Living Outloud: 1 Peter

We argue that Peter’s opening claim—chosen to be obedient—reframes grace as power to live changed, not permission to stay the same. We walk through 1 Peter 1–2 to show how hope, self-control, holiness, and love all grow from obedience fueled by the Spirit.

• finishing Hebrews and turning to 1 Peter 1–2
• chosen to obey Jesus as a core purpose
• grace, legalism, and our millennial overcorrection
• obedience versus legalism and why humility matters
• prepare your mind for action and practice self-control
• set hope on Christ’s revealing, not lesser goals
• resist conforming to old desires and patterns
• called to holiness as set-apart love in action
• obedience serving others’ salvation and freedom

“Let the word of God dwell richly in our hearts as we go out this week and obey him because we love him, so that others can love him too.”

Chapters

• 0:00 From Hebrews To First Peter
• 1:02 Chosen To Be Obedient
• 4:25 Grace, Legalism, And Our Millennial Drift
• 8:30 Obedience Versus Legalism
• 11:23 Gird Your Mind For Action
• 14:56 Set Your Hope On Christ’s Revealing
• 17:29 Do Not Conform To Old Desires

Transcript

SPEAKER_01: 0:11

Hey, welcome back to Living Out Loud, our weekly segment of the Out Loud Bible Project Podcast, where we talk about what we have read throughout the week, and now what do we do about it? And so this week we actually ended Hebrews and started First Peter. And we've had some good discussions about Hebrews, so we're gonna really focus on First Peter.

SPEAKER_00: 0:33

Yeah, I think you wrapped up Hebrews really, really well on that episode with the Thinking Out Loud Thought for the Day.

SPEAKER_01: 0:39

So talk about wrestling with it, bearing with the instruction of the Bible and recognizing that it can be a little bit prickly sometimes. It can be a little bit hard to hear and do.

SPEAKER_00: 0:48

And that might be a bit of our conversation today.

SPEAKER_01: 0:51

You know what that ties in today. So we will be focusing on First Peter chapters one and two. Pretty short segment. If you want to pause right now and go back and read it and refresh, that's fine. Um if you pause, welcome back. Hey, let's get ready to start our discussion. Um so First Peter, we we didn't get very far into it before something jumped out at you.

SPEAKER_00: 1:13

Yeah. Yeah. Uh in just listening to it, it's one of those verses that I'm like, how have I, I feel like I've never heard this verse before. How have I read the Bible so much and been a Christian for so many years and never heard this verse before? And it's right there in the beginning of the letter, verse two, uh, Peter's just giving his address to the letter, to God's elect, to those exiled. Verse two says, who have been chosen, and I'm reading the NIV right now, but it's it's phrased this way in a lot of translations in the NIV, ESV, NASB, like a lot of translations are phrasing it this way. Who have been chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father through the sanctifying work of the Spirit to be obedient to Jesus Christ and sprinkled with his blood. Peace and grace be yours in abundance.

SPEAKER_01: 2:03

Well, first of all, there's a great example of all three persons of the Trinity working together and having their roles and functions, which is cool.

SPEAKER_00: 2:10

But what stuck out to me is that phrase to be obedient. Like if you just look at it to those God's elect who have been chosen to be obedient. God's elect who have been chosen, yes, through the foreknowledge of the Father, but the sanctifying work is that of the Holy Spirit. It is not ours. That is a by grace through faith statement, not by works, right? But in order to be obedient to Jesus, like that's why he set us apart. That's why he chose us, that's why the sanctifying work of the spirit is at work to be obedient. Like if someone asked me, Kelsey, why does God save you? Like, what's the purpose?

SPEAKER_01: 2:51

Because he loves me. Because he wanted to spend eternity with me. Because he wanted to, I don't know.

SPEAKER_00: 2:57

He wanted to save me from the consequences of sin and death. And yes, all those things have text in scripture that would point to them as well. But this says to be obedient to Jesus Christ. To be obedient. Oh we don't like the word obedient, do we?

SPEAKER_01: 3:16

Yeah, that's a in our culture. That's a tough word. It's also interesting when it's to be obedient to Jesus Christ, because so often in our culture we we see Jesus as the one who loves us and has grace to cover our sins.

SPEAKER_00: 3:31

And yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 3:32

And he didn't come on earth to to condemn the world. Yeah. Not to condemn the world, but to save the world, you know, and to to demonstrate the Father's love. And like again, that's all true, but he did come to teach us how to live, teach us what to do, to change our mindsets and change our behaviors accordingly. And like in Matthew 7, he says, Hey, if if you hear what I'm teaching and you don't do it, you're like a foolish person building house on sand, and then it's just gonna fall apart. So clearly Jesus did come to teach us and instruct us and tell us how to live, and we have a responsibility to obey him. Apparently, that's what we were saved to do.

SPEAKER_00: 4:15

God's elect who have been chosen to be obedient to Jesus. Like that's that's the grammatical structure of this first sentence of the book.

SPEAKER_01: 4:27

Yeah, and obedience is is tough because especially like in America, we don't like the word obey. Like that just feels ew, icky. And in our we're not here to talk about politics, but like there's there's a lot of people who do not like the idea of doing anything that the leader says, you know, like and they call it bending a knee and they call it being weak and they call it being a sheeple and like and forget politics, just in general. Like we don't like the idea of obeying anybody or anything.

SPEAKER_00: 4:56

We like our independence and we like our autonomy, and we we don't like being obedient.

SPEAKER_01: 5:02

You and I live in New Hampshire, and the the state motto is live free or die. I would rather die than do what you tell me to do, is what that says.

SPEAKER_00: 5:13

Yeah. So And even more, Mike, you and I, we are millennials. That's the generation label that we follow.

SPEAKER_01: 5:21

Millennials are in their 30s right now.

SPEAKER_00: 5:22

Yeah. Um and and early 40s. Early 40s. And um I get I was recently told that we are technically elder millennials. Like there's a there's a millennials and then there's elder millennials, and that's where we're at. I'm okay with it. It's fine. So that's the perspective that I'm coming at this from is that of a American millennial. For us growing up in church in the 2000s, this idea of legalism was like really getting pushed against. This this concept that we have to act in a certain way to be a good Christian. We have to do certain things in order to be a good church kid. And we have, I think, as a generation in the American church, have pushed so far back against legalism. We don't want to be legalistic, that we have pushed so hard against that that we've just propelled ourselves in the opposite direction, where we really want a church culture that is defined by things like celebrating grace and freedom, encouraging honest questions and fostering community, not this conformity, but like focusing on transformation instead of performance. And none of those things are bad.

SPEAKER_01: 6:40

Right. It's those aren't wrong in and of themselves.

SPEAKER_00: 6:42

Notice what's missing in that list. What's missing in that list is a recognition of our need for repentance and obedience. My dad actually, when he was growing up, phrased it, and maybe you've heard this before. I don't drink, smoke, or chew, or go with girls that do.

SPEAKER_01: 6:58

Yeah. Our parents and our grandparents lived in and kind of perpetuated a special church culture of behaviors. If we can modify behaviors, then we can, you know, have the heart of God, basically, which is backwards. And so we we kind of grew up in the tail end of those institutions and thought and mindsets, and we're like, well, no, hold on. I I I think if we pursue the heart of God, then the behaviors will work themselves out, which I think is accurate, but we threw out the fear of God. We wanted to focus on the love of God and really just dwell in the love of God, which we are praise God, free to do, but we've lost the fear of God.

SPEAKER_00: 7:43

Yeah. Here's a hot take. I said this to you like two Sundays ago in church. I was I said, uh, legalism wasn't totally wrong. And that will make some of my millennial brothers and sisters like just cringe to the ceiling. But what I meant by that was just realizing that where legalism was telling us to live up to some cultural standard of what Christians ought to do and look like and be, we have rejected with that, with rejecting that perspective, we have also rejected the fact that there are standards for living in scripture. There are standards for how we ought to act and how we ought to live in scripture. And so we come at passages like this and we're like about obedience and following some rules that God set down through Jesus Christ and through his apostles. And we come at that and we're like, oh, but I don't want to be legalistic. And so we just kind of skim over passages like this. We just kind of skim over it and we're like, oh yeah, that's good. We nod our heads, and then we go about not really challenging ourselves to be obedient to scripture because it just sounds too legalistic to us. And I think that we've gone too far in one direction and we really need to come back, not rejecting what we've built as a church culture of transformation over conformity or over performance, but really truly come back to what I think the heart of the millennial Christian in the United States is, which is what you said earlier, to fall in love with Jesus and seek out his heart and have his heart change how we act. But we actually have to like do that. We have to actually we have to actually change how we act. Like it takes obedience, right? There is something we have to do. We can't just sit in the love of Jesus and praise Jesus all day long and be like, oh, Jesus loves me. Thank you, Jesus, thank you, Jesus. It actually means nothing if we don't obey him. Love and obedience throughout scripture go hand in hand throughout scripture. You cannot read scripture and pull those two pieces apart from one another. This is what I'm gonna say. This is my claim, Mike, that you cannot truly love Jesus if you do not obey him, nor can you obey him if you do not love him.

SPEAKER_01: 9:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 9:58

They are inexplicab inextricably linked.

SPEAKER_01: 10:03

Yeah. So when we talk about obedience, chosen to obey, we're gonna keep talking here about some of the things that 1 Peter very practical things, some of the things he tells us to do and obey, we wanted to just maybe cut off before it it really settled in some of these negative feelings we have about obedience and just check ourselves. Like, hey, do we buck up against the idea of actually doing what God says, actually doing what the Bible says? Because we want to, you know, live for ourselves, live independently, or think that, oh, well, that if we just do what it says, that's legalism. No, no, no, that's obedience, and we need to not equate obedience and legalism. Yeah. There is legalism, which is an over-emphasis on rules, or expecting behavior modification to mean more than it does, or do more than it does, or whatever. Or expecting other people to have the same standards you do when they're matters of preference or conviction, but not, you know, obedience to the word. That's legalism. We're talking about obedience. It does take humility. I think legalism also leads it, lends itself to pride, and I think obedience lends itself to humility, and we're called to humility. So, in light of this, what does Peter say? I'm going down to verse 13 in chapter one. Uh in NLT it says, so prepare your minds for action and exercise self-control. I like how some of the older translations say this, like gird your minds for actions, like gird your loins. But that it comes from well, you know, girding your loins is is back when everyone wore robes and tunics and under garments like that. Then they would have to take up all of the loose material that's around their legs and everything and gather it up, cinch it up, and that would then be then how they could run. That's how they could start to take action. Because you can't really run when you have a robe on and a tunic around your knees and everything. You you gather it up, you tie it up, you cinch it, you gather up all the loose stuff that's gonna trip you up and get in the way, and then you go. You can run, you can move. Similarly, that's what that's what Peter is talking about here. Like, hey, get ready to run, get ready to act. Gird up your own your mind. Like all of the loose thoughts that are floating around and all the distractions and all the things that are getting gonna get in the way. Tighten it up, man. Just like, hey, it's time, it's it's time to take action here. If we're gonna follow Jesus, we gotta tighten it up.

SPEAKER_00: 12:23

Tighten up what kind of content you're letting flow into.

SPEAKER_01: 12:26

Yeah, what are you letting to go into your mind?

SPEAKER_00: 12:27

Let's let's cinch it up and let's let's tighten up what you what you think about and what you daydream about and where your mind goes when you're just bored. Like, tighten it up.

SPEAKER_01: 12:36

And exercise self-control is the second part. Like, hey, start doing the sort of things now that lead you to where you actually want and need to be. And and stop doing the things that don't get you closer to Jesus, don't get you closer to the kind of goals that he has for you. Say no to your flesh for once in your life. Like, just because you want it doesn't mean you need it, right? Like, let's start doing this stuff. This isn't being legalistic. This is this is preparing ourselves to obey. We're not just doing this so that we can, you know, be a better person or have people impressed with our self-control and how sharp our minds are. No, this is this is get ready to obey. He he keeps going. Put all your hope in the gracious salvation that will come to you when Jesus Christ is revealed to the world. Put all your hope.

SPEAKER_00: 13:20

Oh, but Mike, I hope to own a house someday. I hope to have a family and I hope to have a good career, and I hope to make a certain amount of money and have a lot put away in savings and in investments. I have hopes for my career and hopes for my ministry and hopes for the way that I'm gonna impact the the world for Jesus. Like I have hopes for the way that what I do is gonna change the world to be a better place. Mike, shouldn't I hope for those things too?

SPEAKER_01: 13:49

Did you say gracious salvation that will come to you when Jesus Christ is revealed to the world? No. So not those things, I guess. I'm just I'm just re just reading I'm just reading what it says. Like to put all your hope in the gracious salvation that will come to you when Jesus Christ is revealed to the world. We're talking about the end times. We're talking about when when Christ comes and makes everything clear and makes everything right. That's what we have to start putting our hope in and living in light of that. If we live in light of anything short of that, then we're gonna get distracted and we're gonna miss the mark. We're not gonna be ready when he comes. It says, so you must live as God's obedient children. Here's that word again. You must live as God's obedient children. Don't slip back into your old ways of living to satisfy your own desires. Like the things that you did to self-soothe or self-care or the things that you did to cope before Jesus, without Jesus. Don't just because you're saved doesn't mean that those things aren't still tempting.

SPEAKER_00: 14:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 14:49

Hopefully they're not, praise God. But like they they may still be. And don't slip, don't slip back into those things.

SPEAKER_00: 14:54

Here's a thought from my fellow millennials out there, those of us who don't like to conform, right? Conformity is is one of those things at legalism culture that we push back against, just in general, that we push back against conformity. In the NASB, this verse is written as As obedient children, do not be conformed to the former lusts which were yours in your ignorance. Like going back to living the way you did without Jesus and giving in to those things that just your flesh wants, that's just conforming to sin.

SPEAKER_01: 15:25

Put your anti-conformity energy into avoiding looking like the world and looking like you did before Jesus has done such a good work in you.

SPEAKER_00: 15:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 15:33

I mean, he says, keep going, and in the end of verse 14, you didn't know any better then, but now you must be holy in everything you do. Well, that sounds legalistic. We're talking about holiness. It's not legalistic to pursue holiness, it's godly. And it's it's not for your sake to feel better. Like you, you because spoiler alert, you can't get holiness by yourself. Right. You can only have it through the work of Jesus.

SPEAKER_00: 15:55

And I think if I'm gonna have a little bit of compassion on our parents and grandparents' generations that that we then pushed back against, I think their heart was this idea of holiness, which literally means to be set apart. They were trying to set standards that would set us apart from the way the world worked.

SPEAKER_01: 16:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 16:13

Right. Like I remember my my parents' generation as cr Christians growing up in the 60s and 70s, they thought playing with face cards was wrong. Yeah, right. That was poker cards was wrong because that's what gamblers played with, right? And gambling is wrong. Gambling is this in, and so we're not going to play any card games because it looks like the world. I think the heart behind it was this. The heart behind it, be set apart from the way the world looks. And it may have gone too far, and that's what we pushed against. But but let's be fair to those Christians who came before us with the wisdom that they had. They were honestly just trying to set up some standards within culture that would help believers align with biblical standard to be set apart from the way the world looks and the world way the world operates.

SPEAKER_01: 17:02

I think here's here's what it boils down to. We can wrap this up in a very similar way as Peter did in this chapter, jumping down to verse 22, which is talking about the why. Um you were cleansed from your sins, made holy, made righteous, when you obeyed the truth, right? That our first step of obedience is is our surrender and results in our salvation, right? That's not the end game. That's not the end of it. Now you must show sincere love to each other as brothers and sisters. Love each other deeply with all your heart. For you've been born again, not to a life that will quickly end. Your salvation isn't just so that you can modify your behavior and live in such a way for the remainder of your life on earth. No, you've been born again not to a life that will quickly end. Your new life will last forever because it comes from the eternal living word of God. Our obedience is not for ourselves, even. It's it's so that we can be God's love to other people who haven't even encountered it yet. This whole discussion of obedience and God calling us to obey, girding our minds, you know, preparing for action and doing the things that help set us apart as holy to him, aren't for us, aren't for our lifetime. It's for other people and for their eternity as well. And that's why God cares so much about it. Yes, dwell in his love and enjoy his love, but we have all eternity to do that. In the meantime, not only that, but let's also live with holiness, live rightly, obey him, and in doing that, we'll find ourselves being a part of other people's salvation stories as well when they experience the love of God.

SPEAKER_00: 18:42

Praise Jesus. That's some good stuff there, Mike.

SPEAKER_01: 18:44

Obedience is not a bad thing. Doing what the Bible says is not a bad thing. It it takes humility, it takes dying some part of ourselves, you know.

SPEAKER_00: 18:56

But you know what else it offers? It offers so much freedom. Obedience to God offers so much freedom from the world. A philosophy that says freedom comes by living outside the bounds of what some divine being says you should be like is a lie from the pit of hell. True freedom is found by living within the bounds that God has set up so that we can be free from sin, free from the world, free from the effects of the enemy in our lives. And that comes through obedience to Jesus Christ. And that's why we were set apart.

SPEAKER_01: 19:34

Well, let's live the rest of this week with this in mind. Like First Peter writes People are like grass, their beauty is like a flower in the field. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our Lord remains forever. So let's let the word of God dwell richly in our hearts as we go out this week and obey him because we love him, so that others can love him too. We'll see you next time.