1 Peter 5:12-14 | Finishing Well

Sunday Morning | March 2, 2025 | John C. Majors | Louisville, KY

In his sermon "Finishing Well," based on 1 Peter 5:12-14, Pastor John outlines four key principles for living faithfully now in order to finish strong in the Christian journey. First, he emphasizes the importance of locking arms with faithful companions, surrounding oneself with godly relationships that provide encouragement and accountability. Second, he urges believers to stand firm in a trustworthy message, holding fast to the truth of the gospel as their unshakable foundation. Third, he highlights the value of celebrating a shared legacy, recognizing the rich history of faith passed down through generations. Finally, he calls believers to pursue their promised peace, embracing the deep and abiding peace that comes from God alone. Through these four principles, Pastor John encourages the church to remain steadfast, ensuring a life that honors God and a finish that is faithful.

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Transcript

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Amen. Thank you. McCoy. And you know, I said he stepped up to lead. Tiffany did just as much leading. So not to miss you. Tiffany. Sorry about that is a team effort and I'm grateful for that. Like I said, we are going to wrap up the book of First Peter today around the theme of finishing well, a lot of times people look at those last few verses at the end of a epistle and the end of the at the end of a letter in the New Testament, and those kind of seem like throwaway person, verses. He mentions a few random people. He talks about giving a kiss or a hug, and I wrote this letter with my own hand and whatever. We don't want to do that. We don't want to just throw away these verses. Proverbs 30 verse five says, every word of God proves true. He is a shield to those who take refuge in him. We want to count every word as useful, so we want to finish the book well so that we can finish well. In fact, a friend of mine when I started in seminary this was in Phoenix 20 years ago now, and most of us students were pretty green. Nobody wanted to hear anything from us, I can promise you that. But one of us, one of the guys I got to know pretty well, was already serving as a pastor in a church right down the road from us. We started going to church there. Great guy, really smart, really sharp. And over the course of those years together, I remember some of the conversations we would have. And one time in particular, you'd just seen a well-known pastor make some very poor public decisions, and he said, you know what, John? And here he is a very young pastor. Still, every passing year, my prayers change from God help me to be successful, to help me to be faithful. Yes. I want to honor him and do my job well and serve people well. But I really want to finish well. I want to be faithful to the end and not get caught up in the trappings of what we might say is success, and yet not finish well. And so, as we're sliding into the end of first Peter, that's the theme we're going to talk about today. How do you finish? Well, we want to finish the book. Well, we want to finish our lives. Will. But the key statement I'm going to repeat over and over again, if you want to finish well, live your days well. How you live now determines how you finish. Live well now, to finish well later. And the reason that's important is you actually don't know where the finish line is. We think it's somewhere out there. And for some of us, we think it's a little closer than it used to be. But you don't know. So if you want to guarantee to finish well, make sure you're living well day after day. And I don't know what might be keeping that from happening in your life, but we're going to talk about some principles to finishing. Well, how do you live well today to finish well tomorrow. In fact, in the passage we're going to look at today, we're going to see four ways to live well today so that we can finish well later, whatever that is. How do we live well today? To finish well later. And we're going to be in first Peter chapter five, the last couple of verses here. First Peter chapter five, verses 12 through 14. And if you have a church Bible that on be on page 956. If you don't have a Bible, those are out in the lobby in the connection corner. We'd love to put one in your hands, but for you to be able to turn there to read the words on your own, to have a copy of God's Word for you to read from on your own, that's so important to your spiritual growth. Here. I'm going to read from first Peter chapter five, verse 12 through 14 by Silvanus, meaning sent from, sent through Silvanus, a faithful brother. As I regard him. I have written briefly to you, exhorting and declaring that this is the true grace of God. Stand firm in it. She who is at Babylon, who has likewise chosen, sends you greetings, and so does Mark, my son, greet one another with the kiss of love. Peace to all of you who are in Christ. Four Ways to live well now, to finish well later. And the first is to find faithful companions in the gospel. If you want to live well now, to finish well later, make sure you're surrounded by faithful companions in the gospel. Who you surround yourself with will have a large factor in determining who you become. One of the number one predictors of your health is who you're surrounded with. If you're surrounded by healthy people, you're probably a lot more likely to be healthy yourself. And the converse is true as well. Surround yourself with people who are passionate about the gospel, and we see that he's done that here. He names two people in particular, Sylvanas and Mark Sylvanas in verse 12. Mark at the end of verse 13. These are two significant names. Let me first just comment on the fact that he mentions names. This is just one thing that points to the truth the historical accuracy, the veracity of scriptures, the fact that he's actually mentioned in people who, when he wrote this, would have been alive and people could go to them and ask them, did you do that? Have you met him? Do you know about that? This moves it into the realm of something that is verifiable and trustworthy. Now, each of these people are significant. They're important in the history of the church. In fact, Sylvanas largely likely delivered this letter to the intended audience. But Silvanus was also called Silas. And if you've read the book of acts, which if you're in the church Bible reading plan, you would have read that recently. Silas shows up like a dozen times in between chapters 15 and 18, and he does some really important things. He takes the letter from the Jerusalem Council, and the Jerusalem Council was the group of Jews who are going. Now wait a second. This is only been kind of a Jewish thing. Now we have Gentiles becoming Christians. How much of our old mosaic law do they have to follow to become Christians? Because they they weren't circumcised, they didn't know about sacrifices. They didn't know about the temple. Like how much of that do they have to follow? And they wrote a letter saying, basically none of that walk in sexual purity and don't worry about all that follow Christ. And so he's been given kind of their Declaration of Independence. He's the one that's in charge of delivering that to people to say, here's what to do, here's how to live as a Christian, as a Gentile moving forward. That's an important role. He is a trustworthy person. He travels with Paul on his missionary journeys. He ends up in prison with Paul. He's a guy who has been through it. He's seen a lot. He's trustworthy. And Peter is saying, I've entrusted him with this message. That should add some weight, some credibility. That's the kind of guy he's surrounded himself with. Someone trustworthy, someone who's been through it, someone with a lot of experience. Now he also mentions Mark. Notice he says here my son Mark. Mark would have also been John, Mark, Mark and we know this from some church history records from some early church fathers. Mark is believed to be the one who was traveling with Peter, which we know he did travel with him here even in Scripture, and actually is the one who then wrote the book of Mark. Let me write down what Peter said. Mark being the younger one traveling with him, I'm capturing his information as we go. That's why it's called the gospel of Mark, not the gospel of Peter, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Mark was there alongside him and he calls him my son, my son in the faith you see Mark show up. Mark also travels with Paul. Here's the interesting thing about Mark and we need to keep this in mind, especially with young believers. Mark would have been his son in the faith. Mark would have been someone he was investing in, pouring into younger than him, less spiritually mature than him. And Mark and Paul have a big falling out. Whatever reason, we don't even know what happened. But Paul said he's not going with me. They went their separate ways. But later he's restored. Don't give up on people who are new in their faith. People who are new in their faith are going to make mistakes. You know how I know that I make mistakes? It's going to happen. Be patient with those, especially high profile public figures who haven't been Christian. Now, say they are Christian and then they do very young Christian things. Some patterns, as we all know, are very hard to break. Imagine if you were a brand new Christian. You had a very high. I mean, think back to some of the dumb things you did right after coming to know Christ. What if everybody knew about that? We need to be very patient with those. We still correct, we still redirect. We still speak truth. But it's in love. It's in patience. It's an understanding. Not not in judgment. Mark was like that. Fallen out with Paul. He was restored. We need to be patient with one another. The other thing about Mark, though, he surrounded himself, not just with Silas, who would have been his peer, maybe even someone he could look up to. But he also had people around him who he was born into. We all need that. I need people that I can look up to that are pouring into me. And this week I'm going to get a little bit of time with Bob Russell, former pastor at southeast. He's going to pour into me. I'm going to write down every single thing he says, no matter how seemingly trivial. I'm going to hang on every word. Please give me your wisdom. You've been down that road. I need you pouring into me. I don't have it all figured out. We need peers. We need people who seem to be at kind of a similar level. We're sharpening one another. I'm also going to hang out with some pastors this week at a pastor's conference, who are going to be also in the same stage of ministry in life, and we're trying to figure it out together, sharpening one another. And then we also need those that were pouring into. And by the way, those people are sharpening me as well. First Timothy 412 don't let anyone look down on you because you're young. But set an example for the believers when I see someone young, passionate about getting to know Christ, even if they're new in the faith, and that sharpens and inspires me to, and we need all that. We need to be surrounded by a community of people who are pursuing Christ. And I think, practically speaking, before we go into the next stage, this is a point for you to do a little bit of self-examination. If you find yourself struggling to grow spiritually, continuously falling back into the same sin patterns, the same strongholds is the word we used today. Just do a little self-assessment with who you've surrounded yourself with. More than likely, there's a number of people who are continuing to pull you down, and I know some of those relationships. They may be family. You may not be able to make as hard as changes as you would like. I get that, but where you can make clear changes, make sure to surround yourself with faithful companions in the gospel. Sometimes we feel like if I break off that relationship, that'll be unloving, that'll be unkind. Who else are they going to hear Jesus from? Well, look, the most important thing you can do to pour Jesus into the life of someone is to make sure first, you are growing as a Christian. If they're pulling you down, you're not showing them Jesus. So get strong spiritually, physically, emotionally, first yourself, and then you can come back around to them and pour into them. But if they're continuing to pull you down and create some space, create some separation, and find faithful companions in the gospel. One of the most powerful ways to do that here at Valley View is to get in a life group, get involved. Those meet at 930, get involved in a life group. You're going to connect with other people who are trying to pursue Christ, not doing it perfectly, but but we're trying and you can lock arms with them. So that's the first thing. We see it here if you want to live well now, to finish well later, start by finding faithful companions in the gospel. The second thing here stand firm and a trustworthy message. Stand firm in a trustworthy message. Look back at verse 12, Savannah's faithful brother. As I regard him. I have written briefly to exhort to, briefly to you, exhorting and declaring that this is the true grace of God. Stand firm in it. We need something that we can stand firm in as a foundation, something that is strong, something that will bear up your weight, the weight of your faith. And this is where we find that in God's Word. Now, he says a, a couple of very important things about that. Notice he says two things he has been doing related to the true grace of God. He has been exhorting and declaring both this is really important. We want to make sure we are both declaring and exhorting, meaning we are speaking the truth, but we're also pleading with one another to follow the truth. We see that all throughout here. He's he's speaking the truth. But then he's saying, I urge you, I appeal to you, I compel you live this out. We don't want Scripture to just be hidden knowledge. These are just interesting ideas about someone who lived thousands of years ago that maybe we might contemplate and consider how it might relate to our lives. No no no no. I want there to be a sense of urgency, a hunger. I hope you hear, hear. Constantly pleading depend on his word. Trust his word, follow his word. Know it. May it be your God for life. There's nothing else that is going to give you a strong, firm foundation. Then, knowing Christ through His Word, we don't just declare, we also exhort, plead. I remember having a conversation with a guy who I served in ministry with. This was 20 years ago. Now, and I thought he was in a great place. And then one day he said, I'm going a completely different direction. And I pleaded with him. I begged him, don't do this. Don't give up. Every everything you've said you believe, don't just think about you. Think about all the people that's going to affect. I begged, I pleaded, I called, I emailed, I had friends call him, beg him, don't do this. He kept plowing ahead, kept moving ahead. If you want to finish well later, live well now. Stand firm in the faith in a trustworthy message. The message which we have. Look, if it's not this, then what is it? What are you going to stand firm in? What does this world offer that gives you a firm foundation? Good luck finding it, and as soon as you think you've found it, it'll it'll change what you thought you could depend on. Yesterday will become undependable in an instant. Stand firmly in the foundation of truth. Now, he says a couple of different things about this. He he has a couple of descriptors about how we stand firm in the truth. First, note what he says about Scripture. He says in verse 12, I have written briefly to you, all right. This is part of the beauty of Scripture. The reality is the book of First Peter. You could sit down and read in ten minutes, no big deal. It's a very short. It's a letter. It's called an epistle. That's a fancy word for a letter, a ten minute read. And yet we've taken 24 sermons to try to understand that ten minute read. You know, he MC squared is also very brief. I didn't mean it's simple. I've written to you in brief. And yet the amount of wisdom here to unpack it's almost infinite. I remember hearing a story. Howard Hendricks was a well-known professor. That seminary influenced a lot of people in ministry over the years, and one of the things he would do in his How to Study the Bible classes, he would tell guys, okay, take acts one eight, just that one verse. That's the whole one about go out to Judea, Samaria, to the ends of the earth. He said, take that verse. I want you to go home tonight and make 30 observations about that one verse. Just that's the beginning of Bible study is observing what's there. What does it say? Go home tonight, 30 observations about that one verse. And of course, everybody's going, how in the world there's not 30 words here. How am I going to make 30 observations about this verse? And they get home and they come back the next day and you can see like the angst, the sweat on their brow stuff. You can tell they hardly slept all night struggling through this. I get through it all and they come pretty, you know, pretty proud, pretty excited. I got 30 observations. I don't know if they're good or not, but I got it done. I turn it in and Mr. Hendrix goes, that was great. Now tonight I want you to do 30 more. How in the world can I get 30 more? I just wrong, every ounce of sweat out of this verse that could possibly be in the history of the world. There could be no more knowledge attained from this verse. And I go home. And then the next day they come in and almost to a person, they say, I finally started to see some things here. His word is not exhaustible. Even verses you have memorized and repeated over and over again. The amount of wisdom, though seemingly brief, is inexhaustible for all of us. The wisdom here transcends everything you can experience in life. Yes, it's brief, but it's a depth could not imagine. So he calls it brief. But then also notice what he calls it. This is the true grace of God, the true grace of God. Both those words are important. Of course we believe it's true. But there are times where we don't. And especially when he's writing to an audience who has been suffering. Those are the times where you wonder if it's true or not. How appropriate is it for him to call this the true grace of God? Because grace is what you need in the midst of suffering. Grace is what you need. When you were ready to give up, to live day by day, to finish well, you need to know that he cares and he's gracious. He's not just true information. He cares deeply. And it's his grace that will be with you through whatever you're facing. You know, there's a phrase they use in battle zones called the fog of war. You may have heard of that. Some I've heard, different boxer say everyone has a great plan till they get punched in the face. All that goes out the window. I had a great battle plan. We had a great battle plan for how we were going to defeat the enemy. And then now war has started and it's a fog. We have no idea what's going on or where to turn, or where people are or what I should follow when you're in the midst of suffering, it feels like that fog of war, right? When will this end? What part of his word seems to make sense right now? But look, it's the grace of God that helps you look back and see he was still there. He was still in control. He was still true. I could still trust him. That's why we need those relationships to lean on in the midst of those hard times. So stand firm in a trustworthy message. That's how we live. Well, now, to finish well later. Now let's look at the third way here. You'll see on the screen. Remember a shared legacy. Remember that we have a shared legacy. Look back here in our passage today, the true grace of God stand firm in it. Verse 13, she who is at Babylon, who is likewise chosen, sends you greetings, and so does Mark. My son. Remember, you have a shared legacy. Last week we touched on this. Remember, you are not alone. And he talked about that. There are others who are going through what you've been through and even worse. But the emphasis here is not just on the fact that we know individuals who have struggled with what we might struggle with, but also as a body of believers, there's a shared legacy that's been handed down to us through generations and generations. There's a church who has remained faithful to him, and he hints at that by talking about she who is at Babylon. Now, to understand that we need to talk about Babylon, because he doesn't mean literally the city of Babylon. He's referring to Rome talking about Rome as Babylon. You know, you might do that today if you were talking about Las Vegas and you call it, what's it called? The city that burned up Sodom and Gomorrah. Right. And I'm headed to Sodom and Gomorrah. Oh, you mean Las Vegas? All right, so you're using that to imply that there's something going on there that relates to a historical truth? So, Babylon, why would he call Rome Babylon? Flip over to Genesis chapter 11. But I've a page number on screen. But yes, we do page seven. It's at the beginning of the book. Obviously, it's the first book in the Bible. A couple of pages in chapter 11, because here's what was happening in Babylon, at Babel, at the Tower of Babel. They were doing two things. They're meant to intentionally thumb their nose up at God, intentionally disrupt his plan. What Babylon represents is the center of the world. Who has said, we're not following your plan. We're following our plan. In fact, look at chapter 11. Look here specifically at verse four. Then they said, come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens. Let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth. They're doing two things here in defiance of God. First he said, be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, Noah. The ark. The earth is empty. He says, fill the earth. Go out. And now they're saying, no, no, no, no, we're going to stay right here. That's what you want us to do. We're going to do the opposite. We're going to stay here. And instead of making your name great as we build this city, what do you say we're going to make our name great. We're going to make a name for ourselves. Babylon would have been the center of the efforts to say to God, you have a plan. We're going in a different direction. And Rome at this time would have been the very center of that as well. We're going to conquer the Earth on our terms. We're going to make up our own gods. We're going to follow our own ways. And so this is where part of the church was rooted. That's when he says, if you look back at first, Peter, you can flip back over there. She who is at Babylon, this is a hint. This is a reference to the church, the church in Babylon. The church is rooted there. You're not alone. You think wherever you are, you're facing challenges in your faith. And it's true. By the way, the part of the hard part of saying this is we're going to talk about how much harder some people have it. That doesn't mean you don't have it hard. I don't want to minimize what you're facing. You legitimately may be facing persecution. You may have someone persecuting you for your faith. There's other people out there facing that as well, in other contexts, in a different way. I think of a pastor I've looked up to for decades. He's passed now. But Tim Keller, who's rooted in New York City, that's a whole nother set of challenges he's trying to face and sharing the gospel. That's very different here. Or think of people who've right now, you may have heard some of the stories in Uganda, Christians losing their lives just because of raising their hand. I follow Christ. Those who were in Rome, who were in Babylon, the center of defiance of God. He's saying they're with you. They're believing. Stand firm. Remember that you have a shared legacy. You're not alone. You're in this together. Part of what we need to be doing is also praying for one another. We need to be praying for other churches, other churches around us as well. There's another pastor in town I get together with about once a month. We pray for one another. We pray for our churches. We pray for other churches around us. There's not enough empty seats in any of our churches to reach our communities. We need to be praying. We're not alone. We're not alone in this. We're all trying to tell others about the hope we have in Christ. Remember, we have a shared legacy that goes back for generations. And then lastly, pursue the promised peace. Pursue the promised peace. So if you look back in verse 14, greet one another with a kiss of love. Peace to all of you who are in Christ. I've talked to the men's ministry about making verse 14, our theme verse moving forward. I thought that would be a lot funnier than it was. I'm sorry. No laughing. That was too serious. Obviously touched on a nerve. No no no no. Hold on now look, this is a custom. They had a time. Maybe if you've seen people in Italy greet one another with a kiss, it's obviously we do a different handshake, fist bump, elbow bump, whatever. What it speaks to is the reality. These are people you're united with in Christ. Greet one another as a friend who is closer than a brother. You can meet someone in a foreign country that you've never known before, and you find out that they know Christ. And in an instant, just like that, they're closer than a brother. Greet one another in the church with that mindset, but notice how he ends the book. Peace to all of you who are in Christ. Peace. If you're suffering, that's the word you need to hear. Peace. I have been beginning my mornings this week in particular, praying over that word peace. God, help me to walk in peace today. Help me to walk in joy. It's too easy to submit to the tendency to walk in frustration. To walk in a scattered ness. To walk in hurry. All of our lives are pressing that direction. God, help me to walk in peace. I had a moment this week where I was driving down I-65. Actually, I was getting ready to get on 65, and I thought I made what I consider to be a pretty strategic maneuver to get on the ramp in front of someone else. This person disagreed, and they reminded me, you're not walking in peace with an interesting hand gesture. I was really impressed by how long they continued that hand gesture. It was minutes as we sat there on the ramp, and I just got the stare in my rearview mirror at it, wondering, what am I doing? What are you doing? What's the hurry? You're not walking in peace. You're only thinking about you. Walk in peace. Walk in peace. God has called us to live lives of peace and I know depending on your your job, your pace of life, your family, you're going. Good luck with that, John. Easy for you to say. I read from this Catholic monk. You probably have heard of Thomas Merton, read his letters. I read his journals. Obviously, I don't agree with all his theology. What I love to read about is him talking about peace. And what's fascinating is how often he says, you think a guy in the woods in Kentucky, the monastery he was in, is he or near Bardstown? You think that guy would be at perfect peace? The struggles they have with finding peace, it's crazy. And his point is peace is about inner peace. You can be not at peace in the woods of Kentucky at the monastery, but you can be in the subway in New York City and be at peace if you have inner peace. It's not about your environment. If you wait for your environment to dictate your peace, you'll never have it. We got to pursue. And here's the word here pursue the peace of Christ. And the way they find, we find that is to continue to come back to His word over and over and over again. When your heart is tugged towards frustration, towards hurry, come back to peace, come back to His word. Come back to prayer. If you want to finish well, live well. Now. Start by living your days in the peace of Christ.