NOTES for Pe1 1:17-21

We know that God loved the world and gave His Son for the salvation of all people. But today the apostle Peter tells us that Jesus appeared in the last times not simply for everyone, but also personally for us. Precisely for us. Moreover, Christ's Resurrection too was for us: "so that we might have faith and hope in God."

Perhaps it is worth thinking seriously about the fact that the Lord did so much specifically for me, that He did not simply save everyone and me along with them; He saved me specifically. If we understand and feel this even a little, obedience to the truth through the Spirit may become natural for us. And then, having sensed His boundless love for us, we will be able to answer it with love for Him, and through Him, for our brothers...

At first, the call to be obedient children may seem demeaning. But then it becomes clear that self-abasement is the first and necessary step toward accepting the astonishing destiny which the Lord reveals to us. The call sounds so simple and brief: “Be holy”—and the reason God gives for it is so unexpected and incompatible with human logic: “because I am holy.”Unexpectedly, yet in fact quite naturally, we are given a glimpse of the direction in which we are called to move: toward the Lord, drawing closer to Him.

Even many Christians find it difficult to accept the conclusions that follow from this call. We are accustomed to seeing ourselves as sinners, and this is a truth we must recognize if we are not to fall into pride, which separates us from God. But the truth is also that the Lord redeemed us with His Blood, and now we belong to Him. This is why He wishes to raise us up to Himself.

Peter begins his discussion of Christian life with the question of holiness. In doing so, he refers to the Torah, more precisely to the Book of Leviticus, where God's call was first heard: “Be holy, because I, Yahweh your God, am holy.” The bar was not merely set high: with His call, God sets it at the highest possible level. What is at issue is a fullness of sanctification in a human being corresponding to the fullness of God's own holiness.

Of course, a human being is not God. But a person can be sanctified by abiding in God's presence. God changes the person, changes even human nature itself, just as He changes the nature of everything He touches. This change of nature through God's touch is precisely what sanctification is. But holiness is more than sanctification alone. A human being cannot be sanctified in the same way as, for example, stone, wood, or metal. For a human being is the image of God and therefore a person possessing self-awareness and freedom of will. Thus a person cannot be sanctified without taking part in the process. And their participation begins, above all, with their consent to take part.

It begins with the “yes” they say to God. But a single “yes” is not enough: it must be repeated continually. For the process not to stop, for a person always to remain “holy,” that is, sanctified, this “yes” has to be affirmed again and again, so as to remain in God's presence. This is where that concentration of the “mind,” that “girding” of it of which the apostle speaks, is needed. Of course, this concerns not only the intellect as such, but also the ability to distinguish good from evil: the corresponding Greek word actually means “discernment.”

Knowing how to distinguish good from evil, what accords with God's commandments from what contradicts them, is the essential skill of Christian life. Direct communion with the risen Christ opens up the possibility of moving forward on this path. It is His shed blood, His death, and His resurrection that open the way of Christian life to us.

Were it not for the Kingdom which, in the Savior's own words, “has drawn near,” were it not for its breath and its power, fullness of sanctification, unbroken abiding in God's presence, would be as impossible for us as it was for people in the pre-Christian world, even those who had set out on the path of righteousness. And if any of us now chooses the evil in which the world lies, rejecting holiness, this is solely that person's own choice—and the responsibility that follows from it.