Scripture
1 Peter
25 sermons
The Blood of the Unblemished Lamb
What makes the blood of Christ 'precious'? Expounding 1 Peter 1:18–21, this sermon works through Peter's characteristic rhetorical pattern — negation followed by assertion — to establish that no corruptible thing, whether material wealth or old covenant religious observance, can redeem a soul bound under sin and condemnation. The sermon then unfolds why the blood of Christ is precious: because of the dignity of the God-man who shed it, what it infallibly accomplishes in the redemption of the elect, what it cost the Father to give his own Son, and its eternal appointment in the counsel of the triune God before the foundation of the world. Preached in the context of a Lord's Supper service, the sermon closes by examining the typological significance of the unblemished Passover lamb, showing that the holiness of God, the depth of human sinfulness, and the logic of penal substitution each demand a perfectly spotless sacrifice — which Christ alone is and was.
Christ's Precious Gem Collection
What does it mean that believers are 'living stones' built into a spiritual house? This sermon traces a single biblical-theological theme from Genesis 2 to Revelation 21: God gathering his elect — his precious gems — out of the scattered nations to build a temple where he will dwell with his people forever. The identity of those gems (God's chosen people), their location (scattered among every nation under the dominion of spiritual darkness), and the means of their gathering (Christ's victory over the strong man, and the church's commission to carry the gospel-light into the darkness) are each examined in turn. The sermon presses its hearers toward a missional 'spiritual gold fever' — a willingness to spend and be spent in the divine treasure hunt Christ has commissioned.
The Ground of Christian Love
What is the ground and shape of the command to 'love one another fervently with a pure heart'? Expounding 1 Peter 1:22–25, this sermon works through three movements: the exhortation to fervent, sincere Christian love; the foundation of that love in the new birth wrought through the incorruptible Word; and the motivation for that love in the stark contrast between the transient glory of man and the enduring Word of the Lord. The sermon draws on 1 Corinthians 13 and Romans 13 to define love's character and content, and closes with the assurance that the divine promise sealed in the gospel is itself imperishable — and therefore the sufficient ground for fervency in loving the brethren.
The New People of God: Part 2
The titles given to the church in 1 Peter 2:9–10 — chosen generation, royal priesthood, holy nation, and his own special people — are drawn directly from Old Testament Israel typology and applied to all who believe in Christ. Working through Deuteronomy 32, Exodus 19, 2 Samuel 7, and the Abrahamic covenant, the sermon traces how God's act of separating Israel from the nations at Babel prefigures his rescue of the spiritual Israel — the church — from the dominion of darkness into the marvelous light of Christ. The sermon argues that the new covenant fulfils what the old covenant typified: believers now constitute the household of God, the spiritual temple, and a royal priesthood whose commission is to proclaim the excellencies of the one who called them out of darkness. This demands that the church pursue its prophet-priest-king calling not through military or political dominion but through the proclamation of the gospel of King Jesus to every tribe, tongue, people, and nation.
The New People of God, Part 1
What does it mean for the church to be built on Christ as a living cornerstone, and how does the Old Testament ground that identity? Expounding 1 Peter 2:6–8, this sermon traces the biblical-theological arc from Adam's failed dominion mandate in Genesis through Israel's typological history—law-giving, exile, and restoration—to the fulfilment of Isaiah's cornerstone prophecy in the Lord Jesus Christ. Israel's covenant history is shown to be a historical type of the cosmic reality: the broken covenant of works and its restoration by the Messiah, who is now building a global kingdom of redeemed image-bearers out of every tribe and tongue. Believers are called to marvel at God's sovereignty over history, over the kingdom of darkness, and over the unified message of Scripture that runs from Genesis 3:15 to the church as the true Israel of God.
The Call for Christian Growth
Unrepentant sin and a failure to desire the Word of God are the chief hindrances to Christian growth — and that growth is not merely a personal blessing but a corporate responsibility. Working through 1 Peter 2:1–5, this sermon argues that believers are living stones being built into a spiritual house, and that weak, doctrinally shallow Christians produce a structurally unsound church. The exhortation is concrete: mortify the sins of malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander; cultivate an insatiable hunger for the pure milk of the Word; and do so knowing that justification rests on faith alone while sanctification calls every believer to steady, disciplined growth.
Brotherly Love
What grounds the command to love fellow believers, and what does that love look like in practice? Expounding 1 Peter 1:22–25, this sermon argues that brotherly love among believers is not merely a moral duty but flows necessarily from regeneration — the purification of the soul through faith worked by the Holy Spirit. The sermon carefully distinguishes passive, receiving faith from any works-based or neonomian construal of 'obeying the gospel,' grounding the command to love in the incorruptible seed of the new birth. Application presses toward sincere, unhypocritical, self-sacrificial love that crosses denominational and theological-liberty lines, because the bond of the brethren is founded on the eternal word of God, not on natural or doctrinal affinity.
Redeemed by the Precious Blood of Christ
God is an impartial judge who will call every person to account for every transgression of his law, and no corruptible thing — no silver, gold, religious ritual, or moral effort — can satisfy the demands of that justice. Redemption comes exclusively through the precious blood of Christ, the spotless Lamb foreordained before the foundation of the world, whose death made propitiation for sin and whose perfect obedience is imputed to the believer's account. Drawing from 1 Peter 1:17–21, this sermon expounds the condition, command, reason, and result of the Christian's call to conduct life in reverent fear: not a slavish terror born of misunderstanding God's character, but a reverent awe that flows from knowing the God who is both perfectly just and perfectly merciful. The believer's ongoing faith and hope are to rest continually in God — grounded in Christ's resurrection, confirmed by his ascension to glory, and oriented toward the certain hope of the new heaven and new earth.
Exhortations in light of so Great a Salvation
Peter's exhortations in 1 Peter 1:13–16 are grounded in the prior theological indicatives of the epistle: the elect have been saved by the triune God, unto an incorruptible inheritance, and must now respond with corresponding imperatives. Two commands govern this passage — set your hope fully on the grace to be revealed at Christ's return, and live a holy life in all your conduct — each requiring mental intentionality, self-control, and an understanding of the regenerate nature as 'children of obedience.' The sermon argues that sanctification involves both mortification of former lusts and vivification of the new nature of obedience, while insisting that this holiness contributes nothing to justification, which rests wholly on Christ's perfect active obedience and atoning death.
The Magnitude of Salvation
1 Peter 1:10–12 raises a question that magnifies the gospel: if the Old Testament prophets searched so carefully for what believers now possess, how great must this salvation be? The sermon traces three witnesses to that greatness — the prophets who inquired but did not receive the full disclosure, the apostles who proclaimed what the Spirit now made plain, and the angels who bend over in perpetual wonder at a redemption they themselves never needed. The pattern of Christ's sufferings followed by glory is shown to be the shape of every believer's life, grounding present endurance in the certainty of future inheritance.
1 Peter 1:6-9
The paradox of simultaneously rejoicing and grieving marks the Christian life as Peter describes it in 1 Peter 1:6–9. Trials are not accidents of providence but a necessary divine instrument: God uses suffering to prove and purify a faith that is more precious to Him than refined gold is to men, and that tested faith will issue in praise, honor, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ. The principle for maintaining joy amid suffering is not mere willpower but a growing, knowledge-grounded faith fixed on Christ — His cross, His resurrection, and the inheritance He has secured — so that joy becomes the constant fruit of right focus rather than a fluctuating response to circumstances.
The Suffering Servant
1 Peter 2:21–25 sets forth Christ's suffering as redemptive before it is exemplary: Peter's primary purpose is not to give believers a moral template but to ground their conduct in the substitutionary, sin-bearing work of the Servant prophesied in Isaiah 53. The sermon traces the description of Christ's redemptive suffering — his sinlessness, his silence under reviling, and his substitutionary death on the tree — before turning to its results: the freedom of God's people from sin's penalty and power, and the recovery of straying sheep by the Shepherd and Overseer of their souls. Believers are therefore called not to whine or revile under unjust treatment, but to commit themselves to him who judges righteously, following the pattern of the one whose stripes have healed them.
The Sight of Salvation
How do believers apprehend Christ now, before the sight of glory? Expounding 1 Peter 1:8–9, this sermon traces the apostle Peter's contrast between the present age — marked by faith, love, and unspeakable joy in an unseen Christ — and the age to come, when faith reaches its divinely appointed telos in the full, final, and bodily sight of the glorified Mediator. Faith is shown to be the foundation of every other grace: love for Christ and joy in Christ are impossible apart from it, and both are sovereign gifts of divine mercy, not works stirred up from within the believer. The sermon closes by pressing the necessity of saving faith as the only preparation for glory, calling the unconverted to flee to Christ and assuring the tried believer that no promise of God in Christ will fail.
The Sacrifice Remembered
What does it mean to remember the death of Christ at the Lord's Supper? Examining 1 Peter 1:18–20, this sermon traces three dimensions of that remembrance: the incomparable value of Christ's precious blood over all corruptible earthly things, the eternal and love-driven divine purpose behind the atonement foreordained before the foundation of the world, and the singular historical reality of the incarnation and sacrifice. The congregation is called to prize Christ above every earthly attachment and to observe the Lord's Supper with the gravity and joy befitting so great a Savior.
He Cares for You
The murder of Naboth the Jezreelite in 1 Kings 21 exposes the convergence of covetousness, governmental tyranny, and idolatry — and demonstrates that no crime against God's people escapes divine notice. The chapter divides into two broad movements: the orchestrated injustice Jezebel engineers against Naboth (vv. 1–16) and Elijah's prophetic condemnation of Ahab (vv. 17–29). Four conclusions emerge: God's people will face injustice in this world; governments may administer that injustice; God nevertheless intervenes in the affairs of men; and the abandonment of the first table of the law invariably produces the abandonment of the second. The chapter closes on a surprising note of divine mercy — even Ahab's shallow remorse moves God to suspend judgment, which becomes a ground for confidence that a true penitent who comes to Christ will receive far more.
The Suffering Servant
Christ's suffering in 1 Peter 2:21–25 is first and foremost substitutionary atonement, not merely moral example — yet because he bore the sins of his people in his own body on the tree, his conduct under unjust suffering becomes a pattern for servants and all who endure hardship for conscience toward God. Drawing extensively on Isaiah 53, the sermon expounds the sinlessness of Christ as the ground of his perfect sacrifice, the imputation of sin to the sin-bearer, and the definitive freedom from sin's penalty and power that his death secures. The recovery of straying sheep by the chief Shepherd and Overseer is traced to sovereign, efficacious grace — not to any act of the will — calling believers to meditate on these realities as they come to the Lord's Supper.
The Precious Blood of Christ
What is the value of Christ's blood, and why does the New Testament insist that nothing corruptible — no silver, gold, or human religious tradition — can redeem a sinner? Drawing from 1 Peter 1:18–19 in the context of a Lord's Supper meditation, this sermon works through three considerations: the vanity of any bloodless redemption, the aimless sinfulness that necessitated a blood redemption, and the exclusive and infinite worth of Christ's precious blood. The application is direct — because believers have been purchased at such an infinite price, they are to hold Christ alone as precious and to conduct themselves in a manner worthy of that redemption.
The Trinity and the Death of Christ
The death of Christ on the cross is not the work of the Son alone but of the entire Triune God — Father, Son, and Holy Spirit — each acting distinctly yet inseparably in the one work of redemption. Drawing from 1 Peter 1:2 as a launching text, the sermon traces each person's role: the Father in purpose, promise, and punishment; the Son in penal obedience, perfection, and protection; the Spirit in publication, persuasion, and purification. The definite, efficacious nature of Christ's atonement is insisted upon throughout — Christ did not die to make salvation possible but to actually and perfectly save his elect. Observed in the context of the Lord's Supper, the sermon calls believers to reflect on the Triune God as the sole and sufficient author of salvation from beginning to end.
Patient Enduring of Suffering
1 Peter 2:21–25 calls believers to the patient endurance of suffering, grounding that call in the person and work of Christ. This sermon examines the reason for that exhortation (the promised and realized persecution of the first-century church), the shape of the exhortation itself (negatively, refusing to revile or threaten; positively, committing oneself to the righteous Judge), and the threefold foundation for obedience: Christ's atoning suffering on our behalf, Christ's example as the sinless sufferer, and the believer's present status as found sheep safe in the fold. The application presses believers to expect suffering, to cut off retaliatory impulse at its root, and to meditate on Christ's cross as the chief remedy for a vindictive heart.
The Three Whos of Christ
How does Christ serve as the supreme example for Christians called to suffer in an ungodly world? Expounding 1 Peter 2:21–24, this sermon identifies three Christological realities Peter sets before suffering believers: Christ's sinless messianic humanity, His non-retaliatory resolve under verbal abuse and physical torment, and His substitutionary curse-bearing on the cross. The sermon argues that substitutionary atonement is not a negotiable theological option but the irreducible heart of the gospel, and calls believers to wonder at the Savior who bore their sins in His own body while refusing to revile those who reviled Him.
Tribulation and Joy
What should a Christian expect when faithfully following Christ in a world hostile to God? Drawing from 1 Peter 4:12–19, this sermon presents four imperatives for the suffering believer: expect tribulation as the normal experience of the Christian life, exult in it by recognising union with Christ in His sufferings, evaluate its cause to distinguish genuine persecution from self-inflicted consequence, and entrust the soul to God as a faithful Creator who sovereignly ordains and will ultimately vindicate His elect. The sermon closes with 2 Thessalonians 1 as apostolic confirmation that divine vindication of the church is certain and ought to sustain perseverance along the narrow way.
The Privileges of Christ's Church
1 Peter 2:9 presents the church with a fourfold corporate identity — chosen generation, royal priesthood, holy nation, special people — rooted in what God originally purposed for Israel at Sinai and fulfilled in Christ. This sermon traces that identity from Exodus 19 through the failure of Old Covenant Israel, to its consummation in Christ who, by his obedience, death, and resurrection, purchased these privileges for his church. The God-centered function of this identity is the proclamation of God's excellencies, which demands a gospel rightly understood as centered on the doing, dying, and rising of Jesus Christ. Believers are called to take up the corporate privileges of access to God, prayer, praise, and the knowledge of God with the seriousness these mercies deserve.
Suffering and Our Substitute
Christians are called not merely to accept suffering as inevitable but to embrace it joyfully, after the pattern of Christ, who endured reviling and unjust punishment without retaliation. This sermon works through 1 Peter 2:21–24 under three headings — the calling to suffer, Christ as exemplar, and his penal substitution — drawing heavily on Isaiah 53 and Old Testament typology to establish that substitutionary atonement is the doctrinal foundation of Christian endurance. The doctrine of penal substitution — that God the Son bore in his own body the punishment due to guilty sinners — is defended as the irreducible center of the gospel, without which there is no comfort for the guilty and no hope for the dying. Hearers are called to make Christ's substitutionary work chief in their affections and to follow his non-retaliatory example in the face of suffering and provocation.
The Believer's Inheritance
What does the believer's inheritance consist of, and how is it secured against every threat? Expounding 1 Peter 1:4–5, this sermon examines the three negative descriptions of the believer's heavenly inheritance — incorruptible, undefiled, and unfading — before turning to the divine preservation that guarantees the heir will actually receive it. The inheritance is secured not by the believer's own resolve but by the power of God working through the gift of faith, so that even amid persecution, trial, and the triple enmity of the devil, the world, and the flesh, the Christian presses on in confident, heavenward hope.
Be Clothed With Humility
Pride is the greatest enemy of the Christian life, and 1 Peter 5:5–11 commands believers to be clothed with humility — not as a religious technique, but as the necessary outworking of submission to the sovereign God who resists the proud and gives grace to the humble. The passage moves through a fourfold structure: the command to be submissive and clothed with humility (v. 5), the implication that genuine humility toward others flows only from prior submission to God (v. 6), the disposition required — casting all care upon a God who cares for his people and resisting the devil steadfast in the faith (vv. 7–9) — and the benediction that sets fleeting suffering against eternal glory in Christ (vv. 10–11). The sermon closes with practical counsel on cultivating humility: the necessity of new birth, meditation on the cross, acknowledgment of dependence on God, thankfulness, and returning glory to God at the close of each day.