Peter, Paul, and the God Who Has No Second‑Class Children

So, Romans eight, sorry, Romans eight, um, starting at verse one through to seventeen and then verse thirty-three through to thirty-nine.

There is, therefore, now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.

For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.

For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh, that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit.

For they that are after this after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh, but they that are after the spirit the things of the spirit.

For to be carnally minded is death, but in to be spiritually minded is life and peace.

Because the carnal mind is enity against God, for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.

So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God, but ye are not in the flesh, but in the spirit.

If so be that the spirit of God dwell in you, now if any man have not the spirit of Christ, he is none of his.

And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the spirit is life because of righteousness.

But if the spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his spirit that dwelleth in you.

Therefore, brethren, we are debtors not to the flesh to live after the flesh.

For if ye live after the flesh ye shall die, but if ye live if ye through the spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.

For as many as are led by the spirit of God, they are the sons of God.

For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear, but ye have received the spirit of adoption, whereby we cry Abba, Father.

The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit that we are the children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God, and joint heirs with Christ.

If so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together.

Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect?

It is God that justifieth.

Who is he that condemneth?

It is Christ that died, yea rather that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God who also maketh intercession for us?

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?

Shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril or the sword?

As it is written, for thy sake we are killed all the day long, we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.

Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.

For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Amen.

There are times when I sometimes feel like a Peter.

Maybe you do too.

I'm impulsive.

I'm certainly emotional.

I'm sometimes, most often than not, actually, stumbling.

I am sometimes, very rarely, shining.

Often unsure.

You know what?

I think that's true for all Christians.

Sometimes I feel like a Paul.

Structured, theological, disciplined, clear-headed.

And sometimes I feel like a Barnabas and a Titus.

All different characters that we come across in the New Testament, all reflecting different types of Christianity.

And Mary's in there.

I don't feel like a Mary every now and then, but Mary's in there, and Martha and Dorcas, and all these great women of the New Testament.

And I'm not studied enough, in my own opinion.

And you know what?

Sometimes I don't feel like any of them.

I'm mother, and I do wonder whether I truly belong here, if anywhere, at all.

I want to show you though this night from scripture that God actually has no favorites.

He has no elite Christians, no spiritual hierarchy.

There is one Lord, one faith, one baptism, and one family.

And every believer is adopted with the same love, the same dignity, and the same inheritance in Christ.

Peter, for example, is a believer.

I think we can all agree that.

But he wobbles.

He sometimes says things and then goes back.

He wobbles.

His faith is solid, but he wobbled.

Very ought to do that.

But the thing about Peter is he loves Christ dearly.

Peter is a disciple, many of us recognize in the mirror.

We look there and we go, somebody who speaks with before thinking.

I often often told that.

Sometimes I think it and I actually say it, and my wife goes, you're supposed to think it, but not say it.

Peter promises more than he can deliver.

That sounds like my one-to-one's at work.

You promise this in, but you haven't delivered.

He sinks after two taking two steps of faith.

Remember when he walks on mortars and he sees Christ and suddenly he realizes he's walking on water and starts to sing?

Yeah, I can recognize myself in there.

And why I'm sort of pointing to me is I want you to know that I'm no different to you.

I believe nearly everybody, even those that just listen to this, will be able to see these images.

He denies Jesus three times before the cockpills.

I suspect I've done that.

If I haven't done it in words, I've certainly done it in deeds and actions.

And yet he's restored by Christ three times.

And he becomes a pillar of the early church.

See, Peter is a picture of the ordinary believer, full of love, full of weaknesses, full of hope, and most certainly full of mistakes.

And Jesus never once says to him, Peter, you are too messy for me.

Peter, you are not spiritual enough.

Peter, you are not like Paul.

Peter, feed my sheep.

And that's the message I try to give from the gospel.

Feed my sheep.

We go and we follow Jesus.

Peter shows us that Christ builds his church with wobbly people.

Obviously, he's seen me when I wasn't on a diet.

That was quite wobbly.

Wobbly people.

He doesn't build it with perfect people.

If you go looking for a church with perfect people, you're in the wrong one at the moment, and if you ever find one, it won't be perfect for long.

Paul is a different person.

Paul is entirely different.

Paul is a believer who thinks deeply and teaches clearly.

And you know what?

There are times when I wish I had poor skills.

Paul is different.

Paul is a trained theologian.

Paul is a disciplined mind.

Paul is a structured writer.

Paul is a missionary strategist.

He's a man who can preach for hours without losing his thread.

I can't even go five minutes, I've just proven to you without losing my thread.

Paul is the picture of the clear thinking believer, the one who sees the big picture, the doctrines, the patterns, the logic of the gospel.

But Paul is not superior to Peter.

He is not level two.

He is not the real Christian.

While Peter is the basic model.

Paul himself says, I am what I am by the grace of God.

And he says, of the church, there are varieties of gifts, but within the same spirit.

Imagine the Spirit of God, the Spirit of love.

Paul shows us that Christ builds his church with thinkers as well as feelers, with planners as well as doers.

And the early church, just as the church today, needed both.

And you know what?

So do we.

In Galatians 2, Peter and Paul clash.

Not because one is better than the other, but because God uses different personalities for different purposes.

Peter opens the door of the gospel to Gentiles.

Paul builds the theological foundation for Gentile inclusion.

Peter preaches the first sermon of Pentecost.

Paul writes the letters that shape Christian doctrine.

Peter shows the heart of a shepherd.

Paul shows the mind of a teacher.

And the Holy Spirit says, both are mine.

The church, any church, but the church as a global body, is healthiest when both kinds of believers stand side by side.

You see, God has no second class children.

Some of you feel like, and I certainly do, I'm not clever enough.

I often feel I'm not clever enough.

I'm not holy enough.

I'm not confident enough.

I'm not like the Christians I admire.

But Scripture says to us, God shows no partiality.

You are all sons and daughters of God through faith in Christ Jesus.

The same Spirit works all of these things.

There is one body and one spirit.

There are no favorites in the kingdom.

There are no spiritual elites, there are no second class believers.

The ground at the foot of the cross was perfectly level.

Your identity in Christ is not in your personality, not what we see in the world.

It's in Christ.

Peter's identity was not the emotional one.

Paul's identity was not the intellectual one.

Their identity was chosen by God, loved by Christ, sealed by the Spirit, and so is yours.

And whether we are a Peter who wobbles, a Paul who reasons, or someone who feels like neither.

Your identity is not in your strengths or your weaknesses.

Your identity is the what is in, the one who died for you.

What does this mean for our weak congregation here at Bootle Protestant Free Church?

We need Peters who love deeply.

But he's a Peter.

I think he's a Peter.

He's been coming here.

How many years now?

He's devoted his life to this church.

Paul who thinks clearly.

We've got George and some others.

Barnabas who encourages.

I'd like to be a Barnabas for you a lot.

Mary's who sit at Jesus' feet.

Martha's who serve faithfully.

Thomas's who ask honest questions, Rachel.

You know, asking questions is brilliant.

Andrews, not you, Andrews, alright.

Andrews who quietly bring people to Jesus.

Good man.

The church is not a factory.

We don't produce.

We do not produce identical Christians.

It's a family with many children.

Each loved unequally.

Each loved equally, each gifted differently, each necessary.

You see, I believe, and I've said this many times, nobody is here by accident.

I think people only come to church when God sends them.

And I'm I may be blowing my own trumpet a wee bit here because I only have the evening service.

But I actually think it takes more to be a Christian and come to an evening service because that's what few people do than it does to go to a morning service because that's the norm.

This is like extra effort.

But it doesn't get you extra marks.

It just sets a seal on people that goes, actually, she must be serious about, or he must be serious about what he believes because he's actually gonna church in the evening as well as well as or instead of.

You see, you're not here, as I said before, by accident.

You are not the wrong kind of Christian.

There is no wrong kind of Christian.

You are not less valuable than anyone else.

God has placed you here on purpose.

So today I call you to do this.

I call you to stop comparing yourselves with others.

I call you to stop believing the lie that you don't belong.

I call you to stop thinking God prefers someone else, and I call you to stop assuming your gifts don't matter, and instead I call you to stand in the grace that saved you, and I call you to walk in the calling God has given you, and I call you to serve with the gifts the Spirit has placed in you, and I call you most certainly call you to rejoice that you are fully adopted, fully loved, fully included.

And whether you are a Peter or a Paul or somebody else or neither, please keep this in your heart.

Christ died for you.

Christ called you, Christ keeps you, and Christ delights in you.

See, we are one family.

We are the adopted sons and daughters of God, we are the co-heirs of the kingdom, and we are one family, and we have one Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ.

Peter and Paul were different, but they were united in this one thing Jesus Christ, crucified and risen.

And that same Christ called you today, not to be Peter, not to be Paul, not to be somebody else, but to be his.

Fully loved, fully forgiven, fully adopted, fully included.

God has no second-class citizens, and that includes you.

Amen.