Gird Up Your Mind: An Easter Season Meditation on 1st Peter 1

Wherefore gird up the loins of your mind,

be sober, and hope to the end for the grace

that is to be brought unto you

at the revelation of Jesus Christ;

As obedient children,

not fashioning yourselves according

 to the former lusts in your ignorance:

But as he which hath called you is holy,

so be ye holy in all manner of conversation;

Because it is written,

Be ye holy; for I am holy.

The first chapter of St. Peter’s first letter is a rousing call to the scattered brethren, beginning with a remembrance of the salvation given by grace through faith to all who believe in Jesus.  He describes the fallen world from which Christians are redeemed, together with its corruption and lust, and the eternal life into which we have been raised through the sacrifice of Jesus upon His Cross.  The world is passing away under the curse and condemnation of the wickedness which permeates to its core, and only through the Vicarious Atonement of Jesus, the very Son of God incarnate, can anyone hope to escape this fate.  Such salvation is worth celebrating, as we do in the Easter season, but it also calls us to consider what kind of life this salvation leads us to live.

Peter did not leave his readers wanting for guidance in this consideration.  He knew that Christians would be tempted to return to the same rudimentary evils from which they were rescued, and even compared such temptation of one’s faith to the refinement of gold in fire—that both are tested and purged by their respective trials.  Peter certainly doesn’t offer his readers a false solace that in this world they will avoid trouble, but rather (as he heard Jesus tell His disciples in the garden before His crucifixion,) that our Savior, Jesus Christ, has overcome the world.  In this, Peter rightly calls his readers to gird up their minds and prepare for the battle which will rage all around them until the Lord calls them home.  Jesus did not destroy the fallen world after He rose again from the dead; rather, Jesus sent His disciples with His Word into the world, that all who might hear, believe, and turn to Him would live forever.  Such was not a call to a soft and vapid existence, playing about in one’s passions and lusts until the fire sweeps everyone away.  This call of Jesus which St. Peter proclaims, is one of a life lived soberly, aware of one’s real enemies (sin, death, hell, and the power of the devil) and the victory which resides in Jesus alone.  This makes the Christian a military emissary of the Kingdom of God, sent into the world to speak God’s truth to evil powers, and by the Word and Spirit of God leading others out of their captivity to the devil and to life and freedom in Jesus.

Such a life and mission is not to be taken lightly.  To gird one’s mind is to place securely upon it the armor of God’s Eternal Word, with a heart steadfastly clinging to that Word which both calls us to repentance for our sin and to life in His grace.  This Word of Life which calls us, calls through us to the whole world, that everyone might repent and believe unto eternal life.  And of course, the evil one does not lay down quietly, even in his defeat at the Cross.  Rather, he pursues the faithful with ardent fury, seeking to tempt Christians into the same evils from which they were saved, that he might invalidate their witness to the world, and drag as many souls as he can into the fires of hell prepared for him and his wicked host.  The devil is girded up for war, a suicidal plunge into perdition where he seeks to take everyone he can with him.  He is cunning, ancient, and powerful, bent on the destruction of the world and the whole human race.  Yet his power over fallen men is broken by Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection, for all who repent and believe in the Gospel.

This is our battle, and today the world lies before us in full cacophonic array.  Our enemy is not flesh and blood, but the evil powers which seek to kill and destroy and enslave.  Our victory is not one of swords and spears, but of the finished work of Jesus, in whose resurrection is the promise of eternal life to us all.  Our calling is to life, united to the Lord of Life by His Eternal Word, and armed with that Word as we press headlong into the ranks of our foes, seeking the salvation of souls.  We are the military emissaries of the Kingdom of God, sent and sealed by the Lord of Hosts, to destroy the works of darkness and shine the saving light of His Word into every dying soul.  We are set aside unto this work, made holy by the shed blood of Jesus, that we might be holy as our Savior is holy.

Gird up your minds in the Word of God, and prepare to surge once more into the battlefield.  The enemy will rage even as he flees before you, and the hearts of men will beat once more with the hope of everlasting life.  Amen.