1 Peter 1:13

1 Peter 1:13. Wherefore: the exhortation is thus made immediately dependent on the previous statement of grace. The duty is born of the privilege. The ‘wherefore,' however, points back to the idea which called forth the ascription of praise with which the introduction opened, and not merely to the thought of the necessity of trial (de Wette), the grandeur of the grace (Calvin), the destination of the salvation from of old for these very readers (CEc.), or anything else which comes in only in the train of the leading idea. The connection, therefore, is not of the indeterminate form, ‘Seeing this salvation was designed for you, and is so studied even by angels, be not ye unregardful of it' (so substantially Alford, etc.). It is far more pointed than that, and amounts to this, ‘God, then, by so marvellous a provision of His mercy, having begotten you unto a living hope, see that you make that hope your own, and live wholly up to it.'

having girt up the loins of your mind. The first exhortation is not to watchfulness and endurance in hope (Alford), but to hope specifically. The three verbs do not enjoin each a distinct duty, but the first two (‘gird up' and ‘be sober') express conditions which are necessary to the discharge of one great duty of hope which is denoted by the third. The act of tucking up the loose Eastern tunic in preparation for travelling or running, for work or conflict, or for any kind of exertion (cf. Israel's preparation for the flight from Egypt, Exodus 12:11; Elijah's for running before Ahab to the entrance of Jezreel, 1 Kings 18:46; and David's for the battle, Psalms 18:32; Psalms 18:39), is the natural figure of a certain mental preparedness. There is an evident fitness in applying the figure to men in the pilgrim state described in 1 Peter 1:1 and 1 Peter 2:11, and it is possible that Christ's own injunction (Luke 12:35) may have given form to Peter's phrase. The tense indicates that the attitude of mind here in view must first be taken up definitely and once for all before the kind of hopefulness which is charged on these sojourners can be made good. The term used here for ‘mind' is admirably in point. It is the term which denotes the understanding in its practical issues, and in its intercourse with the outer world, the higher intellectual nature specially in its dealings with things without, the power of thought ‘as a process of close and thorough scrutiny of outer objects, and as a special outward attitude of the soul' (Beck, Biblical Psychology, p. 71). The clause, therefore, expresses the necessity of a certain mental concentration, the putting a check upon the ‘dissipation of thought' on the interests or trials of the present. The man who will live up to the hope into which God begat him must begin by reining in the tendency of his thoughts to wander everywhere, and by turning his mind, in its habitual outward attitude, to the great vision of the future.

being sober, a second condition necessary to the hopefulness which should characterize the Christian pilgrim. The sobriety in view here, as often elsewhere, involves much more than moderation in regard to appetite. It means the settled self-control, the elevated equanimity which should make the Christian superior to the distractions of the present, and save him equally from undue elation in the pleasures of time, and from excess of sorrow in its pains. This, as a disposition to be continuously maintained, is expressed in the present tense, ‘practising sobriety,' where the former condition was in the past.

hope perfectly: the former things have defined the kind of hopefulness which is urged. This is usually taken to be still more distinctly described by the addition of the term which is rendered ‘to the end' by the A. V. It is doubtful, however, to which of the two clauses this adverb (which is found nowhere else in the New Testament, and which has the larger sense of ‘completely,' ‘so as to leave nothing lacking,' rather than the temporal force ‘to the end ‘) is to be attached. It may qualify the sobriety (‘practising a perfect sobriety') a connection entirely in point, and saving one of these related phrases from being left in an unqualified independence unlike the other two. If it is attached to the ‘hope' (as most interpreters attach it), it defines it as one that will rise to the full idea of a regenerate hope, and leave nothing to desire. Once let a guard be established against the natural waywardness of thought, and let the self-collectedness be sustained which looks with a calm eye upon earth's joys and sorrows, and they will be able to lead a life of hopeful expectation worthy of that act of God's grace by which they were begotten into hope.

for the grace. It is questioned whether we should translate ‘ for the grace' or ‘ on the grace.' The construction is peculiar, and found exactly, indeed, nowhere else, in the New Testament, except in 1 Timothy 5:5 (in 1 Peter 3:5 also, according to the received text, but not according to the best editors). It is not uncommon, however, in the Greek Version of the Old Testament. Some take the sense to be make the grace the strength or foundation of your hope. So Huther considers grace to be presented here simply as that ‘from which the fulfilment of hope is expected,' and others (e.g. Mason) hold it introduced as that in the strength of which we are confidently to look for glory. The truth which is struck, however, is deeper. Grace is exhibited here as the object of our hope, and the shade of meaning suggested by the uncommon construction is simply that our hope is to be turned fully and confidently toward it. What is otherwise called glory or salvation is here called grace, the believer's present being seminally the believer's future, and glory being the blossom of which grace is the bud.

which is being brought unto you: not ‘which is to be brought,' as if the object of hope were remote, and wholly of the future; but ‘which is a-bringing,' already on the wing, and bearing ever nearer.

in the revelation of Jesus Christ, that is, at His final advent. Both the currency of the phrase itself and the close connection instituted by the opening ‘wherefore' between the ideas of this section and those of the Preface forbid us to understand it of the present revelation of Christ in the Gospel.