May 4, Evening

C. H. Spurgeon · Modern retelling

"Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible." — 1 Peter 1:23 · KJV

Peter earnestly urged the scattered saints to love each other "with a pure heart fervently," and he wisely drew his argument not from the law, nor from nature, nor from philosophy, but from the high and divine nature God has planted in His people. Just as a wise tutor of princes might work to awaken and nurture in them a kingly spirit and dignified bearing, finding his arguments in their rank and ancestry, so Peter looks on God's people as heirs of glory, princes of the royal line, descendants of the King of kings, earth's truest and oldest nobility, and says to them: See that you love one another, because of your noble birth, being born of incorruptible seed; because of your lineage, being descended from God, the Creator of all things; and because of your immortal destiny, for you will never pass away, though the glory of the flesh fades and even its existence comes to an end. It would be good if, in a spirit of humility, we recognized the true dignity of our regenerated nature and lived up to it. What is a Christian? Compare him with a king, and he adds priestly holiness to royal dignity. A king's royalty often lies only in his crown, but in a Christian it is poured into his inmost nature. His new birth lifts him as far above his fellows as a man stands above the animals that perish. Surely he ought to conduct himself, in all his dealings, as one who does not belong to the crowd but has been chosen out of the world, marked by sovereign grace, enrolled among God's own special people, and who therefore cannot grovel in the dust as others do, nor live in the manner of the world's citizens. Let the dignity of your nature and the brightness of your prospects, O believers in Christ, hold you fast to holiness and make you avoid even the appearance of evil.