1 Peter 2:17

1 Peter 2:17

The Obligation of Christians to the World and the Church.

I. "Honour all men." Christians in deed and truth, called by the grace of God to be a peculiar people, separate from the world, have this rule laid upon them. Why? Because in all men, even in those who refuse the Gospel, in the worshippers of the world, in those who are strangers to the family of Christ, there is something worthy of honour. The most depraved of the human race has an infinite price set upon his life; the blood of the meanest does not fall to the ground unavenged. There is a Divine light, "which lighteth every man that cometh into the world"; and for the sake of that, honour is due unto him, though by choosing darkness rather than light he has dishonoured himself. You owe to all men courtesy, generosity, charity, respect, and (what is perhaps harder than all) justice.

II. Having fulfilled this law, draw the line broadly and distinctly between it and the second rule: "Love the brotherhood." Remember where you are, if you be lively members of the body of Christ. You have been chosen out of the world, gathered into a fold of which Christ is the door, adopted into a home for the members of which He prayed to the Eternal Father "that they may be one, as We are." If you be true to your character, you will find in the peace of love and unity of your Christian home not only a solace for the troubles of the world, but a counterattraction against its sinful pleasures and shelter against its dangers. And, moreover, that love and union, which ministers to your joy, serves to the glory of God, and wins souls from the world into the Church.

C. W. Furse, Sermons at Richmond,p. 143.

References: 1 Peter 2:17. Homiletic Quarterly,vol. i., p. 405; vol. xiii., p. 274; R. D. B. Rawnsley, Village Sermons,4th series, p. 51; Homilist,3rd series, vol. iv., p. 25; F. W. Farrar, Christian World Pulpit,vol. xix., p. 17; R. Duckworth, Ibid.,vol. xxiv., p. 211; J. G. Rogers, Ibid.,vol. xxvii., p. 117.