Our focus is on verses 8 and 9 this morning as we continue our series through 1st Peter.

And my question this morning that I want to begin with is why does Peter tell these people what they are experiencing?

Says, though you have not seen him, you love him.

And though you do not see him now, but believe in him, you're believing in him, you greatly rejoice, that's another thing you're doing, with joys,

inexpressible and full of glory,

obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your soul.

So he tells them what they are experiencing.

You are loving Christ, and you are believing in Christ and you are rejoicing in Christ

even though you haven't seen him and in all of this and through all of this you're

obtaining salvation.

Now why does he talk like that?

Why does he tell them what they are experiencing,

as though they didn't know what they were experiencing?

Why do you tell somebody what they are experiencing?

If you write a letter, you tell them what you're experiencing.

You write letters to people to tell them what they're experiencing, right? The Bible is different from us in many ways, and that's one of them.

And here's my answer to the question. I think Peter does this because he wants them to know what true Christianity really is,

so that if they begin to drift away from it, there will have been presented to them a standard

described in terms of their own experience that they will be able to look back on to see

what they have drifted away from.

When I was thinking of it that way,

I got a picture in my mind that helped me get a handle

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