A good attitude

1 Peter 5:5 to 9

These are practical exhortations – how we are to live as Christians. What we have here is a series of imperatives that come one right after the other to remind of us of the basic attitude for our maturity. Not so much how we act but our motives.

ATTITUDE NUMBER ONE IS THAT OF SUBMISSION
We could be young in years or in the faith. Why is this addressed to young men in part? They often challenge authority. Experience in life under the Holy Spirit gives us maturity, wisdom and balance. They have known perseverance. The generation gap was not invented in our century, and the church has not been immune to it in any century. Today the young have grown up with computers. Older ones who have not can feel left behind. The young should benefit from the wisdom of the old. Submission is primarily an attitude of respect and recognition of rank. The young can be wiser than the old, when the older ones have not grown in maturity. The can have a clearer light on the word. They can have a clearer grasp of the word in relation to their own generation. The young should always respect the older ones but it is the truth that matters. We need to put the old truth in new suits for each generation. This is broadened out to include everyone so we follow the leadership bestowed on the church. The leader’s responsibility is to God.
ATTITUDE NUMBER TWO IS THAT IF HUMILITY
Submission opposes pride, humility attacks self love.
a) Peter says be humble to each other so that you can know the grace of God. That word ‘clothe’ means to tie something on like a work apron such as that used by a slave. Philippians 2:3 to 5. You are going to do humble service. You are not above doing an unskilled menial task. He was alluding to the Lord Jesus who washed the disciples feet and put a towel around his waist. Nothing is too unpleasant for us to do for the Lord. Think others are more important than you are. Moody said ‘Lord make me humble but do not let me know it.’ We should be careful that it is not false humility – we have been redeemed by God. Humility means not thinking of ourselves at all or conscious of ourselves.
b) Peter says be humble toward God if you want His blessing.
(i) Humility recognises what we are is by the grace of God. What have we to be proud about? 1 Corinthians 4:7 Luke 18:9 to 14. We need to admit to God that we are unworthy and He will lift us up. Pride is the root sin of all sin. Humility is the first precept of the Christian faith – so said Augustine and Calvin. Humility recognises what we are – we are believers because of what Christ has done.
(ii) Humility is not a false humility that thinks too lowly. It is not humility to pretend to be less than God has redeemed, commissioned and equipped us to be. Micah 6:8
(iii) Humility submits to God because the same hand will lift up. God brings trials to teach us lessons, when we have humbled ourselves under God’s hand he will lift us up in due time.
ATTITUDE NUMBER THREE IS THAT OF TRUST – verse 7.
In stressful days cast your cares on Him and trust Him.
a) What we have is anxiety – worries distract us from the productive things God wants us to do and consume us by diverting all our thoughts into these channels of fear. These anxieties often come from a spirit of independence like being on a ship when the storm hits the ship and we start to become anxious. When we cast our cares on Christ we can rest from anxieties.
b) What we are to do – Meyer ‘Treat cares as you treat sins. Hand them over to Jesus one by one as the occur’. It is like putting a blanket on a horse. We unload our load on Jesus. We take it to Him and leave it on Him. We hand over anxieties as we hand over our sins to the Lord Jesus. It can be hard to do this but it is the only solution.
c) Why we should do this. Here is the genius of biblical Christianity: God cares for me. He proved it by sending his own Son. Any God who would sacrifice his own Son must care for me. If he cares that much everything else is mine. He will hear my prayers and answer them. We can place our load on Him. Jesus tells us to cast our burdens on Him. He was given freely for his people so we can cast our cares freely on him.
ATTITUDE NUMBER FOUR IS WATCHFULNESS. Verses 8 to 9
We are to cast our cares on the Lord but we are not to be careless. We cannot become careless because Satan prowls around trying to get to Christians who are fallible and weak. We are vulnerable to Satan’s attacks – he is not omnipresent, resist him and he will flee. There is a tow fold strategy for defeating Satan’s attacks: we must resist him by standing firm in the faith. We must remember our brothers and sisters who at this very moment are standing firm in the face of satanic attack around the world. Some are having a lot harder time than we are in China and the Islamic world. We need to learn lessons form the difficulties of our lives. Stand firm and be alert.