Because we have been born again by the imperishable seed of our Heavenly Father, our character and our love increasingly reflects his.

Christians live in the [right] fear of God because he is our Heavenly Father who is altogether holy and just and is the one who judges fully and impartially.

We focused on the idea that our new status as God’s children (identity) both exhorts and empowers us to be holy like our Father in Heaven is holy (activity)

Grace is [the characteristic of God's work] that enables God to confront human indifference and rebellion with an inexhaustible capacity to forgive and to bless.

God’s chosen people will be alienated from the priorities and values of the culture around them. Though this will inevitably result in suffering, that suffering produces joy.

By virtue of being elect to respond in faith to the gospel, we are at the same time necessarily alienated from the priorities and values of the culture around us. This will inevitably result in suffering.

Few verses are as pregnant with the gospel as 1 Peter 1:3-5. For Week 2 in our Series, ‘Stand Firm,’ we explored the robust idea of our inheritance, our living hope, and our new birth in Christ.

Peter sets up his weighty excursus with an equally weighty greeting, calling his audience “elect exiles of the dispersion.” Give the sermon a listen and dive into this new series with us.

Psalm 12, like many of the Psalms we’ve covered this Summer, is a lament and it teaches us “even when wickedness seems to prevail, God will guard the poor and needy.”