1 Peter 2:17

A RULE OF LIFE

‘Honour all men.’

1 Peter 2:17

What is the true motive for the honour claimed from us for all men?

I. It is the revelation that man is made in the image of God.—By his double endowment of intelligence and freedom, man is clearly differentiated from the beasts that perish. He is a spiritual being, gifted with a full capacity to reflect on his own origin, and nature, and destiny, entrusted with a faculty of moral choice, and able not only to know his Creator, but to decide for himself whether he will obey or defy Him. And no familiarity with human life can make any thinking man indifferent to this great distinction which belongs to us. Even in the lowest, the most degraded of the race, where this divine element is least discernible, we must own its presence, and bow before it; we must recognise, however marred and distorted, the image of our God. Here is the great indestructible motive for mutual honour; it is to be found where the essentials of the bond of human fellowship are to be found, even in identity of nature before God. Have we not all one Father? Hath not one God created us? That spiritual relationship cannot be separated from a living recognition of its natural consequences. It has been well said that it follows from our brotherhood that the smallest justice, the poorest charity, which each of us owes to man, is that we should interpret human nature from the best that we ourselves know of it. Yes; these aspirations, of which we are conscious at our best, are hints of the dignity within the reach of all. They are the key to a nature which, in spite of all present failure and disfigurement, is but a little lower than that of angels, and crowned with glory and honour.

II. Honour all men, because Christ has died for all.—Every human being born into the world, no matter in how lowly a state, has an unspeakable dignity conferred upon him by the work of redemption. The Bible is not a book of definitions. It has never answered in set terms that old question of the Psalmist: ‘What is man?’ But it gives us clearly to know the value of man. The Gospel is simply the good news that man is precious in the sight of God—so precious as to be deemed worthy of a sacrifice transcending all words and thought. What was the strength which Christ brought to the weak? What was the secret of that hope which He gave to the self-despairing? It was just the assurance that, forlorn and lost as they might feel, they were, nevertheless, dear to the Father in heaven; to the very worst of men, to the chief of sinners, to the most wretched of outcasts. Christ could say, ‘You are the child of a God who thinks of you and yearns over you, and to whom, in your utmost failings, you are as a prince in bondage and exile, worthy of being sought out, and ransomed, and brought home.’ Let men speculate as they will on man’s origin and place; let them explain the stages of development by which he has attained to his present structure and power—this much, at least, is clear about him, clear on the face of God’s Word, that he is a being whose rescue from moral evil is held on high to be worth the agony and bloody sweat, the cross and passion, the precious death and burial, the glorious resurrection and ascension of the Son of God. His sacrifice is the eternal witness to the truth that man, at the very worst, is worthy to be ministered to from heaven, and at a cost which defies expression in terms of our earthly sacrifices. If you are tempted to think meanly of man; if, face to face with the dark facts of his vice and frailty, all the fine things that poets have sung of him, and prophets have forecast, seem to you but a hollow mockery, then remember that there is a judgment above your own: remember that however little you can see to honour or admire, there must be in each one something of infinite value, since God would even redeem it for Himself by an infinite sacrifice. The humblest personality is glorified by this thought of redemption. No one can stand before a human being, no matter what his race, his creed, or his character, without being in the presence of one whom God loves and for whom Christ has died.

III. Honour is due to men, because in every man there is a well-nigh boundless capacity of improvement.—Man has not only been rescued from ruin, but he has been endowed with the Spirit of God, and therefore with the promise and the power of a glorious progress. That which illumines with a species of immortal hope the hereditary and actual condition of man, is the truth, that unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of the ascended Christ. His life in heaven is the pledge of a perfection attainable by the whole race. Not only has He received gifts for us, not only does He shed them forth upon us, but His presence on high is itself the glorification of the nature which He took upon Him and still wears. By His exaltation we are ennobled: already as it were we sit together with Him in heavenly places, and, if this be so, brethren, can any hopes be too high for us to cherish? The earnest given to us of the glory that shall be revealed transfigures our condition, and appeals to us to honour all men as the heirs of it.

IV. Do we realise then, as an essential Christian duty, the great precept of the Apostle?—Can we say that we honour, or try to honour, all men? Christianity has taught men to call one another brethren, but has it yet given us the true feeling of brotherhood? Do we feel ourselves to be in very deed children of the same heavenly Father? Do we know and believe that there is a divine life in our own and in all souls? It is not an easy thing to keep habitually before our minds this great inspiring faith. When we go out into the hard everyday world we encounter those inveterate barriers which have been raised by the folly and prejudice of man, and too readily we acquiesce in them. Such honour as we pay is not paid on principle with many of us; it is that mere show of kindly deference, that superficial courtesy which is compatible with low views of human worth, and which may be no more than a trick of social art. We ought to cultivate the full spirit of our brotherhood, and to penetrate beneath all the passing accidents of this life to that which is divine and indestructible in every man.

Rev. Canon Duckworth.

Illustrations

(1) ‘It was once said by a keen observer of modern life that to believe a man with £60 a year as worthy of respect as a man with £6000 a year, one must be a Christian indeed. Only let a man attain rank and station, let him make or come in for a fortune, and, be he never so uninteresting in himself, what an interest at once attaches to him! How readily men concede his title to honour as soon as he has something to give and to bequeath!’

(2) ‘No nobler tribute could be paid to a memory than that which was written of the martyred bishop Patteson, by one of his simple converts in the Southern Seas: “He did not despise anyone, nor reject anyone with scorn. Whether it were white man or black man, he thought of them all as one. And he loved them all alike.” Honour all men. Be that the rule which, by God’s help, we will take to guide our relations to all who share with us the awful probation of the life that now is, and look forward with us to the great issue of the life to come!’

(SECOND OUTLINE)

MUTUAL REGARD

This honour is to be given to all men. We must not confine it to those generally known as good men. If we confine it to this class, we clearly rob the greater part of mankind of their due. Moreover, we are really passing a verdict as to those who are good and those who are not good, a thing which God alone can do. Granting, however, that a man’s life is such that no one could possibly call it a good life, that it has fallen to the lowest depths of degradation, yet, I venture to say, there is some good in that man though I cannot see it. For aught I know, God’s grace may yet restore that fallen man to something more than at his first glory.

I. Christian charity refuses to acquiesce in the dogma that men or races are incurable or degraded.—She treats the lowest as still bearing the stamp of the Divine, therefore as still capable through grace of the very highest elevation. Our blessed Lord certainly sets an example of honouring all men, for not only does He honour that good man Zacharias, and Simon Peter the Apostle, but also Mary Magdalene and that nameless woman who is described as a sinner. He honoured them all, and therefore, as a disciple, you and I must not attempt to be greater than the Master. ‘Honour all men.’

II. Never was there a time when the precept needed greater enforcement than our own.—Just take note for a few moments of the disrespect with which royalty is sometimes spoken of in certain quarters. Think of the disreputable way in which our bishops are spoken of, as if they were mere expensive luxuries, instead of persons necessary for the well-being of the Church. And then, again, think of the small amount of respect which is accorded by children to their parents, servants to their employers, young people to their spiritual pastors and masters. And, again, what of the precept to ‘order myself lowly and reverently to all my betters’? Who are our betters? The answer is, those who are superior to us in station or anything else. Some people nowadays seem to think that they have no betters, and so there is no politeness on their part.

III. Honour and respect are due from the employer to the employee as well as from the employee to the employer.—Very possibly, I think, if this rule were observed, many of those disastrous strikes which we hear of from time to time would be averted. One cannot but feel that if employers were more considerate, rebellion would very often never have risen at all. Here, however, we must take into account the employer’s view of the question. Threats and attempted coercion are not the best way of gaining what we want in this world.

IV. And among equals in social standing the same rule of honouring must be observed if the wheel of society is to move steadily along. There must be no inconsiderate disregard of other people’s feelings, still less any assumption of superiority.

V. And then let us not forget the honour which is due to the young.—If a child is bound to honour father and mother, father and mother are bound in their turn to honour the child. The greatest respect we can pay a child is to be careful what we say or do in that child’s presence. Children are naturally imitative. The notions they imbibe in their early years are not easily eradicated, and think how terrible a thing it would be if it should be found in the great day that we have led our own children astray through our own thoughtlessness, or worse still, by our vicious manner of living.

—Rev. G. W. Oliver.