1Pe 1:1
I. Election in its source: "elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father."
II. Election in its means: "elect through sanctification of the Spirit." (1) Election first shows itself in a man's separation from the world, which lieth in wickedness. (2) But more than separation from or nonconformity to the world is here intended: the moral purification of our nature. (3) The wording of the text leads us still further: this holiness is not a limited, circumscribed result of the inward operation of the Spirit, but an infusion into our nature of the very quality or attribute of holiness inherent in Himself.
III. Election in its end: "elect unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ." (1) Election has for its object our obedience, obedience in a twofold sense: ( a ) the obedience of faith; ( b ) the obedience which faith produces. (2) The sprinkling of the blood is necessary not only at the beginning of the Christian career, but all along to the very end.
J. C. Jones, Studies in First Peter; p. 1.
References: 1Pe 1:1 , 1Pe 1:2 . G. E. L. Cotton, Sermons to English Congregations in India, p. 283; J. S. Howson, Church of England Pulpit, vol. vii., p. 259.
1Pe 1:2
Who would take happy views of religion, whoever would have full assurance of his own salvation, must be accustomed to look for his evidences, not in himself, nor in any abstract truth, but in the character, and the work, and the person of God. In this respect, the doctrine of the blessed Trinity is a very tower of confidence and strength to a Christian. The offices of the Holy Three are so full, they so fit into each other and make a harmony, they are so appropriate, each in its distinctness, and they are so sufficient, all in their completeness, that they seem made for this very purpose: to assure a man's soul and to leave no place for the weakest doubt.
I. The beginning, the foundation, of the whole scheme of salvation, is the electing grace of the Father. The election of the saved ranges without the slightest reprobation of the lost; and the right application of the doctrine is always an application of comfort. So St. Peter here implies, in like manner St. Paul, always to strengthen and assure, and stir up to holiness, afflicted Churches and tried believers.
II. Look at the path which election takes, by which it always travels, without which it is no election at all: "through sanctification of the Spirit." The great object of all election is the glory of God. The glory of God is a happy, holy thing, the reflection of Himself. The Spirit carries on His sanctifying work by implanting a new life, new principles, with new affections, within a man's breast, which then act with a threefold influence. First, they occupy the heart; then they keep down and restrain the evil that was and still is there; and then they gather up and absorb the bad nature, purify and elevate it towards the character of the Divine: this is sanctification.
III. "Obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Christ." In that obedience we were elected; for it we were created in Christ Jesus; God willed it, God purposed it, and God means it.
J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons, 5th series, p. 294.
References: 1Pe 1:2 . Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. viii., No. 434; Ibid., Morning by Morning, p. 194.
1Pe 1:3
To the question, What has the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead done for us Christians? a great many answers may be given.
I. Of these the answer which is, perhaps, of the first importance, the answer which Christ's own Apostles would have given, is this: that by rising from the dead Jesus Christ proved that He had a right to speak about God, a right to speak about the old religion of His countrymen, a right to speak about the religious conduct of the most influential classes among His countrymen; above all, that He had a right to speak about Himself as He had spoken. When He was asked to give a sign that is, a something which might be accepted as evidence of the commission which He had from heaven, He gave this: He said that just as the old prophet Jonah had been buried out of sight in the whale, and yet had been restored to his ministry and to his countrymen, so He Himself, though He should be stricken beneath the pangs and convulsions of death, though laid in the darkness of the tomb in the very heart of the earth, yet would at a given time burst the fetters of the grave and would rise again. Accordingly, when this prediction had been actually realised, the fact was appealed to, as we see from the Acts of the Apostles, by the earliest preachers of Christianity, almost in every single sermon. It was the fact which evidently did their work, in compelling men to listen to what they had to say about their risen Lord and in making faith in Him at least easy, better than any other topic; and St. Paul puts it forward when he begins his great Epistle to the Romans by simply saying that Jesus had been "declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead."
II. But the Resurrection has done other things for us besides this its great evidential achievement. It has endowed Christians, who treat it as a serious matter of fact, with the grace, the great grace, of hope. St. Peter feels the preciousness of this when he exclaims that God, the Father of our Lord, is blessed, if only because, from His abundant mercy, He has begotten us again unto a lively hope by His Son's resurrection from the dead. No man who has not a clear belief in a future life can have permanently a strong sense of duty. A man may, indeed, persuade himself during various periods of his existence that this sense of duty is the better and purer from not being bribed by the promise of future reward or stimulated, as he would perhaps say, unhealthily by the dread of future punishment. But, for all that, his moral life, if he has not an eternal future before him, is, depend upon it, feeble and impoverished. It is not merely that he has fewer and feebler motives to right action; it is that he has a false estimate, because an under-estimate, of his real place in the universe. He has forfeited, in the legitimate sense of the term, his true title to self-respect. He has divested himself of the bearing, the instincts, and the sense of noble birth and lofty destiny which properly belong to him. He is like the heir to a great name or a throne who is bent on forgetting his lineage and responsibilities in a self-sought degradation. Man cannot, even if he would, live with impunity only as a more accomplished kind of animal than are the creatures around him. Man is by the terms of his existence a being of eternity, and he cannot unmake himself; he cannot take up a position which abdicates his higher prerogatives without sooner or later sinking into degradations which are in themselves a punishment. He needs a hope resting on something beyond the sphere of sense and time, and God has given him one by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.
III. There are three forms of interest which must be accorded to such a fact as the Resurrection. The first is the interest of curiosity in a wonder which is altogether at variance with the course of nature. This interest may exist in a high degree, observing and registering the fact, yet never for a moment getting beyond the fact. Then there is the interest of active reason which is satisfied that such a fact must have consequences, and is anxious to trace them, an interest which may lead a man to say that the Resurrection does, intellectually speaking, prove the truth of the mission of Christ, although the man may know nothing of the power of Christ's blood and of His Spirit. The third kind of interest is practical, moral, spiritual. It is an effort to answer the question, What does Christ's resurrection say to me? what does it mean to me? If it is true, if Christianity through it is true, what ought to be the effect on my thoughts, my feelings, my life? And St. Peter would answer all these questions. Thought, feeling, life, should be invigorated by the force of that living hope. But then this absorbing moral interest does not come of any ordinary process of observation and reason, like these two earlier forms. St. Peter says, using a remarkable expression, "We are begotten unto a lively hope." It is not the outcome of our natural mind or of common-sense, though it does not contradict it; it is the product of the Divine breath playing upon the soul and giving it the new birth, the new capacity for life. Of this birth the Father is the Author; the Eternal Spirit is the instrument; union with Jesus Christ, the perfect Man, the essence and the effect.
H. P. Liddon, Church Sermons, vol. i., p. 309.
1Pe 1:6
The Theology of Suffering.
I. Temptations or trials reveal faith. (1) Trials, on the one hand, show us the evil that is in us. (2) Afflictions further serve to evoke our good, to lead forth into visibility the faith, the hope, and the charity God, in His loving-kindness, has infused into our souls.
II. Temptations or trials strengthen faith. (1) Bitters are the best tonic for the spiritual man, as for the physical; (2) sorrows further invigorate faith because they call it into frequent, yea constant, exercise.
III. Temptations or trials purify faith. (1) Trials release it from the impurities attached to it; (2) adversity throws faith more upon its proper resources, making it draw its aliment and inspiration more directly from God, from God as revealed in His book.
IV. Temptations or trials beautify faith.
J. C. Jones, Studies in First Peter, p. 29.
References: 1Pe 1:6 , 1Pe 1:7 . R. W. Dale, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxxv., p. 102 1Pe 1:6-9 . H. S. Brown, Ibid., vol. xii., p. 230. 1Pe 1:7 . Spurgeon, Morning by Morning, p. 317; H. W. Beecher, Christian World Pulpit, vol. vii., p. 147.
1Pe 1:8
Love a Way to Faith.
I. Love to Christ is the usual way to faith, both to belief in His reality and trust in Him. Of course I do not question that men may attain to faith through investigation. Inquiry and search cannot be otherwise than favourable to faith; what I mean is this: that for men in general, for men and women of all sorts, the way that leads through love to faith is the practical, the usual, the reasonable, and the sufficient one. In the Gospels Christ is presented specially and directly in a way to awaken love rather than to meet the questions of the reason. The great qualities of Christ have the effect of rousing some answering feelings in the souls of men. Every truly elevated life has such an influence, and that of Christ in an altogether peculiar and transcendent manner.
II. Let us notice one or two inferences from this line of thought. We see how love to an unseen Christ operates in keeping Him near to the soul in spite of the lapse of centuries. It seems at first sight as if it would be well-nigh impossible to resist the influence of time. It has such a dissolving power; all things crumble before it. But when souls love Christ and are in constant fellowship with Him, what matters the first century or the nineteenth? There are humble, earnest souls today in myriads that feel Christ more real and near than many who had seen Him in the flesh. How finely the natural and the spiritual blend in love to Christ. There are those who never seem to get beyond the natural. They love Christ as they love any great benefactor of the world. And who can tell just precisely when his love to Christ rose out of this sphere and became spiritual, or when any such love becomes spiritual, aspiring, and active? There are those who do not take the name of Christ, or call Him Master, who have an enthusiasm for Him that might make many Christians blush and bring tears to their eyes. Can any men draw the line between the natural and the spiritual, and say, Here the natural ends, and the spiritual begins? Is not all this love to good and right at bottom ultimately a love to God, if only it knew itself? Is not the immense power that Christ has over the natural admiration of men one of His own greatest weapons and one of the things which the Spirit of God most uses?
J. Leckie, Sermons, p. 147.
1Pe 1:10
I. The prophets are an example to us in the study of salvation (1) in the intention of their study; (2) in the subject of their study; (3) in the noble spirit of resignation they evinced in presence of intellectual difficulties which they were not able to surmount.
II. The Apostles are examples to us in the proclamation of the Gospel (1) in subject matter; (2) in manner of preaching; (3) in the power which accompanied their preaching.
III. The angels are examples to us in the wonder and adoration that should fill our minds in the contemplation of this salvation.
J. C. Jones, Studies in First Peter, p. 71.
Reference: 1Pe 1:10-12 . Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xxvi., No. 1524.
1Pe 1:11
The Suffering which Fruits in Glory.
I. The sufferings of Christ. From what source did they spring? What was their deepest and most essential characteristic? There will be many answers. (1) They were vicarious; (2) they were extreme; (3) they were unmerited; (4) they were according to the will of God.
II. The glory that should follow. Language and imagination alike stagger in the Apocalypse under the revelation. It is called the glory of the Father, the glory at which the Father has been aiming through all the sin and sorrow of the world, for the sake of which He saw Eden broken up and the pall of sin settling over the earth. It is the glory which God saw beyond all the unutterable anguish of the great experiment of freedom, and which we shall behold, if we believe in Him who hath overcome the world, in the day of the manifestation of the Cross.
J. Baldwin Brown, The Sunday Afternoon, p. 243.
Reference: 1Pe 1:11 . Homiletic Magazine, vol. vii., p. 199.
1Pe 1:12
Advent Tidings.
Our text speaks of angel students, and it speaks of them as being engaged in their eager and, if I may use the word of such high, and blessed, and holy intelligences, in their curious, research; for in the original the term which is translated "desire to look into" conveys the idea of bending, stooping over, in order that they may eagerly peer into those subjects which are the objects of their investigation. Those subjects are the great Advent tidings.
I. The Apostle first brings before us those Advent tidings, or this Gospel report, in its great aim of salvation. This is the keynote of the passage salvation first introduced to us, not in its primary stages, not in those stages of salvation which some of us are now enjoying, and which are within the reach, through God's mercy, of all of us, but salvation in its consummation. Never take a low view of this term "salvation." Remember that, while the salvation which you are called upon to seek is a salvation from the masterful tyranny of the devil, and of the world, and of indwelling sin, the crown of salvation, the full accomplishment and development of salvation, is never attained until the body is glorified by its resurrection at the second coming of the Lord. And this is the salvation of which the text speaks.
II. And mark again that we not only have the great aim of these Advent tidings, but we have also their great characteristic. The great characteristic is presented to us by the Apostle when he says, "the grace that should come unto you." Grace in this particular phase is love: love to the guilty; love to the fallen; love to those who have forfeited all right and title to God's favour. There is a combination of characteristics in the Gospel which shows how it bears the stamp of adaptation to our wants, while it bears the impress of the mind of Deity. It is the wonderful combination of depth and simplicity. There is such a combination of depth and simplicity in the Gospel that I may sit down to study it with an angel for my fellow-student, or I may sit down to teach it with a little child for my pupil.
J. C. Miller, Penny Pulpit, New Series, No. 617.
References: 1Pe 1:12 . T. J. Crawford, The Preaching of the Cross, p. 38; Homiletic Quarterly, vol. iv., p. 131; vol. xiii., p. 321.
1Pe 1:13
Hope.
I. Christian hope, as St. Peter tells us, is seated in God. It is, as it has been called, one of the triad of virtues specifically theological. It takes its stand on Divine revelation; it looks on to the attainment of Divine promises; it draws its life-blood from no mere surmise as to what is possible for humanity in the race at large or in the individual, but from the manifestation of Divine truth and goodness in the Incarnate, whom St. Paul in one passage calls our hope, because our hope is grounded on Him and centred in Him. St. Paul, indeed, cannot think of hope without thinking of Christ.
II. A hope which is thus essentially religious, thus Christian, from the root upwards, and impossible except on the terms of Christian belief, is strong enough to face all facts, even such as are unwelcome or austere. Life must, after all, be taken seriously; the hope which is a Christian's privilege involves a wakeful collectedness of mind. When trial comes we are not to say, "It is more than we bargained for," but rather, "We were duly forewarned." Certainly there will be temptations to unhopeful-ness; there must be the discipline of hopes deferred, of successes marred, of apparent defeats and disappointments, of much that might tempt impatience to despair. A hope thus trained, while resting on august realities, is strong, because it is not fanciful.
III. Hope is a great instrument of moral and spiritual discipline. The hope which maketh not ashamed is always humble and always active. It remembers the terms of its existence: "We are made partakers of Christ, if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast unto the end."
W. Bright, Morality in Doctrine, p. 141.
1Pe 1:14
Holiness.
I. Holiness in the heart, or as it works its way down to the depth of our nature. (1) In their unregenerate state men always fashion themselves after the pattern of their lusts or inward sinful desires; (2) the power of evil, though not expelled, is dethroned in the believer's heart, and the principle of dutiful obedience takes its place.
II. Holiness in the life, or as it widens out over the whole area of conduct. This enjoins holiness (1) in all our reading and thinking; (2) in all our conversation; (3) in all our acts.
III. Holiness in its standard: "Be ye holy, for I am holy."
J. C. Jones, Studies in First Peter, p. 111.
References: 1Pe 1:14-16 . W. Landels, Christian World Pulpit, vol. viii., p. 404. 1Pe 1:15 . Clergyman's Magazine, vol. iii,. p. 207. 1Pe 1:15 , 1Pe 1:16 . J. Burton, Christian Life and Truth, p. 67; W. Simpson, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxi., p. 390.
1Pe 1:16
God's Holiness and Man's.
I. The nature of God is the foundation of moral obligation. When we travel in thought to the cause and origin of all things, we perpetually fall back on God as the only solution of the mystery of the universe. In God's nature we find all moral principles, just as in His duration we find eternity, in His omnipotence all the forces of external nature, and in His thought absolute reality and truth. God's holiness is that which has made holiness desirable to every intelligence in the universe; His character is the rule of all mind.
II. The nature of man makes resemblance to God possible. It is a sublime truth that there is such resemblance between God and our poor hearts that even in our fallen condition there is enough of the Divine image left upon us for us to hear this heavenly voice and to know that it has a triumphant message even for us. We are not so smitten but that these words appeal to our conscience and are verified by our experience. It is possible for us to yield ourselves unto God, because He is God, and we are made in His likeness.
III. All the essential perfections of God, even those in which we cannot resemble Him, add force to this appeal. (1) He who is omnipotent is holy. He has resolved to bring His omnipotence to bear upon the extermination of sin, for He is holy, and it is He who says to us, "Be ye holy." (2) He who is omniscient is holy; He who knows all the recesses of your heart, all the excuses to which you resort, all the palliations that you can make for yourself, all your thoughts, passions, fears, and joys, is holy. (3) He who is merciful is holy; therefore "be ye holy." His mercy is a manifestation of holiness; it is not a random or an arbitrary affluence of pity for our misery, but it is the transfiguration of holy law into heavenly love, so that from nature and from Calvary, as well as from Sinai, is heard the voice which says, "Be ye holy, for I am holy."
H. R. Reynolds, Notes of the Christian Life, p. 165.
1Pe 1:17
We collect from the language of the New Testament that fear formed a greater part of the state of mind in which the first disciples of Christ lived than it does now. Persons are described as being in a permanent and habitual state of mind which is called fear. It is not, of course, that state of disturbance and alarm which we are placed in by a sudden danger, not excitement and alarm. Still it is fear, and it has the natural and true characteristics of fear. It keeps people in earnest that they should be in the right way, apprehensive lest they should fail. They are solicitous about their own salvation, do not regard it as a matter of course. They always have it in their minds that they are going they do not know where; and while, on the one hand, they have firm hopes resting on God's promises, they still do not think of an unknown world and another life without fear.
I. It must appear indeed, when we examine it, that this fear is part of the very life of Christians, and that we cannot have even our understanding quick and vigorous without it; it is part of our very understanding. Fear is the very mode through which we express the fact that we do believe; it is our perception of things being real. It is simple stupidity, it is being without ideas, to be without it. Persons may have quick parts, eyes and speech may be quick and ready, but their souls are dull, they are without the quickening faculty, if they are without fear.
II. In the Christians of the Bible we see, as I have said, habitual fear, and this fear, far from depressing them, is rather a stimulus to their faith; and by giving strength to their faith, it confirms a happy experience of the effects of the Gospel upon them. With fear operating in them, they felt that they could not doubt. The faith of the early Christians was largely indebted to their fear for its rootedness and firmness. Fear planted it in their souls, and established it as a natural product of the soil, whereas under mere joy and hope it would have flourished prosperously for a season as an exotic, but its strength would have been a delusive one. While you fear, you believe; this, at any rate, is one effect. Fear is thus sustaining. While you fear God, you believe that God is, and that He is a Rewarder of them that diligently seek Him. This is ever the accompaniment of fear in Scripture, and the great compensation; it settles, it tranquillises, it gives peace, and it breeds ultimately security and calm, and a reasonable assurance. All those quiet, settled views of the Divine government which fix and strengthen its hold upon the mind, and make it the great anchorage it is, from which to be unmoored is to lose everything, arise from fear, from seeing the awfulness of facts as they are and this whole world as it is around us.
J. B. Mozley, Sermons Parochial and Occasional, p. 322.
Christian Fear.
I. The first reason why we should cultivate this fear is that the God on whom we call is a Father.
II. The second, that He is a Judge.
III. The third, that He judges according to every man's work. (1) Here the work, not the person, is the subject of judgment; (2) work, not works. God will judge our life as a whole.
J. C. Jones, Studies in First Peter, p. 131.
1Pe 1:18
The Ransom.
Note:
I. The foreordination of the sacrifice.
II. The preciousness of the sacrifice.
III. The efficiency of the sacrifice in accomplishing its twofold object (1) in satisfying Divine justice, for "God raised Him up from the dead, and gave Him glory"; (2) in effecting the emancipation of men from the dominion of sin and the corruption of their nature, redeeming them from their vain conversation, received by tradition from their fathers.
J. C. Jones, Studies in First Peter, p. 149.
References: 1Pe 1:19 . Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xi., No. 621; Ibid., Morning by Morning, p. 107; H. J. Wilmot-Buxton, Sunday Sermonettes for a Year, p. 203; Homilist, 3rd series, vol. x., p. 286; A. C. Rice, Christian World Pulpit, vol. vi., p. 108; J. Stannard, Ibid., vol. xiv., p. 232. 1Pe 1:21 . L. D. Bevan, Ibid., vol. xxvii., p. 299.
1Pe 1:22
Christian Love.
I. Purity: "Love one another with a pure heart fervently." (1) The word for purified in this verse is not that denoting the infusion of virtue, but that which signifies the expulsion from the soul of all defilement, and especially of selfishness. (2) The way to secure this is by believing obedience to the truth as revealed in the Gospel.
II. Unfeignedness: "unfeigned love of the brethren" genuine love, without dissimulation, free from hypocrisy. (1) We read of faith unfeigned that is, faith which is firm and solid to the core. (2) Love unfeigned is love which will not give way under trial, that will suffer a burden to be put on its back.
III. Fervour: "with a pure heart fervently." This implies that our love of the brethren should be powerful enough (1) to overcome all sinful obstacles in our nature, (2) to overcome all national and sectarian differences.
J. C. Jones, Studies in First Peter, p. 170.
References: 1Pe 1:23 . Spurgeon, Evening by Evening, p. 125; Homilist, 2nd series, vol. i., p. 325.
1Pe 1:23
The New Birth.
I. Man's inner and nobler life is not like his outer life, a life carried on in many of its most important functions unknown to himself. That lower life has its youth and its age, its vigour and its infirmity, its ruddy cheek and its grey hair, independently of him who lives it. These things follow a fixed law, and come upon us although we will not, and when we know not. But it is not so with the higher life of the Spirit. There is no unconsciousness here. No man lives unto God and knows it not. If you are made a son of God, by the power of the Spirit, through faith in Christ, you don't go about hoping and trusting you are God's, committing your eternal prospects to a miserable uncertainty; no, if you have this life, you know it, and you live it. The truth of love first softened, first warmed, first quickened, your hard, and cold, and dead hearts, first found its way, like a chance seed, under some broken bit of the surface, and obtained a lodgment there, so that the birds of the air snatched it not away, nor the foot of the passer-by trod it down. "The Father hath loved Me." Let this seed abide and work, and though little is done in comparison with what is to come, much is done in comparison with what is past.
II. We want some Divine, abiding influence which may show us the wonders of that love; and so it was that when the incarnate and triumphant Son of God was taken from us He did not leave us orphans. He went up on high and received gifts for men, even God the Holy Spirit, who came down upon the assembled Church as the one fulfilled promise of the Father, the great result of redemption, the begetting, and enlivening, and enabling power of the new life in man. Without Him all were vain; without Pentecost Calvary were powerless.
H. Alford, Quebec Chapel Sermons, vol. iii., p. 324.
References: 1Pe 1:23-25 . Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. vii., No. 398; vol. xvii., No. 999.
1Pe 1:24
The Frailty of Man.
"For all flesh is grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass." Disease is a democrat, like death. It makes no distinctions, and equalises all ranks in society, as the grave levels all mankind. For disease is no respecter of persons. It does not mind Cossacks on guard, or policemen on duty, or locks on doors; it has no awe of any king, or respect for purple and a crown, but invades a palace as well as a hovel. For we all go together in the main features of our wasting lives. We are all alike in weakness, in pain, in sorrow, and in death. Everything in the world is relative. Happiness is pretty evenly distributed. Fortune never comes with both hands full. In the main headings of our history you and I are alike; in sin and sorrow, in weakness and pain, by the open grave and with a broken heart, we are all alike you and I, king and peasant.
I. Now hear the argument and application. Since, as Simon Peter says, "all flesh is grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass," since the longest life is such a pitiful span, since our days are flying before the pursuit of death, since you and I shall soon be "a kneaded clod in cold abstraction lying," since our little path across this world shall soon be overgrown with weeds and obliterated, and you and I forgotten well, since that is so, what follows? "Let us eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die"? No. St. Peter and you do not agree. But since all flesh is as grass, since we die tomorrow, and we want to dream sweet dreams in the sleep of death, therefore "wherefore" let us lay aside "all malice, and all guile, and hypocrisies, and envies, and all evil-speakings." Ah, that is better. We go with Peter. For since we are grass and live a brief day of years, what is the use of so much anxious care, of so much fretting and fussing? What is the good of hoarding money for other people to ruin themselves with when you are dead? What is the good of hating your neighbour? What is the sense of trying to act a part, of seeming other than we are, of being hypocrites? What is the gain of guile, or envy, or evil-speaking? Let us think no evil, and do no wrong; for this is the word of the Lord that endureth for ever: that all bitterness and wrath, that all anger and clamour, that all evil-speaking, that all malice, be put away from you. And let us be kind one to another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven us. Then, since I am grass, and disease is in the air, and I die tomorrow, I will have no dealings with malice, or hate, or envies; I will chide nobody in the world except myself, against whom I know most faults. And that is the moral. If all flesh is grass, let us remember it: no grudge, no guile, no hate, no evil-speaking, but to love one another, for we are only the dream of a dream anyway; we are only here a night and gone tomorrow.
II. A man is only as big as his average deed not an inch taller, not an ounce better when it comes to assigning him his place among his fellows, or to rewarding him in presence of the judgment angels, before the throne of God; but a man is as big as his faith or his intention, thanks to Jesus Christ and His atoning sacrifice, when it comes to saving the soul of a dying thief on the cross, or, for that matter, the soul of you and me. The reward for deeds done in the body is one thing; salvation by faith in Jesus Christ is another thing. There shall be millions of people saved so as by fire. They won't take anything with them, not a bond, not a brick in a mansion, nothing. Everything but their little soul shall be consumed, and it saved so as by fire, as Lot was out of Sodom. But there are some thousands of people who won't go in through the gate empty-handed. No; they shall not merely be saved, but they shall have something in their hands. Like Vespasian coming amid triumphal acclaims up the Appian Way to the centre of the "Eternal City," with trophies won by conquests in many wars in far-away lands, so some heroes of God shall go through the gates, as Paul did, with stars of rejoicing in their crown. These are they who did Christ's works as well as confessed His name.
J. R. Paxton, British Weekly Pulpit, vol. ii., p. 495.