1 Peter 5
1 Therefore, I exhort the elders among you, as {your} fellow elder and witness of the sufferings of Christ, and a partaker also of the glory that is to be revealed,
2 shepherd the flock of God among you, exercising oversight not under compulsion, but voluntarily, according to {the will of} God; and not for sordid gain, but with eagerness;
3 nor yet as lording it over those allotted to your charge, but proving to be examples to the flock.
4 And when the Chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the unfading crown of glory.
Peter was an elder in the church at Jerusalem. He witnessed the sufferings of Christ, and he became a believer and was looking forward with hope for the resurrection. He learnt a few things and was kind enough to share his thoughts with us so that we can learn from his experiences.
One thing that he learnt was the importance of being an example instead of just telling people what to do. As parents, we are elders in the church at our home, and if we preach to our children without also being examples in everything we preach they we are just hypocrites. Don’t command your children to do what you never did or never could do. Children under such authority are likely to rebel.
Another thing that Peter learnt was that the reward for being a light to others is not given in this world but in the next – when the Chief Shepherd appears. So then, don’t look for it in this world, and don’t get upset with you can’t find it in this world. It was never meant to be found in this world.
Peter also learnt that being a light to others should never be done so that you can receive money or any equivalent compensation. If you are pastoring a church, and you depend on the church for your finances, and you find such finances insufficient, if this causes your thoughts to frequently revolve around money, and your decisions regarding matters of church and personal life to be based on how much money people have and how much they might contribute to your church or ministry then you have got it all wrong. If you can’t fix it, I would urge you to step out of ministry and find another (paying) job.
If your job as a church leader is not done voluntarily and eagerly but done under compulsion then you may need to fix your attitude or back out.
5 You younger men, likewise, be subject to {your} elders; and all of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, for GOD IS OPPOSED TO THE PROUD, BUT GIVES GRACE TO THE HUMBLE.
6 Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you at the proper time,
7 casting all your anxiety on Him, because He cares for you.
One of the important lessons that we must learn is that God cares for us. A good way to learn such a lesson is to experience loneliness and unjust suffering, and watch how God makes it work for your good. Joseph had to endure a lot of unjust suffering in his time, but he took it in his stride and in the right spirit, and years later, looking back, he saw that it all worked out for his good. He was a young man, all alone, far away from family, and in those troubling times, he learnt how to humble himself and submit to the authority that God placed over him. In doing so, he received grace from God to handle the situations around him. When you are all alone, you learn to cast your anxieties on God, and it is a very valuable lesson to learn.
What is the mighty hand of God? It is the things that happen around you. For Joseph, it came in the form of persecution from his brothers, and their selling him to the Midianite traders, and the unjust suffering for refusing to give in to Potiphar’s wife, and the disappointment of being forgotten by his friend in jail, and things like that.
When Jesus had to face the cross, he regarded it as ‘the cup that His Father gave Him to drink’. He didn’t get mad at the Pharisees for their behavior, or at the fact that His disciples would desert Him. To Him, all those things were ‘the mighty hand of God’. Peter must have observed that, and learnt from it. You and I should learn from it too.
As Peter writes here, and James too (in Jas 4:6), God is opposed to the proud but gives grace to the humble. Pride and humility are opposites. Therefore, the only way to get grace from God is to be humble; for if you are proud, then you are not humble (because they are opposites) and instead of God helping you He will oppose you. In other words, to merit God’s grace, you have to be humble. That is, grace is not unmerited (as so many pastors teach), but merited.
Yes, we cannot save ourselves from the wrath of God. Yet, even grace that leads to salvation, is merited – we have to repent, and we have to believe, and we have to forgive, and we have to confess Jesus. God grants us faith and repentance, but He grants it to those who humble themselves and acknowledge that they have sinned against Him and those who believe Him rather than their own mind.
8 Be of sober {spirit,} be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.
9 But resist him, firm in {your} faith, knowing that the same experiences of suffering are being accomplished by your brethren who are in the world.
10 After you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ, will Himself perfect, confirm, strengthen {and} establish you.
A Christian must be sober and alert. To be alert means to use your senses to detect danger. To be sober means to ensure that your senses are at full sensitivity and not dulled by anything. If you eat too much or drink too much or strain yourself too much your sobriety can be compromised, and your ability to withstand temptation can diminish. When everything is going well, and your bank balance is abounding you can have a sense of euphoria and become proud. At such times, Satan can take advantage of you.
Satan’s greatest attacks are at your faith – your ability to believe that God is good and always has your best at heart. Therefore, we must watch out more carefully over there.
Realize that you are not the only person who has to endure Satan’s attacks.
God will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you can bear. So then, don’t give up. When the time is right, God will stop the temptation and bring you to safety. He is in full control at all times.
11 To Him {be} dominion forever and ever. Amen.
One of the key realizations that we must always live by is that all dominion was, is, and will always be, God’s and only God’s. Even when we are in charge, we are really not in charge – only God is in charge, and whatever charge we have, we exercise it within the dominion of God’s charge. Anything that anyone can do, God can nullify.
Nebuchadnezzar had to learn this the hard way (and hopefully, we won’t). When Nebuchadnezzar was in charge, he wondered how long it would last. So God gave him a dream, and Daniel interpreted it for him, explaining that after him, other kingdoms will come, but in the end, Jesus would reign. Nebuchadnezzar must have doubted that, and so he made himself to be like God and forced people to worship him, and when Daniel’s three friends didn’t, he tried to kill them, even making the furnace seven times hotter. But God snatched Daniel’s friends out of Nebuchadnezzar hands, and then allowed Nebuchadnezzar to lose his mind for seven years – until he came to his senses and realized that God was in charge (Dan 1-4).
Many of us who haven’t yet learnt this lesson experience, in various degrees, what Nebuchadnezzar experienced – the mighty hand of God. The only way out is to realize that God is in charge – that is, all dominion is His, forever.
12 Through Silvanus, our faithful brother (for so I regard {him),} I have written to you briefly, exhorting and testifying that this is the true grace of God. Stand firm in it!
What is the true grace of God? It is His help to be more and more like Jesus, and we are to stand firm in it – that is, we are to make it a reality in our lives. There will be people who will talk about the grace of God, but they will not speak the truth – the grace that they talk about is to exalt man and make man rich; others speak of the grace of God as a means for healings and for receiving power over other people. Don’t listen to them. When you receive the true grace of God you will be able to submit to whatever authority God has placed over your, and to suffer unjustly, and live a life of obedience to God, and make the best of the salvation that God has made available to you. The grace that they talk about is unmerited, but the grace that God gives is given only to the humble.
Peter sent this message through Silvanus. I am not sure whether this Silvanus is the same person Paul refers to in his letters to the Thessalonians.
13 She who is in Babylon, chosen together with you, sends you greetings, and {so does} my son, Mark.
14 Greet one another with a kiss of love. Peace be to you all who are in Christ.
Peter ends with greets from those around him, and his own greetings.
There is a peace that the children of God experience because of God’s protection. If you are not at peace about something, don’t accept it as normal, but ask God for help so that you may experience His peace.
I’ve been to places where people misuse Peter’s exhortation to greet one another with a kiss of love. Peter’s intent is expressing affection, so let’s not use it to promote sexual promiscuity.
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