Blessing Our Community - Day 49

DAY 49 - Saturday, May 18, 2024

1 Peter 3:8
Finally, all of you, be like-minded, be sympathetic, love one another, be compassionate and humble.

Scripture Insights
Why is love listed third in today’s scripture? Peter’s teaching in the chapters leading up to this verse is radically countercultural to his contemporaries and deeply offensive to our modern ears. This verse serves as both a concluding exhortation for what has come before and an introduction to what follows. Peter directs his teaching to those who have received the gospel and desire to faithfully live it out in the midst of the world we find ourselves in.
Peter exhorts his readers to embody five virtues. The first, “be like-minded,” and the last, “be humble,” deal with understanding in community and, in fact, share a common root word. The second, “be sympathetic,” and the fourth, “be compassionate,” deal with emotion and passion.
This leaves the third, “love one another,” standing on its own. In his New Beacon Bible Commentary on 1 Peter, Dan Powers recognizes the chiastic structure of this list that is more common in Hebrew literature than Greek (a-b-c-b-a).
The chiastic structure gives us the key clue as to why love comes third in the list. It is the cardinal virtue, the hinge on which all the other virtues rely, and it is expressed in Christian community by our willingness to be of one mind (like-minded and humble) and one passion (sympathetic, compassionate).

Today’s Prayer
Our Father in heaven, may your Word become the prevailing reality of our lives together. May we experience these virtues in fellowship with one another as we humbly choose to agree with your revealed truth and passionately participate in each other’s suffering. We pray this in the name of Jesus and for his sake.

What is the Spirit saying to you today?

—Scott J. Sherwood
President, Nazarene Bible College