I Peter 1:22-23

Verse 22, Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren, see that ye love one another with a pure heart fervently:

I. Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren.

A. ye (the individual person) have purified (make clean, or sanctify) your souls (actually the spirit in salvation).

1. This is talking about the salvation of the soul.

2. Some would rebel at the thought of Peter declaring that these people had saved themselves, but notice what Paul declares in I Cor. 4:15, "...for in Christ Jesus I have begotten you through the gospel." Paul didn't mean that he had saved these people, but his preaching the truth about salvation was used by the Holy Spirit, and they were saved by the power of God.

3. The truth of the matter is that it is quite impossible for a person to be saved unless they yield themselves to the wooing of the Holy Spirit.

4. The farmer would grow no crop if he only trusted God for that crop. The farmers responsibility is to prepare the ground for the seed, to plant the seed, and cultivate the plant. He then has the responsibility of harvesting the crop, and preparing it for market, or his own personal use. If he sits idly by and believes God will give the increase when he hasn't even planted the crop, he is a fool of the worse sort.

5. There are Baptists today, 1989, who want to be called "Sovereign Grace Baptists", and are afraid of "whosoever will" or of saying that an individual has a part in their salvation. I do not want to be called a Sovereign Grace Baptist any more than I desire to be called a Free Will Baptist. I do not want to preach on the local church all the time, any more than I want to preach against the universal, (visible, or invisible) church all the time. I do not want to major on any one doctrine, but rather "...teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you..." like Jesus commanded in the Great Commission. The desire of some is to "pigeonhole" the brethren of Christ so they will be able to fellowship only with those that are of like belief. The purpose of this "pigeonholing" is supposed to keep the church membership doctrinally pure. I do not believe this will work. Our people live in a real world and meet doctrine contrary to the doctrine of Christ every day. They must learn what the truth is and be able to stand for that truth, and against no person at all. If we as pastors will teach our people the complete truth of the Word of God, they will be able to stand for the truth, and make a good showing for themselves when they come up against false doctrine. Another thing to consider is those that do not believe the truth. I will use the doctrine of wine in the Lord's Supper for an example. The brothers that believe in using wine for the Lord's Supper have made this doctrine a test of fellowship and will not fellowship with those that believe in using grape juice as an element in the Lord's Supper. The result of this is that the people that use grape juice do not understand why we believe what we believe. They continue fellowshipping together, and with some brethren that use wine. The result of this fellowship has caused some brethren that formerly believed in wine to change their position and now they use grape juice. The major cause of this is that those that believe in wine would not fellowship with those that believe in grape juice, thus the position of wine was one of non fellowship. I believe we ought to be "missionary" in everything, not just about reaching lost souls in another country. We ought to be missionary about Bible doctrines in our own neighborhood, and even with those that don't believe exactly like we do. We should not forsake or compromise Bible doctrines, but we will never win anybody to the truth if we aren't open to fellowship. If they won't receive the truth; then, and only then, are we free to forsake them. But the way that will work is that we won't forsake them, or refuse to have fellowship with them. The Bible says, they will forsake us, I John 2:18,19.

B. Through the Spirit.

1. Peter adds this thought to assure his readers (and us) that it is impossible for someone to be saved without an external force (the Holy Spirit).

2. A person doesn't "decide" to be saved, or "make his commitment to Christ". (The phrase "make a commitment to Christ" is really a very sorry substitute for the word "salvation" as it sounds like salvation is something a person determines by himself, without God. It makes no mention of "total depravity" or his complete inability to do anything of himself.

C. Unto unfeigned (undisguised) love of the brethren.

1. Whenever a person is saved, the Holy Spirit directs the believer to love other believers.

a. I Thess. 4:9, "...ye yourselves are taught of God to love one another:"

b. I John 3:14-18 - If we don't love the brethren, it is because we are not saved.

2. This is not something a person must work at, but it comes immediately upon salvation. Even if they were formerly enemies, now they are the dearest of friends.

II. see that ye love one another with a pure heart fervently.

A. Even though the Holy Spirit gives us an undisguised love for the brethren at salvation, it is our responsibility to continue to develop that love and not let it fall to the ground.

1. John 13:34 - The new commandment Jesus gave is that we love one another as He loved us.

2. The foundation of love for our brethren is our love for God.

B. Pure heart - Titus 1:15, "Unto the pure all things are pure: but unto them that are defiled and unbelieving is nothing pure..."

C. fervently means intently, and with much desire.

Verse 23, Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever.

I. Born again, or receiving salvation.

II. Corruptible seed.

A. The seed is speaking of the source of life between a man and a woman.

B. If the seed was 99.99% pure, it would still be corruptible, and would produce totally corruptible fruits. After a process of time, as a small amount of corruption produced a greater amount of corruption, there would be great corruption indeed, until the whole was corrupted.

III. Incorruptible.

A. I Peter 1:4 states that our inheritance is incorruptible.

1. It is incorruptible because it's maker is incorruptible.

2. I Cor. 15:52 - At the resurrection, we shall receive an incorruptible body.

B. Word of God. There is a lot of discussion concerning whether this phrase means the Bible or Jesus. This discussion doesn't make any sense to me because Jesus is the Word of God, the Bible.

1. This scripture isn't talking about the physical book called the Bible.

a. John 5:39, "Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life:..." Some believe they are saved by reading, studying, declaring, and a physical obedience to the Bible, but this isn't so.

b. This scripture is not saying that we are saved by the Word of God (meaning words written down on a page).

2. It is saying that Jesus is the incorruptible seed, and that He is also the Word of God.

a. John 1:1-5,14 declares that Jesus is God and the written Word.

b. If we truly believe in Jesus to the salvation of our souls, we will have no trouble believing the Bible is the Word of God.

C. Liveth and abideth for ever. There are two that will live and abide forever, the Bible and Jesus Christ, but in eternity, we will not experience them as separate.

1. Liveth means to be alive, or have life.

2. Abideth means to stay (in a given place, state, relation or expectancy).

3. Our relationship to Jesus Christ.

a. Our relationship to Jesus Christ will remain the same throughout all eternity.

b. We believe Security of the Believer is a most glorious doctrine, but when this doctrine follows its logical conclusion into eternity, it takes on an unfathomed depth of splendor.

c. The great difference between our relationship with Jesus now and in eternity, is that now we are cumbered with this physical body which retains the sinful nature. In eternity we will no longer look through a glass darkly, but shall see Jesus face to face.

4. Our relationship to the Word of God, the Bible.

a. The pages the Bible is written on will be burned up in the fire that destroys this universe.

b. The Words of the pages will never be destroyed, for Jesus is the Word of God.

c. We receive much joy in studying the Bible even though we have a sinful nature, but in eternity, our joy will be so much more enlarged that our earthly joy will seem as nothing.

d. Our understanding of the scriptures will be much clearer because our study will not be hindered by our preconceived ideas.