1 PETER 1 (NOTES OF A READING)
[p. 213] 1 PETER 1 (NOTES OF A READING)
Ques Grace in this verse is the subject of hope, is it not? We are apt to think of glory in that connection rather than grace.
CAC Yes, clearly so. As we have been told sometimes, grace is commensurate with glory; that is, we do not really get the full measurement of grace without bringing in the thought of glory too. The scripture says, “Jehovah will give grace and glory” (Psalm 84: 11).
Ques How do you gird up the loins of your mind?
CAC Does it imply a tendency with us to let our thoughts run loosely in all directions, and it is well they should be bound up and concentrated upon the wonderful things that will be ours at the appearing of Jesus Christ? It supposes that we have our minds under control, does it not?
Rem Yes, a definite control and narrowing up of that on which our minds are set.
CAC Yes, and yet really occupied with a vast range of things.
Rem It refers to the lower affections; that the mind might not wander is guarded against. Sometimes it is difficult to concentrate on divine thoughts and things in our minds, and if we pray at any length. Peter is very practical.
CAC Very practical.
Rem It supposes that it has been done.
Rem Yes, I think it is a basis from which these other considerations can be looked at.
Ques The thought of obedience comes in — “children of obedience”. In what way does that work out?
CAC It would suggest the saints take character from that principle. They are, as it were, begotten of that principle; that is, the element of obedience has come in marking off the saints from all other people.
[p. 214] Ques Is it connected with verse 2, the same principle of obedience as Christ’s?
CAC Well, I think so. I think the great principle of obedience has been fully manifested in Him. It is really the necessary principle of all God’s ways with His creature. He said in the first covenant, “If ye will hearken to my voice indeed and keep my covenant, then shall ye be my own possession out of all the peoples” (Exodus 19: 5). It is those marked by obedience who alone can be of any value to God.
Ques This is set out in Christ in perfection, but are these things for formation in the saints?
CAC I thought that the first chapter is descriptive in detail of how saints become living stones in the second chapter. All these things have to be put together to constitute what is a living stone. Then all the stones are built together to form the house. Certain elements are needed for us to fit together. If nothing else were in evidence in you and me, how beautifully we should fit together.
This new principle of obedience is introduced, and nothing is more delightful than this principle when accepted. The principle of obedience is heaven. “Thy will be done as in heaven so upon the earth” (Matthew 6: 10). It is just as well if a little of heaven comes to us, and when it begins to operate it is the principle of heaven in the soul. It is what will come into evidence at the revelation of Jesus Christ; there will not be anything else.
Every believer is taken up for this. There is material for it potentially in every believer. That is why we value the brethren, because they are potential material for this wonderful working out of divine thoughts. Satan has brought in the principle of disobedience. God is meeting all that in bringing in the principle of obedience. What was it constituted me a lost being? Just the principle of disobedience; naturally I much prefer my own will. When God begins to work, He gives an entirely new thought, that God’s will is very much better than mine.
[p. 215] Moses and Elias are taken up as patterns, but they appeared in glory, two men in company with Jesus glorified, and perfectly suited to be there. That is, the very principle of obedience that was glorified in Jesus was also glorified in them. It is the great mark of the work of God in the soul. There are certain things I cannot be happy to go on with; there is a definite breaking off from the line of what pleases me to the line of what pleases God. That is conversion!
Rem Some of us could do with more of that.
CAC Well, there is the chance of another conversion! Angels must be astonished to see creatures of God doing their own will, must they not? So really “as children of obedience, not conformed to your former lusts in your ignorance”, they were no longer to bear the mark of these things. What we desired naturally was really a matter of ignorance — we did not know God.
Rem They are Christ’s generation. They belong to and are traced out here as such.
CAC No doubt it is so. These great principles come out here: obedience, holiness, faith, hope and love. They are features very suitable to a redeemed people on earth. Peter is writing to a redeemed people.
Rem It could not be possible apart from redemption.
CAC What they were talking about on the holy mount was not what good people they had been. It is a great matter to be firmly grounded on the fact that we are redeemed, that our place with God is according to all the value of the precious blood of Christ, and it is on that ground alone that we can take up the exercises of faith and hope. And however much we take them up it does not add one tittle to the value of redemption.
Ques Does redemption imply God’s claim placed on the matter of purchase?
CAC Yes, “Redeemed ... from your vain conversation handed down from your fathers”. Does it not imply that it referred to the system of religion in which they had [p. 216] been brought up?
Rem In that way everything is made to contrast with Christ, and give great prominence to Him.
CAC Yes, indeed. Any kind of conversation that left Him out would be “vain conversation”. Judaism was really an empty thing because it was not Christ. It presents certain things in a typical way, but it was vain; it had no true divine value. But now we have come to that which has infinite divine value. “Conversation” is the whole course of a person’s life.
Rem Redemption is for God. It is the value He sets on us.
Ques. A ransom?
CAC That is purchase — “Bought with a price” (1 Corinthians 7: 23) is like a slave bought in the market as the absolute possession of the one who bought him. It must be a question of redemption in that way. We do not want to escape from that sort of slavery, do we?
Ques Is there some reference in verse 19 to the paschal lamb? That was to be its feature.
CAC The Spirit of God emphasises the incorruptible value of the blood of Christ — all it means to God. That is the purchase price — the cost. It shows the value of the saints to God if they were purchased at that price. It brings in all that Christ is as “foreknown indeed before the foundation of the world”. Before Adam was created, God had Christ before Him, as the One who would effect redemption, so that God might have a people composed of men, human beings, entirely free from everything that is vain and worthless, that they might be to the pleasure of God. It is all in the value of the precious blood; and the One who is so made known is the One by whom we believe in God; that is, He becomes the medium by means of whom we believe on God.
Rem You have not expressed your thought as to the paschal lamb.
[p. 217] CAC I was thinking that would be in Peter’s mind. “A lamb without blemish and without spot” is almost a direct reference to the passover lamb, and in a certain sense it was greater than all the other sacrifices, because it formed the basis on which all the other sacrifices were offered.
Ques Do we get any other type of redemption besides the passover lamb in the Old Testament?
CAC Have you anything in your mind?
Rem I thought it was the only basis of relationship.
CAC Yes.
Ques Redemption is connected with the shedding of blood, is it not, and connected very much with the blood of the paschal lamb?
CAC Well, it is perhaps doubtful whether there is another type, because the blood on the mercy-seat is not quite the thought of redemption, but meeting the glory of God in respect of sin.
In Romans it is “redemption which is in Christ Jesus”; that is, redemption in its full value and results. “Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus; whom God has set forth a mercy-seat, through faith in his blood” (Romans 3: 24, 25).
Ques Is it the same application in Hebrews? “By his own blood, has entered in once for all into the holy of holies” (chapter 9: 12).
CAC That seems to refer to the high priest going into the holiest with the blood. I suppose the two greatest types of the death of Christ are the paschal lamb, and the sin-offering on the day of atonement. One is, so to speak, at the beginning, God taking His people out of Egypt for Himself, whereas the blood on the mercy-seat is the abiding ground on which He speaks to His people. He ever speaks to them from that standpoint. “There will I meet with thee, and will speak with thee” (Exodus 25: 22).