Love One Another (1 Peter 1.22–25)

Peter is urging the readers to love one another deeply from the heart. He emphasizes that this commandment is the main focus of their study. He also addresses the issue of ecumenism and the divisions within the church. Peter encourages Christians to love each other with a pure heart and persistently. He emphasizes the importance of submitting to the transcendent Word of God, which has the power to transform and purify believers. The goal is to love the brethren with purity and without malice. This love should be characterized by righteousness, innocence, chasteness, and sincerity. Peter reminds readers that God's Word is unchanging and enduring, and it should be the ultimate authority in their lives. The commandment to love deeply with a pure heart can only be fulfilled through obedience to the truth found in God's Word. The passage highlights the need for Christians to love and support one another, especially in times of persecution and suffering. Peter emphasizes the importance of un So I invite you then to open your Bibles in the first epistle of Peter to various churches scattered throughout the Roman Empire. First Peter, and we are going to read from verses 22 to verse 25 on this occasion. Verse 22, Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for each other, 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. For all people are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of the field. The grass withers, and the flowers fall, but the word of the Lord endures forever, and this is the word that was preached to you. Let us pray one more time briefly. Dear God, thank you for your word, and thank you for what you have done for us. May you always be honored with our lives, with our words, with our actions. May this church, Calvary Baptist Church, honor you always. Amen. This is actually a rather straightforward passage. There is one single command in this passage, simple, in verse 23, or at the end of verse 22, love one another deeply from the heart. That is the passage, that is the commandment, and that is what we are going to be studying this morning. Interestingly though, in very Peter's style, or Petrine style, if you use those fancy words, the commandment is enveloped, or couched, with so many other things around it, that initially they look like other commandments as well. That is because in Greek you can do something like that with what they call a participle clause. You don't have to remember that, it is just for you to know. But actually there is only one commandment in this passage, and it is love one another deeply. However, that commandment makes better sense as we examine all the things surrounding it, and that is what we are going to do this morning. When I was in undergraduate school, or actually not undergraduate because I did something else there, but when I went to seminary, I went to a very conservative seminary. And one of the concerns, there was a class at seminary, one of the concerns was how fast ecumenism was growing. Now what is ecumenism? I don't know if I am saying the word right, okay, so you will forgive me for that. But ecumenism is the idea that different branches of the Christian church, and I use Christian here in its most generic sense, different branches of the Christian church were discussing that we are too divided, we need to unite. So you have the Catholic church, the Orthodox church, Lutheran churches, other evangelical churches, trying to do things together to unite. Now for many conservative fundamentalist churches, this was a problem, because they thought that some of these churches have denied or renounced some of the important truths. And they had a point, so it was concerning that ecumenism was growing. But ecumenism was becoming more and more attractive. In fact, you can see that today in the fact that many churches nowadays are refusing to identify with a specific denomination. More and more churches that you see refer to themselves as independent church, or they like the word community. You will have a lot of Bible community church, chapel community church, I don't know, you just name it, everything is community. Right from the get-go, you don't know what's their affiliation. Are they Methodist, Westman, Pentecostal, Baptist? It's community church. Now that's not, I'm not saying this to criticize, but why was there this interest in many Christians being an ecumenical church? Why was it so attractive? Why do many churches today refuse to affiliate themselves with certain denominations, and they rather go with the community kind of label? The answer is simple. The reason ecumenism is attractive for many people in the church is because many Christians are tired of all the divisions that exist in the church. And perhaps some of these ecumenical ideas are not that bad. Perhaps there is good at it. You see, I realize that we have to separate ourselves when a church or a group has embraced heretical ideas that are not part of the historical faith, the historic faith. But the truth of the matter is that many churches separate from others and break communion, not because there's been some disagreement on the historical doctrines of the faith. Some of these divisions actually happen because of petty things, not grounded on the scripture at all, many of them preferences, many of them wrong interpretations of the scriptures, or a misunderstanding of what is an essential doctrine and what is not. For some people an essential doctrine is that every one of you wears a tie when you come to church. I'm not exaggerating. I know of churches, these are not Baptists, but they are Mennonites, where when you wanted to become a member of this church, you had to go to the Council of the Elders, and they were going to tell what color of shirt were you supposed to wear on a given Sunday. Churches are fighting all the time, dividing all the time for silly things. Now the pastor is preaching from the NIV. I'm no longer coming to this church. Or they've decided to go with a green hymn book. I like the red. And you think I'm making stuff up, but this happens all the time. Churches fight, divide for silly things. To be honest, most of the things that have affected churches have not been doctrinal in the majority of cases. As a matter of fact, many Baptist churches are known to grow through divisions. Churches are constantly divided and fighting. And yes, Peter is not concerned about an ecumenical movement. He's actually writing to local churches. And because these are issues in every church, and the gospel of Christ is at stake, if we don't solve this issue, Peter writes to his readers, Love one another deeply from the heart. Now interestingly, before, however, he gives the commandment, he already assumes that this has happened. He has kind of like a romantic vision of the church. He says, now that you've been purified yourselves by obeying the truth, so that you have sincere love. This is his romantic perspective of how Christians ought to be. You already have been purified. You have sincere love. Since this is what you are to be, theoretically, since this is what you are, then well, let's fold our sleeves and let's get the job done. Love one another deeply from the heart. And that is the commandment. The commandment is that you, wherever you're sitting, right there, the commandment is that you would love your neighbor. This passage is particularly to the local church. So I am going to be speaking to Calvary Baptist Church right now. It spills, of course. And my prayer to you, and I believe this is Peter's prayer to you and commandment, is that may God's deep love for you, for us, overflow in our deep love towards one another. Don't forget that this passage is given in the context of believers being persecuted for their faith. And this is meant to be a spiritual resource for them to face persecution, to face suffering. It's enough, you know, that the world is hating you. You don't need to add your brother to that. You need your brother to love you. You need your sister to love you. Only our love for one another is going to sustain us in the difficult moments, particularly when we are facing trials and persecution because of our faith. So Peter begins with, he doesn't begin with the commandment, he begins with stating what I would call his romantic perspective of Christians, which is a reality in our inner being, but it needs to be reflected in our lives. But I will begin with the commandment, and we will work our way through that. So as we look at our passage, the first thing that Peter makes evident, or the one thing that is most important in this passage, is that Christians are to love one another with purity and without malice. The commandment that Peter gives us in this passage is found at the end of verse 22. As I said, he says, love one another deeply from the heart. That's what the NIV says. And yet, I preach every week from the NIV, but I've told you before, if you've been in the seminar of the Bible that I've given two years ago, by the way, I was not here last week because I was invited to another church to give this seminar. In that seminar, I tried to make it clear to people that only the autographs are inspired, the original documents. No copies of the New Testament or of the Bible are inspired, and no translations. We do have reliable translations, and we can speak that this is the Word of God, because yes, it is. But no translation is perfect and inspired. Not even the KJV. Neither the NIV. And I think here the NIV, for the purpose of clarity, they've missed something. The NIV translates the text as, love one another deeply. There it's great, but then it says, from the heart. However, there is one word that the NIV decided not to translate, that the Net Bible captures better. And the Net Bible says, love one another earnestly. That could be deeply, it's the same. But then, from a pure heart. There is this word that Peter writes. He tells the readers that they ought to love each other deeply. But he says, from a pure heart. The commandment is to love the brethren of the church. That's the other thing, okay? Because before, in verse 22, he says, Now that you've been purified yourself by obeying the truth, so that you have sincere love. That word, sincere love, literally means brotherly love. Philadelphia, that's where the name for the city in Pennsylvania comes from. Philadelphia, brotherly love. Literally, it says, now that you've purified yourself by obeying the truth, so that you have brotherly love. Love one another. So, the commandment here is to love the brethren in the church. Your sister and your brother in Christ. Those with whom you have fellowship, and with whom you have in common, the gospel of Jesus Christ. Love them, he says. Yes, as Christians, we are commanded to love everyone, including those who oppose us, our enemies. That's true. But here in this context, Peter's emphasis is on brotherly love. The commandment is to love our brothers and sisters in Christ. That's the commandment. Think of the person that sits on the opposite side of you, with whom you hardly ever talk. Think of the children that, because of their energy and loudness, annoys you and makes you really mad. Think of the person that sees things completely different than you. Think of those who have a different preference of music. Think of the teenagers whose hairstyle bothers you. I love your hairstyle, don't worry. I wish I could have dreads too. Or think of that teenager whose attitude gets on your nerves. Think of that lady or gentleman that talks too much. Or the opposite. They hardly ever talk. Think of the person that very seldom have words of encouragement. Only criticism. Or think of the person that is always happy, as if they live in a bubble. And there's not a real world. According to Peter, you are to love them. You're to love them. You're to love them. Love one another with a pure heart and deeply. And that's the first thing. Love the brethren with a pure heart. Now, how is it that you are supposed to love them? You're supposed to love the brethren with a pure heart. As I've already mentioned, even though the NIV simply says, from the heart, the text literally says, from a pure heart or with a pure heart. The preposition could be translated either way. But what does it mean to love somebody with a pure heart? What does that mean? To love with a pure heart means to love without malice, without guile, without ulterior motives. And with a love that is characterized by righteousness, innocence, chasteness, and sincerity. The word pure here literally means chaste, without contamination. And it can go so many ways. Without contamination from sin. It could mean don't love your brethren in a sinful way. It could mean in a hypocritical way. In a malicious way. Hoping to get something out of this transaction. In a phony way. Or in an impure, lustful way. It could be so many things. Peter doesn't specify. He just tells us pure heart. And I think he chooses to remain ambiguous on purpose. So that we don't just limit it to one way. It is a love that is generous. It is a love that is kind. It is a love that is appropriate. Love the brethren with a pure heart. But that is not the only way Peter qualifies our love. He also says that we should love the brethren with a deep love. In this regard, the NIV correctly renders the text as love one another deeply. And what does that mean? Again, how do we love our brothers and sisters? Deeply. We love them deeply when we love them strenuously or persistently. We don't throw in the towel after various unsuccessful attempts. We don't give up. We keep on loving again and again. If our love is not appreciated, we persist until it is felt. If our love is rejected, we keep on loving. We keep on going and we do it sincerely. Because that is what God does. Isn't it? If I was God, I would have burned you already probably. But I am not God. He keeps on loving. He keeps on loving. He keeps on forgiving us. He keeps on putting up with us. And sometimes we got to put up with each other. But we need to keep on going. Doing it again. Trying again. Let's do it one more time. Deeply. Persistently. Strenuously. And that is my prayer. And that is what Peter wants for all of us. Yes, may God's deep love for us overflow in our deep love toward one another. And this is more than a mere emotional, bubbly, butterfly-ly feeling. This is a loving action. Putting yourself or considering the others as superior to yourself. Putting their needs above your own needs. Now, if Christians are going to love with purity and without malice, Christians must submit to the transcendent Word of God. In fact, in our passage, Peter assumes, as I told you at the beginning, that his Christian readers are already, in essence, in their own lives, they are already this kind of people. People that ought to love. Meant to love. Before he actually gives them the command to love deeply with a pure heart, he states that they are already pure. He writes, you've been purified yourself. And that's exactly what Peter is saying here. Peter's readers can obey the command to love deeply with a pure heart because they have been purified to love in this way. But how have these believers been purified? How can they have a holy love, if you are to say? Because they themselves have been made holy. But how? Or more precisely, how are believers purified to love with a deep love? Well, believers are purified when they obey God's Word. And this is precisely what Peter states. You have purified yourself, how? By obeying the truth. And what was the goal of this purification, by the way? Well, the goal was to have a pure, sincere love for the brethren. You've been purified yourself by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for each other. Believers are able to love with a pure and a deep love only when they are transformed by the Word of God, as they submit to it. Interestingly, Peter qualifies God's Word as the truth. He says, you've been purified by the truth. Indeed, God's Word is our absolute truth. The authority of God's Word in our lives has no competition. There are no other truths for us. That is not to say that there are no other things that are true outside the Bible. They are scientific, mathematical truths. But there is no competition for the Word of God as our absolute truth, as our authority. It is God's Word what defines the way we are to talk and think and behave. And as long as we submit to God's Word, our souls will be purified. And we will be able to love with a deep and pure heart. With a deep love and a pure heart. Now, how is it possible for God's Word to have this transforming power? How is it that these words in the Scriptures that we are studying right now, how is it that they have this transforming power? How is it that we can be purified? Why? Why does the Word of God do that? Well, the answer is because God's Word is unchanging and transcendent. And we have to think a little bit about that. In the following verses, Peter describes God's Word as imperishable, living, and enduring. In fact, to support his theological perspective about the nature of the Scriptures, Peter himself quotes the Old Testament Scripture. He quotes Isaiah chapter 40, verses 6 and 8. He says, For all people are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of a field. The grass withers, and the flowers fall. But the Word of the Lord endures forever. Now, what's the point of all of these verses? Well, the point of these verses is that we humans are transitory. We are just here for a little while. But it's not so much that. But it is also that we are fickle. That is the idea. We're fickle. We're not reliable. Most people. I hope you are. But in comparison to God, we're fickle. We're changing our minds. We're not reliable. Sometimes we lie. We lie too much. God's Word is not like that. God's Word is transcendent. It's unchanging. It's permanent. This is what Isaiah believes. And this is what Peter believes. And this is what he's telling them. Love. And you can love. Because why? Because you've been changed. By obeying the truth. The Word of God. The truth that is imperishable. That its statutes never change. It's living. I love that word. It's living. Because it's not just like a written law on the stone tablets. Or on the constitution that are there. It's a living Word. It's a Word that stirs our souls. And changes us. It's living. It's enduring. Permanent. Reliable. God's Word endures forever. It endures forever as the source of ultimate authority. And it endures forever as God's instrument to change us. So that we could love with a pure heart. So that we could love with a deep love. That is why Peter prays. And I do. Our desire is that God's deep love for us. Overflow. In our deep love toward one another. This is my prayer for all of us. We are called to love one another. With a deep love. And this deep love ought to drive us into action. To be careful listeners. Careful listeners to try to put yourself in the situation of the other person. To know what is the background. What are they feeling? Why do they feel this way? Because the same for you too. And we can only do this if we are submitting ourselves to the Word of God. Because the Word of God challenges us. To be kind. To consider the others as superior than myself. To humble myself. If I'm not listening to the Word of God. I can't love the way Peter is saying. Yes, we are called. To help the poor. We are called to feed the hungry. As a matter of fact, sometimes I get scared. When the Lord Jesus comes in His second coming. And His supposedly disciples come to Him. And the Lord Jesus says, I was naked. I was hungry. I was in jail. And you didn't care for me. And then His disciples or the people who are ready to be judged. Will ask, Lord, when did we do that? When you didn't do it to one of these little ones. We don't like to talk about these things. That's social gospel, right? We're good at separating things. No, people need the Word of God. The Gospel of Jesus Christ. And they need the love of Christians. But it needs to begin here in the church. We need to love each other. We need to be able to overcome the things that separate us. We need to be able to have a conversation. Because God loves us. And His love overflows. And our love needs to overflow for one another. But this will only happen as we submit to the Word of God. Now the heart of this passage is that Christians are supposed to love with purity and without malice. I have said that we are going to do this. That is to love with purity and without malice. Only if we submit to the transcendent Word of God. Now I would like to point your attention to the fact that Peter is giving these commandments to Christians, however. And to Christians alone. He's not writing here to society in general. He's writing to Christians in the church. Why is that? Why is he saying this? Is it because non-believers cannot love? Of course not. People who are not Christians can, and of course, show their love at times. They do. However, the kind of love Peter is challenging us to have to our brothers and sisters in Christ, is a love that cannot exist without God's miraculous intervention. It's a radical love. No one can love with a deep and a pure heart without ulterior motives, unless they themselves can submit to the Word of God. And for a person to be able to submit to the Word of God, they have to have been changed by God's love. They have to have experienced conversion. They should indeed be Christians, for only real Christians are saved through the preached Word of God. At the beginning of verse 23, Peter says to his Christian readers, that they have been born again through the living and enduring Word of God. Then at the end of verse 25, Peter states, and this is the Word that was preached to you. These believers are able to obey God's command to love the brethren deeply and with a pure heart, because they have experienced salvation. They've experienced new birth. They have been loved deeply by God, and they have been changed by God's transcendent Word, by God's unchanging truth, which in Peter's mind, by the way, is summarized in the message of the Gospel, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that He was buried according to the Scriptures, and that on the third day He rose again in victory according to the Scriptures. For Peter, the Word of God is summarized in this Gospel. Peter states that the Word of God is the Word that was preached to you. There we go. It's not just social Gospel, because we must preach the Word of Truth. We love them. We open our homes. We're generous. We show them Christ, and we share Christ with everybody. Only if you have been changed by God's love, can you truly love deeply and with a pure heart. But it has to begin here. I doubt there's here nobody that has done something that maybe makes you upset or things like that. Things happen. But we love each other. We keep on loving. We deeply do. We keep on going, and on, and on, and again, and again, and again. That's the testimony we give to our community and to the people outside. When they come, they need to experience this is a loving community. And when they come, they can experience love, forgiveness. I've said before that our approach here at Calvary Baptist Church is a grace approach. That doesn't mean we... It doesn't matter the truth for us. The truth is very important for us. But it is a grace approach. We give people the benefit of the doubt. It is a grace approach. We strive to be gracious to you when we talk. Because we have been shown great mercy. I have been shown great mercy. If it wasn't by the grace of God, I would probably be somewhere with a needle in my arms. If it wasn't by the grace of God, I wouldn't be here preaching His word to you. I've been shown so much grace. And that's why I hope and pray that the Lord helps me to show grace to you. Sometimes we can be firm. And we ought to be firm. But we do it with grace. May God's deep love for us overflow in our deep love towards one another. Let us pray. Dear God, thank you for your word. And thank you for this opportunity you give us to be here. Help us to submit to your word so that we are enabled to love deeply with a pure heart. And help us to begin here in church with those we know best. Because it is more difficult to love those we really know. May our sincere love overflow to one another, but also to those outside these church walls. Amen.