Living a Life of Integrity Will Guard Your Soul, Minister to Others, and Glorify God
Man’s responsibility is threefold. It can be boiled down to three fine points. The first is that man has an inward responsibility, which consists of his growth in godliness. The second is that man has an outward responsibility, which consists of ministering to others. Finally, man has an upward responsibility, which consists of living a life to the glory of God. When these three factors align in the life of an individual, it can be rightly said that he will be living a life that is pleasing to the Lord.
Davis was a man who pursued holiness. Throughout the Psalms, David poured out his heart to God. When he sinned against the Lord, he kept short accounts. He can also be seen as someone who sought to show compassion toward others. His care for the men under his authority is absolutely amazing and is to be emulated. Finally, he loved to glorify God and bring honor to His name. These three strands (the inward, outward, and upward callings of God) can be seen in the lives of many people throughout Scripture. Even Jesus can be seen as a Man Who lived righteously (inward), ministered to others (outward), and longed to do the Father’s will and bring glory to the Father (upward).
But let us break that down as we take a look at 1 Peter 2:11-12. Here, Peter admonishes the recipients of this letter to live an inward, outward, and upward life. He also admonishes the Christian today to do the same.
The inward calling of God
Scripture says, “Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul” (1 Pet. 2:11). The Greek word translated as “lust” is epithumia, which means a longing for that which is forbidden. Peter emphasizes the word lust by calling it fleshly lusts. This means that there are ways in which the corrupted nature of man seeks to find fulfillment in that which is forbidden.
The Christian must not long for that which God tells him is forbidden. Peter provides a preface as well as a conclusion to this command. He creates a sandwich in the hope that, in the minds of his readers, his words will create a victorious mindset rather than a defeated one. The sandwich goes like this. The first slice of bread consists of Peter telling us that the Christian is a stranger and a pilgrim. The rotten meat is the various forms of fleshly lusts. The second piece of bread is the ways in which fleshly lusts war against the soul of the Christian.
When Peter tells his readers that they are strangers and pilgrims, he does not flippantly throw it there. He is not seeking to be wordy or sound spiritual. The fact that the Christian is a stranger and pilgrim must characterize the entire life of the Christian. The world in which the Christian finds himself is not his home. The Christian is not to co-mingle in the fleshly lusts of the people of this world. The Christian is not to be carried away by the tide. Rather, he is to move against the current; he is to move against the flow. There must be friction in the life of the Christian as he relates to the world. The Christian belongs to a kingdom of holiness and righteousness. This must characterize his life.
It is after this first piece of bread that Peter then introduces the rotten meat. (After presenting the rotten meat, Peter tells of the way that this rotten meat wages war against your soul.) Imagine eating a piece a sandwich with rotten meat in the middle. At the end of the day, it would not matter how good the bread is if you chose to eat the sandwich. You would get awfully sick. Such is the case for those who endulge themselves in fleshly lusts. It does not matter what else they choose to do. They can praise God at church; they can read their Bible; they can pray. But if they choose to indulge in fleshly lusts, the outcome will be what Peter spoke of. These lusts will wage war against the Christian’s soul.
This warning comes as the second piece of bread. Man is easily deceived. Satan has been a liar from the beginning. He was a deceiver in the Garden, and he is a deceiver today. Oftentimes, people think that a little bit of sin or a little bit of straying in the mind will not matter. But Scripture says, “Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap” (Gal. 6:7). The Christian is to wage war against his flesh lest his flesh wages war against his soul.
The outward calling of God
As Peter continues, he says, “Having your conversation honest among the Gentiles…” (1 Pet. 2:12). Peter seemingly turns abruptly from fleshly lusts waging war against the soul of the Christian to speaking honestly among the Gentiles. However, the connection is clear. First, the Christian must make sure that he is walking with the Lord in integrity. The Christian must not put on a show for the people around him and simply act spiritual. The Christian must be a godly individual.
It is when the Christian is truly godly that he will be able to speak honestly. Peter was concerned with a different type of honesty than is normally addressed or brought up in this way. The Pharisees were liars. They were liars because they were hypocrites. The acted a certain way around others, but they were white-washed tombs. This was the type of honesty Peter was speaking of. He desired that his readers would live a godly life and then minister to those around them from a state of genuineness.
The upward calling of God
Finally, Peter’s desires for his readers would not have been complete without his next statement. Peter wanted them to live a godly life and abstain from fleshly lusts. He also wanted his readers to minister to those around them with pure words that were not corrupted with hypocrisy. But there was an end in sight for Peter, and it was not rooted in man. Scripture says, “…that, whereas they speak against you as evildoers, they may by your good works, which they shall behold, glorify God in the day of visitation” (1 Pet. 2:12). Peter recognized that in this world, one’s life is to be lived for the glory of God.
One of the great challenges that is confronting the modern church is not a lack of knowledge concerning what the Bible says. Rather, there seems to be a growing tendency for the words of Scripture to fall flat on the minds and hearts of many. People know what to say, but they lack conviction. Living for the glory of God is one of those statements that many have heard a million times before.
But what does it mean, and has it actually taken root? Self will rise up. Self will seek to gain the throne and, with every fiber of his being, guard it. The only way to dethrone self is for self to die. Self wants the throne too much to be allowed to live. It is like Saul who had the throne first. But then a new king arrived. Yet just like self, Saul would not go down without a fight. Saul sought to kill David; self will seek to kill the King of kings. David was anointed as king, but Saul would not dare to step down. Saul clung to his throne despite hearing of the new king. The way for David to rule over the land was for Saul to die. This also must be the case in the life of the Christian. The old self must be crucified. He will seek to gain his own glory and establish his own kingdom. But the Christian must not let him. The Christian must take this fight seriously. To live for the glory of God means to die to self. It means to stop seeking your own glory for the sake of the glory of Another.
Final prayer
Father, I thank you for Your Word. I pray that You would cause it to take root in my life. Teach me how to be more like Jesus. In Jesus’ name, Amen