 We're looking at 1 Peter chapter 2. We're going to look at verses 13 through 17 this morning as we continue going through This book called first Peter now. I'll begin reading at verse 13 I'll read to verse 17 and we'll get into our study the apostle Peter writes first Peter chapter 2 verse 13 And therefore submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake whether to the king as supreme or To governors as to those who are sent by him for the punishment of evildoers and For the praise of those who do good For this is the will of God that by doing good you may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men as Free yet not using your liberty as a cloak for vice, but as servants of God Honor all people love the brotherhood fear God honor the king Now we've been going through first Peter and as you know The apostle Peter has been giving certain directives towards believers in the Lord Jesus Christ And he's been exhorting his belief the believers his readers and by application He's been exhorting all believers to live godly lives now That word godly once again is is part of our vocabulary as Christians We use the word godly, but there are those who perhaps don't know what that word means The word godly speaks of an attitude it speaks of an attitude that desires to be pleasing to God it is Character and conduct that is motivated by the fear of God and a love for God So when a person is living a godly life, it's motivated for love by love for God a fear of God And it's actually something that that reveals an attitude that desires to be pleasing to God This is godliness now godliness is not something that you automatically have you get saved and suddenly you're godly It's doesn't work that way godliness is actually part of the discipline of a Christian life You actually pursue it it's something that you seek after it's not something that automatically happens because you got saved The Apostle Paul said in 1st Timothy 4 verse 7 reject profane and Old wives fables and exercise yourself toward godliness. So it's something that you discipline yourself to it's a way of life It's a way of life that is lived out in front of believers and unbelievers alike When you want to find certain scriptures that may give the qualities of godliness that's not hard to do You could see 1st Timothy for example chapter 3 verses 1 through 7 and Though that passage is referring to the qualifications of leadership in the church Because it begins with the words of any man desire the office of a bishop He desires a good thing and so you know that these things that you find in chapter 3 verses 1 through 7 are really the attributes of a godly leader Yet you can by way of application look at some of those things that he says as a matter of fact all of those things and apply them to yourself So if you want to live a life that is godly all you need to do is look at 1st Timothy chapter 3 and begin to evaluate What is he saying there? Because there Paul gives illicit qualities of godliness. He speaks of having a good reputation He speaks of having moral purity being balanced in word and action a Person who is godly is wise and humble a good role model They are unselfish and generous they communicated a non-threatening manner A person who is godly is not addicted to substances is not somebody who controls other people They're not quick to anger. They're not abusive a person who is pursuing godliness is sensitive and kind Non-argumentative they are free from the love of money They're a good spouse a good parent. They pursue godly activities. They're wise. They're not prejudice They're devoted to God and their discipline. These are things that you can see as qualities of godliness And so when I speak concerning godliness, those are the things that I'm speaking about and and the Apostle Peter here in 1st Peter has been exhorting us as believers to live godly lives now Part of the reason why we live godly lies is we understand that we're just passing through yet said that we are sojourneys He said that we are pilgrims and Being sojourners and pilgrims means that we do certain things in verse 11 He said that means that we abstain from what he refers to as fleshly lusts which war against the soul So if a person is living a godly life, what they're doing is they're avoiding certain things They are actually abstaining from things that would be called sins of the flesh When he speaks about these sinful lusts by the way, these are the sinful impulses that continually carry on a campaign for dominance in our lives These are the impulses that we as human beings deal with on a continual basis. You see the old nature that we that we have Struggles against the new nature for dominance. There's a war that's going on. It's an internal civil war There's a war that goes on within us and Paul speaks about that in Romans chapter 7 verses 18 through 20 When he says I know that nothing good lives in me that is in my flesh For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out For what I do is not the good I want to do. No the evil I do not want to do this I keep on doing Now if I do what I do not want to do It is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it. There's a war going on within me Paul would say I want to do what is right, but there's a war that fights against me And it's a war within that attempts to keep me from doing that which I desire so much to do All of us can understand that Paul called these the lusts of the flesh in Galatians chapter 5 In Galatians 5 17 through 21 he said the lusts of the flesh These are described here in this way he says the flesh desires what is contrary to the spirit in the spirit What is contrary to the flesh? They are in conflict with each other so that you do not do what you want, but if you are led by the spirit You're not under law The acts of the flesh are obvious then he lists some sexual immorality impurity debauchery idolatry and witchcraft hatred discord jealousy fits of rage selfish ambition dissensions and factions and envy drunkenness orgies and the like and he goes on to say I warn you as I did before That those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God Don't let anybody deceive you and to believe in that you can live in that manner and still be heaven bound the apostle Peter said no we're pilgrims and we're sojourners we We have to deal with the fact that there are lusts that are warring against us at this moment there's a conflict within and So the entire answer to that is to pursue godliness To seek the Lord and to do those things that are pleasing to him So Peter is exhorting the people to abstain from these lusts when he says that he's saying do not yield yourself to the impulse That war is within you the war against the spirit of God that dwells within you you can Be victorious. You can have a life That is evident that you are more than a conqueror And Paul in Romans 6 12 to 14 says do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires Do not offer the parts of your body to sin as instruments of wickedness But rather offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life offer the parts of your body to him as instruments of righteousness For sin shall not be your master because you are not under law But under grace you can win I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me I can make decisions that are pleasing to God and live a life that is blessed by him That's why he says don't let sin reign in your mortal body That's why he says you can resist and you can actually have victory We're to have according to verse 12 conduct that is honorable among the Gentiles because they're going to speak against you So my conduct is to be excellent in nature and characteristic amongst those who don't believe in God Because the way that I live is going to reveal what I believe even as it says in Proverbs 20 verse 11 Even a child is known by his actions by whether his conduct is pure and right what I believe I'm going to do and therefore I had to do that which is pleasing to God which demonstrates what I believe You see unbelievers are on the watch in order to see if you can lapse in your moral conduct And so speaking of you in a way that is not proper is Inevitable, but your righteous life should be of such quality that that they see that the things that they're saying are not true And then ultimately they'll even glorify God in the day of visitation in other words either They're going to acknowledge God was with you when they stand before God or they're going to watch your good works And they're going to be converted because of the quality of your life and the things that you share Now this is what he's been saying up to this point and now he moves on into verse 13 here in chapter 2 By saying therefore submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake whether to the king is supreme or to governors as To those who are sent by him for the punishment of evildoers and for the praise of those who do good And so he's going to begin at this point to make a point that you're going to see developed over this chapter and into chapter 3 He begins to speak concerning the word submission He uses the word here in verse 13. He also speaks of it in verse 18 and then in chapter 3 verse 1 What does it mean to submit? Well submission means to subject yourself It's a voluntary decision that you make to rank yourself below or under somebody who has superior authority Here he's referring to submitting yourself to God's designed order for society So the point he's making and we'll be looking at this if we're going to live lives that bring glory to God It's going to occur when we have a Life of quality a life that that people see is really sold out to Jesus Christ to affect change in the society Then we need to have change occur in us Because the way that we are going to change the society that we live in the culture that we live in is to be changed by God himself and that comes through being transformed by the Lord Jesus Christ So he's pointing out that that changed lives are going to affect society And so God would have us to be changed. How can I do that? Well one I'm to submit myself to every ordinance of man For the Lord's sake that word ordinance is a word that you can actually translate Institution it's a thing that's created by by man for order. It's another word for government Since submission is voluntary. He's saying submit decide to submit for the Lord's sake Now that's a difficult word that word submission to me. It still is You have to decide to submit When Jesus on one occasion was being approached by a centurion The centurion had a servant boy that was not well, and he wanted the Lord Jesus Christ to heal him Jesus said to this centurion this Roman military man I'll go with you The centurion said no no Lord. I'm not worthy that you should enter under my roof All you need to do is speak a word and my servant will be healed for I too am a man under authority I say to this one go when he goes I say to another man come here and he comes Jesus marvels at this man. He says I haven't seen faith like this No, not even in Israel that this man who was a Gentile not a not a person under the covenant law of Moses a Gentile Would understand the relationship that Jesus Christ had with his father because Jesus came to do the will of his father It is written in the volume of the book your book. He says in the book of Hebrews. I have come to do thy will oh God Jesus said the words that I speak to you and the works that I perform are not originating in my own plans But he said I'm doing the will of my father Even in the garden where he said nevertheless not my will but yours be done as a demonstration of Jesus Christ being under authority The centurion saw it. He recognized it. That's why he would say to him. I too am a man under authority I see that you are a man under authority because a man who's not under authority is not to be trusted Because a person who does not submit himself to anybody else is somebody that will be dangerous with my life He understood that from military You learn that in the military You have people who are over you superior to you in the military from an E1 in the army all the way up to the general And there is a military kind of a system of authority that you have to learn and you have to yield to it If you don't yield to it, there are penalties When I was in the military I discovered that Because I was in formation. We had a large company. There were 400 plus and we all had a half formation at At 8 o'clock in the morning We all would stand in attention in formation and the company commander would address us and that would take that would take place at about 8 o'clock in the morning every morning Monday through Friday and Normally there would be somebody that would be assigned to address you if the company commander wasn't there and on one occasion I was standing there in formation and The sergeant major was there who was gonna address us and as he was addressing us He looked in my direction and he said Rosales You've got you've got extra duty report for extra duty tonight at 5 and I said no He said what? He said I said report for extra duty at 5 and I said I'm not going to I'm not gonna be there You don't do that You don't do that in the military. You just don't do that But I was one of these rebellious kids and I said I'm not coming and so he got all mad I don't know why he got all mad. I'm saying that in front of 400 400 guys No So he says come into my office So I go walking into his office. He actually disses me and tells me to meet him in his office I go into his office and I go into the office. I'm thinking to myself. I know what he's gonna do He's gonna come in he's gonna bluster. He's gonna try and threaten me. He's gonna act like he's this and that is a special forces Guy and he's gonna try and scare me. I know what he's gonna do but I'm a Christian And so I start to pray I was a new Christian I was a year old in the Lord and the Lord convicts my heart So here comes this guy he walks in he starts kind of throwing one of these moves on me to show me how in charge he is Before he says anything. I said before you say anything. I Need to tell you something. I said I showed you disrespect in front of the men and for that I apologize. I Said I'm a Christian and the Lord spoke to my heart and told me That what I did was improper and that I need to ask you for forgiveness. I'm sorry blew him away He didn't know what to do with that He really didn't he didn't know what to do with that. He thought you know, he was you know I don't know what he was thinking he was gonna do but he thought it was gonna be different than that I guarantee you I Reported for extra duty some other time because I had something I had to do that's the reason I said no I was already scheduled to do something else But instead of just approaching him with respect to and telling him, you know sergeant can't do that But I'll be there when I can because I took the wrong route See, I've learned something about submission to proper authority I've learned it over the years and I began to learn my lessons about that in the military in the military I had a friend of mine, you know that was a living example of how you're supposed to submit and what you shouldn't do sometimes because My friend wouldn't get up in the morning. You have to get up at a certain time and the sergeant came into his room and said get up and My friend was still in bed. Everybody was already up. He was supposed to be up and he's supposed to be active But he's just laying in bed and serge came in there and said get up soldier And he says my friend tells the sergeant. He says no he said that I come into your room and wake you up this morning. I Think he's still doing extra duty 40 years later So you have to learn your lessons of submitting to proper authority in this particular context We're seeing that that the Apostle is speaking about submitting to proper governmental authority and so that's what he's speaking about here when he speaks about Submitting to the king submitting to governors and all he's saying you need to submit now submission is voluntary So you decide to submit for the Lord's sake? Proverbs 24 21 my son fear the Lord and the king Matthew 22 21 render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's and to God the things that are God's Romans 13 1 through 3 everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities For there is no authority except that which God has established the authorities that exist have been established by God Consequently he who rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted Those who do so will bring judgment on themselves for rulers hold no terror for those who do right But for those who do wrong Do you want to be free from fear of the one in authority? Then do what is right, and he will commend you you want to be free from fear Don't be the speed limit Stop it. Stop signs You know, you know what happens. You're on the freeway. You're driving. You've seen this happen. There's a CHP a cruiser That's next to you You're wondering why is everybody going so slow? They're actually going the speed limit And you look in your mirror and you see this cruiser Oh, he gets off the freeway, and it's the start of the Indy 500 boom there goes everybody That's what they do. They only obey as long as someone's there to bust them you come to a stop sign There's suggestions today, aren't they stop sign suggest they think it'd be cool But there's nobody around here after all it's five in the morning. There's nobody in my neighborhood. I can blow through that I'm late, right? So people I see that in my neighborhood all the time. They think the stop sign is a suggestion And it's not it's a stop sign or we're supposed to go this speed limit because You know, well, there's nobody around here except for me And so I'll go as fast as I want until I see a cruiser behind me then all of a sudden I'm thinking Oh, man, what's the first thing you do when you're driving and you see a police car behind you It's the first thing you do. Do you look at your speedometer? Why? Because We speed that's why it's obvious, isn't it? And oh, oh good. I'm in that five mile per hour We credit ourselves, you know, it's really it's not 25. It's really 30 31. Oh, I'm speeding 25 but that's just the way we are and any officer will tell you that because I've spoken to my share No, we don't give you a grace of five miles an hour if you're going 26 year speeding. They'll tell you that It's a fact. I was driving to church and I got pulled over by a cop who goes to our church He's my brother-in-law, but I wasn't speeding well actually I was but I didn't know it See, there's a right there on Riverside Drive coming here in pipeline It's 45 miles an hour and then it changes to 40 and I went through it 45 But the sign wasn't up that said 40 so he pulled me over my brother-in-law He used to go to this church He says Dave you were speeding I said no, I wasn't I was going 45 Well, are you sure? I said well, you know what it says right back there. We argued, you know in a nice brotherly way But later on he came up to me he let me go he came up later on and he says, you know, you were speeding I went back and check that sign. I said hi too late Bottom line is is I have to learn like everybody else to discipline myself to do what is right I submit I make that mind up myself. I have to learn to do that. It's a choice that I make Now when it comes to government We submit the laws. I'll show you something in just a moment. We submit the laws and all of that But what happens when those who are an authority over you begin to tell you that you can't do certain things that Violate your conscience as it relates to Jesus Christ We have an example of that in scripture more than one really but there was a time when the Apostles Peter and John resisted a clear command for them to stop preaching in the name of Jesus It's recorded in Acts chapter 4 verses 17 through 20 and and those who were Conspiring to try and stop the gospel said To stop this thing from spreading any further among the people we must warn these men to speak no longer to anyone in this name Then they called them in again and Commanded them not to speak or teach at all in the name of Jesus But Peter and John replied judge for yourselves whether is right in God's sight to obey you rather than God For we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard You judge for yourself. Is it right for us to obey man or is it right for us to obey God? We have to speak what God has commanded us and therefore we're gonna continue speaking in his name now when you resist that Kind of evil there will be consequences But because they continued preaching they contend continued sharing and ultimately got arrested again Once again, they were threatened in Acts 5 40 through 42 It says after that they had called for the apostles and beaten them They commanded that they should not speak in the name of Jesus and let them go So they departed from the presence of the council rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for his name But notice daily in the temple and in every house. They did not cease teaching and preaching Jesus as the Christ So even though they were commanded not to speak in the name of Christ and even suffered consequences through the beating They continued to preach in the name of Jesus Christ When the government establishes laws That forbid us from preaching Who do we obey the government? Or the Lord we obey the Lord if you go into Canada as a minister There are laws against you preaching the full counsel of God in Canada I don't know if you know this or not, but there are there are laws there If I were to be teaching a study through the book of Romans and actually teach Romans chapter 1 the way it is intended to be taught I can be cited for that Because when you speak concerning the subjects that are brought up in Romans chapter 1 which includes homosexuality as a sin When you teach the passage the way that is intended to be communicated You are going to be cited for hate speech So there are laws against you preaching the full counsel In Sweden a pastor was put in jail for preaching Romans chapter 1 because they have laws against hate speech there and So you have to make a decision do I teach the whole counsel of God or do I refuse to? As a minister I'm called to preach the whole counsel of God Which means that should the United States continue in the direction that it's going there's a possibility of Intrusion of the government within the confines of the church It's interesting how separation of church and state only works in one direction when the government wants it to work in that way But the government is willing to Metal in the affairs of the church and does all the time And so the day may come when I stand up here giving the word and there are hate speech Advocates who might make a complaint because laws have been passed And the fact of the matter is is we one day may end up going to jail for preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ But should we obey men or should we obey God is the question and the answer is we obey God rather than men So we'll go to jail and have Bible studies there because that's what's going to happen because that's what God has called us to do That's how it works You see as all of this is taking place. He's speaking concerning the will of God and He's sharing this is the will of God and I want you to notice in verse 15 He says this is the will of God that by doing good you may put into silence the ignorance of foolish men By doing the will of God now we read concerning the will of God in scripture fairly often 1st Thessalonians 4 3 speaks about the will of God in this way This is the will of God your sanctification that you should abstain from sexual immorality or 1st Thessalonians 5 18 The Apostle Paul writing says in everything give thanks for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you and Romans 1 the Apostle Paul was making plans and he says making requested by some means now at last I may find a way in the will of God to come to you So the will of God is just wanting to be in the the stream of where God is moving you Here the quality of lives that he's speaking about that are going to evidence the will of God Are going to be lies that are blessed and peaceful and self-controlled and he said these are the lives that will glorify God When he says in verse 15 that you may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men He's simply saying that by living a life that is blessed by God is going to actually put a muzzle on a detractor And their verbal viciousness will be silenced by your good behavior. They'll have nothing evil to say of you Continuing he goes in verse 16 as free Yet not using your liberty as a cloak for vice, but as servants of God. This is a very powerful scripture guys It's a very powerful scripture. I want you to see it I'm going to spend a couple moments looking at this with you as free yet not using your liberty as a cloak for vice We're free from the law of Moses. Let's make the context clear We're free from the law of Moses the law of Moses does not is not my guideline The law of Moses isn't something that I am under I have liberty from the law of Moses But just because I have liberty from the law of Moses not being a Jewish individual And he's actually writing to Jewish believers, but I as a non Jewish individual I'm free from the law of Moses because I have liberty well liberty is from the law of Moses but this liberty that we have actually binds us to a greater rule of life and The greater rule of life that this liberty binds me to is love Love for God and love for others in Galatians 5 13 Paul said for you brethren have been called to liberty Only do not use liberty as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another Do not use your liberty as an opportunity for the flesh There are those today who look at grace as being permission to continue in sin and go to heaven. They're misunderstanding grace Grace was not extended to me or to you grace was not given to us as believers To allow us to continue in sin but to free us from the power of sin Now that I am in the grace of Jesus Christ, it's not permission for me to go out and do the things I used to do and continue in that God has given to me grace to set me free from the bondage that I had in the past to a variety of things including to my religious Preoccupations and things that I thought were right with God this grace that has been given to me sets me free to serve Jesus Christ Because at one time I was in bondage to sin and now I'm free because of him and his grace But the Apostle Paul made it very clear in verse 1 and 2 of chapter 6 of Romans when he said what shall we say then shall We continue in sin that grace may abound then he goes on to say certainly not how shall we who died to sin live any longer in it So there's a mistake that I've seen even in the church today where people are using grace as a cloak for sin They're hiding behind it. They're saying I can continue doing these things But the bottom line is we were set free from the power of sin so we could be set free To serve God with a complete heart listen you were saved not to continue living in sin And it's a great deception when you think that you can continue in sin and have no penalty as a result of that Fear of God is a very important thing You're gonna see that in just a moment where he speaks about Fearing God and honoring the King fear of God is a very important thing It's one of the things that is the earmark of a believer and the lack of the fear of God is the earmark of an unbeliever They have no fear of God in them the unbeliever and so Liberty The way it works is this and I'll share very briefly about this But it's really worth looking at deeper and we're gonna do so when we get into 1st Corinthians 8 next week on Sunday night Liberty you have what are called legalists some of you have heard that term legalists if you haven't heard the term a Legalist is an individual who has rules of conduct that you need to abide by in order to have a right standing with God So if you came to to faith in Christ in a church that is filled with legalism They would give you a lot of rules and regulations there that you're supposed to abide by that are not even scriptural They're just the way that this church runs So you may be as a woman will say you'll be told in certain legalistic circles You can't wear makeup anymore, and you can't wear jewelry And you need to be careful to wear dresses that drag on the ground when you walk in because you don't want to stumble anybody and And and that's legalism. I think that makeup is a blessing from God And I thank him every day But you may have that there's this attitude That you you you can't you can't do this or you can't do that. It's all legalistic It's not what you do in terms of of your relationship with Christ is what you're not doing that makes you spiritual amongst people and so it's legalism and They keep you in bondage. I Remember when I first got saved I got saved as all of you who know this church I got saved as a hippie. I got saved with long hair But there was a church at that time was very large church. It was in Indiana I remember reading of it well because they had a barber on staff True story they had a barber on staff and if some hippie got saved They would usher him into the back to get a haircut to prove that it was really saved Because everybody knows that Jesus Christ had a crew cut everybody knows he had a buzz everybody knows that and And that was that's called legalism It's it's trying to put you in some cookie cutter kind of thing that makes you look like everybody else because we all look Alike, you know some place same place same time that kind of mentality We just all kind of like and and that that's not how it is in the body of Christ. It's never been and it should never ever be Legalism it's it's defined by by the rules and regulations that you abide by and the things that you don't do But then you swing the pendulum somewhere else and you can get to what is called license This is where you get the word licentious from The one who is licentious is the person who has no law their Antinomian there people with no law no system in their life And so what happens is you have one person saying you can't do this and go to heaven And then you have the other one saying you can do anything you want and go to heaven If you want to do it do it you're free in Christ free indeed if anybody's set free by Jesus He's free indeed and they'll preach the freedom that you have in Christ. It's called licentiousness And that's what Paul was arguing about what shall we continue and sin that grace may abound God forbid How can we who have died to sin live any longer therein? Because they were arguing at that time in the book of Romans There were those arguing that Paul was saying that Moses's law is no longer abiding or no longer in in in effect And therefore he is saying that you can do anything you want at any given time and it all comes under grace Paul said no, I'm not saying that at all What grace does is it sets you free from the bondage of sin and sets you free to follow Jesus Christ and so the third word instead of legalism and licentiousness the third word would actually be liberty that is founded on love Liberty in Christ is the freedoms we have in him because we love God and love others to live in such a way That we can bring honor to him and have joy in our life Never allow Legalism to dominate because you're not better than somebody else because you don't do certain things Today, there's an argument right now. You can't really be a solid Christian. You've got tattoos. I Get letters from people Pastor doesn't the Bible say that you can't have a tattoo and and and it's a question But really what's happening is people saying we'll see these these kids with these tattoos and this and that These kids are not really saved because if they were saved they wouldn't mark their bodies Well, you know, I see these women they put these little little Doves on their lower back here and and it may be cute now But one of these days when they're walking that doves going to be flying That hummingbird becomes a vulture Your third service I can be a little looser, but is it a sin? No, it's just gross We got to be careful You know and I do I have people asking about that what do you think about this and what do you think about that? What's it say here? What's it say here? You know, don't use your liberty to cause other people to stumble You know and there are others who really don't understand what liberty is because liberty is the freedom that Christ gives to us to love God to love others and we're gonna live a life that demonstrates that Again, love does no harm to a neighbor It's a love God and as you love the Lord you live in liberty and you won't be using God's grace as a cloak to continue in sin You know that saying don't judge me only God is my judge. Well, come on now There are times when I as a brother have to approach somebody and I've been approached I know the unpleasant feeling of coming into conviction because I've hurt somebody. I know the feeling and You have to listen to what they say and you have to if it's a scripture you apologize. God forgive me And I'm sorry. I hurt you. I didn't mean to you humble yourself and the Lord moves why because that's love Because you want God to be honored you see and we don't use our liberties as a cloak to hide You know, there are some people who don't understand that to this day and So they say oh you can't judge me and you shouldn't you know Jesus said judge not according to appearance, but judge righteous judgment and what is righteous judgment? Righteous judgment is knowing the scriptures knowing the spirit of the Lord as he moves through those scriptures And then having a discernment that is capable of using the scripture in a proper way to be able to point us in the right direction That's what the Lord calls us to so the Apostle Peter speaking about that and he's making it very clear That we can have freedom, but we don't use our liberty as a cloak for vice But rather he says be a servant of God and then finally he says honor all people Love the brotherhood fear God honor the king I want you to see this because you you can combine honor all people and love for the brotherhood And you can actually combine fear God and honor the king and you can get a full picture. What he's talking about Honor all people in general show respect to people in general. That's the way that we ought to be We ought to honor people in general, but we also love our fellow believers all people are to be honored Not just the noble and not those who are in government all people are to be honored because they are created in the image of God And so we honor people but not only do we honor people because they have been created in the image of God But we also love our fellow believers because we're family in Jesus Christ That's what Romans 12 10 says be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love We love one another why because loving one another Demonstrates that we know that we've been bought by a price Jesus Christ blood and we've been brought into a family So Christians of all people should love one another Jesus said by this shall home and know you're my disciple if you love one another And so he's just making it very clear you honor all people you give a general respect But you have a special love for those who love Jesus Christ family and God Then he goes on to say fear God and honor the king Now it's interesting because notice in verse 17. He began with the word honor honor all people Then he closes in verse 17 by saying honor the king but in between love the brotherhood and fear God That's an interesting thing because what he's saying is this If I really am honoring people and loving brothers That's all going to be based on one thing and that is the fear of the Lord and that fear of the Lord Is also going to motivate me to honor those who are in authority over me But I don't honor those who are in authority over me Just because they are I honor them because I have a fear of the Lord first somebody did a research kind of did research on What was called moral development? actually developed several stages of moral development and The lowest stage if you were having a ladder With rungs that you were climbing towards the highest stage the lowest stage The bottom rung in his research was that people will do right things and abstain from doing wrong Because of their fear of government If they're afraid of getting arrested they won't do it That doesn't make them better It just means that they restrict what they do because the law says I can't but this guy in his research pointed out that The problem with that kind of thinking morally is this if it becomes legal Then I can do it legally and it then automatically becomes moral to do it so you pass a law in California that says You can you can smoke medicinal marijuana if you've got certain kinds of Eye problems like glaucoma and suddenly everybody's got glaucoma And they go to their physician on hold or wherever And get a prescription filled and they'll argue with you It's legal You've heard it. Have you heard it? They'll say it to you. It's legal. So legal to them is moral. You see that Legal to them is moral if it's legal it is moral if I can go with my prescription to one of these places and get my Prescription marijuana, it's legal. Therefore. It's moral. Who are you to judge me because I have glaucoma or whatever That's the argument we're having right now. So they equate Legality and morality. That's the lowest on the wrong on the ladder Abortion is legal Therefore it's moral We've been arguing that for many years Some of those who are the strongest proponents for abortion were the strongest voices Against it and some of you are not old enough to remember when Jesse Jackson Said that abortion was going to hit the African-American community harder than any other and therefore It was racist in its origin. I'm old enough to remember that I'm old enough to remember Jesse Jackson arguing against abortion and now he's a proponent. What happened? It's been legal for 40-plus years. That's what happened That's how it works and that's how it finds its way into our society That's what's taking place right now with the legalization of homosexual marriages if it becomes Law it becomes moral Now on this man's theory He said the highest form of morality is a morality based on the fear of God This was not a Christian by the way who did this it was in his studies in his research He said those with the strongest form of moral development are those who believe strongly in God Why is that because they took the scripture as their guideline and not what the law said? Because the law changes every 10 or 12 years something that was once looked at is wrong is brought in as being right But God's standards are unchangeable and so believers Will fear God then they honor the king Notice he didn't say honor the king and then fear God He said honor all people love the brotherhood Fear God honor the king because those are couplets they're brought together Because if I'm going to be able to love the brotherhood I need to be able to have a general respect for people in in just in general if I'm going to honor Government then I'm gonna have to have it built on something stronger than just with the laws today Therefore I fear God So fearing God will cause you to be a good citizen because you owe your allegiance to that Which is higher you have a higher standard and higher authority Which is why Christians have always been the best citizens of any nation? Because they fear God when you fear God first then you're able to do the other things But when you fear man that simply means you're afraid they're gonna restrict your behavior When you fear God there's an internal submission to the things that God gives you to do and you do that willingly Because it glorifies him which is a higher standard and that's why the Apostle Peter would say that you honor men But you love your brothers you fear God and then you can honor your king That's how it works, and that's what we ought to do, too