Part 10 (1/2)
V. 21. _The like figure whereunto, even baptism, doth now save us; not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward G.o.d._ But you are not kept and saved by merely was.h.i.+ng away the filth of the flesh, that the body be clean, as was the practice of the Jews; such purification has no further value. But the answer of a good conscience toward G.o.d,--that is, that you feel your conscience to be rightfully at peace within you, that it stands in harmony with G.o.d, and can say, ”He has promised to me that which He will fulfil, for He cannot lie.” If you shall rely upon and cleave to His word, then shall you be preserved. Faith, alone, is the band whereby we shall be held; no outward work which you can do will suffice.
_Through the resurrection of Christ Jesus._ This St. Peter adjoins, in order to explain that faith which rests on the fact that Christ died, descended to h.e.l.l, and has risen again from the dead. Had He continued subject to death, it would not have advantaged us; but since He has risen and sits at the right hand of G.o.d, and suffers this to be proclaimed to us so that we may believe on Him, we have a union with G.o.d, and a sure promise, whereby we shall be saved as Noah in the ark. Thus has St. Peter given to the ark a spiritual significance throughout, within which is not flesh and blood, but a good conscience toward G.o.d,--and that is faith.
V. 22. _Who is gone into heaven, and is on the right hand of G.o.d; angels, and authorities, and powers, being made subject unto Him._ This he says for the enlightening and strengthening of our faith. For it was necessary that Christ should ascend to heaven and become Lord over all creatures and powers universally, that He may bring us thither, and make us conquerors. This is said for our consolation, that we may know that all powers, whether they be in heaven or earth, must serve and aid us, even death and the devil,--since all must become subservient, and lie at the feet of the Lord Christ. This closes the third chapter. The fourth follows.
CHAPTER IV.
V. 1. _Forasmuch, then, as Christ hath suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves likewise with the same mind; for he that hath suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin._
St. Peter continues still in the same strain. Just as he hitherto has admonished us generally that we should suffer, if it be the will of G.o.d, and has set Christ before us as an example,--so he now confirms it more broadly, and repeats it again, saying, While Christ, who is our captain and head, has suffered in the flesh and presented us an example, (besides that He has ransomed us from our sins,) we also should imitate Him, and prepare ourselves, and put on the same armor.
For in the Scriptures the life of the Lord Christ, and especially his suffering, is presented before us in a twofold manner.
Sometimes as a gift, as St. Peter has already exhibited it in the third chapter; and to those first, who are built up and instructed in the faith that we are ransomed, and our sins taken away by the blood of Christ; and so he is a gift and bestowment upon us, which none can receive except by faith. Whereof he speaks where he says, ”Christ has once suffered for our sins.” That is certainly the grand doctrine, and the most precious one of the Gospel.
Again, Christ is set before us and offered to us as an example and pattern for us to follow. For if we only receive Christ, through faith, as a free gift, we shall go farther and do ourselves as He has done for us, and imitate Him in His whole life and sufferings. In this manner St. Peter presents it here. But he does not speak here particularly of those marks of the love which leads us to befriend our neighbor, and do good, which are called, specifically, good works (for he had said enough of this above), but of such evidences as concern our personal experience, and are of service in strengthening our faith, that sin may be put to death in the flesh, and we thereby become of so much better service to our neighbor. For if I control my body so that it be not l.u.s.tful, then can I leave my neighbor, his wife or child, at peace; while if I subdue hate and envy, I shall become so much better prepared to be kind and friendly toward my neighbor.
We have repeated often enough already that we are justified through faith, and thus have the Lord Christ as ours; still we must also do good works and show kindness to our neighbor. For we are never entirely purified while we live on earth, and every one still finds in his body evil l.u.s.ts. The believer indeed prays for the death of sin and the gift of heaven, but is not yet become entirely and completely strong; but as Christ described the Samaritan, who was not yet healed, but was laid under restrictions and directions that he might become sound, so it is also with us. If we believe, then is our sin restrained,--that is, the disease which we have derived from Adam, and we begin to recover. But it is the case, in one more, in another less, that in proportion as one mortifies and subdues the flesh, so much does his faith increase. So that if we have these two things, faith and love, our future experience will be, that we shall continue to drive sin before us till we die.
Therefore St. Peter says, _arm yourselves with the same mind_; that is, take up a firm purpose, and strengthen yourselves with the mind which you receive from Christ; for, if we are Christians, then must we also say, My Master has suffered and spilt His blood for me, and has died for my sake. Should I then be so base as not to love Him?
While the Master runs upon the spears' points in the conflict, how much more should the servant advance with joy? Thus do we awaken a courage such that we press onward, and arm ourselves in our own minds so as joyfully to persevere.
The word _flesh_ refers in Scripture not only outwardly to the body, but includes all that is derived from Adam. As when G.o.d says, in Gen.
vi.: ”My Spirit shall not always strive with men, for they also are flesh;” and Isaiah, chap. xl., ”All flesh shall see the Salvation of G.o.d,”--that is, it shall be revealed for all men. So we also make confession in our own form of faith, ”I believe in the resurrection of the flesh,” that is, that men shall rise again. So man uniformly throughout is called flesh, as he lives here in this state of being.
The marks of the flesh are carefully recounted, one after another, in Paul's Epistle to the Galatians v., not only the gross carnal works, as lasciviousness, but also the highest and most reckless blasphemies, as idolatry and heresy, which belong not only to the flesh, but to the reason. We must understand, therefore, that man, with his intellectual nature,--and with respect both to that which is inward and that which is outward--that is, the body and spirit,--has the appellation of flesh; and this, because with all his faculties, internal and external, he seeks only that which is carnal, and can serve to gratify the flesh. St. Peter says here, too, that Christ suffered in the _flesh_, while it is certain that His suffering extended further than to the body merely, for His soul suffered the greatest anguish, as is said by the prophet Isaiah.
In the same way, also, you are to understand that which follows, in the pa.s.sage before us: ”_Whoever hath suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin._” For this implies not only such things as the death and the torture of the body, but whatever can work misery to man--whatever he endures through calamity and necessity. For there are many people who are sound in body, and yet inwardly experience much heart-sorrow and anguish. If it comes upon us for Christ's sake, it is serviceable and profitable. For whoever suffers in the flesh (says he) ceases from sin, and therefore the Holy Cross is profitable, that sin may thereby be subdued; since it requires you to mortify l.u.s.t, envy and hate, and other wickedness. Therefore G.o.d has imposed the Holy Cross upon us that He might urge and constrain us to believe, and extend the hand of kindness one to the other. Hereupon it follows:
V. 2. _That he henceforth, in the time that still remains for him in the flesh, should live not according to the l.u.s.ts of men, but the will of G.o.d._
We should henceforth, as long as we live, hold the flesh captive through the Cross, and by mortifications, so as to do that which pleases G.o.d, and not with the idea that we should or can deserve anything by it. _Not according to the l.u.s.ts of men_ (says he),--that is, that we should not do that to which we might yet be tempted by others; for we are not to be conformed to this world, as Paul says, Rom. xii. What the world demands of us we must refuse.
V. 3. _For the time past of our life is enough to have wrought the will of the Gentiles, when we walked in lasciviousness, l.u.s.ts, excess of wine, revellings, banquetings and abominable idolatries._
We have already gone altogether too far, that before our believing we have so shamefully spent our life in accordance with the will of the Gentiles, which is the same with l.u.s.ts of men. Therefore as long as life continues we should see to it that we do that which is well-pleasing to G.o.d; for we have our enemy in our flesh, the one that is the real knave--not gross matter merely, but more particularly blindness of mind, which Paul calls carnal wisdom,--that is, the policy of the flesh. If we have subdued this depravity, that other is carefully to be constrained, which does our neighbor injury in so secret a manner as not to be observed.
St. Peter calls that lasciviousness that is accompanied with outward gestures or words by which evil intentions are expressed, though the deed itself be not performed, and it is that which is unchaste to the sight and hearing, upon which afterward the l.u.s.t and the act also follow. Thereupon there succeeds such idolatry as is abominable. And we may easily bring all this upon us, for when we have lost faith we have certainly lost G.o.d, also, and may fall into more abominable idolatries than the heathen, if we view the matter aright.