1 PETER 1:13–25
WHAT DOES A LIVING HOPE LOOK LIKE?
Peter has spent the first twelve verses telling Christians what God has done for them.
They have been born again.
They have a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
They have an inheritance that cannot perish, spoil, or fade.
Their faith may be tested, but God has not abandoned them.
Now verse 13 begins with an important word:
“Therefore…”
Peter is about to move from what God has done to how God's people should live because of it.
Christian conduct does not earn salvation.
It grows out of salvation.
1:13 — PREPARE YOUR MINDS FOR ACTION
Peter says:
“Therefore, preparing your minds for action, and being sober-minded, set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.”
Older translations say:
“Gird up the loins of your mind.”
That sounds strange to us, but Peter's readers would have understood the picture.
People commonly wore long garments. When someone needed to run or work, he gathered up the loose clothing and tucked it into his belt.
In our language we might say:
Roll up your sleeves. Get ready.
But Peter applies the picture to the mind.
Christian living requires thinking.
Peter does not tell Christians to stop thinking and simply accept what someone tells them.
He tells them to get their minds ready for action.
And then:
“Be sober-minded.”
The idea is clear thinking, self-control, alertness.
Where should that prepared and disciplined mind be directed?
“Set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.”
Notice again that Peter looks toward the future.
Grace is something Christians have already experienced, but there is still grace to be received when Christ is revealed.
Our hope looks forward.
1:14 — DON'T GO BACK TO THE OLD LIFE
Peter continues:
“As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance.”
These people had a life before Christ.
Peter doesn't merely say:
“Don't do bad things.”
He describes their former life as one shaped by ignorance.
They did not understand.
Now they know something they did not know before.
And knowledge brings responsibility.
They are not to allow their former desires to squeeze them back into their old pattern of life.
Something has changed.
They now belong to God.
1:15–16 — “BE HOLY, FOR I AM HOLY”
Peter writes:
“But as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct.”
Then he quotes Scripture:
“You shall be holy, for I am holy.”
Peter is drawing from Leviticus, especially passages such as Leviticus 11:44–45 and 19:2.
What does holy mean?
At its heart, holiness involves being set apart for God.
But Peter doesn't leave holiness as an abstract religious idea.
He says:
“Be holy in all your conduct.”
Holiness reaches everyday life.
How we speak.
How we treat people.
How we handle money.
How we behave when nobody is watching.
How we respond when mistreated.
How we live among people who do not share our faith.
Peter will develop many of those things later in the letter.
And notice the standard:
Peter doesn't say:
“Be holy because other Christians are holy.”
He says:
“As He who called you is holy…”
God Himself is the standard.
1:17 — LIVE WITH REVERENT FEAR
Peter next says:
“And if you call on him as Father who judges impartially according to each one's deeds, conduct yourselves with fear throughout the time of your exile.”
There is an interesting combination here.
God is Father.
And God is Judge.
Those truths do not contradict one another.
Calling God “Father” does not mean treating Him casually.
Peter says He judges impartially.
Therefore Christians should live with fear during their earthly exile.
This does not mean living in terror that God is waiting for an opportunity to destroy us.
It is the reverence of people who understand who God is and therefore take Him seriously.
Peter has already emphasized God's mercy and protection.
Now he emphasizes accountability.
Both belong in the Christian life.
1:18–19 — WHAT DID YOUR FREEDOM COST?
Peter reminds them what God has done:
“Knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers…”
They had been ransomed.
The word carries the idea of being released by the payment of a price.
What was the price?
Not:
“perishable things such as silver or gold.”
Peter has already called gold perishable in verse 7.
Now he contrasts silver and gold with something infinitely more valuable:
“the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot.”
Peter's language takes us into the world of sacrifice.
An acceptable sacrificial animal was to be without defect.
Jesus is the spotless Lamb.
Their salvation was not purchased with money.
It cost the blood of Christ.
That gives Peter's command to holiness tremendous weight.
We do not belong to ourselves.
A price has been paid.
1:20 — BEFORE THE FOUNDATION OF THE WORLD
Peter says of Christ:
“He was foreknown before the foundation of the world but was made manifest in the last times for the sake of you.”
The cross was not God's emergency response to an unexpected problem.
Christ was foreknown before the world's foundation.
But He has now been revealed in history.
Notice Peter's perspective on time:
“in the last times.”
Peter believed his readers were already living in the period toward which God's earlier purposes had been moving.
The “last times” were not merely something thousands of years in Peter's future.
With Christ's coming, death, resurrection, and exaltation, something decisive had happened in God's plan.
1:21 — FAITH AND HOPE IN GOD
Through Christ, Peter says, they:
“are believers in God, who raised him from the dead and gave him glory…”
Once again Peter returns to the resurrection.
He began the section by telling them they had a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Now he says God:
raised Jesus from the dead and gave Him glory.
Therefore:
“your faith and hope are in God.”
Christian hope isn't wishful thinking.
It is anchored in what God has already done.
The God in whom Christians hope is the God who raises the dead.
That matters when Peter is writing to people facing suffering.
1:22 — LOVE ONE ANOTHER EARNESTLY
Peter now turns from holiness toward other Christians:
“Having purified your souls by your obedience to the truth for a sincere brotherly love, love one another earnestly from a pure heart.”
Notice that holiness doesn't merely concern our relationship with God.
It changes how we treat one another.
Peter uses language of brotherly love and then commands them:
“Love one another earnestly.”
The word can carry the sense of something stretched out or extended.
This isn't casual friendliness.
It is determined love.
And Peter specifically says it should be sincere.
Not performed.
Not merely spoken.
Not something we display publicly while harboring resentment privately.
A holy people should become a loving people.
1:23 — BORN AGAIN THROUGH THE WORD
Why should these Christians love one another?
Peter returns to something he said in verse 3:
They have been born again.
This time he says:
“Since you have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God.”
Physical life comes from seed that eventually perishes.
Their new life comes through something that does not perish:
the living and abiding word of God.
Peter has contrasted several things that perish with things that endure.
Gold perishes.
Silver perishes.
Human life perishes.
But God's word remains.
1:24–25 — THE GRASS WITHERS
Peter quotes Isaiah 40:6–8:
“All flesh is like grass
and all its glory like the flower of grass.
The grass withers,
and the flower falls,
but the word of the Lord remains forever.”
Peter's readers knew how uncertain life could be.
Peter tells them that human beings are like grass.
It grows.
It flowers.
For a while it can be beautiful.
Then it disappears.
Human glory is the same.
Wealth disappears.
Power disappears.
Governments disappear.
Generations disappear.
Even our bodies eventually die.
But:
“The word of the Lord remains forever.”
Then Peter adds something important:
“And this word is the good news that was preached to you.”
The gospel they received is not another temporary human philosophy.
It is the enduring word of God.
WHAT DOES A LIVING HOPE LOOK LIKE?
Peter has answered that question.
A person with living hope:
thinks carefully.
Sets his hope on God's grace.
Refuses to return to the former life.
Seeks holiness because God is holy.
Takes God seriously.
Remembers the price Christ paid.
Trusts the God who raised Jesus from the dead.
Loves fellow Christians sincerely.
Builds life upon God's enduring word.
Peter's Christianity is neither merely believing certain facts nor merely behaving according to certain rules.
God has given His people new life.
Therefore they begin living differently.
SOMETHING TO THINK ABOUT
Peter tells Christians:
“Do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance.”
That raises a question for those of us who have been Christians for many years.
It may be easy to identify the sins we left behind when we first became Christians.
But are there things we have continued doing simply because “that's the way I've always done it”?
Are there beliefs we have never examined because “that's what I've always been taught”?
Peter begins this section by telling us to prepare our minds for action.
Holiness sometimes requires more than changing what we do.
Sometimes it requires allowing God's Word to change how we think.
QUESTIONS TO THINK ABOUT
Why does Peter begin verse 13 with “Therefore”?
What would it mean today to “prepare your minds for action”?
Is holiness primarily separation from something, dedication to God, or both?
How can God be both our Father and the impartial Judge Peter describes?
Why does Peter contrast Christ's blood with silver and gold?
What does verse 20 tell us about God's plan for Christ?
What connection does Peter make between truth and love in verse 22?
What things in our lives are temporary—and what does Peter say will remain forever?
Are there things we believe or practice primarily because we have carefully examined Scripture—or simply because we have always understood them that way?
NEXT STUDY
1 PETER 2:1–10 — “YOU ARE LIVING STONES”
Peter has spoken about being born again through the living word of God.
Now he changes the picture.
Jesus is the living Stone.
Christians are living stones.
Together they are being built into a spiritual house.
And Peter is about to take some of the Old Testament's most important language about Israel—chosen race, royal priesthood, holy nation, God's own people—and apply it to the people who belong to Christ.
That one deserves particularly careful exegesis.
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