Everything here hangs on the first word. 13"Therefore." Peter has spent twelve verses on what God has done, and only now does he ask anything of his readers. Holiness in this letter follows hope. The order matters, since holiness is what a person does after the inheritance has already been handed over.
The first command is about the mind. 13"Preparing your minds for action" is a picture: gird up the loins of your mind. Men tucked their robes into the belt when there was work to do, and Israel ate the first Passover dressed that way. Peter moves the image inside. Being ready begins with where attention goes. Sober-minded adds a clear head, a mind not dulled by whatever is passing through it. Both phrases serve one main command: 13"set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you."
Then he quotes Leviticus to a church of scattered believers. 16"You shall be holy, for I am holy." The word for conduct, *anastrophe*, runs through the whole letter and means the manner of a life. Israel's holiness rested on who God is and what he did at the Exodus. The church's rests on the same God and a greater rescue.
Peter names that rescue, and he holds Father and judge in one sentence. The fear he asks for is the seriousness of people who know what their rescue cost. They were 18"ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers." He has just promised them a different inheritance, imperishable and unfading, so the one they received from their ancestors was futile, and the one kept in heaven endures. The price was 19"the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot." This Lamb was 20"foreknown before the foundation of the world" and revealed for the sake of these scattered people.
The ransomed are then pointed at each other: 22"love one another earnestly from a pure heart." Holiness has a destination, and it is a family. Its strength comes from the new birth, 23"through the living and abiding word of God." The word that gave them life is the word that keeps them alive, 25"the good news that was preached to you."
So Peter says to put away malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander. Every item on that list damages the family he has just described, and most are sins of the mouth and heart. Then he says to 2"long for the pure spiritual milk." The Greek carries a small wordplay. Deceit is *dolos*, and pure is *adolon*, without deceit. Put away the deceit and long for the milk that has none in it. Nobody teaches a baby to crave. Peter trusts the appetite to follow the taste: 3"if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good."
Ask what your mind has been girded for this week, and what you long for when you are hungry.
Prayer
Father, you are holy, and you have called us to be holy in all our conduct. Forgive the old passions that still pull at us. Prepare our minds for action, set our hope fully on the grace to be revealed, and keep us mindful of the blood that ransomed us. Teach us to love one another from a pure heart, and give us a hunger for your word. In Jesus' name, amen.