superiority about you, without any chip on your shoulder, without any sense that I'm just better than all of you, you bear up. You patiently endure that as you depend on the Lord to carry you.

Even then it doesn't let up. What does Peter say at the end of verse 20? This, ah this finds favor with God. This is the ultimate bonus. This is the payoff.

Can you see beyond? This is the payoff. The gracious commendation of God. See we think that we're going to stand before the Lord one day and maybe if we've been heroic he'll say well done. You ever thought about the fact that just working hard tomorrow receives his commendation?

I love the way F.B. Meyer, a pastor of another generation passed from England who commented on this text and he said this kind of submission in the face of this kind of treatment produces a thrill of delight in the very heart of God and from the throne God stoops to say to you thank you. Thank you.

Can you imagine? Thank you for the way you handled that personal innuendo. Thank you for how you responded to that unkind word, that unfair assessment or assignment. Thank you for demonstrating what everybody around you knows is surprising submission.

You live that way because you see beyond all the junk, all the politics. You know ultimately that you didn't write that term paper for George, Professor George. You wrote it for God. You didn't work hard with excellence on that assignment for boss man George. You don't live with graciousness and deference and respectfulness just for King George but for God. It's never really about George is it? Let me ask you as we wrap it up who's George in your life? I mean you've got his face, her face right now. I know it.

Who is it? What are you going to do about him or her tomorrow? How are you going to respond? How are you going to speak to them?

How are you going to work for them? Servants be submissive to your masters with all respect. When you pillow your head tonight I want you to hear Peter writing on behalf of the Lord who suffered more than we could ever imagine unjustly but on behalf of God Peter says he is saying to you thank you. Sometimes the teaching of God's word is difficult for us to accept and apply and this might be one of those passages. Submission is not easy but it's what God calls us to do and so I hope this lesson has encouraged you today. This is Wisdom for the Heart with Stephen Davey.

Before we leave you today I want to remind you of a gift we have available. During the month of March we have a free resource that we want to get to you. Stephen has a booklet called The Coming Tribulation. In it he explores the future period of time known as the Great Tribulation.

It's a topic that has confused and divided Christians for many years. This is a great resource to help you understand what the Bible says about the coming tribulation. This is a free resource that you can download from our website. Go to wisdomonline.org for information. There's a link on the home page that will direct you. Our ministry is on social media and that's a great way to stay informed and interact with us and join us next time as we continue through this series here on Wisdom for the Heart.