A life that is dedicated to looking like Jesus is driven by a reverent respect for Jesus...

This week, we are looking at a section of this letter that the Apostle Peter wrote to early followers of Jesus that is recorded for us in the New Testament of the Bible called the book of 1 Peter. Yesterday, we looked at 1 Peter 1:13-16, where we discovered the timeless truth that the hope we have in Jesus should lead to a life that is dedicated to looking like Jesus.

As followers of Jesus, the reality is that a life that is dedicated to looking like Jesus is not dominated by the selfish desires that dominated our life before we came to know Jesus. Instead, a life that is dedicated to looking like Jesus is set apart and committed to revealing and reflecting Jesus in how we live out our day to day lives in obedience to Jesus. As followers of Jesus, we have been chosen by God and rescued by God’s gracious activity through Jesus to live distinctly different lives. 

We are called to live distinctly different lives when it comes to how we handle our sexuality, our family relationships, how we love and treat those who are different than us ethnically or socioeconomically, how we respond to wrongdoing and injustice, and how we worship, then the culture around us. And when we live such distinctly different lives than the culture around us, we are perfectly positioned to be the vehicle that God used to reveal Himself to the world. As Peter continues this section of this letter, we see him unpack the motivation that should drive our desire to live lives that are dedicated to looking like Jesus in 1 Peter 1:17-19:

 If you address as Father the One who impartially judges according to each one's work, conduct yourselves in fear during the time of your stay on earth; ¹⁸ knowing that you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold from your futile way of life inherited from your forefathers, ¹⁹ but with precious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ.

Now Peter’s statement in verse 17, if communicated in the language we use in our culture today, would have sounded something like this: If you claim to be a Christian; if you claim that you have a relationship with God the Father, you better live out your day to day life in a way that recognizes that God will judge how you live your life in an impartial manner, so you better live your day to day life in a way that demonstrates a reverent respect for God so as to submit and obey Him.”

When Peter uses the word fear, this word does not describe what we experience when we watch the latest “Alien” or “Resident Evil” movie. Instead, when we see the word fear throughout the letters that make up the Bible, this word conveys the sense of having a reverent respect for someone that result in submission and obedience to that person. And it is here that we see Peter reveal for us the reality that a life that is dedicated to looking like Jesus is driven be a reverent respect for Jesus. As followers of Jesus our day to day lives are to be driven by a reverent respect for Jesus that results in a life that strives to live in submission and obedience to Jesus.

Peter revealed three different reasons why we as followers of Jesus are to be driven by a reverent respect for Jesus. First, as followers of Jesus, we are to be driven by a reverent respect for Jesus that recognizes the Lord as the impartial judge. At the end of God’s story here on earth, we will all stand before the Lord to give an account for how we lived our lives. And the Lord is an impartial judge; the Lord will judge our behavior without partiality; the standard is the same for all humanity.

All humanity will have to answer for how they answered the question “Who is Jesus?” And for those who never heard of Jesus, all humanity will have to answer for how they responded to God’s activity in their lives through the creation and through their conscience. The standard is the same for all followers of Jesus; did you respond to my gracious activity in your life by leading a life that was dedicated to look like Jesus? If not, why not?

Second, in verse 18 and 19, Peter explains that followers of Jesus are to be driven by a reverent respect for Jesus “knowing that you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold from your futile way of life inherited from your forefathers, but with precious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ.” Now the word redeemed here, in the language that this letter was originally written in, means to be purchased by ransom. This word was also used to describe how a slave would be purchased from a local slave market.

In addition, when Peter uses the phrase from your futile way of life inherited from your forefathers, he is painting a word picture that these Jewish followers of Jesus would be very familiar with. And this word picture was that of a sacrificial offering that would be offered as part of the Jewish sacrificial system. In the Jewish sacrificial system, there were two times every day that sacrifices were made to God for the sins of the people, one early in the morning and one in the in the late afternoon at 3 p.m. The sacrificial offerings involved animals who were offered as a substitute to pay the penalty for acts of selfishness and rebellion that had been committed against God by the Jewish people.

Peter’s point here is that the Jewish sacrificial system involved objects that were used to pay for the acts of the selfishness and rebellion of humanity that were perishable. Whether it was the silver of the gold that was used to purchase the animals that were used in the Jewish sacrificial system, or whether it was the animals themselves, they would all perish or be ruined over time. Even the purest gold over time becomes ruined over time.

However, unlike the Jewish sacrificial system that used things that would perish or be ruined over time to pay for the selfishness and rebellion of humanity, as followers of Jesus, they were purchased with precious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ. Peter’s point here is that the blood of Jesus that was shed on the cross, in our place, for our selfishness and rebellion, does not lose its value over time. Jesus blood is priceless, perfect, without any defect, and is not subject to ruin over time.

And because of that reality, as followers of Jesus, we are to be driven by a reverent respect for Jesus that recognizes the priceless life of Jesus. There is no price that can be placed on the life that Jesus lived that we refused to live, and the death that Jesus died, that we deserved to die. You see, while God’s grace is free, it is not cheap. While God’s grace does not cost us anything, it was very costly to Jesus.

And because of that reality, our lives should be driven by a reverent respect for Jesus in light of the price that He paid to rescue and redeem us from a life of selfishness and rebellion that enslaved us and separated us from God. Peter then concludes this section of this letter by revealing for us a third reason why we as followers of Jesus are to be driven by a reverent respect for Jesus.

We will discover that third reason Friday…