Would you pray with me?

Father, I ask that you'd help me now to be faithful to your word.

And I ask that you would come and cause us to experience a personal,

close enjoyment of Jesus Christ in all his supremacies as our greatest hope.

I ask for this now in Jesus' name. Amen. I used to think when I read 1. Peter 315 that says,

always be ready to make a defense to anyone who asks a reason for the hope that is in you

that it meant, Piper, you need to nail down three or four solid historical arguments for the resurrection,

and you need to nail down three or four solid historical arguments for the authority and truth of the Bible.

And I thank God that there are people who are called to do that

because those arguments really do exist.

I don't think that's mainly what this verse means.

Because this church I don't think that's mainly what this verse means.

Because this church, those five churches throughout Asia Minor,

they're just ordinary folk.

You know from chapter three, they're slaves.

They didn't know anything.

They didn't have any education.

The last thing they had was access to our sophisticated, intellectual university-trained historians.

What then did it mean?

I think when he said this, that last phrase mattered,

be prepared to make a defense

to anyone who asked you for a reason,

...