Enduring Love

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"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" 1 Peter 1:22-23

Main Readings: 1 Peter 1 & 1 John 3

Supporting Readings: Psalm 34 & 1 Corinthians 13

Jesus, if you remember, said that all the law and the prophets – everything they said – dangle or hang from two great commandments, which are: Love the Lord your God with all your heart and mind and soul. And secondly, love your neighbour as yourself.

In other words, you can’t get more foundational in terms of God’s willfor the people he has made, than these two commandments. And both are love commands. The first is all about God-orientation. And the second is all about neighbour-orientation.

Wherever you find love missing in either area – God or neighbour - you’re finding defective human behaviour. Defective human attitudes. Defective human mindsets. Defective human actions. Defective human speech.

In short, you’re finding sin. No love for God - sin. No love for neighbour - sin.

The reason I’m highlighting Jesus’ teaching on the two great commandments is that, it seems to me clear, Peter is alerting his readers to both these commands here in chapter 1 of his letter.

Last week, it was love for God, coming to expression in reverent fear. A life lived that shows the truth about our redemption, and so glorifies God.

This week, it’s love for neighbour that is the focus. See for yourselves: the command at the centre of the passage here is, ‘love one another deeply from the heart’.

The goal of everything Peter wants to say is this: ‘have sincere, deep love for each other evident in your lives’.

Now, that might not sound too difficult. And you might think that we’ve got that worked out pretty nicely here at Riverside. And I think, to some extent, that’s true. I’m grateful for the sincere love that exists between us.

But I think we need to remember the context in which Peter is writing to these people.

Remember the thrust of verse 6 for example: ‘though now for a little while you have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials’.

And in chapter 4, Peter states the case again: ‘do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal that has come on you to test you’.

It's easy to forget the background of the letter when we’re engrossed in it like we have been recently.

But the background is, that they are caught in the middle of all kinds of difficulty right now.

And what that background of suffering and trial means is, the call Peter made last time - namely, to love the Lord your God with all your heart, and mind, and strength - comes in the midst of fire.

Comes in the midst of a moment when the impulse to self-preservation is at its most intense.

But love isn’t self-preserving; love looks outwards - to God and to neighbour, according to Jesus.

Think of the impulse to self-preservation that Shadrak, Meshak and Abednego must have felt when faced with their fiery furnace in their day. It’s like that for these people too. It’s like that for us too.

And these trials, and this suffering, is the backdrop to this call on our lives that Peter is now making too - which is to love our neighbour as ourselves.

At the very moment, as it were, when relationships are under the greatest pressure and the deepest strain. That’s when Peter is calling them, and us, to love deeply from the heart.

That’s not to say that Peter doesn’t want this love to be in us all the rest of the time too. He does! But the time of greatest adversity will be the time of greatest testing.

And so, it’s out of times like that, that Peter says, ‘love one another deeply from the heart’.

So that’s the goal this morning. In the face of life’s troubles and setbacks; life’s sins, and strains, and disappointments, how can welove one another deeply from the heart, and so fulfil Jesus’ call on our lives?

Peter is here to help us.

He kicks off this passage by reminding them that they have purified themselves by obeying the truth.

This is one of those places where it’s not easy to know what the writer has in mind when he uses a sentence like, ‘purified yourselves by obedience to the truth’.

And not knowing is a problem for us, because, if we misunderstandwhat he means in this phrase, we’ll fail to understand his teaching as a whole in this passage. So, we have to get this one right.

The temptation here, is to pull the emphasis on holiness from verses 13 to 21 through into this passage and allow that to control our understanding of ‘purified yourselves by obeying the truth’.

After all, we had ‘obedient children’ back in verse 14. We had the word ‘holy’ in verses 15 & 16.

And ‘holy’, in some sense, means ‘purity’ which is what we have here in verse 22. So, that impulse seems like a good one.

Put that together with the fact that the alternative interpretation is problematic too.

Because, if this phrase is not referring to ongoing holiness, then the alternative is that it’s referring to the moment the gospel took hold in our lives.

And as you know, we were purified by the blood of Jesus, when we believed, not by ourselves! And the truth was believed on not obeyed! Surely!

It’s the word ‘yourselves’ connected with purity that puts us off that interpretation. And it’s the word ‘obedience’ connected with truth that is disconcerting.

I said last week, justification has nothing to do with us except that we believe.

Which would surely make words like ‘yourselves’ and ‘obey’ out of reach, if Peter had in mind the moment of saving faith here.

If Peter had said instead, ‘Now that you have been purified by Christby believing the truth’ we would be comfortable with the interpretation that Peter has in mind here the moment of salvation.

But because he says, ‘Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth’ it doesn’t sit quite right, that he could be referring to the moment the gospel took hold in our lives. It sounds too much of usto be talking about conversion.

But, having said all that, it is my contention that he is referring to conversion here, and not to ongoing holiness.

Not that Peter has dropped holiness. His appeal ‘to love each other deeply from the heart’ is an appeal to holiness.

So, don’t think that he’s dropped his emphasis on holiness. Not at all!

But that doesn’t mean that holiness is what he’s got in mind when he says, ‘having purified yourselves by obeying the truth’.

The main reason I think he has the moment of saving faith in mind here, is that in verse 23 there’s no doubt he’s talking about conversion.

Because, there, in verse 23, he brings into the conversation the idea of ‘new birth’. Which is, unmistakably, a work that forms a believer, not a work that maintains a believer.

So, the question is, does Peter, or indeed any of the apostles, frame the moment of salvation in terms of: us purifying ourselves and in terms of our obedience?

And the answer is yes.

There’s a pointer, at the Jerusalem council in Acts 15, when Peter says, in his speech, that God ‘purified the hearts of the believers by faith’.

Since faith is something that is exercised by the individual, that is not far off saying what Peter says right here, which is ‘you have purified yourselves’.

He might add here ‘by your faith’. And if he did, he would be matchingwhat he said back in Acts 15.

In Titus, there’s no ambiguity about the source of the purification, it’s Jesus. In Hebrews 9 and 10, there’s no doubt about the source of cleansing, it’s Jesus.

But in Acts, the emphasis is falling on the individual’s faith, like it is here in 1 Peter 1:22.

And then there’s how Peter talks in chapter 4 of this very letter.

He says, ‘it’s time for judgement to begin with the household of believers and if it begins with us, what will become of the unbelievers’.

Except he doesn’t call them ‘unbelievers’. He calls them those who ‘do not obey the gospel of God’.

And the Apostle Paul says the same in 2 Thessalonians 1:8. And the writer to Hebrews also, in chapter 5.

So, there is a way of talking, where the Apostles want to put the emphasis on human responsibility, that uses terms that we generally do not associate with justification. ‘Justification’ that we, and all the Apostles agree, is a sovereign work of God.

So how are we to understand this approach to talking about gospel salvation? Peter, again, gives us a pointer Acts 15.

Even though his emphasis there is that our hearts were purified by ourfaith. He says, God purified the hearts. You see, it was a God-work first and foremost.

And Hebrews does the same thing with reference to obedience. It says, ‘he [that is God] became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him’.

So, none of the biblical writers undermine the fact that God is the first cause of our salvation. And, that Jesus’ work is the means of our salvation.

But, we all know that faith is absolutely central to this salvation. No faith means no forgiveness of sins. Without faith it is impossible to please God!

And when the New Testament writers want to emphasis ourresponsibility in terms of that faith, they are willing to use words and phrases like, ‘obey the gospel’ and ‘purify yourselves’.

Let’s not forget, after all, that every single person who does not receiveJesus (that’s the phrase John 1 uses, ‘receive’) as their personal Lord and Saviour, by faith, will be held personally accountable for their rejection of him.

Even though, salvation is a sovereign work of God.

Faith itself is a gift of God, Ephesians 2 says.

Nevertheless, the responsibility to exercise that faith rests firmly with us.

So, all that to say, Peter is referring to the moment of salvation here. The phrase ‘purified yourselves’ refers to faith in Jesus which brings about the application of Jesus’ cross-work to our lives for the purification of our sins.

And the phrase ‘obeying the truth’ refers to the act of faith that aligns with the call of God on all people -  that they believe the truth of the good news of Jesus - crucified for sinners.

Oh where would we be without that news?

Unlike, ongoing holiness, which will continue all the days of our earthly journey and will never be completed in this life. Unlike that, this purification, Peter refers to here, has happened and in Peter’s mind is complete.

This truth has been obeyed and has, once for all, done its work. Those are compelling reasons to track with Peter here - that he really does have the new birth in mind – just like he refers to in verse 23.

Now, whilst it’s important to know how Peter can use the terms he uses – and I think we’ve learnt something from that this morning already.

More important than that, is knowing why he’s talking this way.

The purification is the result of obedience, and the obedience is in linewith the truth.

Peter wants to show us then, that the way we got started out on our Christian journey – and there’s only one way to get started, not multiple ways – the way we did get started was by faith in the truthof the gospel.

His point is: that way of beginning is also the way of continuing in the Christian life.

It’s not like we got started by obedience to truth and we proceed by some different means. No! We continue as we started.

And that’s particularly important because of what obedience to the truth and purification from sin at the moment of salvation, produced in us.

Look for yourselves. Peter says, it produced in us ‘sincere love for each other’.

What does he mean? Does he mean that before faith in Jesus we weren’t capable of sincere love? Does he mean, that since salvation, something has changed so that for some reason, he now has to tell us, seemingly in the same breath, that ‘you have sincere love for each other’ but you need to ‘love one another deeply from the heart’?

What does he have in mind?

It's quite odd to say, isn’t it, ‘you love one another sincerely; now love one another deeply’?

‘Why, Peter, are you commanding us to do something you say we’re already doing?’

Well, I think it’s like this. Love before conversion and after conversion is radically different.

That’s not to say that love before conversion was fake, or less than valuable.

But it is to say that there is a quality to love that comes about through salvation that has God under it, and in it, and as its ultimate object. A quality, that transforms love into something more.

‘God is love’, John says. And so, if God lives in us by His Spirit – which is what the new birth is – then God’s love dwells in our hearts. And we have a new desire to love God and to love each other.

That’s why Peter can say, ‘you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for each other’.

So, there is a Godly quality to the love that rises in our hearts as Christians, that wasn’t there in the same way before our conversion.

And there is an inclination in our hearts to love, that wasn’t there in the same way before conversion.

Perhaps one of the ways that love is shown to be different is that it is capable, in the Christian, of suffering everything. I wonder if we believe that.

In the unbelieving heart, love has limits. If someone wrongs you, love for self tends to rise above love for your enemy.

In the unbelieving heart, if someone is testing the limits of your patience, love for self leads to frustration at the other person.

In the unbelieving heart, if someone has something that you want or something you believe you’re more deserving of, and yet they have it, love for self leads to jealousy and envy.

And it’s in the unseen categories where love is particularly neglected within the unbelieving heart. Because there, where it can’t be seen, it is believed that it also can’t be known.

Hatred can be harboured, unseen. Anger can be harboured, unseen.

But the spiritual seed of the Christian’s new birth is ‘imperishable’ Peter says.

There’s some debate about what Peter is referring to when he uses the word ‘seed’. But I think it’s the Holy Spirit of God who is the imperishable seed that has brought about our new birth.

And so, God’s Spirit testifying with our spirit, speaks to us, that God sees every aspect of our conduct, whether outward or inward.

And so, we are constrained by love against jealousy and against envy, and against anger and hate.

And when we are wronged, our Holy Spirit-inclination is to love our enemy. And when our patience is being tested, our Holy Spirit-inclination is to endure it in love.

1 Corinthians tells us what love is, in detail doesn’t it: love is patient, kind, not boastful, not proud, not dishonouring, not self-seeking, not easily angered, not a keeper of wrongs, not a delighter in evil, but a rejoicer in truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. It never fails.

This is the love of Christ shed abroad in our hearts by his Spirit.

So, what is the issue?

‘Why Peter, call for obedience in love when, by the Spirit, it is a natural product of the new birth?’

And the answer is: because of remaining sin!

Real conversion to Christ creates all kinds of things. But two of them are: purification from sins in the courtroom of heaven. God will not count our sins against us anymore – that’s what it is to have been purified.

And secondly, indwelling by the Holy Spirit of God so that we are counted children of God - called ‘the new birth’.

But ‘purification’ does not mean sinlessness.

And ‘in-dwelt’ does not mean, always in step with the Spirit.

That’s not the reality of our Christian lives.

The reality of our Christian live is: Sin remains. And resistance to the Holy Spirit is a real thing.

The ongoing Christian life is a battleground, in other words, against remaining sin. Undertaken in the power of the Spirit, as we walk in step with Him.

And that battle continues to the very end!

This is the striving for holiness that the bible, and Peter is calling us to.

It's because of sin and the temptation to return to that ‘empty way of life’ passed down to us from our ancestors, that Peter calls on us to ‘love one another deeply from the heart’.

And so, as the reason for obeying the command he’s calling us to, Peter says:

‘look, remember that you were born again by imperishable seed [namely the Holy Spirit] and through the living and enduring word of God’.

In other words, the gospel message that was preached to you - and you can see he has that in mind from the last word of verse 25 – is not temporary! It is not transitory! It is not fleeting! As though you could love sincerely from the heart for a moment and then return to the way you used to “love” when you were an unbeliever. That’s not God’s will for your life.

Not at all!

The word preached to you was imperishable, just like the Spirit that dwells in you is imperishable.

The word you obeyed when you came to faith is not like the people of the world who are like grass.

Peter calls on Isaiah 40!

‘All people are like grass, and all their glory like the flowers of the field; the grass withers [temporary] and the flowers fall [temporary] – that’s what all people on earth are like [temporary] – but the word of the Lord endures forever! And this is the word that was preached to you.’

So, the word endures. The word you obeyed in faith at the beginning really endures.

And the Holy Spirit who is the seed of your salvation endures.

John says in his first letter, ‘no one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God’s seed abides in them’. That means it endures.

And therefore, Peter is saying, ‘your love must endure also’.

That’s his big point here.

Peter’s call is, that we keep in step with the living and enduring word that we obeyed at the beginning. And in step with the imperishable seed that in-dwelt us at the beginning.

Neither of those fade! And so, our love which was there at the beginning – like the Spirit and the word were there at the beginning - should also not fade.

But should endure!

Peter says, ‘pay attention to it, that your love may not fade!’

Why that word now?

Well, because there was never more reason for it to fade.

In the face of opposition: trial, tribulation, sin, betrayal, offence, mistreatment - love is likely to fail. ‘But you, Christian, don’t let love for your neighbour dry up’!

You know, even as I say those words I can hear an objection rising up in my own heart.

It says, ‘but who is my neighbour?’

‘You talk of mistreatment, of offence, of betrayal, of suffering. But you don’t surely mean love people who perpetrate those kinds of offences against me – love them deeply from the heart! Do you?’

And, then I remember that this whole scenario played out precisely like this with Jesus in his own day.

And was this that was the very prompt that caused Jesus to draw out the two great love commands in the first place! Amazing! We’ve come full circle!

You can read this later for yourselves in Luke 10.

A teacher of the law came to Jesus and asked, ‘what must I do to inherit eternal life?’

And it was these two commands; the teacher came up with when prompted by Jesus.

And Jesus said to him, ‘you got it!’ ‘Do this and you will live’.

But the teacher wanted to justify himself Luke says – just like my heart did a minute ago!

So, he asked Jesus, ‘who is my neighbour?’ Just like I asked!

To which, Jesus responded with the parable of the good Samaritan.

The Samaritan was a man who came across his ethnic enemy, a Jew - lying in the gutter, beaten, and left for dead.

Other Jews had already passed him by. His very own people had passed him by!

Self-preservation did not extend to love for a dying wretch in the street! Even when he was one of their own!

But the Samaritan – the sworn enemy of the Jew - was not like the Jewish priest or the Jewish Levite who had passed by. Why?

Because of real love. That’s Jesus’ point!

The Samaritan went to the man, bandaged him, poured oil and wine on him. He put him on his own donkey and brought him to an inn.

He paid for the inn keeper to look after him at his own expense. And even paid for any extra expense the inn keeper might incur.

Now Jesus says to the teacher, ‘which was the neighbour to the man – his sworn enemy or his fellow man?’

And the teacher got the message. His sworn enemy was his trueneighbour that day!

Jesus said to the teacher, ‘go and do likewise in fulfilment of the second of the greatest commandments’.

Peter is calling on believers in these churches to love each other with enduring love.

Love akin to that which they had at the beginning of their Christian journey. And to keep doing it.

Why? Because even in church, when the going gets tough, people sinagainst each other.

There would be nothing closer to Jesus’ parable than for Christians to start treating each other like the Priest or the Levite did that Jew.

In other words, returning to what love looked like as an unbeliever and failing to love like the Spirit taught us and enabled us at the beginning.

Peter knows that Christians can fail to love each other as their neighbour. Especially when they feel wronged by their fellow Christian. And that happens!

Maybe you’ve been wronged by a fellow Christian before. Peter says, ‘don’t fall foul of the temptation to love them with the thin, flimsy, self-serving love you had in your old way of life’.

‘Rather, love them as your neighbour. Love them like the Samaritan’.

The radical nature of Christ’s love shed abroad in our hearts is that, whilst we were still sinners (enemies) he died for us!

Whilst the beaten man was still his enemy, the Samaritan loved him and went to him at great cost to himself.

This is love.

And that’s how we should be to Christians who have wronged us.

The reason Peter doesn’t address our love for unbelievers here, who abuse us, is because, if you can love Christians who you do not expect to sin against you, when they do sin against you. Then loving the unbeliever who abuses you, and who you do expect to abuse you, will actually be the easier thing to do.

So, Peter is calling us to maintain love in the face of opposition, and sin, and shame, and fear, and pain, and misrepresentation, and all the other things that might tempt us to revert to a former way of loving which is always, that we preserve ourselves!

For me personally, it would be an application in light of the untruths and unkind words that were levelled at me last summer.

Peter says, ‘Tim, the enduring word you obeyed at the beginning; the imperishable Spirit that lives in you, calls you to love those detractors. You can do that!’

‘But will you?’

Peter says, ‘I call on you to love them. Press in with them. As far as is possible, live at peace with them. Don’t harbour hatred for them. Do good them. Be like the Samaritan, reach out to them’.

That’s a high calling. And so is the gospel!

Jesus practiced this love to bring about your salvation. Jesus is calling us to this love in light of his great salvation.

So, let’s strive to this holy love Peter says.

Love each other deeply from the heart, in line with the new birth, that we have been made partakers of by the love of Jesus.

And by God’s grace we will do it.