1 Peter 1:3-4

Blessed be the God, and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to his abundant mercy, has begotten us again to a lively hope, by the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. To an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fades not away.

It is a cold lifeless thing to speak of spiritual things upon mere report; but they that speak of them, as their own, as having share, and interest in them, and some experience of their sweetness, their discourse of them is enlivened with firm belief, and ardent affection; they cannot mention them, but their hearts are straight taken with such gladness, as they are forced to vent in praises. Thus our Apostle here, and Saint Paul (Ephesians 1), and often elsewhere, when they considered these things, with which they were about to comfort the godly, to whom they wrote, they were suddenly elevated with the joy of them, and broke forth into thanksgiving. So teaching us by their example, what real joy there is in the consolations of the Gospel, and what praise is due from all the saints to the God of those consolations. This is such an inheritance, as the very thoughts, and hopes of it are able to sweeten the greatest griefs, and afflictions. What then shall the possession of it be, wherein there shall be no rupture, nor the least drop of any grief at all. The main subject of these verses is that which is the main comfort that supports the spirits of the godly in all conditions.

1. Their future inheritance in the fourth verse. 2. Their present title to it, and assured hope of it, verse 3. 3rdly, the immediate cause of both assigned, namely, Jesus Christ. 4thly, all this derived from the free mercy of God, as the first and highest cause, and returned to his praise and glory as the last and highest end of it.

For the first — the inheritance. [But because the fourth verse which describes it is linked with the subsequent, we will not go so far off to return back again, but first speak to this third verse, and in it,]

Consider 1. their title to this inheritance: begotten again. 2. their assurance of it, namely, a holy or lively hope. The title that the saints have to their rich inheritance is of the most valid, and most unquestionable kind, namely, by birth. Not by their first natural birth. By it we are all born to an inheritance indeed; but we find what it is (Ephesians 2:3): children of wrath, heirs apparent of eternal flames. It is an everlasting inheritance too, but so much the more fearful, being of everlasting misery, or (so to speak) of immortal death, and we are made sure to it; they who remain in that condition cannot lose their right, although they gladly would escape it — they shall be forced to enter possession. But it is by a new and supernatural birth, that men are both freed from their engagement to that woeful inheritance, and invested into the rights of this other here mentioned, as full of happiness as the former is miserable. Therefore are they said here to be begotten again to that lively hope. God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ has begotten us again. And thus are the regenerate the children of an immortal Father, and so entitled to an inheritance of immortality — if children, then heirs, heirs of God. This sonship is by adoption in Christ, therefore added, joint heirs with Christ (Romans 8:17) — we adopted, and he the only begotten Son of God by an eternal ineffable generation.

And yet this our adoption is not a mere extrinsic denomination, as is adoption among men: but accompanied with a real change in those that are adopted, a new nature, and spirit infused into them, by reason of which, as they are adopted to this their inheritance in Christ, they are likewise begotten of God, and born again to it, by the supernatural work of regeneration. They are like their heavenly Father; they have his image renewed on their souls, and their Father's Spirit. They have and are acted, and led by it. This is that great mystery of the kingdom of God, that puzzled Nicodemus; it was darkness to him at first, till he was instructed in that night, under the cover of which he came to Christ.

Nature cannot conceive of any generation or birth, but that which is within its own compass; only they that are partakers of this spiritual birth understand what it means; to others it is a riddle, an unsavory unpleasant subject.

It is sometimes ascribed to the subordinate means, to baptism, called therefore the laver of regeneration (Titus 3:5), to the Word of God (James 1:18). It is that immortal seed, by which we are born again; by the ministers of this Word, and the seals of it, as (1 Corinthians 4:15): for though you have ten thousand instructors in Christ, yet you do not have many fathers; for in Christ Jesus I have begotten you through the Gospel. As also (Galatians 4:19). But all those have their vigor and efficacy in this great work, from the Father of Spirits, who is their Father in their first creation, and infusion, and in this their regeneration, which is a new and second creation. (2 Corinthians 5:17): if any man be in Christ he is a new creature.

Theologians have reason to infer from the nature of conversion thus expressed, that man does not bring anything to this work himself; it is true he has a will, as his natural faculty, but that this will embraces the offer of grace, and turns to him that offers it, is from renewing grace, that sweetly, and yet strongly; strongly, and yet sweetly, inclines it.

1. Nature cannot raise itself to this, any more than a man can give natural being to himself. 2. It is not a superficial change; it is a new life and being. A moral man in his changes and reformations of himself is still the same man, though he reform so far as men in their ordinary phrase call him quite another man; yet in truth, till he be born again there is no new nature in him. The sluggard turns on his bed as the door on the hinges, says Solomon. Thus the natural man turns from one custom and posture to another, but never turns off. But the Christian by virtue of this new birth can say indeed, ego non sum ego — I am not the same man I was.

You that are nobles, aspire to this honorable condition; add this nobleness to the other, for it far surpasses it; make it the crown of all your honors and advantages. And you that are of mean birth, or if you have any crack or stain in your birth, the only way to make up, and repair all, and truly to ennoble you, is this: to be the sons of a King, indeed of the King of Kings, and this honor have all his saints. To as many as received him, he gave this privilege to be the sons of God (John 1:12).

To a lively hope,] Now we are the sons of God, (says the Apostle, 1 John 3:2) but it does not yet appear what we shall be. These sons are heirs; but all this lifetime is their underage; yet even then being partakers of this new birth and sonship, they have right to it, and in the assurance of that right, this living hope. As an heir, when he is capable of those thoughts, has not only right of inheritance, but may rejoice in the hope he has of it, and please himself in thinking on it; but hope is said to be only of an uncertain good. True, in the world's phrase it is so; for their hope is conversant in uncertain things, or in things that may be certain after an uncertain manner; all their worldly hopes are tottering, built upon sand, and their hopes of heaven are but blind and groundless conjectures. But the hope of the sons of the Living God is a living hope. That which Alexander said when he dealt liberally about him — that he left hope to himself — the children of God may more wisely and happily say, when they leave the hot pursuit of the world to others and despise it, their portion is hope. The thread of Alexander's life was [reconstructed: cut] off in the midst of his victories, and so all his hopes vanished; but their hope cannot die, nor disappoint them.

But then it is said to be lively, not only objectively, but effectively, enlivening and comforting the children of God in all distresses, enabling them to encounter and surmount all difficulties in the way. And then it is formally so: it cannot fail, dies not before accomplishment. Worldly hopes often mock men, and so cause them to be ashamed, and men take it as a great blot, and are most of all ashamed of those things that discover weakness of judgment in them. Now worldly hopes do thus — they put the fool upon a man, when he has judged himself sure and laid so much weight and expectation on them; then they break and foil him. They are not living, but lying hopes, and dying hopes; they die often before us, and we live to bury them and see our own folly and infelicity in trusting to them. But at the utmost they die with us when we die, and can accompany us no further. But this hope answers expectation to the full, and much beyond it, and deceives no way, but that happy one of far exceeding it.

A living hope, living in death itself. The world dare say no more for its device, but dum spiro spero; but the children of God can add, by virtue of this living hope, dum exspiro spero. It is a fearful thing when a man and all his hopes die together. Thus says Solomon of the wicked: when he dies (many of them before, but at the utmost then all of them) then die his hopes (Proverbs 11:7). But the righteous has hope in his death (Proverbs 14:32). Death, that cuts the sinews of all other hopes and turns men out of all other inheritances, alone fulfills this hope and ends it in fruition, as a messenger sent to bring the children of God home to the possession of their inheritance.

By the Resurrection of Christ from the dead,] This refers to both — begotten again by his resurrection, and having this living hope by his resurrection — and well suits both, it being the proper cause of both, in this order: first then of the birth, then of the hope.

The image of God is renewed in us by our union with him who is the express image of his Father's person (Galatians 4:19). Therefore this new birth in the conception is expressed by the forming of Christ in the soul, and resurrection particularly is assigned as the cause of our new life. This new birth is called our resurrection, and that in conformity to Christ, indeed by virtue and influence of his. His resurrection is called a birth — he the first begotten from the dead (Revelation 1:5) — and that prophecy (Psalm 2:7), "You are my Son, this day have I begotten you," is applied to his resurrection as fulfilled in it (Acts 13:33): "God has fulfilled the same to us their children, in that he has raised up Jesus again, as it is also written in the second Psalm: You are my Son, this day have I begotten you." Not only is it the exemplary, but the efficient cause of our new birth. Thus Romans 6 at large, and often elsewhere. And thus likewise it is the cause of our living hope — that which indeed inspires and maintains life in it — because he has conquered death and is risen again, and that implied which follows: he is set down at the right hand of God, has entered possession of that inheritance. This gives us a living hope, that according to his own request, where he is, there we shall be also. Thus this hope is strongly undergirded, on the one side by the resurrection of Christ, on the other by the abundant mercy of God the Father. Our hope depends not on our own strength or wisdom, nor on anything in us — for if it did, it would be short-lived; would die, and die quickly — but on his resurrection that can die no more; for in that he died, he died to sin once, but in that he lives, he lives to God (Romans 6:10). This makes this hope not to imply in the notion of it uncertainty, as worldly hopes, but it is a firm, stable, inviolable hope, an anchor pitched within the veil.

According to his abundant mercy,] Mercy is the spring of all this — indeed great mercy, and manifold mercy. For, as Saint Bernard says, great sins and great miseries need great mercy, and many sins and miseries need many mercies. And is not this great mercy — to make of Satan's slaves, sons of the Most High? Well may the Apostle say, "Behold what manner of love, and how great love the Father has showed us, that we should be called the sons of God." The world knows us not, because it knew not him. They that have not seen the father of a child cannot know its resembling him; for the world knows not God, and therefore discerns not his image in his children to esteem them for it. But whatever be their opinion, this we must say ourselves: Behold what love — to take firebrands of hell and to appoint them to be one day brighter than the sun in the firmament; to raise the poor out of the dunghill and set them with princes ([reconstructed: Psalm 113:8]).

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.] Lastly, we see it stirs up the Apostle to praise the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. This is the style of the Gospel, as formerly under the law, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and the God that brought you up out of the land of Egypt, etc. This now is the order of the government of grace, that it holds first with Christ our head, and in him with us, so he says, I go to my Father, and your Father, and my God, and your God. Which as Saint Cyril of Jerusalem in his Catechism observes, shows us not only our communion with him, that might have been expressed thus, I go to my God and Father, but the order of the covenant, first my Father, and my God, and then yours. Thus ought we in consideration of the mercies of God, still take in Christ, for in him they are conveyed to us, thus (Ephesians 1:3): with all spiritual blessings in Christ Jesus.

Blessed.] He blesses us really, benefaciendo benedicit, we bless him by acknowledging his goodness. And this we ought to do at all times (Psalm 34:1): I will bless the Lord at all times, his praise shall continually be in my mouth. All this is far below him, and his mercies. What are our lame praises in comparison of his love? Nothing, and less than nothing: but love will stammer rather than be dumb. They that are among his children begotten again, they have in the resurrection of Christ, a lively hope of glory, as it is (Colossians 1:27): which is Christ in you the hope of glory. This leads them to observe and admire that rich mercy from where it flows, and this consideration awakes them, and strains them to break forth into praises.

To an inheritance incorruptible.] As he that takes away a garment in cold weather, and as vinegar upon nitre, so is he that sings songs to a heavy heart (Proverbs 25:20).

Worldly mirth is so far from curing spiritual grief, that even worldly grief, where it is great, and takes deep root, is not allayed but increased by it, a man that is full of inward heaviness, the more he is compassed about with mirth, it exasperates and enrages his grief the more, like ineffectual weak medicine, that removes not the humor but stirs it, and makes it more unquiet, but spiritual joy is seasonable for all estates. In prosperity it is pertinent to crown, and sanctify all other enjoyments, with this that so far surpasses them; and in distress it is the only nepenthe, the cordial of fainting spirits. So (Psalm 4): he has put joy into my heart, this mirth makes way for itself which other mirth cannot do, these songs are sweetest in the night of distress. Therefore the Apostle writing to his scattered afflicted brethren, begins his epistle with this song of praise, Blessed be the God and Father, etc.

The matter of it is, the joyful remembrance of the happiness laid up for them under the name of inheritance. Now this inheritance is described by the singular qualities of it. They contain: 1. The excellency of its nature. 2. The certainty of its attainment, the former in these three, Incorruptible, Undefiled, and that fades not away. The latter in the last words of this verse, and in the following — reserved in heaven for you, etc.

God is bountiful to all, gives to all men, all that they have, health, riches, honor, strength, beauty, and wit, but those things he scatters (as it were) with an indifferent hand. Upon others he looks, as well as on his beloved children: but the inheritance is peculiarly theirs, inheritance is convertible with sonship, for (Genesis 25:5): Abraham gave gifts to Keturah's sons and dismissed them; but the inheritance was for the son of the promise. When we see men rising in preferment, estate, or admired for excellent gifts, and endowments of mind, we think there is a happy man: but we consider not that none of all those things are matter of inheritance, within a while, he is to be turned out of all, and if he have not something beyond all those to look to, he is but a miserable man, and so much the more miserable, that once he seemed, and was reputed happy. There is a certain time wherein heirs come to possess, thus it is with this inheritance too, there is by the Apostle mention made of a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ (Ephesians 4:13). And though the inheritance is rich and honorable, yet the heir being young is held under discipline, and is more strictly dealt with possibly than the servants, sharply corrected for that which is let pass in them, yet still even then, in regard, of that which he is born to, his condition is much better than theirs, and all the correction he suffers, prejudices him not, but fits him for inheriting. The love of our heavenly Father is beyond the love of mothers in tenderness, and yet beyond the love of fathers (which are usually said to love more wisely) in point of wisdom. He will not undo his children, his heirs, with too much indulgence? It is one of his heavy judgments upon the foolish children of disobedience, that ease shall slay them, and their prosperity shall prove their destruction.

While the children of God are childish and weak in faith, they are like some great heirs, before they come to years of understanding, they consider not their inheritance, and what they are to come to, have not their spirits elevated to thoughts worthy of their estate, and their behavior conformed to it, but as they grow up in years they come by little and little to be sensible of those things, and the nearer they come to possession, the more apprehensive they are of their quality, and what does correspondingly become them to do. And this is the duty of such as are indeed heirs of glory, to grow in the understanding, and consideration of that, which is prepared for them, and to suit themselves, as they are able, to those great hopes. This is that the Apostle Saint Paul prays for, for his Ephesians (Chapter 1, verse 18): the eyes of your understanding being enlightened, that you may know what is the hope of his calling, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints. This would make them holy and heavenly, to have their conversation in heaven from where they look for a Savior, that we may then the better know something of the dignity and riches of this inheritance, let us consider the description that is here given us of it, and first,

Incorruptible. Although this seems to be much one with the third quality, that fades not away, which is a borrowed expression for the illustrating of its incorruptibility, yet I conceive there is some difference, and that in these three qualities there is a gradation. Thus it is called, Incorruptible, that is, it perishes not, cannot come to nothing, is an estate that cannot be spent; but though it were abiding, yet it might be such, as the continuance of it were not very desirable, this life at the best, were but a misery to continue always in it. Plotinus thanked God that his soul was not tied to an immortal body. Then Undefiled, it is not stained with the least spot, this signifies the purity and perfection of it, that the perpetuity of it, it does not only abide, and [reconstructed: is] pure, but those together, it abides always in its integrity. And lastly it fades not away, it does not fade nor wither at all, is not sometimes more, sometimes less pleasant, but ever the same, still like itself — and that is the immutability of it.

As it is Incorruptible, it carries it away from all earthly possessions and inheritances; for so all those epithets are intended to signify in opposition to the things of this world, and showing how far it excels them all; and thus comparatively we are to consider it: for as divines say, of the knowledge of God, that we have here: the negative notion makes up a great part of it, we know rather what he is not, than what He is, Infinite, Incomprehensible, Immutable, etc. So it is of this happiness, this inheritance, and indeed it is no other but God. We cannot tell you, what it is, but we can say so far, what it is not, as declares it is unspeakably above all the most excellent things of the inferior world, and this present life, it is by privatives, by removing imperfections from it, that we describe it, and can go no further. Namely, Incorruptible, undefiled, and that fades not away.

All things that we see, being compounded, may be dissolved again, the very visible heavens that are the purest piece of the material world (notwithstanding the pains the philosopher takes to exempt them) the Scriptures teach us, that they are corruptible (Psalm 102:26): They shall perish but you shall endure; yea, all of them shall wax old like a garment: as a vesture shall you change them, and they shall be changed. And from there the Apostle to the Hebrews (Hebrews 1:10) and our Apostle in his other Epistle (2 Peter 3:11) use the same expression. But it is needless to fetch too great a compass, to evince the corruptibility of all inheritances. Besides what they are in themselves, it is a shorter way to prove them corruptible in relation to us, and our possessing them by our own corruptibility, and corruption, or perishing out of this life in which we enjoy them, we are here inter peritura perituri, the things are passing we enjoy, and we are passing who enjoy them. Earthly inheritance is so called in regard of succession: but to every one it is but at the most for term of life. As one of the Kings of Spain answered to one of his courtiers, who thinking to please his master wished that kings were immortal: If that had been said he, I should never have been King. When death comes, that removes a man out of all his possessions to give place to another; therefore are these inheritances decaying, and dying in relation to us: because we decay, and die, and when a man dies his inheritances, and honors, and all things here, are at an end in respect of him: yes, we may say the world ends to him.

Thus Solomon reasons, that a man's happiness cannot be upon this earth: because it must be some durable abiding thing that must make him happy, abiding, to wit in his enjoyment. Now though the earth abide, yet because man abides not on the earth to possess it: but one age drives out another, one generation passes and another comes, [reconstructed: velut unda impellitur unda], therefore his rest and his happiness cannot be here.

All possessions here are defiled, and stained with many other defects and failings, still somewhat wanting, some damp on them, or crack in them, fair houses, but sad cares flying about the gilded and paneled roofs, stately and soft beds, a full table: but a sickly body and queasy stomach. The fairest face some mole or wart in it. All possessions stained with sin, either in acquiring or in using them, therefore called Mammon of Unrighteousness (Luke 16:9). Iniquity so involved in the notion of riches, that it can very hardly be separated from them. Saint Jerome says, verum mihi videtur illud, dives aut iniquus est, aut iniqui Haeres. Foul hands pollute all they touch, it is our sin that defiles what we possess, it is sin that burdens the whole creation, and presses groans out of the very frame of the world (Romans 8:22): For we know that the whole creation groans and travails in pain together until now. This our leprosy defiles our houses, the very walls, and floors, our meat and drink and all we touch, polluted alone, and polluted in society, our meetings, and conversations together being for the greatest part nothing but a commerce, and interchange of sin and vanity.

We breathe up and down in an infected air, and are very receptive of the infection by our own corruption within us. We readily turn the things we possess here to occasions, and instruments of sin, and there is no liberty, nor delight in their use without abusing them, how few are they, that can carry (as they say) a full cup even, that can have digestion strong enough for the right use of great places and estates, that can bear preferment without pride, and riches without covetousness, and ease without wantonness.

Then, as those earthly inheritances are stained with sin in their use; so what grief, and strife, and contentions about obtaining or retaining them. Does not matter of possession, this same Meum and tuum divide many times the affections of those who are knit together in nature or other straight ties, and prove the very apple of strife between nearest friends?

If we trace great estates to their first original, how few will there be found, that owe not their beginning, either to fraud, or rapine, or oppression, and the greatest empires, and kingdoms in the world have had their foundations laid in blood. Are not those defiled inheritances?

That withers not] A borrowed speech alluding to the decaying of plants and flowers that bud, and flourish at a certain time of the year, and then fade and wither, and in winter are as if they were dead.

And this is the third disadvantage of possessions, and all things worldly, that they abide not in one estate; but are in a more uncertain and irregular inconstancy, than either the flowers and plants of the field, or the moon, from which they are called sublunary: like Nebuchadnezzar's image, degenerating by degrees, and in the end into a mixture of iron and clay.

The excellence then of this inheritance is, that it is free from all those evils, falls not under the stroke of time, comes not within the compass of its scythe, that has so large a compass, and cuts down all other things.

There is nothing in it weighing it towards corruption. It is immortal, everlasting, for it is the fruition of the immortal everlasting God by immortal souls, and the body rejoined with it, shall likewise be immortal, having put on incorruption as the Apostle speaks.

That fades not away] No spot of sin, nor sorrow there, all pollution wiped away, and all tears with it, no envy, nor strife, not as here among men one supplanting another, one pleading, and fighting against another, dividing this point of earth, with fire and sword, No, this inheritance is not the less by division, by being parted among so many brethren, every one has it all, each his crown, and all agreeing in casting them down before his throne from whom they have received them, and in the harmony of his praises.

This inheritance is often called a kingdom, and a crown of glory. This word may allude to those garlands of the ancients, and this is its property, that the flowers in it are all Amaranthes, as a certain plant is named, and so it's called (1 Peter 5:4) a crown of glory that fades not away.

No change at all there, no winter and summer, not like the poor comforts here, but a [reconstructed: bliss] always flourishing. The grief of the Saints here, is not so much the changes of outward things, as of their inward comforts. Suavis hora, sed brevis mora. Sweet presences of God they sometimes have; but they are short, and often interrupted, but there; no cloud shall come between them, and their sun, they shall behold Him in his full brightness for ever; and as no change in their beholding, so no weariness, nor abatement of their delight in beholding. They sing a new song, always the same, and yet always new. The sweetest of our music, one day of it will weary them that are most delighted with it, what we have here cloys; but satisfies not the joys above, never cloy, and yet always satisfy.

We should here consider the last property of this inheritance, namely the certainty of it.

Reserved in Heaven for you. But that is connected with the following verse, and so will be fitly joined with it. Now for some use of all this.

If these things were believed, they would persuade for themselves, we needed not add any entreaties to move you to seek after this inheritance: Have we not experience enough of the vanity, and misery of things corruptible? And are not a great part of our days already spent among them? Is it not time to consider whether we be provided of any thing surer and better, than what we have here? If we have any inheritance to go home to after our wandering? Or can say with the Apostle (2 Corinthians 5:1) We know that if our earthly house of this Tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.

If those things gain our assent while we hear them yet it dies so; None almost retire themselves after, to follow forth those thoughts, and to make a work indeed of them, but busy their heads rather another way, building castles in the air, and spinning out their thoughts in vain contrivances. Happy are they whose hearts the spirit of God sets, and fixes upon this inheritance; they may join in with the Apostle. And say as here, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has begotten us again to this living hope, to this inheritance incorruptible, undefiled and that fades not away.