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This is a reading from the first letter of Peter.
1 Peter 1.1 and 1.13-2.3
Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ to God's elect,
exiles scattered throughout the provinces of Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia.
Therefore, with minds that are alert and fully sober,
set your hope on the grace to be brought to you when Jesus Christ is revealed at his coming.
As obedient children, do not conform to the evil desires you had when you lived in ignorance.
But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do.
For it is written, be holy because I am holy.
Since you call on a father who judges each person's work impartially,
live out your time as foreigners here in reverent fear.
For you know that it was not with perishable things, such as silver or gold,
that you are redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your ancestors,
but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect.
He was chosen before the creation of the world, but was revealed in these last times for your sake.
Through him you believe in God who raised him from the dead and glorified him.
And so your faith and hope are in God.
Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth,
so that you have sincere love for each other, love one another deeply from the heart.
For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable,
through the living and enduring word of God.
For all people are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of the field.
The grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of the Lord endures forever.
And this is the word that was preached to you.
Therefore, rid yourselves of all malice and all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander of every kind.
Like newborn babies, crave pure spiritual milk,
so that by it you may grow up in your salvation,
now that you have tasted that the Lord is good.
This is the word of the Lord.
Good morning, Christ Church.
Honestly, I don't know what I'm doing up here after Lindsay.
I think we could just be done.
Good job.
Thank you.
We are in this letter of 1 Peter,
and if you've been here the past few weeks,
you know that it opens with this glorious doxology.
Peter's just praising God for the mercy that he's had on us in Jesus Christ.
And really at this point,
having celebrated the wonders of God's salvation by grace in Jesus,
Peter now turns his attention,
and he turns our attention,
to describing the appropriate response
in the lives of those who received God's grace.
He's describing what it means to live consistently
with who we've been made in Jesus Christ.
And so I want to focus your attention today on an unpopular topic.
We're going to talk today about a topic that very few Christians and churches
tend to spend much time focusing on,
and that is the topic of holiness.
Personal, individual holiness,
collective, communal holiness.
Peter quotes this Old Testament book of Leviticus
when he says,
Be holy.
The Lord is saying there,
Be holy because I am holy.
What in the world does that mean?
Well, that's what we're going to explore,
and because I have a lot to say,
we're just going to dive right in.
Here's the thread I want to follow,
is that the gospel creates holy lives,
revering our God and craving His grace.
That's what the gospel creates.
The gospel creates holy lives of revering our God
and craving His grace.
So first of all, the gospel creates holy lives.
Just follow with me in verse 13.
Therefore, with minds that are alert and fully sober,
set your hope on the grace to be brought to you
when Jesus Christ is revealed at His coming.
As obedient children,
do not conform to the evil desires you had
when you lived in ignorance.
Peter's saying that if you're confident
in Jesus' return,
when He comes again in glory,
and if you're confident in the hope
that there and then,
you're going to experience the fullness
of God's grace that you already have
here and now,
then here are all the implications
of God's grace for your life.
And he describes in verse 14,
he says that when you were ignorant
of the reality of Jesus Christ,
before you came to know Christ,
you were full of all these evil desires,
full of all these self-centered desires
that were in fact driving your life.
But now, he says,
this God of grace is coming in
and He's given you a new birth
into a living hope.
We talked about that in chapter 1, verse 3.
He's brought you into this new reality.
He's made you a new creation.
He's given you a new life in Jesus Christ.
So, Peter says,
you've got to abandon your conformity
to all of those old self-centered desires.
And now, because of this new life,
you've got to give yourself
to that new life
in conformity to the grace of God.
Now, what does that mean?
Well, Peter says in verse 14,
it means this,
be obedient children.
Live as obedient children of your Father.
If God has given you this new birth,
if you've been born again
through the imperishable seed of the gospel,
as it says in verse 23,
if you've been brought into this new relationship
as a child of God the Father,
then Peter says,
the only proper thing to do
is to obey your Father
who's newly begotten you.
And what does it mean to obey
our good and gracious Father?
Well, to obey means this,
like Father, like Son.
Like Father, like Daughter.
That the character of the children
is to reflect the character of their Father.
And what is the Father like?
Well, when Jesus prays in John 17,
that great high priestly prayer,
He calls God, He says,
Holy Father.
That's how Jesus prays.
Holy Father.
And that's what Peter's picking up on here in verse 15.
But just as He who called you is holy,
so be holy in all you do.
For it is written,
be holy because I am holy.
The Holy Father who called you and me to Himself,
He is the pattern
to which our character is to conform.
Now, what does it mean when God says,
I am holy?
What does that mean when He says,
I am holy?
Well, the word holy means set apart.
So God is saying there,
I am separate.
I am distinct.
I am different.
I'm in a category of my own
in terms of moral beauty
and excellence of character.
And just to try to illustrate this,
when you go to the center point
and the high point of the Torah,
which is the first five books of the Bible,
basic Bible,
you find there this amazing moment
where the people of God,
they've just made the golden calf.
And Moses,
the leader of the people of God,
he's interceding for God to forgive them.
And he says to them,
to God,
in his intercession to God,
he says,
God,
show me your glory.
And God says,
well, that's great, Moses,
but you can't handle my glory.
And so he says,
I will hide you in this rock
and I'll cover you with my hand
and I will show you
the backside of my glory.
I'll show you the afterglow
of my goodness and my glory.
And here's what happens in Exodus 34.
This is what Moses hears.
He hears,
I am the Lord, the Lord,
compassionate and gracious God,
slow to anger,
abounding in loving kindness
and faithfulness,
maintaining love to thousands,
forgiving wickedness,
rebellion and sin.
Yet I do not leave the guilty unpunished,
but I punish the children
for the sins of the parents
to the third and fourth generations,
which means I'm just
and I'm righteous
and I'm holy.
Now there's a reason
that that is the most quoted verse
in the whole Bible.
It's repeated over and over
in the Old Testament
because it definitively reveals
our Father's moral beauty
and his excellence of character.
It reveals his holiness.
This is the God,
the Holy One of Israel
who dwells in the midst
of his people.
And so why does Peter now quote
Leviticus 19 here in this passage,
be holy because I am holy?
What does that mean?
Well, God is saying to us,
you are my people.
You have been set apart by me
and for me.
You belong to me.
And so because of that,
you've got to live
no longer for yourselves,
no longer for your desires,
but you're to live for me
and for my desires.
And this is what Exodus 34,
Leviticus 19,
the whole of the Torah
is really all about.
It's to direct Israel
in a way of life
that's completely other than
the way that all the people
around them are living.
The people in whose midst
they dwell,
Israel,
the people of God,
are to have a decisively
alternative way of life
that's set apart
from all of those other cultures.
And so when God says,
be holy because I'm holy,
he's saying,
just as Abraham and his family
were set apart
from all the cultures
of Mesopotamia
and just as Moses and Israel
were set apart
from the culture of Egypt
and the culture of Canaan,
just as Isaiah and Jeremiah
and Ezekiel and Daniel
and that whole generation
were set apart
from the culture of Babylon,
I am telling you,
Christian exile
scattered throughout
these five provinces
of central and northern Turkey
that you are to be set apart.
You're to be set apart
from the culture
of the Greco-Roman Empire.
That it's within
this cultural environment
that is ignorant
of the reality
of Jesus Christ,
this cultural environment
that's full of evil
and self-centered desires.
This is the place
where you are to be holy
because I am holy.
The Lord says to his church,
I've set you apart
from this culture
for lives that conform
to my moral beauty
and my excellence
of character.
Now what might it mean
to live this set apart,
distinctive, holy life
in a practical way?
Well, I want you to think
about these Christian exiles
that Peter's writing to.
Think about all the people
in central and northern Turkey
in the Greco-Roman Empire there
and think about
what people there believed.
Think about how people there
were living with respect
to the gods of the empire.
People all around the church
were saying,
okay, mammon,
mammon, the money god,
is divine.
And mammon rules our pockets
so that making a profit
trumps everything else
that we could possibly value
or be about.
And then they said,
not only mammon,
but Aphrodite.
Aphrodite, the goddess
of sex and love,
she is divine.
divine.
And she rules our loins.
And so any hint
that we should resist her
just feels like it infringes
upon our rights.
Why would we ever say no
to our appetites
and to getting more pleasure
for ourselves?
And the people said,
not only mammon
and Aphrodite are divine,
but they also said Mars.
Mars, the god of power,
the god of war,
is divine.
And he rules our relationships.
And so the way we engage our lives,
the way we go about our relationships
is through merciless competition
and conflict.
And ruling over all these cultural gods
of mammon and Aphrodite and Mars
was Caesar,
who they also thought was divine.
And they said, you know,
in his empire,
money, sex, and power
just reign unchecked and unchallenged.
And so when Leviticus 19,
be holy because I am holy,
is spoken to these Christian exiles,
what in the world does that mean
in this cultural environment?
Well, these Christian exiles
whom God had set apart,
they refused to give allegiance
to all these prevailing gods.
They said, we refuse to be conformed
to all the desires
and all the customs
and all the practices
that are accepted as normal
by our society.
And they were holding fast
to their risen and exalted Lord Jesus,
at whose name they believed
every knee would bow,
including the knee of Aphrodite
and Mammon
and Mars
and Caesar
and all the other gods.
These Christian exiles
had embraced a holy way of life
that made them instantly suspect
by the people around them
because they were living
by different beliefs,
different values,
different priorities
that were at odds
with their cultural surroundings.
And that's why,
as it says in verse 6 of chapter 1,
they're suffering grief
in all kinds of trials.
It's why it says in verse 7
that they were going through
a fiery furnace
that was testing their faith
because our Holy Father
had called them
and our Holy Father
calls us to this
set-apart,
distinctive,
alternative,
non-conformist,
counter-cultural
way of life,
which is a life
as obedient children
who are becoming
more and more like
our Holy Father.
You with me so far?
Trying to give you
some practical examples
of holiness.
holiness.
If we are bending
our knees to mammon
and money as God,
if we're bending
our knees to Aphrodite
and sex as God,
if we're bending
our knees to Mars
and power as God,
if we're bending
our knees to Caesar
and politics as God,
if we're bending
our knees to anything
other than the true
and living God,
then we're not being
holy as the one
who called us
is holy.
None of these many gods,
none of these
deified ultimates
of our culture
have any claims
on the life
of the people of God.
We have one Lord
and we've been set apart
by Him
and for Him
and He's separated us out
to this different
and distinctive life
so that we,
as I said before,
we're no longer living
for ourselves
and for our desires.
We're living for Him
and for His desires.
The Christian life,
if it's about anything,
it's about deliverance
from sin.
Jesus died for our sins
so that sin
might be overcome,
it might be resisted,
it might be nullified
as an influence
in our lives.
And the Christian life
means orienting
our entire lives
around this Holy Father
and allowing the beauty
of His image
and the excellence
of His likeness
to be reflected
by us
and through us
into the world
so that when people
are looking at
the character
of the church,
when people are looking
at the character
of our lives,
what are they seeing?
They're seeing the character
of our glorious God.
So I have to leave this point
because I have other things
to say,
but I'm going to leave you
with, first of all,
with a quote
and that is from
G.K. Chesterton
and he said,
the Christian ideal
has not been tried
and found wanting,
it has been found difficult
and left untried.
The Christian ideal
has not been tried
and found wanting,
it's been found difficult
and left untried.
And this apostle of Jesus,
Peter, is saying,
go ahead, try it,
try to be holy.
But don't try it
without this prayer
and it's a prayer
that I've given you before
from Robert Murray McShane
and it goes like this,
Lord, make me as holy
as it's possible
for a saved sinner to be.
Lord, make me as holy
as it's possible
for a saved sinner to be.
And if you want
to follow up on this,
I encourage you to
go home this afternoon
and Google the word holiness
and then you can Google
the name J.I. Packer
and then you can watch
the first video
that pops up for you there
and that'll be helpful,
I think,
in terms of applying
the meaning of this text.
But the gospel
creates holy lives.
It creates a holy people.
And one of the ways
that that holiness
gets expressed
is through reverence.
The gospel creates
holy lives of reverence,
of revering our God.
And so Peter continues on
in verse 17.
He says,
since you call on a father
who judges each person's work
impartially,
live out your time
as foreigners
here in reverent fear.
Again,
that word foreigners,
he says,
you're exiles,
you're following
the way of Jesus
and that means
that you're a counterculture
within the dominant culture.
And he says,
as exiles,
I want you to live out
your time,
I want you to conduct
yourselves
in reverent fear,
reverent awe.
And he contrasts this
in verse 18
with what he calls
an empty
or a futile way
of life
handed down
from our fathers.
What Peter's saying
is that your holy
and gracious Father
who's caused you
to be born again
by this imperishable seed
of the gospel,
verse 23,
your Father in heaven
has handed down to you
a very different way
of life
than the empty
and futile way
of life
that you receive
from your fathers.
It's a new life.
It's a new way
of life
that's marked
by reverent fear
and reverent awe.
And Peter's point
is that to live
or to conduct
ourselves
in any other way
without this reverence,
without this awe
of our holy Father
is to cheapen
his grace.
To continue
to live
in any of the
empty
or useless ways
of idolatry
and immorality
that were handed
down to us
and that's being
practiced
all around us,
Peter says
that's to implicitly
deny the value
of what our Father
has done
for us.
And here's what he says
in verse 18,
he says,
for you know
that it was not
with perishable things
such as silver
or gold
that you were
redeemed
from the empty
way of life
handed down
to you
from your ancestors
but with the
precious blood
of Christ
a lamb
without blemish
or defect.
See,
in the first century
everybody who heard
that word
redeemed,
they would have
had a very specific
image come to their mind.
If you were
a Greco-Roman pagan
you would have
this image
of slaves
or prisoners
of war
who in order
to be freed
had to have
a ransom price
paid for their
redemption.
Or if you were
Jewish
and you heard
this word
redeemed
you would think
about your
people's bondage
and slavery
in Egypt
and how
the Lord God
himself had to
move heaven
and earth
to deliver
his people
and Peter's
saying
I want you
to think
about
what God
the Father
was willing
to do
when you
were slaves
in sin.
When you
were in
bondage
to death
when you
were prisoners
of dark
spiritual
powers
what was
the price
that God
was willing
to pay
for your
freedom?
Did the
Father
give something
perishable
to get you
out of that
old
empty
useless
way
of life?
Did he
give a
large
sum
of silver
and gold
for your
freedom?
Did he
pay a
price
of relative
value
for your
redemption?
Peter's
talking about
money because
he wants
us to see
that none
of us
if we
even wanted
to
could redeem
ourselves.
I mean
at our
best
if we
tried to
redeem
ourselves
all that
we could
offer
is just
perishable
things like
gold and
silver.
Right?
And how
much of
that do
we even
really have?
You know
if we
took all
of our
bank
accounts
and mutual
funds
and 401ks
and we
pulled all
that together
this morning
could we
redeem
one
eternal
soul?
No.
Peter's
saying look
your money
is useless
in this
realm of
redemption.
It's not
enough
to ransom
a single
soul.
what had
to be
given
was not
silver
and gold
what had
to be
given
was a
life.
What had
to be
given
to liberate
us from
our
captivity
to sin
and death
and the
devil
was a
life.
And here's
the most
wonderful
thing that
the world
has ever
heard is
that God
gave that
life.
God
gave that
life that
was most
precious
and most
infinitely
valuable.
God
our
Father
our
gracious
Father
gave
his
only
son
Jesus.
And God
the son
gave the
highest
and the
best
that he
could
give.
He says
in Mark
chapter 10
verse 45
I've not
come to
be served
but to
serve
and to
give my
life as
a ransom
for many.
He laid
down his
life for
us.
He paid
the ultimate
price to
redeem us.
And again
in verse 19
Peter says
it's with
the precious
blood of
Christ
the lamb
without
blemish
or defect
that you
were
redeemed.
He's saying
here think
about all
those
sacrificial
lambs
in the
temple
of God.
Think
about how
they're
offered on
behalf of
sinners
every morning
and every
night
day by
day
week by
week
slaughtered
in the
place of
sinners
as a
substitute
to atone
for their
evil and
self-centered
desires.
Peter says
that's what
Jesus came
to be
for you.
That's what
the eternal
Son of
God is
for you.
All of
our sins
have been
laid upon
this pure
and perfect
one
Jesus
who is
the Lamb
of God
who takes
away
the sin
of the
world.
And Peter
is telling
us that
you can't
measure the
value of
this.
It's
beyond
silver
and gold.
It's
beyond the
highest
standards
known to
human
beings.
Think about
what it
took for
you to
be redeemed,
for you to
be ransomed
and set
free,
Peter says.
It was the
precious blood
of Jesus.
That's the
measure of
the love
that God
the Father
has for
you.
And here's
his point.
To live
in a way
and to
conduct
yourself in
a way
that's
inconsistent
with the
gravity
of this
cosmic
reality
of the
ransom
price that
God paid
for your
redemption
is to
presume
upon God's
grace,
is to
cheapen
his grace,
is to
deny the
value of
what your
gracious
Father has
done for
you.
If your
new life
was secured
by nothing
less than
the precious
blood of
Jesus,
which is
of infinitely
greater value
than anything
that can be
secured with
silver or
gold,
then each
and every
one of us
is called
to recognize
the value
of our
new status
by living
our lives,
conducting
ourselves
with what
Peter calls
reverent fear,
reverent awe.
The Apostle
Paul is making
a similar
point in
1 Corinthians 6
when he says
you are not
your own,
you were
bought at
a price,
therefore honor
God with
your bodies.
What these
apostles are
saying is how
could we
live carelessly?
How could
we live
self-indulgently?
How could
we give
free reign
to our
self-centered
desires?
How could
we allow
money
or sex
or power
or any
of the
other
gods
that are
out there
to rule
over us
as if we
were our
own,
as if we
did belong
to ourselves,
as if we
had not been
bought with
this great
price,
as if we
were not
in fact
accountable
to our
Father who
Peter says
is going
to judge
all of our
works
impartially?
See,
becoming
obedient children
of our
Holy Father
means that
we leave
behind the
empty way
of life
that was
handed down
to us
from our
unholy
fathers.
And having
Jesus as
our Redeemer
means living
in ways that
are appropriate
to the
precious and
measureless price
of our
redemption.
We've seen
that great
hymn,
love so
amazing,
so divine,
demands my
soul,
my life,
my all.
It's the
degree to
which you
see how
Jesus gave
himself for
you,
and that is
the degree to
which you
will be
willing to
give yourself
for him.
The degree to
which you
value the
price that he
paid for
you is the
degree to
which you
will live as
if no price
is too high,
no cost is
too great to
honor him.
reverent fear,
reverent awe.
Peter's asking
us, is that
the attitude,
is that the
posture that
we have before
our God?
Is that the
way that we're
living our
lives and
conducting
ourselves?
The gospel
creates holy
lives of
revering our
God and
craving his
grace.
And I just
want to
close briefly
with this.
The gospel
creates holy
lives of
revering our
God and
craving his
grace.
There's so
much in
this passage
and a
lot to
leave on
the table.
But I do
want to
close with
Peter's final
imperative to
these Christian
exiles.
He says in
chapter 2,
verse 2,
like newborn
babies crave
pure spiritual
milk so
that by it
you may
grow up in
your salvation
now that
you've tasted
that the
Lord is
good.
Now this
is a
lovely text
because we
have so many
newborns in
this church.
And so we
don't have to
look very far
to think about
what this
means.
to think
about the
single-mindedness
with which
those newborns
yearn for the
milk that
alone will
nourish them.
That milk is
the very
sustenance of
their lives.
And as some
of you parents
know painfully
well, any
delay at
feeding time
creates this
powerful reaction
from this
tiny little
person.
For the
infant,
milk is
not a fringe
benefit.
It's not
just like a
nice to
have.
It's a
need to
have.
And Peter
is urging
these Christian
exiles, he's
urging the
church to
have an
infant's
desperate
desire for
their appropriate
nourishment.
And he's
saying as
babies crave
milk, so
you must crave
the goodness
and the grace
of God that
alone will
sustain the
vitality of
the new life
you've been
given in
Jesus Christ.
God
is
going to
do it.
And so Peter's
saying you've
got to put
off.
You've got to
put behind you,
you've got to
abandon all of
those old
desires, all of
those old
cravings of your
former life.
And because of
this new life you
need to begin
instinctively desiring
new things, eagerly
and incessantly
craving God and
the grace of God.
God, like a
sensible baby, do
not be satisfied
with anything less
than this.
Cry out for it and
if you don't get it,
cry more.
Let your desire for
God, let your desire
for the grace of the
gospel, Peter says, to
be as fervent and as
constant and as
unrelenting and as
tenacious as a
hungry newborn.
If you make God's
regenerative word and
His satisfying grace
and His life-giving
presence your
desperate desire, then
this is the spiritual
nourishment that will
enable us to grow up
in the salvation that
we've been given.
This is the thing that
will enable us and
nourish us and
strengthen us to be
able to be the
obedient children God's
calling us to be, to
be the holy children
God's calling us to
be, to be the
reverent children our
Holy Father has made
us and called us to
be.
So as we prepare to
come to this table of
grace, my question for
us is, how hungry are
you?
How thirsty are you for
our holy God?
What are you desiring?
What are you craving?
It is your deepest
desire to know more and
more of the goodness and
the grace of the God, the
holy God who's called us to
be holy as He's holy.
In the name of the Father,
Son, and Holy Spirit,
Amen.