"Putting an End to a Frustrating Life"

Sermon Text: 1 Peter 1:13-21

This is one crucial missing note in modern Christianity, and one of the main reasons why the church is such a carbon-copy of the world. We think that grace means there's nothing to fear in our behavior. And so the sanction of judgment has no place in our lives. And 1 Peter 1:17 is simply blanked out in our superficial adaptation to culture. But God is gracious and calls us back today to fear the behavior that leads to destruction. John Piper

3 commands, because there are big responsibilities to come

1. Hope: disciplined thinking and biblical sobriety about what the world has to offer for your future.

Holiness: imaging the holiness of God and refusing to dabble in
worldliness.

Fear: the judgment to come of those not in awe of what God did to
rescue them from futile living. Is your Christian experience, behavior,
commitment consistent with the sacrifice of God's Son to save you?

Discussion Questions

1. What would be the advantages to opening up a Life Group to
non-believers? Would it be hard to be transparent? Would our
transpar ency be attractive to them?

2. What areas of personal holiness can you begin to work on? Examples: misuse of alcohol, movies, language, anger, raunchy humor, prayerlessness, ignoring Scripture memorization, etc. Why does it sound legalistic (but it really isn’t) to encourage holy living.

3. What is living in fear in 1 Peter 1 mean? What are we to fear? Does this sound like grace from God? Is it?

4. What are the facts about our status as believers Peter highlights in
1 Peter 1:1-12? How can we integrate this kind of thinking into our
everyday Christian experience?