The Two Greatest Questions in the Universe
00:00:00.000 | (upbeat music)
00:00:02.580 | - Hello and welcome back to the podcast on this Wednesday.
00:00:06.960 | Okay, so the passions of the flesh
00:00:09.160 | wage war against our souls.
00:00:12.340 | That's 1 Peter 2, verse 11.
00:00:15.060 | That's what we looked at in depth last time
00:00:17.080 | with Pastor John in the studio on Monday in APJ 1825.
00:00:21.180 | The desires of the flesh draw us away
00:00:23.740 | from the all satisfying fullness of Christ.
00:00:28.040 | That's what we talked about there.
00:00:29.960 | It's big, I mean, that's a huge point.
00:00:31.680 | And I wanna return to that text and to that verse
00:00:33.760 | and to the verse after it,
00:00:35.300 | because in them we encounter the two greatest questions
00:00:40.000 | faced by the universe.
00:00:42.640 | No joke.
00:00:43.980 | The universe's two greatest questions are answered
00:00:47.840 | here in 1 Peter 2, verses 11 and 12.
00:00:51.300 | There Peter wrote, "Beloved," writing to Christians,
00:00:55.180 | "Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles
00:00:58.760 | to abstain from the passions of the flesh
00:01:01.200 | which wage war against your soul.
00:01:04.120 | Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable
00:01:07.160 | so that when they speak against you as evildoers,
00:01:09.520 | they may see your good deeds and glorify God
00:01:13.280 | on the day of visitation."
00:01:16.600 | These two verses answer the two most gigantic issues
00:01:21.400 | faced by the universe.
00:01:24.320 | To make the claim and to defend it,
00:01:26.880 | here's Pastor John in a 1994 sermon.
00:01:30.020 | In those two verses, two issues
00:01:34.480 | are seen to be massively important.
00:01:39.320 | In fact, I would say they are the two most important issues
00:01:44.240 | in the world, in the universe.
00:01:48.200 | They are the two issues that the whole Bible
00:01:51.600 | deals with throughout.
00:01:54.920 | And one of the ways that we know that we are aliens
00:01:59.480 | and exiles and strangers, like verse 11 says,
00:02:02.520 | is that the world by and large does not think
00:02:05.840 | that they are important issues.
00:02:07.560 | If the world did, the newspaper will look different,
00:02:13.200 | television would look different,
00:02:14.920 | radio would sound different,
00:02:16.840 | university classes would sound different,
00:02:19.760 | advertising would be different, business would be different.
00:02:23.760 | But by and large, these two issues,
00:02:26.720 | which the Bible treats as the most important issues
00:02:29.880 | in the world, are non-issues in our world,
00:02:34.160 | which makes aliens out of us
00:02:36.080 | who get our bearings from the Bible.
00:02:39.240 | The two issues are these,
00:02:43.200 | the salvation of the human soul
00:02:46.440 | and the glory of the name of God.
00:02:49.480 | Or to put it another way,
00:02:52.940 | the two big issues in the Bible and in the world are
00:02:57.040 | how do you save the soul so that it's not destroyed
00:03:02.840 | and how do you glorify God so that he's not belittled?
00:03:06.140 | Those are the two huge issues in these two verses.
00:03:11.720 | Let's just get that before we even talk about any details.
00:03:15.480 | Verse 11, "Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers
00:03:19.320 | "to abstain from fleshly lusts,
00:03:22.600 | "which wage war against the soul."
00:03:27.600 | The issue here is whether the soul
00:03:32.360 | is gonna be so fought against that it dies,
00:03:36.880 | that it is lost.
00:03:38.600 | There are anti-soul forces in the world.
00:03:43.900 | I mean, the world by and large
00:03:45.380 | doesn't even think about its soul.
00:03:50.100 | But this text says there's a war going on
00:03:53.840 | and there are desires in the world
00:03:57.520 | that are waging war trying to bring my soul to ruin.
00:04:02.520 | And if it succeeds, if the anti-soul forces win,
00:04:08.680 | my soul is lost.
00:04:11.080 | And if my soul is lost, everything is lost,
00:04:14.280 | then there is no recovery.
00:04:16.800 | Remember what Jesus said,
00:04:18.600 | "What will it profit a man if he gains the whole world
00:04:22.760 | "and loses his soul?
00:04:25.120 | "For what can a man give in exchange for his soul?"
00:04:29.360 | Which means if the soul has been lost,
00:04:32.360 | there's no negotiating anymore.
00:04:35.080 | If the soul is lost, you don't buy it back.
00:04:38.980 | It's gone.
00:04:40.600 | If anti-soul forces win, they win.
00:04:44.360 | It's over.
00:04:46.880 | Jesus said in Luke 16,
00:04:48.440 | when he was talking about the rich man and Lazarus,
00:04:51.040 | and the rich man went to Hades
00:04:52.840 | and Lazarus went to Abraham's lap,
00:04:55.200 | and they were granted for a moment
00:04:59.920 | to see and commune in word.
00:05:03.040 | And the man in Hades said,
00:05:05.120 | "Just send him over with a drop of water.
00:05:07.460 | "I am in torment in these flames."
00:05:10.000 | And Abraham said, "There is a gulf here
00:05:14.500 | "that is so big, so wide, so deep
00:05:18.180 | "that God has ordained nobody crosses either way ever."
00:05:23.180 | It's over.
00:05:26.120 | That's an awesome reality.
00:05:27.940 | This is a reality that has to do with everybody.
00:05:30.840 | It has to do with everybody forever.
00:05:33.580 | And it has to do with everybody forever
00:05:36.140 | in huge ways that have to do with hell and heaven.
00:05:43.040 | And yet there's no column in the newspaper.
00:05:47.680 | There's no public service announcement on the radio.
00:05:50.840 | There's no soundbite on television.
00:05:54.520 | There's no values clarification course at the university
00:05:58.840 | or in our schools.
00:06:00.520 | There's no government agency.
00:06:01.940 | There's not even a welfare pamphlet
00:06:05.560 | that gives one hint as to how to fight for our souls.
00:06:11.680 | The biggest issue that our souls face
00:06:16.680 | is a non-issue in the world.
00:06:19.880 | It's a non-issue, which is why you're an alien
00:06:24.360 | and a stranger.
00:06:27.360 | They, the world order, teach us how to fight AIDS
00:06:33.820 | and how to fight mosquitoes and sunstroke
00:06:40.080 | and drunk driving and pollen and depression
00:06:45.080 | and rape and fire and theft and cholesterol
00:06:51.320 | and dandelions, but they don't teach us
00:06:55.440 | how to fight for our soul.
00:06:57.960 | Our world, you must get this,
00:07:03.240 | our world is passionately committed
00:07:09.880 | to the inconsequential.
00:07:11.340 | One of these days, that will not be the case.
00:07:17.520 | The eyes of the world will be opened
00:07:20.920 | and our obliviousness to what will then be seen
00:07:27.040 | to be so obvious will so stun the world
00:07:33.000 | that we will have no explanation
00:07:36.240 | for how we lived the way we lived in America.
00:07:40.480 | How the eternal condition of the human soul
00:07:45.200 | could be a non-issue will be absolutely inexplicable.
00:07:50.200 | It will boggle the mind as we stand before our judge.
00:07:56.840 | We're aliens.
00:07:59.520 | That's the first great issue.
00:08:03.040 | How shall the soul of man be saved
00:08:07.840 | and not destroyed forever and ever?
00:08:10.800 | That is a big issue.
00:08:13.600 | Here's the second one.
00:08:14.700 | Verse 12, keep your behavior excellent among the Gentiles
00:08:20.000 | so that in the thing in which they slander you as evil doers
00:08:24.480 | they may on account of your good deeds
00:08:26.960 | as they observe them, give glory to God
00:08:31.960 | on the day of visitation.
00:08:34.180 | The first issue is how the soul shall not be lost.
00:08:39.180 | The second issue is how God shall not be belittled
00:08:43.780 | or to make it positive, how the soul shall be saved
00:08:47.300 | and now how God shall be glorified.
00:08:51.500 | The salvation of the soul and the glory of God
00:08:55.660 | are the two biggest issues in the universe
00:09:00.500 | and they're non-issues for most people in America.
00:09:05.500 | This text says, the goal of all human behavior
00:09:11.900 | is to be the glory of God.
00:09:15.580 | Isn't that an incredibly sweeping statement?
00:09:20.020 | The goal of all your behavior
00:09:22.660 | from the time you get up in the morning
00:09:24.420 | until you go to bed at night is to draw attention to God.
00:09:30.260 | That's the significance of human life.
00:09:34.220 | The positive significance of human life
00:09:37.740 | consists in our capacity to deflect attention
00:09:42.740 | from ourselves to God.
00:09:48.260 | That's the meaning of human life as God intended it to be.
00:09:52.980 | You see that, I'm not making that up, that's right here.
00:09:55.420 | Keep your behavior excellent
00:09:59.020 | so that the Gentiles might glorify God.
00:10:03.700 | Live, conduct yourselves, act, behave with a mind.
00:10:08.700 | How can I direct their attention to God by the way I live?
00:10:16.780 | That's what life is for.
00:10:20.740 | We live in order to get attention for God.
00:10:25.740 | If we don't, if we don't live for God's glory,
00:10:31.740 | we become simply a little echo of a God neglecting culture.
00:10:37.660 | So echo.
00:10:40.980 | We fit in so well to this world
00:10:47.220 | that we can't direct anybody's attention out of the world,
00:10:51.260 | which is where God is.
00:10:52.940 | I just have the feeling that we're so afraid of being Amish,
00:10:59.420 | dressing wrong, riding a horse drawn carriage
00:11:06.620 | and being anti-modern or getting the wrong tie
00:11:11.260 | or not having a tan or,
00:11:15.220 | we're just so afraid of not being in step
00:11:19.700 | that we blend so well, nobody's saying,
00:11:23.100 | "Wow, look at God," anymore because of the church.
00:11:28.100 | - Man, classic John Pfeiffer.
00:11:29.900 | It's a clip from his 1 Peter 2, 11 and 12 sermon titled,
00:11:33.180 | "The War Against the Soul and the Glory of God,"
00:11:36.220 | fittings title.
00:11:37.260 | It was preached on May 22nd, 1994
00:11:40.420 | and the whole thing is online, of course,
00:11:42.220 | at desiringgod.org.
00:11:44.420 | If you have a great sermon clip like this one,
00:11:46.740 | share it with me, email me, give me your name, hometown,
00:11:49.500 | the sermon title and the timestamp
00:11:51.580 | of where the clip happens in the audio
00:11:53.180 | and make a note of what stands out to you.
00:11:55.020 | Put the word clip in the subject line of an email
00:11:56.700 | and send it to me and askpastorjohn@desiringgod.org.
00:11:59.860 | It's our email address, askpastorjohn@desiringgod.org.
00:12:03.340 | Well, we're back on Friday to talk predestination.
00:12:07.380 | It's a topic that comes up a lot, as you would expect.
00:12:10.740 | I'm your host, Tony Reinke,
00:12:11.740 | and we are rejoined in studio with Pastor John
00:12:14.220 | when we return on Friday to talk predestination.
00:12:18.460 | See you then.
00:12:19.300 | (upbeat music)
00:12:21.880 | (upbeat music)
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