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Presence Weekly: Receiving the Peace of Christ

Conclusion: The Ministry of Faithful Presence (Part 1 of 3)

 

https://youtu.be/FaojdRThXbY

[First Things]

Our newsletter resumes after a month-long break due to the increased pastoral needs generated by the recent shutdown.

If you are in Washington, please let us know if you are interested in joining a 14-week discipleship cohort (meets 8 times) using our new curriculum, 1 Peter: A Guide to Discipleship for the Public Square.

[The Devo] Receiving the Peace of Christ, 1 Peter 5:12-14

12 By Silvanus, a faithful brother as I regard him, I have written briefly to you, exhorting and declaring that this is the true grace of God. Stand firm in it. 13 She who is at Babylon, who is likewise chosen, sends you greetings, and so does Mark, my son. 14 Greet one another with the kiss of love.

Peace to all of you who are in Christ. 1 Peter 5:12–14.

As the recently concluded shutdown has just reminded us, we are fallen, fragged, fragile, and finite.

The failure of Republicans and Democrats to come to a budget agreement was not just about policy differences; it was about what happens when budget negotiations are mixed with spiritually fallen people who have failed to apply Peter’s exhortation, “So, put away all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander.” The result was the vocational fragging of hundreds of thousands of government workers who were abruptly sent home, without pay, or any indication of when their next paycheck would come, while others were forced to work extremely stressful jobs without pay. This resulted in some government contractors not getting paid and then facing cash flow issues to pay their own bills. For many, this exposed emotional and relational fragility as they struggled with exhaustion, frustration, anxiety, and even depression. For all federal workers, and those who rely on their work, they realized their finiteness included an inability to do anything about the situation in which they found themselves, including not being able to find a flight home.

These are the kind of people Peter is writing to encourage with a hope that sustains a posture of faithful presence. In the final three verses, which are often glossed over in sermons, Peter encapsulates all that he has said in the preceding verses. Though brief, Peter presses his readers to receive the peace of Christ, embrace the family of Christ, and declare the message of Christ.

The True Grace of God

As we have noted in an earlier lesson, whenever we see “Therefore” at the start of a sentence, we should always ask, “What is the ‘Therefore’ there for?” Likewise, Peter’s expression that he has been “exhorting and declaring that this is the true grace of God,” forces the listener, or reader, to ask, “What is ‘this’ referring to?” Making this connection would have been far easier for the original audience, who would have heard or read the letter in its entirety in one sitting. Despite the benefit of verse-by-verse messages and devotionals in unpacking and applying various aspects of God’s word, one hermeneutical cost is losing the meaning of connecting and referencing words.

Most commentators agree that Peter’s point is that the teaching of the letter, namely the indicatives of God’s salvific and redemptive work on our behalf, the imperatives of holy living, the manner of navigating power differentials detailed in the house tables, and the subsequent expectation of suffering for doing so, is the grace of God. The grace of God is, quite simply, his communicating to his followers what is true, what to do, and what to expect. Even though we face all manner of unknown situations, we are not left without instruction in how to navigate life.

Standing Firm

Those in the public square understand the difficulty of applying Peter’s exhortation to “Stand firm in it!” There are so many distractions, so much uncertainty, and such compelling alternatives that standing firm requires a renewed commitment every morning and often multiple times throughout the day. Our commitment is also undermined by the reality that most of the time, the cultural feedback we receive from standing firm seems to be negative. Standing firm, then, is something that requires intentionality and dedication.

This phase might conjure up the imagery of Martin Luther’s declaration at the Diet of Worms in 1521, “Here I stand, I can do no other!” Others will recall the young man standing in front of a Chinese tank during the Tiananmen Square Uprising and Massacre in China in 1989 that prompted CBS News correspondant Richard Roth to ask, “What moves a man to just stand still? Is it courage, or outrage, or madness?”

We should consider the observation that both success and failure can apply pressure to move us from standing firm in the true grace of God. Success lures us into believing that we are special, entitled, or that the rules do not apply to us. Failure screams to us to grab shame with both hands, see ourselves as unworthy and unable, and commence to envy those who are seemingly flourishing despite their autonomous set of virtues and self-centered happiness seeking. We are not alone in those feelings, as anyone who has tried to live by Psalm 1 in hopes of getting to Psalm 150 has experienced.

1 Blessed is the man
who walks not in the counsel of the wicked,
nor stands in the way of sinners,
nor sits in the seat of scoffers;
2 but his delight is in the law of the LORD,
and on his law he meditates day and night.
3 He is like a tree
planted by streams of water
that yields its fruit in its season,
and its leaf does not wither.
In all that he does, he prospers.
4 The wicked are not so,
but are like chaff that the wind drives away.
5 Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment
nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous;
6 for the LORD knows the way of the righteous,
but the way of the wicked will perish.

The compilier of the Psalms placed the authentic, honest, and open assessment of the fallen, fragged, finite, and fragile child of God at the exact halfway point of Hebrew Scripture.

73 A Psalm of Asaph.

1 Truly God is good to Israel, to those who are pure in heart.
2 But as for me, my feet had almost stumbled, my steps had nearly slipped.
3 For I was envious of the arrogant when I saw the prosperity of the wicked.
4 For they have no pangs until death; their bodies are fat and sleek.
5 They are not in trouble as others are; they are not stricken like the rest of mankind.
6 Therefore pride is their necklace; violence covers them as a garment.
7 Their eyes swell out through fatness; their hearts overflow with follies.
8 They scoff and speak with malice; loftily they threaten oppression.
9 They set their mouths against the heavens, and their tongue struts through the earth.
10 Therefore his people turn back to them, and find no fault in them.
11 And they say, “How can God know? Is there knowledge in the Most High?”
12 Behold, these are the wicked; always at ease, they increase in riches.
13 All in vain have I kept my heart clean and washed my hands in innocence.
14 For all the day long I have been stricken and rebuked every morning.
15 If I had said, “I will speak thus,” I would have betrayed the generation of your children.

Psalm 73:1-15

The public square has a way of amplifying this pain for those who seek to follow the exhorting and proclaiming of Peter.

Complicating matters further is that sometimes, perhaps often, standing firm in the true grace of God will require giving up standing where you have been standing to stand firm in the proper location. There is immense pressure to continue standing right where you are before the realization that you are not in the right place. Those in the public square know that changing a position is costly and typically used as future ad campaign material. As we are seeing confirmed in headline making attention in a current newscycle, this movement from standing in one place to standing in another will be perceived by some as flip-flopping or even being a traitor. Even when the person issues a full-throated apology for standing in the wrong place and the damage it caused, once the move to a standing position has occurred there is immediate pressure, public and private, to move back immediately, and from others to keep moving, usually to a position also out of alignment with the teaching of the true grace of God.

Likewise Chosen

We will save an attempt to identify “She who is at Babylon” for the next lesson. Nonetheless, Peter’s description of her as “likewise chosen” is deeply and critically theological. Whoever she is, she holds the same connection to Christ and the Father that they do. They, like her, are,

elect 2 according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in the sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience to Jesus Christ and for sprinkling with his blood. 1 Peter 1:2.

This point is made clear by the fact that the word translated elect in verse 1 is the same root word as likewise chosen, but with the added modifier of “together” attached to the root word. The Father’s electing, choosing love is how all of us come to stand firm in the kingdom of light ruled by his Son. Despite the chaos of the world and our own fallen, fragged, fragile, and finite lives, we are chosen by the Father out of love. This produces the peace of Christ in contrast to the frenetic anxiety of the world.

I am reminded of a scene from the long-running musical, Les Misérables, in which Jean Valjean is comforting Fantine on her deathbed. Her life has been filled with unimaginable suffering, exploitation, and her inability to extricate herself or her child from a dream of life, “so different than this hell I’m living.” In his powerful promise to Fantine, which is part of the heart-wrenching “Come to Me,” he assures Fantine that her daughter, Cozette, “will live within his keeping” and that “the child will want for nothing,” before finally telling her as she passes away, “Be at peace. Be at Peace, forevermore.” Valjean was true to his word and spared nothing to care for her or those she loved, even when the cost to him was extremely high.

Most of our lives are nothing like that of Jean Valjean, Fantine, or little Cozette, but we all know what it is like to feel overwhelmed and unable to locate peace. Yet, because we are “elect 2 according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in the sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience to Jesus Christ and for sprinkling with his blood,” we live within the Father’s keeping, and from the proper perspective, want for nothing. When we place our hope in Christ, we place it in someone who is not fallen, but knows what it is like to be fragged and someone who also is not finite but knows what it is like to experience fragility. This is why the final Psalm is an exclamation point not a period to the precedding 149 songs for the key to life.

Psalm 150 Praise the LORD

Praise God in his sanctuary;
praise him in his mighty heavens!
2 Praise him for his mighty deeds;
praise him according to his excellent greatness!
3 Praise him with trumpet sound;
praise him with lute and harp!
4 Praise him with tambourine and dance;
praise him with strings and pipe!
5 Praise him with sounding cymbals;
praise him with loud clashing cymbals!
6 Let everything that has breath praise the LORD!
Praise the LORD!

This is the peace of Christ that Peter wants them, and us to, embrace and enjoy, forevermore.

Application Questions

How did the shutdown expose areas where you struggle to stand firm in the true grace of God?

Which aspects of your life: spiritual, emotional, relational, vocational, ideological, cultural, or evangelical were most exposed? How will you strengthen your formation and resiliency in these aspects of whole-life discipleship?

What impact does remembering that you are “likewise chosen” have on your dedication to standing firm in the true grace of God?

[Faithful Prayer] 

  • Cabinet Agency: The Department of Health and Human Services and Secretary Robert Kennedy, as we enter into cold and flu season.

  • Think Tank, Lobby group, NGO:. The American Nurses Association, which aims to uphold high standards of nursing practice, foster safe and ethical work environments, promote the health and wellness of nurses, and advocate for healthcare issues that impact nurses and the public.

  • Weekly delegation: The delegation of the state of Minnesota.

  • News event: For hundreds of thousands of workers heading back to the office to work a full week for the first time in a month and a half, facing an overwhelming workload.

  • Personal requests: For a couple settling into their first house and enduring the typical joys and stresses that come with it. For a couple enjoying the healthy arrival of their first child. For someone dealing with intense workplace tension. For a senior policy official’s final edits to a high-profile piece of legislation. For an elected official facing backlash for a recalibration of their views. For a couple working through some important relationship questions. For our president, Michael Langer, as he and thousands of other scholars attend the Evangelical Theological Society and Society of Biblical Literature Conference in Boston this week. Pray specifically for the finalization of a book contract for the First Peter discipleship work.

[The Page, The Pod & The Stack]

[What’s Happening]

This Week 

  • Thursday, November 20, 12:00-1:00 p.m. ET, The Urban Institute presents a virtual event, State-Led Approaches to Apprenticeship Expansion and Innovation that will focus “on how states are allocating their resources and funding to support these efforts, exploring what strategies have proven effective, where states are seeing the greatest impact, and which approaches may be phased out or reimagined.”

  • Thursday, November 20, 12:00-1:00 p.m. ET, Rand presents a virtual event, Policy Lab: The Geopolitics of AGI to ask, “how might advanced AI—including the potential emergence of artificial general intelligence (AGI)—reshape global politics and security.”

  • Friday, November 21, 12:00 - 1:00 p.m. ET, Faith & Law’s Friday Forum will host Joseph Prud’homme for Classical Liberalism: A Treasury Worth Defending.

  • November 21 – December 23, 12:00 - 8:00 p.m., Monday through Thursday, and 11:00 a.m. - 9:00 p.m. on weekends, the annual 2025 Downtown DC Holiday Market will be held on F Street NW.

Next Week

  • Monday, November 24, 10:30 a.m. - 12:00 p.m. ET, Brookings hosts a virtual event, The supply side of inflation: How shocks affect the outlook.

  • Thursday, November 27, THANKSGIVING DAY!!!!

    • 8:30 am ET: Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade

    • 1:00 pm ET: Green Bay Packers at Detroit Lions (FOX, Fox Deportes, Tubi)

    • 4:30 pm ET: Kansas City Chiefs at Dallas Cowboys (CBS, Paramount+)

    • 8:20 pm ET: Cincinnati Bengals at Baltimore Ravens (NBC, Peacock)

  • Sunday, November 30, First Day of Advent!

  • November 21 – December 23, 12:00 - 8:00 p.m., Monday through Thursday, and 11:00 a.m. - 9:00 p.m. on weekends, the annual 2025 Downtown DC Holiday Market will be held on F Street NW.

[Two Thumbs Up!] Ken Burns, The American Revolution (PBS)

Ken Burns and his team have produced another storytelling epic that seeks to place flesh on a skeleton, color on grayscale, and depth to a flat picture.

Letters, journal and diary entries, newspaper articles, and other original documents make up virtually all the content, with exceptional research-based insights. As always, the narration and voice-overs are an ensemble, all-star, yet decidedly male cast, including Peter Coyote as the narrator, along with Claire Danes, Samuel L Jackson, Kenneth Branagh, Paul Giammati, Ethan Hawke, Michael Keaton, Craig Ferguson, Tom Hanks, and, of course, Morgan Freeman.

The series was released on Sunday, with new episodes dropping each night through Friday.

https://youtu.be/pqnCsdoXfeQ

[Last Things]

  • Our podcasts are on hold during a remodeling project.

  • Please let us know how we can serve you and any prayer requests which are always kept confidential

If you enjoy this newsletter, please share it with a friend. If you want to join a Bible study, discipleship cohort, or reading group, please get in touch!

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