Evening, May 4
Go To Morning Reading
“Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible.”
1 Peter 1:23
Peter most earnestly exhorted the scattered saints to love each other
“with a pure heart fervently” and he wisely fetched his argument, not from the law, from nature,
or from philosophy, but from that high and divine nature which God
hath implanted in his people. Just as some judicious tutor of princes
might labour to beget and foster in them a kingly spirit and dignified
behaviour, finding arguments in their position and descent, so, looking
upon God’s people as heirs of glory, princes of the blood royal, descendants
of the King of kings, earth’s truest and oldest aristocracy, Peter saith to them, “See that ye love one another, because of your noble birth, being born
of incorruptible seed; because of your pedigree, being descended from
God, the Creator of all things; and because of your immortal destiny,
for you shall never pass away, though the glory of the flesh shall
fade, and even its existence shall cease.” It would be well if, in the spirit of humility, we recognized the
true dignity of our regenerated nature, and lived up to it. What is
a Christian? If you compare him with a king, he adds priestly sanctity
to royal dignity. The king’s royalty often lieth only in his crown, but with a Christian it is
infused into his inmost nature. He is as much above his fellows through
his new birth, as a man is above the beast that perisheth. Surely
he ought to carry himself, in all his dealings, as one who is not
of the multitude, but chosen out of the world, distinguished by sovereign
grace, written among “the peculiar people” and who therefore cannot grovel in the dust as others, nor live after
the manner of the world’s citizens. Let the dignity of your nature, and the brightness of
your prospects, O believers in Christ, constrain you to cleave unto
holiness, and to avoid the very appearance of evil.