Key Truth: We must cultivate a sincere and earnest love for one another because we have been born again of the imperishable word of God.

Introduction:

How would you finish this sentence: “People are _____________.” What does this reveal about your heart?

A Love that Is Sincere and Earnest

1 Peter 1:22

“[Love’s] creation is not the immediate result of volition; it is the issue of a process. We cannot command it; we can grow it. It is not an ‘alpha’ but an ‘omega,’ the ‘amen’ in a spiritual succession. If I want the flower, I must begin at the root. If I want the love, I must begin with obedience. The first stage towards a fervent affection is ‘obedience to the truth.’ If a soul yearns to be crowned and beautified by the grace of a delicate love, it must put itself in the posture of ‘obedience to the truth.’” 

H. Jowett, Epistles of St. Peter

How are you cultivating your ability to love others sincerely and earnestly?

A Love Born of God’s Imperishable Word

1 Peter 1:23-25

“There are two categories of destitution that are real for the middle class: 1) the emptiness of an uncertain future and 2) the emptiness of the unrealized present. These issues are not the sole domain of the middle class, yet they are often uniquely felt by those who are neither poor nor rich.”

Dan Allender, Sabbath

How has God’s word filled you with life and held you fast in our ever-changing, broken world? Who in your life can you share this with?

Application:

“There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilisations – these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit – immortal horrors or everlasting splendours. This does not mean that we are to be perpetually solemn. We must play. But our merriment must be of that kind (and it is, in fact, the merriest kind) which exists between people who have, from the outset, taken each other seriously – no flippancy, no superiority, no presumption. And our charity must be a real and costly love, with deep feeling for the sins in spite of which we love the sinner – no mere tolerance, or indulgence which parodies love as flippancy parodies merriment."

S. Lewis, “The Weight of Glory”

1 Peter 1:22-25 teaches us that

- we must cultivate a sincere and earnest love for one another

- we must live as those who have been born again of God’s imperishable word