The Supernatural Level of Life

Jewish law never allowed for trial to be held, convened at night time in secret. The Jewish Supreme Court composed of 71 men. These were the sages, these were the wise men, these were the godly men. They convened an illegal trial. Now they have Jesus right there. And they have paid off witnesses to lie, perjure themselves, to accuse them.

The trouble is, and it's almost humorous in its irony, they can't find two witnesses who can lie well enough to agree. When's the last time someone treated you poorly or hurt you in some way? It happens to all of us from time to time. But here's the more important question, how did you respond? Did you lash out? Did you retaliate?

What did you do? Well, the example of Jesus is to return evil with good. However, that's not easy. And in our flesh that might be impossible.

Wouldn't you agree? Today on Wisdom for the Heart, Stephen Davey refers to returning evil with good as a supernatural way of living. Stephen's calling this lesson the supernatural level of life.

Let's join Stephen for today's Bible message. It brings to mind that there are a number of different ways you can respond to all those little irritations of life that certainly grow into bigger irritations. Different levels, we could call the first one sinful, right?

Just wait till I get a hold of that person and wait till you can see what I can do in return. There's a sinfulness though that might even relate more to responding to good with evil. That's almost a satanic level to live on.

It's that level of living where people are constantly thinking up evil, even when they're being treated well. Like the young man, I remember in seminary, a little church of 75 where I served on their staff part-time while going to school. And a young man came to church that Sunday evening and we were excited. He seemed interested. And one of the elderly couples in the church asked him where he was staying that night.

He said, you know, I just really need a place for one night. And so they invited him home. And the next morning as promised, he thanked them for their kindness and he left.

We were thrilled. This could be the first step of disciple making with this unbeliever. Maybe he would be ready to hear the gospel because of this kindness. None of us knew until the next day that he had unlocked the window in the guest room.

And when they came home that afternoon, he had stolen everything. That's satanic, that's sinful, returning good with evil. There's another level, we could call this natural, of returning evil with evil, or good with good.

In other words, that's easy, isn't it? If somebody treats you badly, you treat them badly. If they treat you well, you treat them well. That's actually a natural level of living and we started doing that when we were really little kids. We learned to treat other kids that way. They push us down on the playground. We can push back. They kick our shins, we can kick shins back.

Now we get a little older. It isn't so much physical, but it's verbal. You criticize me, I'll criticize you. You say something unkind to me, I'll get you back, verbally. I'm reminded of what one author advised with a rather humorous tongue-in-cheek sort of way. He said it this way, he said, before you're tempted to criticize someone, walk a mile in his shoes. Then, when you yield a temptation and criticize him, you'll be a mile away and you'll have his shoes. That's natural.

I kind of like that. That's pretty shrewd. We would tell someone or they would say to us, you got it, you got them good. You gave them what's coming. You got even. You got even. It's natural.

Does it occur to us that if you spend your time getting even, you never get ahead? So you have the sinful level of living, returning evil for good. You have a natural level, returning evil with evil. Thirdly, you have this spiritual level.

Frankly, I like to call it a supernatural level of living. That's returning good for evil against you. In other words, you respond to people as the Lord instructed, like you wished they responded to you, but don't. Everybody in your world, by the way, knows that you've got to stand up for your rights.

You're in the right. Don't take anything from anybody. You don't take anything on the chin. You fight back against intolerance and injustice and prejudice, unfair treatment. Somebody steps on your toes. Somebody crosses the line against you. Somebody invades your little boundaries.

Watch out. The Apostle Peter has been challenging our thoughts, hasn't he? Our natural way of thinking is calling us to a higher plane of living, a higher perspective in our thought processes, to see beyond the insult and the injury, to see higher and farther from Earth, the junk of Earth, the politics we're calling it, and parliaments of this planet.

Let's go back to his letter. We call it 1 Peter. Chapter 2 is the focus of our exposition, and this is where Peter's upsetting our world. He's commanding the believer to submit to institutions like government and governors, verses 1 to 16, to honor the king, who happens at that point in time to be Nero, verse 17, to submit to earthly masters, employers in our culture today, even when their thinking is unreasonable, it isn't straight, is the word.

Scolios, it's crooked, like scoliosis of the spine. Now, about the time you get past that text, in the first century, the believers would be more than likely holding back their emotions, probably holding their tongues and thinking, but Peter, you have no idea how bad I have it. You have no idea how unreasonable people are in my life. You have no idea how I'm being treated unjustly and unfairly, and it's as if the Spirit of God anticipates that response, because he, through the apostle Peter, effectively responds by saying, let me give you an example of what it means to be treated unfairly, and with that we arrive at verse 21. Notice there, for you have been called for this purpose since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in his steps. You go back to just that first rather shocking phrase for a moment. In fact, let's go back to verse 20 and kind of get a running start so we connect the dots. For what credit is there, what good report is there, if when you sin and are harshly treated, you endure it with patience?

I mean, what good is that? You deserve punishment. But if, when you do it as right, think of it this way, when you are in the right and suffer, and you bear that patiently, this finds favor with God, for you have been called for this purpose.

Wait a second. Does Peter mean that God has actually called us to suffer injustice because of ungodly rulers and ungodly culture? Does he, is he saying we're called to face harsh circumstances because of unreasonable authorities? Yes, in fact, Peter says this happens to be your calling according to the purpose of God.

And by the way, it's going to be God alone who's going to know all the purposes as to why you're suffering. Peter informs us that God is called. The Latin root is vaco, or voco, which gives us the basis for our English word vocation. It's the Greek word in this New Testament text for election. Your election, your spiritual vocation, just as we prayed over deacons and elders who have been elected and because of that election, they have responsibilities and duties. So you, believer, have been elected to this office of suffering.

And we're thinking, really? In fact, Williams translates this first phrase, it is to this kind of living that you have been called. See, we've got to see things differently and through Peter's eyes understand it is actually our vocation. He not only gives us our vocation, he gives us a pattern. Look at verse 21 again.

Since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example. In other words, he's leaving you a pattern for how to suffer, how to live on this genuinely, supernaturally incentivized level. In fact, the word Peter uses, for example, here is packed with implications. It's the only time the word is used in this form in the entire New Testament.

It means underwriting and you have to go outside the New Testament to find out what he has in mind here. In the early centuries, this would be developed into that Victorian era where the students would have slates. It developed on into our own culture with the chalkboard or with papers. This is how children learned to write. They learned to write by tracing over letters that the teacher had earlier faintly written on their slates. They traced over that A and they learned how to write an A.

It might have been little dots. They connected the dots and it formed the letter A or the letter B and so on. Then the children would progress and advance and they'd be given a copy of letters from the teacher. They would look at that copy and they would imitate the form and the motion.

Or they might look up at the copy head or the chalkboard or whatever it might be. This is how they and we learn to write. Peter is saying, do you remember how you learned to write? Jesus is going to teach you to learn how to respond. Copy him.

Trace the alphabet of his demeanor, his vocabulary, his disposition. By the way, Jesus happens to show you and to prove with his own life that you can be in the will of God the Father, greatly loved by God the Father, walking closely with God the Father, experiencing the approval of God the Father and be suffering at the same time. Don't be discouraged. This happens to be your divine calling and Jesus is your divine pattern. Peter changes the figure here by showing us why Jesus provided the example.

It's the end of verse 21. For you to follow in his steps. He shifts gears a little bit here. He's not giving this picture of writing. He's giving us a picture of walking. You are literally tracing, you could render it, his footprints. You're watching the direction in which his footprints are going. This has the idea then of taking note of his direction, which is actually, by the way, a very encouraging way for Peter to write this. Because as consistently failing disciples, and by the way, that's what we do best.

Consistently fail as disciples. We can't put our feet perfectly in each of Jesus' footsteps. You picture in your mind a little child walking behind his mother or father in the snow. He's trying to put his feet in the snow prints of his father and he can't take that big of a step and he's trying and he's missing it and maybe it's one out of five and he loses his balance and he falls over or whatever.

Don't miss this. Like that little boy or girl, you're heading however in the same direction as the line of footprints that you see. And you want to mark it like he marked it. Maybe on a good day it's one out of five steps. But your direction is right. Your desire is right.

Your pattern is right. Peter is suggesting while you can't put your feet perfectly in the steps, you're following in the line of footprints. You're heading in the same direction as he is. And especially in this context how you respond to unjust treatment. And it's as if Peter says at this point, now just in case you've forgotten what it was like for Jesus to be treated unjustly, let me back the truck up and remind you. Verse 22, who committed no sin, nor was any deceit found in his mouth. In other words, he didn't deserve any of the treatment he received. He didn't deserve any of it.

He was completely in the right, in fact he never did anything wrong. Who committed no sin was in anything crooked in his mouth. Verse 23, and while being reviled, he did not revile in return. That idea of reviling means to deliver vile verbal abuse. One Greek scholar translates it, when they hurled insults at him, paraphrases it, he did not hurl them back. I'm going to treat you like you're treating me.

That's natural. Jesus is living a supernatural life. By the way, this is true not only at the event of his crucifixion, which Peter's leading us into, but throughout his ministry. They're constantly insulting Jesus as you read through the Gospels. They called him an illegitimate child born as the result of fornication and out of wedlock, John 8, 41, they called him a glutton, Matthew 11, 19. They called him a drunkard, Luke 7, 34. They said, you're possessed by demons, John 8, 48. You are in secret alliance with Satan.

How's that one? Mark chapter 3, verse 22. They called him a deceiver, a tax evader, and a false teacher.

All of that was in one conversation. Luke chapter 23, verse 2. They constantly hurled abusive accusations at him. In fact, Peter uses the present tense participle to inform us that it really never lets up. In fact, if you want to get a picture of the reality of his ministry, he is on the receiving end of one insult after another.

And even when he's dying on the cross, even the other two that are dying on either side join in. The readers can't resist marching up the hill and insulting him. Peter, it's as if he's asking all of us as readers, remind me again how unjust is your treatment.

Remind me again what those insults are against you. Remind me again how deeply you feel your wounds. See Jesus Christ, your great high priest, has been touched by everything you feel.

He feels it deeply. Hebrews 4.15. Just move into the mock trial. If you're old enough into faith and you've read through that scene, the Sanhedrin is gathered unlawfully.

It's a mock sham court. Jewish law never allowed for trial to be held, convened at nighttime in secret. The Jewish Supreme Court referred to as the Senate, composed of 71 men.

It seems that was the largest number through history, though it may vary. These were the sages. These were the wise men. These were the godly men. They convened an illegal trial.

They would sit in a semi-circle and now they have Jesus right there. And they have paid off witnesses to lie, perjure themselves, to accuse them. The trouble is, and it's almost humorous in its irony, they can't find two witnesses who can lie well enough to agree.

Mark chapter 14. But finally, even though in the Sanhedrin system of jurisprudence the accused is never demanded to speak or incriminate himself, we've adopted that in our own system. We call it pleading the fifth.

It never required any kind of statement that would accuse or indict the criminal from his own lips. They demanded that he speak and finally he does and he does simply because he's going to give them what they need to kill him. The high priest in this mockery of justice says, I adjure you by the living God as if he's representing God. Tell us if you are the Christ, the son of the living God and Jesus says I am. You've said it.

It's true. Matthew 26. Now according to the Sanhedrin custom, the death penalty could not be determined until after a day of fasting. This was a day that represented their agony over their decision to potentially end a man's life, but not with Jesus. Do you remember? As soon as he said that, this courtroom of 71 who'd been sworn to uphold the law of God without any deliberation, without any fasting, without any agonizing call immediately for his death.

I don't know about you, you're probably like me. There's no injustice that turns our stomachs like the injustice of those who are supposed to uphold justice. There's nothing that upsets us more than the report of a crooked judge or a crooked jury, a bought jury and even beyond that a crooked deal, a crooked contract.

It's supposed to be legal. That is in all the gospels record. They immediately surround Jesus. If you could picture the scene they begin slapping him in the face and spitting on him. Can you imagine, beloved, the Supreme Court of our United States condemning a criminal to die and then robes and all coming down from the bench into that courtroom and they begin spitting on the condemned and slapping him and blindfolding him, Mark's gospel records, and punching him in the face saying who was it that hit you that time. That wasn't the Roman soldiers at that point, it was the judges. These were the judges. The Supreme Court of Israel degenerates into an abusive, vile, spitting, slapping, cursing, mocking mob and Peter effectively says here watch him and follow him. Take those steps. See how revolutionary this is for the church.

Something so easy to forget. This is really supernatural being in the right and being willing to be treated wrong. How do you follow that?

How do you do this tomorrow at work or school or in the neighborhood or maybe even in your own family when you're treated unfairly or unjustly? Well Peter not only gives us our vocation and our pattern, he provides us with a transaction. Notice verse 23 again, and while being reviled, it is verbally abused, he did not revile in return while suffering uttered no threats but kept, here it is, but kept entrusting himself to him who judges righteously. Jesus drew the strength he needed for this kind of amazing response in life from his trust in his father's ultimate purpose to accomplish righteous justice on his behalf in the end. In other words, Jesus is seeing beyond that courtroom to that courtroom. He's seeing beyond this injustice to that justice and he knew that his vocation in life was to die.

Why? So that he, for those who would believe, he could spare them the wrath of God in that crushing, fearful, holy demonstration of justice. Revelation chapter 20. That kind of perspective which we've been commanded to trace and write and then follow in our own walk allows us to live on this level when we see beyond this world and we see that world. Jesus, we're told here, notice again, kept entrusting himself. This verb means to hand over.

You could render it. The tense signifies repeated past action. In other words, here's the picture with every new wave of abuse, with every fresh wave of insult, with every fresh wave of injustice, he keeps handing himself over to his father. By the way, would you notice Jesus didn't hand himself, his heart, his emotions, his mind to his accusers. He didn't hand himself in that way to them. He handed himself over to his father and with that came pity and compassion.

Why? Because he knew that unless they repented, that injustice would lead them to the great and fearful justice of God who judges righteously. In fact, this verb will be among his final words. He'll say this from the cross. Father, into thy hands I commit. Same verb, I entrust, I hand over my spirit.

Luke 23, 46. How do you live and in living avoid the sinful level, returning evil for good or living on the natural level which will be applauded? You got even.

How do you live on the supernatural level of returning good for evil? It's a battle, isn't it? A Christian author and poet from the early 1800s describes your battle and mine with this transparent honesty. Have you never tasted the luxury of indulging in hard thoughts against those who've injured you?

Have you never tasted that luxury? Have you never known what a fascination it is to brood over their unkindness and to pry into their malice and to imagine all sorts of wrong things about them? It has made you miserable, of course, but it has been a fascinating sort of misery that you cannot easily give up. Peter would say it has everything to do with understanding your vocation. This is your calling from God. It will include following your pattern, tracing the footprints of your Lord, even when they lead down into that kind of valley where you may be right at this moment. And it demands engaging often, perhaps daily in this kind of transaction, entrusting ourselves back again and again and again to our Heavenly Father knowing beyond all this, as we've called it, beyond all the politics and parliaments of life, beyond all the junk of this world and the way it maneuvers and negotiates, there is in the end a righteous God who will at that point correct every wrong and make everything right. And we have a gift for you today on that website.

It's called The Coming Tribulation. You can download a free PDF copy of that booklet today from our website. Visit wisdomonline.org and you'll find the link there. That's all for today, but join us next time for more wisdom for the heart.