Peter the Apostle sincerely encouraged the scattered saints of the first century church to love one another with a pure heart (pure intentions) not from the Law, not from nature, not from philosophy, not from anything else but the high and divine nature that God our Creator has planted in His people. Just like a teacher of princes would work hard to develop in them kingly behaviour, convincing them from their position of royalty, so does Peter work hard to foster royal behaviour in the lives of his Christian friends by convincing them from their status of being children of God, heirs of glory, princes of royal blood, descendents of the King of kings Jesus. Peter says, love one another because of your royal birth, because you have been born of indestructible seed - the Word of the Lord, because of your pedigree, because you are descendents of God the Creator and because of your immortal destiny, for you will never pass away because of His eternal Word.
It would be a good thing if we, in humility, could see the true royalty of our regenerate nature and live up to it. What is a Christian? We could say that we are kings and queens, kings and queens and priests - for we believe that we all are priests who can enter the most holy olace by the blood of the lamb and interceed for people. An earthly king or queen's royalty lies in their crown, but our royalty has been placed deep in our soul. Surely we should carry ourselves, not as people of this low earth, living by the flesh, but as those chosen out of this world by sovereign grace. Surely we can live daily, not groveling in the dust of sin, following in the ways of dying human civilizations, but in the ways of Jesus our Lord and God, loving one another like He loved us.
May your royal identity and bright future, o believers in Christ, drive you to hold onto holiness and avoid all evil, even the appearance of evil.
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