Introduction
Why should Christians live a holy life?

Peter gives us four reasons in our passage today.

First, because we as Christians are even more privileged than prophets and angels. Prophets and angels spoke of grace and salvation but they were not serving themselves. They were serving us! Wow. Therefore, says Peter (1:13) we are to prepare our minds for action and resist the pressure to conform to the world. His language sounds like Paul in Romans 12:1,2. We are to be holy in all we do, underlining the nature of holiness as involving all of life rather than being limited to religious ritual or practices.

Second, Peter says Christians should live holy lives because God is our Father and he is holy. In him there is no darkness whatsoever. He is utterly without any moral imperfection. He is high and lifted up! Says Isaiah (Isaiah 6). In his presence even the seraphim - the angels around his throne - have to cover their faces. Like Father, like sons. When Immanuel was growing up he increasingly grew more handsome. Beautiful baby, good-looking toddler, handsome young boy. The remarkable thing was that my friends and relatives, looking at him, would say: "Carbon copy. Like father like son." Remarkable - because I was never good-looking. However the genes dictated that we looked alike, albeit he is a handsomer version. Are we like God in character? We must be - if God is our Father. In particular we should be like him in love and in holiness.

Third, Christians should live holy lives because we are different from the rest of society. The majority of the Christians to whom Peter wrote this letter - in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia Minor, and Bithynia - came from a Gentile background. They were pagans! Now they have become Christians and they are counter-culture. They should no longer be ruled by the dominant pagan culture around them. Believers are strangers, or pilgrims journeying their way here but going to the celestial city. Strangers or pilgrims, aliens or foreigners, even exiles. Peter actually uses the language that describes the Jewish diaspora, the twelve tribes scattered all over the world. Gentile Christians now belong to the New Israel, and they too are only temporary dwellers here. Their real home is heaven, as Paul also says (2 Cor 5).

The fourth reason why Christians should live a holy life closely follows the third. We are strangers here because we have been redeemed from the empty way of life we lived when we were pagans. Redeemed. This is our main lesson for today. This is the chief burden of my sermon this morning. Last Sunday we understood reconciliation. How we, as God's enemies, have become God's friends because Jesus died for us! The cause of the enmity between God and us was our sin. Somehow, because Christ died for us, the cause of the enmity was removed! Sin was put away. We have been reconciled to the Father. The helpless, ungodly, undeserving sinners whom God regarded as his enemies have been reconciled to the holy God. All because Christ died for us, Christ's death effects reconciliation. But Christ's death is also a ransom, a redemption.

Today
Thanks to the Abu Sayyaf, Filipinos today understand what ransom means. To ransom is to secure release from some evil by the payment of a price. Did Martin and Gracia Burnham pay a ransom price? I don't know. Perhaps not. Officially, the New Tribes Mission, to which they belonged have a no-ransom policy. OMF too, and we understand why. However, it is very likely that a ransom demand was made because we know that kidnap-for-ransom is one of the major ways the Abu Sayyaf uses to fund their activities.

Certainly the kidnap-for-ransom gangs in Metro manila kidnap certain people in order to make money. Ransom is the price paid to secure release, liberation, freedom, deliverance! The Filipino-Chinese, or Tsinoys, have been particularly vulnerable, and we often see Teresa Ang See on TV. A couple of Christian businessmen I know - Tsinoys - have to hire bodyguards not only for themselves but for their children also. Just consider how much ransom would be demanded for Henry Sy or Lucio Tan?!
Everyone knows what ransom means. Sometimes we use ransom or redeem in a trivial way. Like the PBA sportscaster says Jimuel Torion redeemed himself from a previous miscue by stealing the ball in the next play. Even here, ransom is the price paid to secure release from embarrassment; the special effort expended in stealing the ball is the price paid. Trivial but true.

In Greco-Roman World
In the Greco-Roman world, a prison-of-war (POW) may be released on payment of a price. The price paid was called a ransom. The ransom secured the release or deliverance. It is not mere deliverance; it is deliverance by payment of a price.
Or, a slave may be released by ransom. The purchase may be fictitious, made by a god. The ransom price is paid to the temple treasury, and the slave goes through the solemn formality of being sold to the god. In theory the slave belongs to the god and may have some pious obligations to fulfill. However, as far as men are concerned, the ransomed slave is free! More simply, a slave may obtain his freedom by paying his human master a sum of money, a ransom.

In Judaism
The Jews had other regulations (Exodus 21:28-30). For example, a man may own a dangerous ox. Dangerous to others! It is his duty to keep his ox under control. If the ox got out and gored a man to death, the law was clear," the ox shall be stoned, and its owner shall also be put to death." However, in this case there was no malice, and therefore no murder. Thus provision was made for a ransom so that the owner, whose life in theory is forfeited, may pay a sum of money and save his life. Ransom is the price paid.

Ransomed by Jesus
The Greco-Roman world and Judaism are the background of the New Testament. Thus we begin to understand Peter's words to the early Christians. We were redeemed, not with silver or gold - perishable things - but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect (1 Peter 1:18,19). The blood of Jesus was the price paid to secure our release from the empty way of life we inherited from our pagan forefathers.

Why do we need deliverance, or liberation? Because before Christ came into our lives we were in triple bondage. We were slaves to sin, we were condemned to death (or separation from God), and we were subjects of Satan. The blood of Jesus freed us from all three! When we became believers, God rescued us from the dominion of darkness (the domain of the devil) and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins (Col 1:13,14). Redemption includes both forgiveness and a transfer! When we became believers, the sentence of death was cancelled and we received new life in Christ, eternal life (1 John 5:11-13). When we became believers, we were also saved from sin. First, from the penalty of sin which is death; second from the power of sin, as we yield to the power of the Holy Spirit everyday; finally, even from the presence of sin as we join Jesus in glory! Redeemed by the blood of Jesus! Not with silver or gold, which though precious are perishable. Ransomed, liberated, set free, saved not even with all the gold in Fort Knox (I cannot imagine how much gold there is in Fort Knox, but the James Bond movie, Goldfinger, gives us an idea). Ransomed, redeemed, not with all the wealth in the banks of Switzerland! (I walked a couple of times along Banhofstrasse in Zurich, where all the major Swiss banks are located. I imagined walking into one of them to say to the manager: will you please turn over all the Marcos money to the Filipino people?). Ransomed, redeemed, not with all the jewelry of Queen Elizabeth II. But by the infinitely more precious blood of the Lamb of God, chosen before the creation of the world! How can the blood of one man - if he is only a man, as our Arian friends insist - be adequate to pay for the sins of the whole world? Adequate, enough because the Lamb of God is the eternal Word becoming flesh (John 1:1, 1:14). His offering of his life is immeasurable in value; the grace he offers to us is indescribable! (2 Cor 9:15)

Conclusion
Why should we live holy lives as believers in Jesus? First because we are more privileged than prophets and angels. Second because God is our Father and we are his children. He is holy and so must we be. Third, because we are different from the rest of society. We are pilgrims here, aliens and strangers, foreigners and exiles. We take this world seriously but our real home is heaven. Fourth, because we have been redeemed or ransomed, not with gold or silver, but by the infinitely precious blood of the Lamb, chosen before the creation of the world. We have been bought at a price - the awful and awesome price of the blood of Jesus - so we honor God with our bodies (1 Cor 6:19). Christ died for us, so that we who live should no longer live for ourselves, but for him who died for us and was raised again (2 Cor 5:15). Go forth and live for Jesus. Be holy.