Tonight, we return to our consideration of 1 Peter. Turn with me to 1 Peter chapter 1 once again. The text for our consideration being verses 13 through 16 of 1 Peter chapter 1. And I think it would be good to refresh what we have considered so far. Let's begin reading at verse 1 through verse 16 of the first chapter. As we give our attention to the Word of God. Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to God's elect, strangers in the world, scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, who have been chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father through the sanctifying work of the Spirit for obedience to Jesus Christ and sprinkling by His blood. Grace and peace be yours in abundance. Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. In His great mercy He has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil, or fade, kept in heaven for you, who through faith are shielded by God's power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time. In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that your faith of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire, may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory, and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. Though you have not seen Him, you love Him. And even though you do not see Him now, you believe in Him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls. Concerning this salvation, the prophets who spoke of the grace that was to come to you searched intently and with the greatest care, trying to find out the time and circumstances to which the Spirit of Christ in them was pointing when He predicted the sufferings of Christ and the glories that would follow. It was revealed to them that they were not serving themselves, but you. When they spoke of the things that have now been told you by those who have preached the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven, Even angels long to look into these things. And now the text. Therefore, prepare your minds for action. Be self-controlled. Set your hope fully on the grace to be given you when Jesus Christ is revealed. 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. Beloved congregation of our Lord Jesus Christ, I think I have told you before that one of the things that I was taught in seminary is that a sermon must answer two questions for God's people. First of all, what must I know? And secondly, what must I do? What must I know? What is the teaching that I must understand? And then what must I do with that? What is the application of that teaching? Now, Paul does this beautifully in his writings, especially in his letter to the Ephesian church, as Pastor Donovan has been teaching us. The first three chapters, we might say, are a beautiful instruction with regard to what we must know, and the second three, application of what we must do. And Peter does the same thing in this letter. And so far in our study of Peter's first letter, he has answered that first question with the first part of chapter 1. he has answered, what must I know? Remember, he is preaching to pilgrims. We said strangers. Pilgrims who are living among pagans, and we have called them privileged pilgrims. They have privileges, and Peter has been teaching them what they need to know about their privileges. Now again, what are these privileges? Well, first of all, as we have read again tonight, they have been chosen or elected by God the Father. They have become adopted children of God through the blood and sacrifice of Jesus Christ. And also God the Father has given them new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ. And what is this living hope? You remember it's that inheritance which Peter says can never perish, spoil, or fade, but is kept in heaven. This living hope is salvation you see beloved this living hope is not like our earthly hopes we've talked about this before with the boys and girls boys and girls you remember so often we might say well i hope i get this or that for my birthday or i hope we get to go here or there for vacation or i hope i get to do this or that with my friends but there's nothing certain about these kinds of hopes because we don't know if they are real until they happen. There's no degree of confidence. There's no certainty with those kinds of hopes. But this living hope that these pilgrims have, including you and I, this living hope is real. It's exactly what it says. It's living. It is real today for those who have been born again by the blood of Jesus. It's called a hope because it's still future because we don't have it full and complete salvation yet we have it in part it's it's fully ours in principle to be sure but our hope is living and real and certain that we will have the fullness of salvation one day in glory but you see beloved along with these privileges comes responsibility we teach that to our children don't we as they especially as they get older In their teenage years, you want more privileges? Well, there are responsibilities to go along with those privileges. And that's what Peter is also teaching these pilgrims. Their lives must reflect their privileges. They must live a certain way before the face of God in this pagan world. Now, before someone here raises the red flag and says, Now wait a minute, that sounds like works righteousness. it sounds like you're saying that these pilgrims have to live a certain way in order to obtain that inheritance. No, no, listen closely. Their living hope, salvation, does not come because of the way they live, but instead they are called to live a certain way because of the salvation that has already been given to them in part. you see. Their responsibility is a response to their privileges. And therefore tonight we hear the call to holy living born of living hope. Holy living born of living hope. We want to consider first of all the setting of holiness. Second, the style of holiness. And then the standard of holiness or holy living now peter says again in verse 13 therefore prepare your minds for action be self-controlled set your hope fully on the grace to be given you when jesus christ is revealed it's a little bit difficult to tell but the main clause or focus of this verse is to hope fully or as another translation says hope completely or we can also say hope perfectly But either way, the setting for holiness is hoping. Now, when Peter talked about that living hope before, he was talking about hope as a noun. That hope was a thing. We could say it is an object. It is salvation. But now, in this text, hope is a verb. Peter is talking about the action of hoping. And when Peter says, set your hope fully on the grace to be given to you, Grace is referring, again, back to that living hope, to that inheritance or salvation. So we can also read this here, hope fully on the living hope to be given to you. Again, the setting of holiness is to hope fully, to hope completely, or to hope perfectly. But then what does that mean? Well, on the one hand, it means to hope to the end, as the text says, when Jesus Christ is revealed. It means to keep on hoping for the entire pilgrimage. Don't give up hoping. But that's not all. To hope fully or completely or perfectly also means to hope exclusively. To hope without a doubt. Or to hope undividedly. To hope exclusively means to fix the eye of faith only and exclusively on Jesus Christ and the salvation that comes only or exclusively through Him. To hope without a doubt means to hope with the highest degree of confidence that the thing hoped for is a reality. To hope perfectly is not hoping with some sort of a shrug of the shoulders wondering if there's really any reason to hope at all. But it is to hope with full assurance of the thing hoped for. And then to hope undividedly means that we hope only in the object of our hope, namely salvation through Jesus Christ. Now Hebrews 12, 1 and 2 summarizes what it means to hope fully or completely when it says, let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith. And then in the setting of holiness, Peter also tells us what must be done in order to hope fully or completely. He says, prepare your minds for action. In other versions, the word that is used is gird. Gird your minds for action. Funny language, isn't it? We don't really use the word gird, do we? At least not in the sense it's used here. But another Bible version says here, gird up the loins of your mind. And even though this may sound strange to us, Peter's original audience would have understood what he meant. Because girding up the loins was a common thing then. If we go back to 1 Kings 18, verse 46, we read, Then the hand of the Lord was on Elijah, and he girded up his loins, and out ran Ahab to Jezreel. And then in 2 Kings 9, verse 1, it says, Now Elisha the prophet called one of the sons of the prophets and said to him, gird up your loins and take this flask of oil in your hand and go to Ramoth Gilead. You see, in the Bible times, people didn't wear blue jeans and t-shirts like many do today. They dressed very differently than we do. Different styles, obviously. Their clothes included undergarments like us and outer garments, but also some sort of a robe, maybe a bulky robe of some sort. And to gird up means literally to gather up. And in order to prepare themselves for physical activity, whether it was running or whether it was working or preparing for war, a person would gather up his robe with a girdle or a belt. If the robe wasn't tucked in the belt, it would get in the way when the person needed to do any sort of physical activity. And therefore, girding up the loins meant to prepare oneself for whatever he needed to do. To remove that which gets in the way. And therefore, Peter says in this text, prepare your minds, gird your minds for action, gird up the loins of your minds. He's talking about more than just the brain or simple mental activity. Here the word mind means that which guides and directs our conduct. It is our whole spiritual and mental attitude. And Peter is also talking here about the regenerated mind, the mind that is filled with the Holy Spirit and is able to discern what's right and excellent and is able to distinguish between the things of the world and the things of the kingdom of heaven. And when Peter says, prepare your minds for action, he's saying, prepare your minds spiritually. Get rid of the clutter in your minds that shouldn't be there. Untangle your minds from the passing cares and the vain desires of this world and focus on that which is really necessary. Set your minds on things above. You see, congregation, we must always have a spiritual attitude of preparedness about us at all times. But it's not easy, is it? Especially in the day and age in which we live. Our lives are busy. Our minds are filled with the schedules and the appointments and the activities of our children, of our homes, of our places of business. We can't hardly find the time to sit down for personal devotions, let alone prepare our minds for action spiritually. And often the day comes to an end, and we must confess that we realize that never once have we thought about God throughout that day. And you know, as if we aren't busy enough, we continue to fill our minds with clutter instead of getting rid of the clutter. Do you know how? Through most of the things that we read, or much of what we read. Through most of the TV shows we watch. Maybe you've said, as I confess I have said at a time or two in my life, that at the end of a busy day I just want to sit here in front of the TV and veg for a while. How dangerous. Really, how stupid. I want to clear my mind, you see. I don't want to think about anyone or anything else. I just want to turn off my brain for a little while. Well, beloved, that's unbiblical. Peter's instruction here is not an option. It's a command. You prepare your minds. And he gives us, we might say, a for instance, or a why in 1 Peter 3, verse 15, when he says, Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. Always be prepared. How do you remove the dangerous clutter and spiritually prepare your minds? well a couple of ideas first of all by spending time reading and meditating upon God's word which says in Philippians 4 verse 8 finally brothers whatever is true whatever is noble whatever is right whatever is pure whatever is lovely whatever is admirable if anything is excellent or praiseworthy think about such things drive out the clutter you see by filling your mind with these good things also by spending time down on your knees in prayer before your heavenly father We spend more time often talking to strangers, don't we, than talking to God or allowing God to speak to us through His Word? Or maybe by simply looking at God's creation and thinking and meditating about His majesty and greatness and power? Prepare your minds for action, beloved. But then Peter goes on to give another command which helps us as privileged pilgrims to hope fully or completely. Once you have prepared your minds for action, then he adds, be self-controlled. I really like how the New American Standard Bible translates it. That translates it, keep sober in spirit. Keep sober in spirit. Be self-controlled, sober. To be sober means to be alert. It means to be in control of your actions. It means to be free from confusion and fuzziness. to be sober is the opposite of being drunk when the mind is fuzzy and confused and out of control. Sometimes we say ignorance is bliss. No, it's not. Peter commands spiritual self-control or soberness. Jesus said, watch, pray, be ready. And He said that in the context of the parable of the wise and the foolish virgins, you remember, that at midnight when the bridegroom came, the foolish virgins were out of oil. They were not prepared. Their lamps ran out. Paul says to the Thessalonian believers, For you are all sons of light and sons of day. We are not of night nor of darkness. So then let us not sleep as others do, but let us be alert and sober. What is the setting for holy living? It includes minds prepared for action and being self-controlled and then hoping fully on the grace to be given you when Jesus Christ is revealed. Again, that grace is the inheritance. Imperishable, unspoiled, unfading, which is kept safe in heaven for you and me. And that grace is even now in the process of being brought to you if you are a child of God. And it will be yours completely when Jesus Christ comes again. And then, beloved, once we understand the setting of holy living, then the style of holy living naturally follows, doesn't it? Simply put, the style of holiness is obedience. It's as simple as that. Obedience. Peter begins verse 14 by saying, as obedient children. The original language says literally, as children of obedience. They have been adopted as children of God the Father through Jesus Christ. And obedience defines what it means to be a child of God. did you get that boys and girls young people obedience defines what it means to be a child of god romans 12 tells us that we are not we are under obligation not to the flesh to live according to the flesh but we are under obligation to live according to the spirit why because we are god's adopted children. We are under obligation to God, and that obligation is obedience. You see, beloved children of God prove that they are His children by obedience to Him. What kind of obedience? The same kind of obedience that God expects us as children to give to our parents. No questions asked obedience. I'm sure there's not a boy or girl here who says, why? Is there? Or, obedience without any back talk. I'd like to say that that never happens either among these families. But the same kind of obedience again that God expects us to give to our parents and then some. And Peter tells us exactly what is expected of obedient children. First of all, by telling us what obedient children don't do. Verse 14, as obedient children, do not conform to the evil desires you had when you lived in ignorance. In other words, your past is exactly that. It's past. Don't think about it. Don't desire it. Don't have anything to do with it. Just forget it. Peter says do not fashion yourselves according to those pre-conversion desires and appetites that used to be your guide, that used to be your pattern for life. These include all the actions and the inward emotions and desires of sinful man. They include the lusts and the desires of the flesh. These include the sinful lifestyle of the world. You see, their former desires were controlled by their ignorance. To be ignorant means that you don't know better. There's a lack of knowledge. They were spiritually ignorant, which means that they were spiritually blind and perverted. They had no knowledge of Christ. They were living in darkness. They were living in error, in vanity. They were destitute of light and life. And the temptation to return to their former desires was real. And it was great. We know how that is when trials and persecutions come. What do we do? We look for the easier life. We look for the easy way out. We know how that is because the world looks so appetizing and appealing and inviting. and the temptation is real for you and me to put off the new man and run out and grab onto the old man. You see, beloved, if you are a child of God, then Satan tries all the harder to tempt you and try to win you over. If we think back to the 11 young people who made profession of faith last week, you need to know this. You need to know this, that as you have stood up before God and His people and said, I believe, Satan is going to be there. Maybe harder than He ever has been before. Maybe He has been for you already in this past week. Because if you're not a child of God, you see, then you're living in ignorance and sin. And Satan doesn't have to worry about you, does he? Because he already has you. But Peter says, do not conform to the evil desires you had. Why? Because that is not who you are anymore. Why? Because you have been called by the Holy One. You have been delivered by the calling of God through the blood of Jesus Christ, applied to you by the Holy Spirit. That's what we learned in the first part of chapter 1. You've been regenerated, converted. You've been transformed to a new walk, a new lifestyle, and therefore the old man is now foreign to you. What is that new man, that new walk or lifestyle? As obedient children, be holy in all you do. Peter says in chapter 2, verse 9, these beautiful words of description of God's people, but you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. Now the word translated here in the text, in all you do, includes your walk, it includes your way of life, it includes your conversation, not just your verbal dialogue with another, but conversation here means your whole lifestyle. it includes your active life your public life your private life your life in relation to others whether they be family or friends or enemies it includes what you say and what you think and your attitude about everything it includes how you react to certain situations and how you handle problems with your fellow brothers and sisters in christ the command to be holy includes all civil and religious affairs it includes every condition of life whether you live in prosperity or whether you suffer from a lack of prosperity. Do you get the picture? The new man. Totally new. Absolutely every part and aspect of your life is to be characterized by holiness. Your thoughts, your words, your actions. There are no exceptions. Be holy, Peter says. How are you doing? How are you doing in the holiness department? You see, beloved, this is the style of holiness that is to be holy as children obedient to God why because we belong to him in fact because we belong to him God is then our standard for holiness look again at verse 15 but just as he who called you is holy so be holy in all you do just as he who called you is holy god is holy a couple of months ago we considered the holiness of god and this holy god has called his own and therefore his own are to be holy like him well what does it mean that god is holy god's holiness means that he is absolutely distinct and separate from all of his creatures he is exalted above them in infinite majesty it also means that god is completely separate from moral evil or sin he is pure he is morally excellent he possesses ethical perfection and god's holiness has been made known to you and me in his law the law of god as we often say on sunday morning reveals his holy character and when we show our thankfulness to god for delivering us from our sin and misery when we show that thankfulness by obeying his law then we participate in his holiness, then we are a little bit like him as Peter commands. In the Old Testament, we know that Israelites were God's people. He took them. He claimed them for his own. He set them apart from the other nations. Separation is the primary meaning of holiness. Separation from that which is not holy. Separation from sin. They were to be separate from the world around them. Because to be like God as we are called to be beloved means to be unlike the world. To be like God means to be unlike the world. Does that mean that the Israelites were sinless and morally pure? No, we know they weren't. We know they had their problems but still they were set apart. They were consecrated to God. As believers, as those called by God, You and I have been set apart for God's service. We are called to be holy like Him. You know, like Father, like Son. And our holiness is a response to God's holiness. And that means that we are not to be self-centered. But we are to be centered completely on God. Our fellowship is with God. Not with that which is unholy. Not with darkness. Not with that which is false and wicked. What or who is our standard of holiness? Our holy God Himself. but notice one more thing that this isn't just Peter's personal opinion that he's giving to us here he appeals himself to the highest authority he appeals to the very word of God do you notice what verse 16 says for it is written be holy because I am holy you see this was the very word of God to Moses to be given to the Israelites and we find we find these very words recorded three times in Leviticus and the word translated it is written was a legal term used for legal documents that were valid and binding continually. And that's the Word of God, beloved. The Word of God is valid and binding as valid and binding today as it was and as it ever shall be. And as God's people, we are commanded to be holy because He is. We don't need any other reason. It's because He is. He is our standard. Can we do it? Can we do it perfectly? No way. But that is the goal we are to strive for. And the beauty here is that the One who calls us to be His own, the One who commands us to be holy, He will make us holy. That's sanctification. If we look back again at the first part of 1 Peter 1 and look at what we need to know, we could summarize all of that with one word, justification justification is an act of God's free grace wherein he pardons he forgives all of our sins and he accepts us as righteous in his sight only for the sake of Christ's righteousness which is imputed freely credited to us justification is God's act for us he declares us not guilty and then in this text for tonight we've been talking about things that Peter is commanding us to do that we can't possibly do on our own and that's where sanctification comes in you see you can't have one without the other if God has justified you He will also sanctify you He has sanctified you in the sense that He calls you holy set apart and sanctification is a process it is that gracious and continuous operation of the Holy Spirit by which He causes us to hate sin more and more and in turn to love and seek to do what is right, to be holy and therefore become more and more like God. It's a process of becoming holy. Do we still sin? Absolutely. We're not sinless. But by the sanctifying power of the Holy Spirit, we sin less. Beloved, you and I are called to holy living born of living hope. And the goal of this living hope is perfect fellowship with God. To be like Him. To be delivered from all corruption and from all sin and from the second death. But in order to live holy by the grace of God and through the work of the Holy Spirit, you and I must engage in the setting of holiness. Prepare your minds for action. Be self-controlled. Hope fully on the grace to be given to you when Jesus Christ is revealed. And we must also exercise the style of holiness. As obedient children, be holy in all that you do. And then we must also entrust ourselves to the standard of holiness. Be holy because God is holy. We're talking about active Christianity here. Do you have that living hope? Do you now know what you must do? Are you heeding the call to holy living? You see, beloved, knowing that our Heavenly Father's promises are true, let us heed the words of Paul in 2 Corinthians 7, verse 1. Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God. Amen. Shall we pray? Our gracious God and Heavenly Father, we pray that indeed You would help us to take that which we now know. To take that which You have taught us through the illuminating power of Your Spirit. Help us to take that and apply it to what we must do. Father, may our desire be holiness. That we would desire to imitate our Heavenly Father. That we would not desire to go against Your holiness, but indeed to be seen by others in a way that reflects the holiness of our God. Give us a desire to be obedient children, obedient to You, O Lord. It may be our desire to walk in that obedience each and every day of our lives. And Father, when we are tempted to step away from that obedient path, Work in us powerfully. Do not let us go, O Lord. And keep us on that straight path in a way that is pleasing to You. In the name of Jesus Christ, we pray these things. Amen.