Pastor Skip Heitzig guides us through First and Second Peter in the series Rock Solid.

There was a carpenter who was getting older and he wanted to retire, so he told his boss that he would be quitting, relaxing with his family. He boss said, "Well, I'm going to hate to see you go, but would you do me last favor and build for me one final house?" So, the carpenter decided he would go along with his boss, do him the favor. But his heart wasn't in it, so he used poor workmanship, inferior materials, the work crews weren't the best, and it was a bad way to end a great career.

When the house was done, his boss came to him with a set of keys, and said, "This house is yours. You've been such a faithful worker; I want to give you this last house that you have built." Then the builder was shocked, and he realized if he had known he was building his own home, he would have built it so differently.

All of us are building our lives. We do it every day by choices that we make. Some of us do it well, some of us not so well. We know who the foundation is; the foundation for our lives is the Lord Jesus Christ. We discovered that last week. Paul the apostle said, "No foundation can any man lay, than what is already been laid, and that is Christ himself." So, we discovered that Peter isn't what the church was built on, but it's Jesus is what the church was built on.

I want to talk to you today about what you attach to your foundation with. Several years ago we built this house up in the mountains that the builder decided that the property had so much rock that was actually the mountain itself that we really don't need to pour much foundation at all. He just bolted directly onto the rock itself, so that those anchor bolts, those footings, those underpinnings were solidly attached to the foundation.

I discovered that according to the Uniform Building Code in America, homes didn't have to be bolted to their foundations until 1958, which is the reason why older homes in places where there are earthquakes or mudslide zones will even come off the foundation. So, I want to talk to you about those underpinnings, those things that you build your life and attach to the foundation with. Now, the materials we use to attach to the foundation, we use truths to do that.

And what's amazing about Peter, really is amazing, is that when he writes his letter to these recipients, even in his introduction, he immediately immerses them into some pretty steep theological truths just in this first couple of verses. And here's why: what we think about God determines what we think about everything else. You get him wrong, you get life wrong, and so theology is essential for life.

A. W. Tozer said what a person thinks about God is the most important thing about that person. So, you're to notice as Peter introduces his letter that he puts them into some pretty deep theological truths that are important to him, and are the underpinnings for the foundation---which is Christ---that we attach to.

Look at verse 1 and verse 2. "Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to the pilgrims of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ: Grace to you and peace be multiplied." And I know there's a lot of crazy sounding words in these two verses, especially verse 2, so I want to unpack this verse for you. And even as we covered all of one verse last week, we'll cover all of verse 2 this week.

Moving right along, let me give you the four truths introduced by Peter. These are underpinnings of your life, the underpinnings of a rock-solid life. Truth number one: We've been chosen previously. We have been chosen by God previously. That's the first word in the second verse. Look at the word---"elect." Now, I know it shows up in verse 2, but I was reading this in the Greek yesterday, and I discovered that it's actually in verse 1 in the Greek language. It's a modifier of the word "pilgrims," and in the Greek it says "elect pilgrims" who are scattered in these areas.

So, Peter is writing to a group of believers who are scattered all over the place over in Asia Minor undergoing persecution as we discovered last week. But Peter wants them to know, and it would bring a tremendous amount of comfort for them suffering persecution to know: "You guys have been picked by God long ago."

I remember when I was in school I always dreaded when the students would break up into teams and two of the jocks, the athletic guys, would select people from that group to be on their teams. I hated that because I was, like, never picked till the last. So, I'm kind of around, shuffling my feet, and till finally there's like two kids left, and one goes, "Heitzig." So, great, now I'm on this team---last pick.

Every now and then there would be a rare exception where I would get picked a little bit earlier on. That's usually because the student was new in school, didn't know any better, didn't know me, was hoping against hope: "This guy's tall; he can probably do a lot of things."

Peter writes, and he goes right away, "It's important that you understand you're elected by God." This truth was, to Peter, monumental. And let me explain how it came about, I believe. Peter had made a choice to follow Christ, but then Jesus comes along one day and he goes, "You didn't chose me, I chose you, and I've appointed you that you would go forth and bring fruit and that your fruit would remain."

And I think Peter was, like, in his head going, "What? I distinctly remember that day in Galilee making a choice to follow this Rabbi, and now he's telling me he has chosen me?" That was earth shattering to him. It rocked his world. It changed his thinking. And it did so much so that at the beginning of a letter that he writes, he wants the audience to know that right up front: "You can have this as the underpinning of your life on the solid foundation that you have been elected by God."

He's going to bring it up begin in chapter 2. He's going to say, "You are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood"---chosen, elected. It's sort of like you were driving down the street, guys, and you went passed a restaurant in your car that you've never seen before. And you say to your wife, "Hey, let's go eat there someday." And then you think, "Well, let's just go eat there right now."

So, you double back, you pull into the parking lot, you get out, you walk into the restaurant. And the waiter sees you, and says, "Mr. Heitzig, we have been expecting you." I'm going, "Wow, that's a shock. How is that possible?" And the closest I ever came to a situation like that---true story---is when years ago we were first married, my wife and I. And I got a call from a friend of mine who pastors a church in California. And he asked me to come and speak. And I got to choose when I was to come, and I would choose what topic.

So, I chose when I would come, and I chose the topic. And I flew out the Los Angeles International Airport, was waiting for him to pick me up, and my wife smiles, and says, "He's not coming to pick you up." And she pulls out of her purse tickets to Hawaii, and said it was all a bluff to get you to decide, make a choice, you're going to go do this and do that, only to discover something else has been chosen for you. So, I chose to go and speak and what to speak on, only to discover I had been chosen to go to Hawaii. [laughter]

In the Old Testament the nation of Israel is called God's chosen or God's elect. Thirteen different times Israel is called the "chosen" or the "elect" people of God. You may remember the Fiddler on the Roof when the main actor Tevye looks up to heaven and goes, "I know, I know we are chosen people, but every once in a while couldn't you choose someone else?" because of all the suffering the Jewish people have undergone throughout history.

In the New Testament, Christians are called "God's elect." In Romans and in Colossians we are called the "elect of God." Listen to this beautiful articulation by Paul. This is Romans 8:29---funny how we stop at Romans 8:28. Keep reading, it gets better. "Whom he foreknew, he also predestined to be conformed into the image of his Son." He chose you in advance to undergo a process of changing you to be more and more in your personality and character like Jesus Christ.

And then he goes on, a couple of verses later, "Who will bring a charge against God's elect?" You have been elected by God, which always brings up a debate. It has been a debate going on for thousands of years. It's a debate about God's election and predestination of us versus our volition, our free will. And so the question is simply framed: "Do I choose God or did God choose me?" Answer: Yes. [laughter] "Both are true.

You chose God in harmony with his choice of you. Now you can argue with that, you can read on that, you can fight back and forth about that---may I suggest to you that you simply enjoy it. That's the whole point. He didn't write this to these struggling believers so they can worry about it, and argue about it, and fight and write about it, but they could enjoy the fact that they're on God's team, that God picked you in advance.

When did he pick you? Was it the day when he looked at you and he saw that wonderful character that you have, [laughter] and he said, "You are irresistible. I've got to pick you for my team." [laughter] Uh, you had nothing to do with it, because the Bible says he picked you before you were ever around. Ephesians, chapter 1, "He chose us in him before the foundation of the world." Charles Haddon Spurgeon used to say, "It's a good thing God picked me before I was born, he never would have picked me afterwards."

The truth is God picked us. He chose us. We have been elected. We have been predestined before we were ever born. But then somebody will say, "Well, if that's true, then, Skip, why do you ask people to choose Christ, to make a decision for Christ, to come forward at an altar call?" Here's the reason why: because it's your faith cooperating with his election. It's your faith, your choice, your step that is cooperating with his election. But I will say, even God gave you the ability to have that faith.

Here's what it's like: A man is drowning, a rope is thrown out to him. That rope alone cannot save that man. That man has to grab a hold of the rope, or he'll just go, "Gulp, gulp, gulp." He's gone. He's gotta grab a hold of the rope, but even that is not enough. There has to be somebody on the shore throwing the rope and pulling it in.

So, God by election throws the rope and pulls it in; we by our volition, our choice grab a hold of the rope. God always makes the first move. He always makes the first choice. He always takes the initiative, and we respond. First John, chapter 4, what does it say? "We love him because he---first loved us." Ours is a response to his initiation.

Now, inevitably somebody hears something like this and somebody is going to say, "Well, that's not fair." And I will say, "What do you mean 'that's not fair'?" "Well, I'm not yet a believer, and maybe it's because God didn't pick me." "Well, why aren't you a believer? In fact, why don't you believe right now? Why don't you turn your life over to Christ right now?" "Well, I'm not ready." "Okay, then how can you say it's not fair?" "Well, maybe I'm not ready because he hasn't chosen me."

"Well, I tell you what, why don't you pray to receive Christ right now, and I will prove to you that you will discover that God has, in advance, chosen you." "Well, I don't know if I'm ready for that." "Okay, then, well, maybe God didn't pick you." [laughter] "Well, it's not fair." "Well, receive Christ and you'll discover that you made the choice, but he's already chosen you." "Well, I don't get that." "Neither do I, I'm just declaring it." [laughter]

But what a comfort that would be to persecuted believers scattered throughout Asia Minor to hear this truth that would be this first bolt of underpinning that attaches them to the foundation---and that is, we have been chosen previously. Here's the second truth: We are known completely. We are known completely. Look at the wording: "Elect"---love this---"according to the foreknowledge of God." You know the word "foreknowledge" in the Greek; it's prognósis/proginóskó.

Prognosis---Doctor, what is the prognosis? That's the word he uses here---foreknowledge. God knows, God sees everything in advance. That's a lot of knowledge. The same word is used of the death of Christ. Jesus' death wasn't some accident. It's like, "Well, he got himself in trouble, got himself arrested. They stuck him on a cross, he died." No, that was preplanned.

Same guy, Peter, in Acts, chapter 2, will say, "Him [Jesus], being delivered"---listen---"by the determined purpose and foreknowledge of God, you have taken by your wicked hands crucified and put to death." God sent him; you in your choice crucified him---both are true. God's knowledge, foreknowledge.

Have you ever compared God's knowledge with our knowledge? It's a fun little comparison. Man's knowledge is accumulated knowledge. It's the product of tedious learning. It's the result of long research. It's augmented by human experience, and it's subject to deterioration. That's our knowledge. God's knowledge is immediate, comprehensive, and without deterioration. In other words, God never needs to research anything.

He never has to use Google or Wikipedia to find out facts. His knowledge is immediate and comprehensive. God never has to string one logical premise and attach it to another to come up with a result in critical thinking---he just knows. God never uses words like "huh" or "wow" or "I didn't know that." His knowledge is all-encompassing. You can never tell him anything he doesn't already know, and he never forgets.

How much stuff have we forgotten over the years? You really realize that when your third graders come home and they ask you a third-grade level question that's on their assignment, and you're going, "I have no clue. It's been so long." Yeah, but that's third-grade level; we've forgotten it all. David was amazed at God's total knowledge, his omniscience. And he said, "O Lord, you have searched me and known me. You know when I sit down; you know when I rise up."

And then he said this, "You understand my thoughts afar off," or literally, "You know what I think before I think it." Before the chemical, electrical signal is sent at the synapse of the neuron, God knows it. Have you ever had a weird thought and you go, "Where'd that thought come from?"

The other say I was singing this weird song. It came to my mind, like, it's from the seventies. I never even liked the song to begin with, and it starts coming out of me. I start singing it, and my wife goes, "What are you doing singing that thing? Where did that come from?" I have no idea. It's been stuffed in there for a long time and it came out. And God knows how it came out. He knows my thought before I think it.

Jesus displayed this kind of foreknowledge; did he not? Jesus knew in advance that when he sent two of his disciples into that village opposite Bethany, that there would be a little donkey waiting for them to take and bring to Jesus. He told them that. Jesus knew in advance that when his disciples walked into the city of Jerusalem, they would see a man carrying a pitcher of water who would lead them to an upper room where they would make the Passover ready. He knew that. He told them that in advance.

Jesus even knew what people were thinking. How many times does the New Testament say, "And Jesus, knowing their thoughts, said unto them . . ." What would it be like hanging out with somebody who knew everything. That'd be a little uncomfortable, because you'd be talking, and then you just think something, and Jesus will give you that look. [laughter] "Yeah, dude, I know exactly what you're thinking."

But here's the comfort---if God knows everything, then he knows the worst about you already. He knows the worst about you and he loves you anyway. In human relationships when one person gets to know another person, there's typically a fear. The fear is: "If that person really knows everything about me, I will be rejected by that person." And that's why we learn to hide in relationships. That's why when we date, we put our best face on, and our best foot forward, and say the nicest of things.

Because we're hiding under this illusion, this fear of---"If I'm known for who I really am, I will not be loved." God already knows the worst about you and loves you anyway. How cool is that? The Bible says, "He knows our frame and he remembers that we are but dust." You don't expect a lot out of dust. Also, if he knows everything, he knows the best about us---not just the worst, the best.

He knows your heart. He knows your motives. If you have good and pure intentions, he knows that. Sometimes we do our best and we fail. And when we fail, others see our failure only, but not the motivation behind our try, and we get judged by them. They're critical of us. But God knows the whole scoop. The Bible says, "Even if our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart, and he knows all things."

So, this would be another point of comfort to these estranged, scattered believers. You have been chosen previously. You are known completely. Number three: We are growing constantly. Verse 2, "Elect according to foreknowledge of God the Father"---here it is---"in sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ." Boy, that's a mouthful. Let me unravel that. Let me kind of string it all together in the simplest form: The One who chose you previously and knows you completely will help you grow constantly.

Look at that word "sanctification." If ever there was a churchy sounding word, this is it, right? I mean, you didn't probably stand in line at the grocery market this week and say, "Have you been sanctified?" It's just not a typical word, but it's a good word, and it's a word you ought to know. It simply means to be marked as different, to be set apart, or to be made holy. God's in the process of making you a holy person.

Let me tell you what holiness does not mean. It does not mean that you'll ever become a perfect person, whew! Some of you are still living under the illusion that---"I'm gonna try. I'm gonna attain perfection." You'll just drive everybody nuts around you. It doesn't mean you'll ever be perfect, but it does mean---it does mean that you are being transformed, you are being changed, you're becoming an increasingly obedient person. That's what it means.

So he says, "In sanctification," and that process of being changed, "sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Christ"---okay, stop there. Peter's using a metaphor that if you were a Jewish reader, you would understand. It's a metaphor out of Exodus, chapter 24, when Moses brings the Law to the people of Israel. He sprinkles them with blood. He came down from Mount Sinai, had the Law of God, brought it before the people, and the people said, "Whatever the Lord says to you, we will do it."

So oxen were killed. The basin of blood was brought. Moses dipped something in it, and he started sprinkling the people with blood. And as he sprinkled them, he said, "This blood is the covenant which the Lord has made with you according to all these words." The sprinkled blood was the tangible demonstration that two parties, God and the people, were entering into a binding agreement.

So what does Peter mean? Simply this: You've been saved by the blood of Christ, or his words, "the sprinkling of the blood of Christ." You entered a covenant with God by putting your trust in the God who called you, sending his Son Jesus Christ. You've been saved by Christ; you get sanctified by the Holy Spirit. Just as you cooperated with the Holy Spirit once when you got saved, you should be cooperating with the Holy Spirit again and again and again.

You remember the time when Jesus was leaving, and he said to his disciples, "I'm going away, but I'm going to send the Holy Spirit"? And he said to them, "When the Holy Spirit comes, he's going to convict the world of sin, and righteousness, and judgment: of sin because they believe not on me." A better translation would be, "He's going to convince the world of sin." He's going to convince unbelievers that they're sinners.

Why do they need to be convinced of that? Because unless you are convinced you are a sinner, you'll never look for a Savior. If you never look for a Savior, you'll never get saved. So, only people who know, "I'm sick," look for a doctor; only people who know, "I'm a sinner," look for a Savior. The Holy Spirit is in the business of convincing people, "You need help. You need to get saved." And so just as you cooperated with the Holy Spirit who led you to Christ, that's the sprinkling of blood, you are, and I am to be cooperating with the Holy Spirit in this day-by-day, ongoing process of being changed called "sanctification."

So, let me sum it all up: He picks you. He knows you. He grows you. That's basically what it said so far. He picks you. He knows you. He grows you. Something else, did you notice the reference to the trinity in this verse? All three are mentioned. "Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father"---that's one---"in the sanctification of the Spirit"---that's two---"for obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ"---that's three. In other words, the Father foreknows and chooses, the Son cleanses, the Spirit cleans or sanctifies you.

Remember when Jesus said to his disciples, "I'm going to make you fishers of men"? It's a great concept. Think of it this way: the Father sent his Son fishing; he caught you; he gives you over to the Holy Spirit to clean you up. Jesus always cleans the fishes that he catches, and he uses the Holy Spirit to do it.

Leighton Ford was an associate evangelist with Dr. Billy Graham. And he loved to say, "God loves you the way you are, but he loves you too much to leave you that way." You come just as you are, all the baggage, all the thinking that you have, and then he takes you, and he's in the process of changing you and cleaning you. And I gotta tell you this---this is not a part of the Christian life that is an elective.

It's not like, "Well, you know, I'm a Christian. There's this holiness thing, I'm not really into that. You know, I accepted Jesus, and I prayed the prayer, and, you know, the holy thing---I don't want to get overboard in it." Listen, listen, listen---this is not an elective; you're a major in this. You're a major in this.

You want to know how important it is. In Leviticus, chapter 11, God said, "You must be holy, because I am holy." You say, "Well, that's Old Testament." Okay, here's one from the New Testament: Hebrews chapter 12 verse 14, "Pursue holiness, without which no one can see the Lord." And just to make it very clear, in First Thessalonians chapter 4 verse 3, Paul says, "This is the will of God, even your sanctification." There's very few Scriptures that actually tell you what the will of God is, here's one. This is what God wants. He wants you to be holy. He wants you to be holy.

How do you know if you're holy? Do you walk a different way? Do you talk a different way? Do you kind of walk like this, and say, "O God"? [laughter] No, that's just being weird; it's not being holy. There's a simpler way to know if you're holy. You hate what God hates; you love what God loves. "Be holy because I am holy." You want to be like God? You hate what God hates; you love what God loves. What does God hate? Well, he hates sin, so you will hate sin, and you will love righteousness.

It doesn't mean you will never sin. It doesn't mean you won't fall into sin. You'll always struggle with that. But when you do, your reaction will be like a Psalm 51 reaction of remorse and a desire to change. You will hate sin; you will love righteousness. So faith is the root of holiness; obedience is the fruit of holiness.

These are the underpinnings: We've been chosen previously. We are known completely. We are growing constantly. Here's the fourth and final bolt into the foundation: We are blessed increasingly.

The end of verse 2, "Grace to you and peace be multiplied." I know that just sounds like the introduction to any letter, right? You could look at thousands of fragments of papyri from the ancient world, and you would see similar salutations in ancient letters where the name of the author was given at the beginning, in this case, Peter, and then some well-wishing, some, you know, "I hope you're doing well," and something like that. That's how you and I are tempted to read this, "Grace and peace be multiplied to you."

But there's something more significant, and it really expresses an experience that he believes his recipients will have. "Grace and peace be multiplied unto you." What Peter does, and Paul does it too, is he takes two greetings from the ancient world and combines them.

The typical Greek or Western greeting two thousand years ago was the word chairó in Greek. It meant "rejoice." So, you'd see somebody, and you'd go, "Rejoice," "Chairó." If you were Jewish and you saw someone, you'd say, "Peace," "Shalom": Hello, good-bye, how you doing? Shalom. He takes these two things: chairó, and peace [shalom], translated here differently in the Greek language, and combines them. But he tweaks it a little bit.

Instead of the typical word chairó, which means "rejoice," he uses the words charis, which means "grace." So, it's "grace" and "peace." Why? Because they are more significant than just "rejoice"---grace and peace. And by the way, they're never ever reversed. In any of the letters of Peter or Paul, it's always "grace and peace," "grace and peace," "grace and peace"---never reversed.

You know why? Because you can never experience the peace of God until you experience the grace of God. It's grace---God's undeserved, unmerited favor toward us---that causes us to have peace. Grace is the well that flows into the river of peace that comes into our lives. Got peace? Do you have peace? Because if you don't have peace in your life, could it be that you've never experienced God's grace?

Caesar Augustus the emperor of Rome didn't sleep very well. He heard about a man in Rome who though he was steeped in debt, he owed so much money, he slept like a baby every night. And Caesar Augustus demanded that they find who this man was and get his bed and bring it to him. [laughter] He was convinced it's a Sleep Number thing or some Tempur-Pedic thing going on. "I need a good night's sleep, find that man's bed." Not really realizing that your ability to sleep has everything to do with a clear conscience before God.

Romans chapter 5 verse 1, "Therefore since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ." A hurricane some years ago that went through Florida left communities devastated. A reporter was going through this one devastated area and found a man, whose house was still standing, cleaning up his yard after the aftermath of the hurricane. And the reporter said, "Sir, simple question: Your house is standing, the others are wiped out; why do you figure that is?"

The man said, "Well, I don't know about the other homes, but I can tell you about this one. I built it myself, and I built it according to the strict Florida Building Code. When it told me to use this kind of truss, that's what I used. And I was told that if I were to build a home according to the Florida Building Code, it could withstand a hurricane. And so I did; and it did.

God has given you a "building code." Are you building your life according to these truths? Are you letting certain of these truths be the underpinnings that bolt your life onto the foundation of Christ? Yeah, you got a great foundation, but if you're not bolted in with certain fixed truths, a storm can come and shift that house in a lot of different directions. And so these are the underpinnings that build and make a rock-solid life.

Father, thank you for Peter, such a simple man, a fisherman, a blue-collar worker, a man who said what he felt, a man who stumbled and fumbled and we would wonder looking at him if he'll ever become anything significant. And then we come to this letter and we're absolutely amazed that he immediately immerses us in to some pretty deep and steep theological territory right off the bat.

That the words and the experiences he had with the Lord Jesus Christ while on earth made such an impact on earth that he thought, "Boy, if my recipients could grasp these truths---that they have been chosen by God previously, that they are known by God completely, that they are growing and ought to be growing constantly, that they would be blessed increasingly.

So, Lord, we pray that for our lives as well. We pray you'd strengthen us, pray that not only would our foundation always be Jesus Christ, but that our lives would be firmly pinned, bolted onto the footings of these truths. Lord, I pray for anyone who doesn't experience the peace of God here this morning. Maybe they've never come to a place where they've enjoyed your unmerited, undeserved favor, your grace, and I pray they would.

As our heads are bowed, as we're about to close this service, I'm just wondering if you have come and you have never given your life to Christ. You don't remember an actual moment in time where you have engaged your choice, where you have said yes to him, and you have turned from what you know to be wrong, and you've turned to the Lord as your Savior. Or maybe you think of some experience you've had in the past at some church or some event or some youth group or some weekend, but whatever that was, it's not reflected in your life presently. You need to be sprinkled with the blood of Christ, or you need to come back home to him.

If that describes you, and you are willing to do that today, I'm simply asking you as we're praying that you'd raise your hand up so I can see your hand. I'd love to pray for you; I gotta know who I'm praying for. You raise your hand up, and you're saying, "Here I am. Skip, pray for me, if you would. I want to give my life to Christ just now, or I want to come back home to Christ." Raise it up high enough so I can see it. God bless you, ma'am, to my left; and on my left again toward the back; and in the middle; and way in the back, to my right. Anyone else? Right up here in the front, awesome, awesome.

Father, you know not only these hands, but you know these people. You know them better than any of us. You know the worst; you know the best. You knew they'd be here at this moment. You brought them to this moment. Strengthen them to do your will as sons and daughters of the living God, in Jesus' name, amen.

For more resources from Calvary Albuquerque and Skip Heitzig visit calvaryabq.org.