Holiness Through Obedience

Holiness Through Obedience I Peter  :13-25 (2/15/09HBCAM)

I.                  Holiness Modeled After That of God   (1:13-21)

As our lives from God are experienced by salvation through faith in God, it is characterized by holiness like that of God. 
The central idea in this section is expressed in V. 16  in the quotation from lev. 11:45, “You shall therefore be holy, for I am holy.” 

In the Leviticus passage, the motivation for holiness on the part of God’s people, Israel, was that he who had redeemed them from the bondage of Egypt was a holy God.  They, as his people, were therefore to be a holy people—like God, like people. 

Peter uses the same argument for the Christians as God’s new people.  The God who had redeemed them from their pagan life was a holy God.  They, as the redeemed, were to be like their God—holy. 

A.   Gird up your minds—(13)

--Figure of speech

--When working, they would tie up their long robes around their waist.

--It meant they were to get out of their minds anything that would interfere with holy living.

B.    Be sober—

--be levelheaded

--think straight

C.   Set your hope fully-- 

--focus on the coming consummation of God’s redemptive grace at the coming of Christ.  Such a focus would be conducive to holiness.

D.   As obedient children—(14)

--They were to imitate the life of the father whom they love

--imitate the character of their Father

E.    Conformed— (Romans 12:2)

--Don’t pattern your new life after your old life! Former lusts—desires (refers to pagans who had become Christians rather than dispersed Jews.)

Paul reminds us: 5Therefore put to death your members which are on the earth: fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. 6Because of these things the wrath of God is coming upon the sons of disobedience, 7in which you yourselves once walked when you lived in them. (Col. 3:5-7)

17This I say, therefore, and testify in the Lord, that you should no longer walk as the rest of the Gentiles walk, in the futility of their mind, 18having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart; 19who, being past feeling, have given themselves over to lewdness, to work all uncleanness with greediness. 20But you have not so learned Christ.”  (Eph. 4:17-20) 

F.    But He who called you is holy, be  holy—(15)   --Be set apart…..

The theme of God’s redemptive and holy character is introduced here with the word “but.”  The God who called them from their past ways of ignorance and sin is to be the model for their life as his people.  The demand for holiness is because God is holy. 

Peter here rejects any degree of moral relativism which too often characterizes society. 

Our goal, as hard as it may seem is absolute holiness!  We must not set a lower goal or standard for our lives.  Although that goal is never realized in this life, the tension of striving to reach it must always be there.  The child of God must never be comfortable and satisfied short of reaching the goal.

G.   Judges according to each one’s work—(17)

--This realization inspires in the worshiper a motivation for right conduct.

--“Fear” means awe in face of the responsibility of pursuing holiness. 

--throughout the time of your stay means that as long as one is in this world, he is to conduct his life with a sense of awe in realizing what his life is and what it should be. 

H.   Redeemed…with precious blood of Christ—(18-19)

--Peter expresses the redemption of the Christian by using the figure of a price paid to ransom an object which was regarded as valuable.  God looked upon sinful man, who was following sinful ways and saw them as valuable.  He paid the price for their freedom.  Not silver and gold , but something much more precious, the blood of Christ. 

I.      He…foreordained…you…through Him believe— (20-21) 

Peter’s readers had fixed their faith and hope in God.  It was faith that he had provided salvation and hope that they would realize that salvation as the fulfillment of his promise. 

II.               Holiness Motivated by Love of the Brethren (22-25)

The holiness which comes by obedience to God and by modeling one’s character after the character of God, points to ne common bond which unites all the redeemed. 
That bond is sincere love of the brethren. 

Sincere—means without false pretense, literally un-hypocritical. 

Love one another fervently—constantly or with perseverance.

Love—Agape—

The crowning virtue of the Christian life. 

It is a word for rational goodwill, of desiring for its object the highest goodwill, of putting highest value upon. 

So it is to be with one who has been born again (23). 

Seed--He has been born not of perishable seed.   

--Seed is used as a metaphor of the physical basis for procreation.  Man’s seed is perishable and that which is born of it will perish, die. 

But the one who is born again is born of God’s seed; it is imperishable.  One who is born of it is imperishable; he will not die. 

That seed of God is his living and abiding word.  That which is born of man’s seed is as perishable as the grass (24—Peter quotes from Isaiah 40:6-8.) 

That which is born of God’s seed shall never perish. 

That word of the Lord which endures forever is the spoken word which was the means of evangelizing Peter’s readers.  (25)

It is that Word spoken to you today, through the music, the symbols of the Lord’s Supper and the preaching of the Scriptures that can bring you to eternal life and you too, can be born again, not of corruptible seed, but by the Living Word of God.