Read with Me
1 Peter 1:13-16 (HCSB)
Therefore, with your minds ready for action, be serious and set your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. As obedient children, do not be conformed to the desires of your former ignorance. But as the One who called you is holy, you also are to be holy in all your conduct; for it is written, Be holy, because I am holy.
Listen with Me
The “therefore” at the start of this section refers back to the previous verses where Peter pointed out how privileged his readers were, able to enjoy the benefits of living in the new economy of the Holy Spirit, something that the holiest men and women of the past were only able to ponder with longing. His point is that, as those who are able to live with the Holy Spirit in our hearts, we have absolutely no excuse for not living truly holy lives here and now.
As saints of God in this present dispensation, we must live with the understanding that every one of us has an integral part to play in God’s plan to reach all the people of the world with the good news of the gospel. Therefore, each one of us must start each day ready for action, secure in the knowledge that He will guide us to and through each opportunity if we will simply listen and obey, and that He will empower us as His witnesses if we will simply get in the game (Acts 1:8).
But in order to experience that knowledge and that empowerment, each of us must be obedient to both God’s commands and His leading. He cannot lead those who refuse to follow, and He will not empower those who refuse to obey. This is something that is easy to comprehend if we simply think back to the time when we lived in disobedience and rebellion, when we lived in our “former ignorance”. We could not be used for accomplishing God’s miraculous plan at all.
But now that we have been bought with the blood of Jesus, cleansed from the guilt of our sins, given eternal life, adopted as God’s children, and given the Holy Spirit to transform us from the inside out, all things are possible for us. And that includes obedience to God’s command to all his people: “Be holy, because I am holy”. And notice that this is a commandment from the first time God said it in Leviticus 11:44-45, 19:2, and 20:7. It is not a goal or an aspiration to be pursued if one has time. And with the Holy Spirit living in each of us, we all have the ability to obey it fully.
Pray with Me
Father, as is so often the case, we fully accept as binding the commands that we can see a way to obey in our own strength, using our own resources. But those commandments that seem out of our reach in our human ability, we tend to downgrade to suggestions, goals or aspirations, things that we can try to accomplish, but which we have no idea of being successful. But Peter is showing us that with the Holy Spirit living in us, something that Your people simply didn’t have before Pentecost, but which we all have access to today, everything becomes possible. With the Holy Spirit in us, obedience becomes a solid reality if we will only cooperate fully with Him, and true holiness is assured if we will simply make faithfulness, trust, and obedience our top priority. Help me, Lord, to live fully in the economy of your Holy Spirit every day. Amen.