The Genetics of Genuine Love Text: 1 Peter 1:22-25
Introduction: The Organic and the Artificial
We live in an age that is infatuated with the artificial. We have artificial sweeteners, artificial intelligence, and what amounts to artificial relationships. The world talks a great deal about love, but it is a cheap, sentimental, and ultimately artificial love. It is a love manufactured in the factories of human emotion, a love that is conditional, self-serving, and as disposable as a paper cup. It is a love that has no root system, and so when the sun of affliction or inconvenience gets hot, it withers away instantly.
The apostle Peter, writing to scattered and persecuted Christians, is not interested in this kind of flimsy affection. He is not calling the church to muster up some warm feelings for one another. He is not telling them to "try harder" to be nice. Rather, he is explaining the fundamental genetics of genuine Christian love. He shows us that the love we are commanded to have is not something we manufacture, but something that grows. It is the necessary, organic fruit of a supernatural seed. It is the logical and unavoidable consequence of the new birth.
Peter's logic here is devastating to all forms of hypocrisy and cheap grace. He ties together our purification, our obedience to the truth, our new birth, the Word of God, and our love for one another into one unbreakable chain. If one link is missing, the whole thing is a fraud. You cannot claim to have been born of an incorruptible seed if your life does not produce an incorruptible love. And you cannot produce an incorruptible love if you have not first been born of an incorruptible seed. This passage shows us the foundation, the nature, and the power of the love that must characterize the people of God.
The Text
Since you have in obedience to the truth purified your souls for a love of the brothers without hypocrisy, fervently love one another from the heart, for you have been born again not of corruptible seed but incorruptible, that is, through the living and enduring word of God. For, "ALL FLESH IS LIKE GRASS, AND ALL ITS GLORY LIKE THE FLOWER OF GRASS. THE GRASS WITHERS, AND THE FLOWER FALLS OFF, BUT THE WORD OF THE LORD ENDURES FOREVER." And this is the word which was proclaimed to you as good news.
(1 Peter 1:22-25 LSB)
The Consequence of a Purified Soul (v. 22)
Peter begins with the result and then gives the reason. The command to love is grounded in a prior reality.
"Since you have in obedience to the truth purified your souls for a love of the brothers without hypocrisy, fervently love one another from the heart," (1 Peter 1:22)
Notice the sequence. The purification of our souls is not something we achieve in a mystical vacuum. It happens "in obedience to the truth." The truth here is the gospel. And the gospel is not a set of abstract propositions to be merely affirmed; it is a declaration from the throne of heaven to be obeyed. The first act of obedience is faith itself, submitting to the lordship of Jesus Christ. This obedience to the truth is the instrument God uses to purify us, to set us apart for His purposes.
And what is the immediate purpose for which our souls are purified? It is "for a love of the brothers without hypocrisy." This is staggering. God cleanses you, He sets you apart, He washes you in the blood of Christ for a specific, tangible purpose: so that you can genuinely love other Christians. The ultimate test of your vertical relationship with God is the quality of your horizontal relationships within the church. A faith that does not produce unfeigned brotherly love (philadelphia) is a dead and useless faith. It is a clanging cymbal.
Because this purification has happened, Peter issues a command: "fervently love one another from the heart." This is not the same word for love. He moves from brotherly affection (philadelphia) to a sacrificial, divine love (agape). And it is to be done fervently, which means to stretch out, to strain. It is an athletic love, a determined love, not a passive feeling. It must come "from the heart," from the very core of our new identity, not from a superficial desire to keep up appearances.
The Incorruptible Origin (v. 23)
Now Peter provides the foundational reason, the engine room for this kind of supernatural love. Why can we do this? Why must we do this?
"for you have been born again not of corruptible seed but incorruptible, that is, through the living and enduring word of God." (1 Peter 1:23)
The word "for" is the key. You are commanded to love this way because you are a new kind of creature. You have been "born again." This is not a renovation project on your old self. It is not turning over a new leaf. It is a resurrection. It is a new genesis. God has made you from scratch. And the nature of any offspring is determined by the nature of the seed from which it came.
Peter draws a sharp, absolute contrast between two kinds of seeds. The first is "corruptible seed." This refers to our natural, physical birth. We are all born of Adam's line, and that is a corruptible, decaying, mortal seed. It produces a life that is subject to sin and destined for death. Everything that originates from man, all our best efforts, our grandest philosophies, our most sincere religious strivings, all of it is corruptible seed. It cannot produce eternal life or eternal love.
But Christians have been born of "incorruptible seed." This seed is divine, eternal, and undecaying. What is this seed? Peter tells us plainly: it is "through the living and enduring word of God." The Word of God is the imperishable seed that the Holy Spirit plants in the soil of the human heart, and from that seed springs new, eternal life. Your new life partakes of the character of its source. Because the Word of God is living and enduring, the life it generates is also living and enduring. This is why Christian love can be fervent and from the heart; it is not drawing from the shallow, polluted well of human nature but from the deep, eternal wellspring of God's own nature, imparted to us through His Word.
The Great Contrast: Grass and the Word (v. 24-25a)
To drive the point home, Peter quotes from Isaiah 40, a passage that beautifully and brutally illustrates the difference between the corruptible and the incorruptible.
"For, 'ALL FLESH IS LIKE GRASS, AND ALL ITS GLORY LIKE THE FLOWER OF GRASS. THE GRASS WITHERS, AND THE FLOWER FALLS OFF, BUT THE WORD OF THE LORD ENDURES FOREVER.'" (1 Peter 1:24-25a)
"All flesh" is grass. That means you, me, every human being. It means our strength, our wisdom, our beauty, our accomplishments. And "all its glory" is like the flower of the grass. For a brief moment, it can be stunning. Human culture can produce magnificent art, brilliant philosophy, and impressive empires. But it is all temporary. The grass withers under the sun, the flower falls when the wind blows. This is the destiny of everything that comes from the corruptible seed of man.
To build your life, your identity, or your hope on anything that is "of the flesh" is to build your house on a sand dune in a hurricane. To base your love for others on their performance, their attractiveness, or their utility to you is to love the flower of the grass. It is a love that is doomed to wither and fall off.
But in glorious contrast, "the word of the Lord endures forever." While empires rise and fall, while philosophies come and go, while our own bodies decay and return to the dust, the Word of God stands. It is the one fixed, permanent, and utterly reliable reality in the universe. This is the seed planted in you. This is the source of your new life. You are connected to that which cannot fail, cannot fade, and cannot be destroyed.
The Gospel Seed (v. 25b)
Peter concludes by making the connection absolutely explicit. He brings this high theology down to the ground and puts it right in their laps.
"And this is the word which was proclaimed to you as good news." (1 Peter 1:25b)
This eternal, incorruptible, life-giving Word is not some secret, mystical knowledge available only to a few. It is not an abstract principle. It is the gospel. It is the message that was preached to you, the good news about the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sins. The very words that the evangelist spoke in your hearing, the words you read in Scripture, the sermon you heard that brought you to your knees, that was the vehicle for the incorruptible seed.
The gospel is not just information about God; it is the power of God for salvation. It is the living Word that does what it says. When the gospel is proclaimed, it carries within it the very power to create the new birth that it demands. It is the hammer that shatters the rock, the fire that consumes the dross, and the seed that brings forth eternal life.
Conclusion: Live Like What You Are
So what does this mean for us? It means our love for one another is not optional, nor is it a matter of mere sentiment. It is the primary evidence of our new birth. It is the family resemblance of the children of God.
If you find your love for your brothers and sisters in Christ is shallow, hypocritical, or non-existent, the problem is not that you need to try harder. The problem is that you have forgotten the gospel, or perhaps you have never been born of it at all. The solution is not to dredge up more willpower from your grassy, fleshly self. The solution is to go back to the seed.
We must be a people steeped in the living and enduring Word of God. We must read it, study it, memorize it, and sit under the faithful preaching of it. Because it is this Word that gave us life, and it is this Word that sustains that life. As we are nourished by the incorruptible seed, we will inevitably bear the incorruptible fruit, which is a fervent, heartfelt, and un-hypocritical love for one another.
The world is withering. Its glories are fading. But the church, born of the eternal Word, is the one society on earth that is not destined for the compost heap. Let us, therefore, love one another, not with the flimsy, disposable love of the world, but with the strong, enduring, and fervent love that flows directly from the eternal life God has planted within us.