We saw last time how `setting our hope’, our desires, `fully’ on the enormous glory coming our way from the Lord, provides an `arming vision’; it gives us an essential, emotional base for a holiness that reflects our holy God (1 Peter 1:15), one that can stay on its feet amid the buffetings of the exile experiences we all face from time to time. But what else will arm us for such a lifestyle?
If we list the next verses’ themes, we find Peter focusing on three more vital motivations to turn into prayer!
The first is a vision of the reality of God himself: `Be holy, because I am holy’ (v16). (Lord, I pause here to glorify you for your holiness – minimal though my grasp is of what that holiness means...) We have the astonishing privilege of growing in God-likeness, participating in that pure, fiery glory of the divine nature. But a profound seriousness follows from that privilege. This God is also the one who will `judge each person’s work impartially’; therefore, says Peter, `live your lives… in reverent fear’ ( v17). (We see this same awareness in Paul also, in 2 Cor 5:9-11: `We must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ… Since, then, we know what it is to fear the Lord…….’ Lord, this doesn’t feel quite so contemporary, please help me submit to and grasp what it means…)
Yes: if as `Bible explorers’ we’re listening out for the unexpected word from God, we’ll catch a note here that has been alien to much recent spirituality, and that we must now rediscover. It matches the `be self-controlled’ (NASB has `keep sober’) in v17. I was deeply struck by this while living and working with some Dutch Christians: their commitment to `reverent fear’ in lifestyle, to the enormous importance of carrying through whatever is the will of God, no matter how un-contemporary it may be. Loss of this deep determination soon leads us into religious triviality, into spirituality without the guts and robustness for real counter-cultural radicalism. Lord, please give me that gift of utter seriousness about your will…
Holiness for Peter is something serious. At the same time, however, it isn’t something negative. It points joyously to glory, as we’ve already seen – and in fact it is primarily about love. For where do we find Peter’s specific application of this holiness? Surely in v22 (and 2:1): `Love one another deeply, from the heart’. (I’m reminded of Paul’s comment that love, in its manifold expressions, and if acted out in the ways Scripture commands, is actually the holy `fulfilment of the law` (Rom 12:10).) And what’s more, if we speed-read further in search of this book’s flow, we’ll see this theme flows on all the way from 2:11 to 3:16: holiness is about learning the transformation of the broken relationships we face in exile, on the foundation of Calvary. `”Be holy, because I am holy”‘ is the command of an eternally loving God. Lord, please help me in `reverent fear` to see, and by your power deal with, where I’m being unholy, in the sense of being unloving…
It’s not surprising, then, that here in ch.1, after tying together God-like holiness and love, the second thing inspiring Peter to radical holiness is the outrageously costly love on our behalf of the cross. `Live your lives in reverent fear, for‘ … because you, we, I, have been redeemed with the blood of God himself (vv17-19). On the one hand, that unimaginable commitment on God’s side gives us profound security. But the sheer costliness of what he has done gives holiness enormous importance. If we have even begun to understand the cross, holiness cannot be a hobby pursued merely when we feel like it. (Lord, please help me grasp this…) It involves changes of lifestyle, commitment to a conscious break with the `way of life’ normal to our culture (cf 4:3) and our tradition. The way of the Father takes precedence over the norms of our fathers (v18); or our business colleagues; or our peers.
That, indeed, is what’s involved in the third motivation Peter now presents: the radical nature of repentance and new birth (1:22-2:2). Our first response may be puzzlement. Peter could so easily have moved from exhorting us to love in 1:22 straight on to 2:1. What is he doing instead?
He presents two linked ideas. First, there is the absolute necessity that genuine new birth results in truly transformed relationships; but second, the enormity of what new birth means in itself. And somehow, the second empowers the first. `Love one another deeply, for you have been born again, not of perishable seed’ (v23); `this’ – the `imperishable’ Word of v23 – `is the Word that was preached to you. Therefore, rid yourselves of all malice’ (1:25-2:1). What is he saying here?
Let’s chew on that `perishable/imperishable’ first, because it fits a repeated theme we’ve probably noticed. Here in the `wilderness’, says Peter, there are things that stand out as valuable, `precious’; things worth suffering for, things truly worthy of our desire. What marks them out is that they are `imperishable’. The inheritance held out before us in heaven is one that `can never perish, spoil or fade’ (1:4). And on earth too there are things `of greater worth than gold which perishes’, namely our faith (v7), which in turn is grounded in the `precious blood of Christ’, of so much greater worth than `perishable things such as silver or gold’ (vv18-19). (Father, please help me grasp this sense of value.) `You have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and abiding Word of God'(v23).
So what makes these things precious? Peter goes on to explain: they partake of a different universe, one beyond decay, `where moth and rust do not destroy’ as Jesus said. What vv23-25 present is the same crucial idea we see underpinning parts of Ephesians and 2 Corinthians: heaven gets a bridgehead in us right now through our new birth, and through the Word.
The Word reaches beyond – or from beyond – the Fall. Peter spells it out, quoting Isaiah:
`All men are like grass,
and all their glory is like the flowers of the field;
the grass withers and the flowers fall’ –
(that pattern of tragedy expressed in much of our greatest art; the sadness at the root of our fallen universe that is in `bondage to decay’ (Rom 8:20-21), where there is no beauty that does not finally age and disintegrate, no glory that finally does not turn to dust….)
`but’ – within this decaying universe there is something radically different – `the Word of the Lord stands forever.’ When everything around is perishing, the seed of God’s Word is the presence of the alternative; in a world dominated by death it embodies what is `living and enduring’ (v23). (Thankyou, Lord!) (It’s interesting, by the way, that for this apostle Peter this `imperishable’ bridgehead of the other world is found firstly in the Word rather than the Church.) And it is `through the Word’ that we have been `born again’ (v23), through the springing up into our lives of this incorruptible firstfruits of the alternative universe.
(These ideas were evidently standard in the early church. James says, `He chose to give us birth through the Word of faith, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of all he created’ (1:18); and `firstfruits’ is the word Paul uses to describe the Church as the bridgehead of the new creation in Romans 8:20-22. As we explore, the epistles illuminate each other!)
But all this about the Word is not merely mystical. Peter is not just speaking philosophically, nor only about the time when Christ was on earth. He turns straight round and adds, `And this is the Word that was preached unto you!‘ The preaching or sharing that first drew us to new birth: unpolished maybe, full of mixed metaphors and jumbled thoughts maybe, and yet through the weakness of the messenger we caught sight of salvation; that was this `living word’ in contemporary reality. (It is with reason that Peter later gives an awesome, yet deeply encouraging, charge to preachers: `If anyone speaks, he should do it as one speaking the very words of God’ (4:11).)
(We see something similar, don’t we, in how Jesus presents the self-authenticating power of the preached Word as itself a reason for our faith (Matt 12:38-42). Jesus alludes particularly to the wisdom of Solomon, in whose time God’s presence was revealed in one of the climaxes of the old testament. In Solomon’s history the supernatural `wisdom’ God had given (1 Kings 3:5-12) becomes the `apologetic’ that most impresses the queen of Sheba (2 Chron 9:3,5,6,7), the evident presence of the supernatural on earth. (And the embodiment of that supernatural wisdom, that Word, is of course one reason why Proverbs is in the Bible.))
So then: we have, within us now, the Word that embodies the powers of the `imperishable’ universe. And Peter rounds off the message of this section with two linked commands. First, `Crave‘ (that theme of desire again, that we absorbed last time) the `pure spiritual milk’ – what CSB and NASB translate as `the pure milk of the Word’, because `logikos’, oddly translated `spiritual’ by NIV, surely relates to `logos’, the Word – because it’s through that `living and enduring’ Word and our desire for it that we will `grow up in our salvation’. (Lord, thankyou for your Word! Please guard that desire in me, help me keep that intake flowing…) How then shall we foster that desire? Crave the Word, says Peter, `now that you have tasted that the Lord is good’: experiencing that `taste’, and its recollection, will motivate the longing to feed yet further in the Word. And where do I recall the taste of the goodness of the Lord? Through reflecting, via the Word, on his cross (cf 1:18-19)? Through reading in the Word, in the gospels, about his life on earth? Through listing all the good things he has done in my life, turning that into praise (as proof of Romans 8:32), and seeking to learn from his Word to recognize more of his goodness?
Oliver Barclay was once asked why the British student Christian Unions retained spiritual vibrancy over many decades, while other spiritual movements drifted and dwindled. He replied by pointing to this `craving’ for the `full biblical diet that is really taken into our minds and lives’; the triple intake of the Word through personal quiet times, plus small-group Bible study, plus large-group exposition. It’s what student groups need, and that all churches need too. And as this Word comes to saturate our being, says Peter, it becomes the power for holiness, for `growing up in your salvation’ (2:2).
In summary then: the `heavenly vision’ leads straight into issues of holy lifestyle now. There is a decay-oriented, `empty way’ of relationships that matches this tragically decaying universe (v18). But there is also a radical force within us since the new birth, a power extending beyond all human probability, `imperishable’, `living and abiding’. So how is holiness in relationships to be achieved? `You have purified yourselves by obeying the truth’ (v22), says Peter, that is, `you have been born again’ (v23). As these past tenses make clear (and as Romans 6>8 also emphasize), the decisive transformation has already taken place; `so that you have’, now, `sincere love for your brothers'(v22), says Peter. Or as Paul puts it, God `has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit’ (Rom 5:5).
And if that’s so, says Peter, act on it (1:22,1:25-2:1)! For a community of `aliens’ in exile, `loving one another deeply’ is essential. (Ron Sider cites sociologist Peter Berger to the effect that any community intent on a radical (or `alien’) lifestyle will only preserve it amid the surrounding pressures through a `strong sense of solidarity’ and by `huddling together’ with `like-minded fellow deviants very closely indeed. Only in a counter-community of considerable strength does cognitive deviance have a chance to maintain itself.’) And new birth has put within us the power to make it happen. (I believe it. Thankyou, Father…) John calls us similarly to love, and uses the same `seed’ image as in Peter’s v23 here: `No-one who has been born of God will continue to sin, because God’s seed remains in him; he cannot go on sinning, because he has been born of God’ (cf 1 John 3:9-10). It’s also the argument we find Paul waxing enthusiastic over in Romans 6>8: genuine new birth includes inner transformation that must, and will in the end, result in changed behaviour.
Therefore do it!, says Peter, in terms that imply real seriousness of commitment: `Love one another deeply, from the heart‘ (v22, cf 4:8). We’re reminded of Paul’s `Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit’ in Ephesians 4:3. Peter warns carefully against love that is hypocritical (2:1); unreality is always a danger if we aren’t building on the real regeneration that he’s invoking here. Humanly speaking, the result of his exhortation should be forced smiles, insincere affection. But that’s the importance of what he’s written about the new birth, and the power of the Word. There’s something in you that is real, he says, the seed of genuine love; as you feed on the Word, you will find it grows to change your behaviour.
Isn’t this reality? `Love is a decision’, writes Gary Smalley. Loving those who might naturally be (and have acted as) our enemies scarcely starts with a feeling of affection. Instead, it begins with a deliberate, repentant choice (often in response to the Word) to act out the reality of love: setting out (reluctantly?) to `rid ourselves’ of the tangible specifics of `malice and all deceit…slander of every kind’ (2:1); then in deliberate (reluctant?) affirmation and encouragement, in thanksgiving and prayer for the other person. And we set out on this road, not from any confidence to do it ourselves (that might well lead to hypocrisy), but because we know this is the Spirit’s agenda; and the Spirit reigns in our deepest self, no matter what our emotions say. We try (`crave’) to soak ourselves in the Word, and slowly the bitterness is eclipsed, seeps out, as the Word seeps in. And one day – maybe after weeks, maybe months – suddenly the presence of the `kingdom”s power becomes apparent to us; we glimpse a feeling towards that person that we recognise as affection. God’s transformation spreads slowly right through to our emotions.
Lord, these words are all too easy to write, and I don’t trust myself at all; but I do trust your Word, and your Spirit. Thankyou; help me to learn your ways of getting my relationships right…
(There’s more about these `wilderness relationships` later in chapter 2.)
