Peter Barnes | 1 Peter 1:18-21
SERMON NOTES
REDEEMED FROM FUTILE WAYS
1 Peter 1:18-21
Peter writes of being redeemed or ransomed (ESV).
1. Redeemed from futile ways.
– 1:18a. We usually think, quite rightly, of being redeemed from the penalty for sin (Gal. 3:10 13). But Peter is speaking of being redeemed from the futile or useless ways which they inherited from their forefathers.
– Phil.3:3-9. For pagans there were cults like that of Cybele, the Great Mother where one was baptised in the blood of a bull.
When William Wilberforce was converted about 1785 he recalled that his past life struck him as one of ‘shapeless idleness’.
Robert Leighton: ‘The whole course of a man’s life out of Christ, is nothing but a continual trading in vanity’.
2. Redeemed by blood, not gold.
– 1:18b-19. Was Simon Magus in mind? Acts 8:14-23. See Isa.52:3-6.
– Ex.12:5. Christ is the true Passover Lamb who is without blemish.
3. Redeemed through God’s plan culminating in the resurrection of Christ.
– 1:20-21. This is the last time, the last stage of revelation when the Messiah has come, and the Holy Spirit has been poured out on Jew and Gentile. Our hope is in the resurrection of Christ.