“Since you have in obedience to the truth purified your souls for a sincere love of the brethren, fervently love one another from the heart, for you have been born again not of seed which is perishable but imperishable, that is, through the living and enduring word of God. ‘For all flesh is like grass, and all its glory like the flower of grass. The grass withers, and the flower falls off, but the word of the lord endures forever.’ And this is the word which was preached to you.” 1 Peter 1:22-25 NASB
Because of all we have previously read and studied together, and because of your hope in Him, “you have in obedience purified your souls….” Notice as the emphasis changes in this section and in this part of the sentence to what they have done. Much of what is written here is about the marvelous things the LORD has done and completed for us and given to us as pure gift. Now the sense and emphasis changes to what they have done and what we are to do.
They have “in obedience to the truth purified their souls for a sincere love of the brethren…” They have done the purifying. There is always His part and then our part. This same thing is found in 1 John 3:3 “And everyone who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure.” Once again this is speaking in context to a life-style change.
Faith is action anchored in trust based in confidence. Faith is not just mentally agreeing with something and then “wishing” it were so. “If I just keep thinking about it and speaking it, then it will happen.” That is often what people mean when they say they are trusting God by faith. Faith is not that at all. It is confident action anchored in His word. So when we are truly born-from-above, everything about us begins to come into alignment with Him. We begin the purification business in our love center. We begin to love very differently – in every relationship, but especially in relationship to those in our God-Family.
In this passage in 1 Peter, this alignment is in reference to our loving those who are also born-from-above in the family of God. It is to be a sincere, fervent love for one another from the heart, or from the core of our being. A casual, non-caring and not attached “feeling” is not what He is talking about.
The reason we are to love this way is because of the “seed” of our birth. We were all born from God though the breath of His Word, His seed. Just like we were born in the natural by our parent’s seed, so in the spiritual we were born by spiritual seed – The Father’s through His Word.
Now we are called to begin to align every feeling, every thought and every action with the family’s heritage – the Word. Then the passage/thought is anchored in a quote from Isaiah 40:6-8. The one thing that will never change in our world – the word of the Lord endures forever. That means even when we cross the threshold into His arms, the word is still there.
How do we do this? Through that same word and through His power in the grace empowerment given. It is and always will be a walk in Him. It can get exciting – let’s let Him lead and then align ourselves as He leads. Such is faith.
Mannaword 