Morning & Evening Devotional Reading–

May 4– Evening

by C. H. Spurgeon, revised and edited by W. C. Neff

“Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible.” 

—1 Peter 1:23

Peter most earnestly exhorted the scattered saints to love each other “with a pure heart fervently,” and he wisely drew his argument not from the law, or from nature, or from philosophy but from that high and divine nature which God has implanted in his people. Those who train princes and seek to develop within them a kingly spirit and dignified behavior often remind the prince of their unique position and family history. In the same way, Christians should see themselves as God’s people, heirs of glory, princes of royal blood, descendants of the King of kings, earth’s truest and oldest aristocracy.

Peter told them, “See to it that you love one another because of your noble birth, knowing that you have been born of incorruptible seed. Do it because of your pedigree, being descended from God, the Creator of all things. Like in light of your immortal destiny, for you will never pass away, though the glory of the flesh will fade and its very existence will cease.”

It would be good if, in the spirit of humility, we act according to the true dignity of our regenerated nature. A Christian is not only a king, but also a priest who adds priestly sanctity to royal dignity. The king’s royalty often lies only in his legal position of authority, but with a Christian it is infused into his inmost nature. He is as much above his fellow man through his new birth, as a man is above the beasts of the field. Surely, he ought to carry himself in all his dealings as one who is chosen out of the multitudes, distinguished by sovereign grace, placed among “a peculiar people.” The Christian cannot grovel in the dust as others do nor live the same way as the world’s citizens.

Let the dignity of your nature and the brightness of your future, O believer in Christ, constrain you to cling unto holiness and to avoid every kind of evil. [M&E]