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The quality of Christian love:
v. 22. Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren, see that ye love one another with a pure heart fervently
v. 23. being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the Word of God, which liveth and abideth forever.
v. 24. For all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass. The grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away;
v. 25. but the Word of the Lord endureth forever. And this is the Word which by the Gospel is preached unto you.
Just as earnestly as the apostle emphasized the necessity of faith and of unwavering trust in God, just so strongly he brings out the need of Christian love: Having your hearts purified in the obedience of the truth to unfeigned love of the brethren, from the heart love one another intently. The characteristic of faith is that it is obedient to the truth of the Gospel, that it is eager to give every manifestation of sonship towards God. This obedience of the Christians has purified their hearts from the former selfishness, from the natural love of self. They are able and willing now to show real, genuine, unfeigned love, without a trace of hypocrisy or affectation. But although this is true only in the same degree as a Christian has made progress in sanctification, yet the faculty, the ability, is there and is being fostered carefully by the Christians. Therefore they can and do accept the admonition of the apostle to love one another from their hearts, fervently, intently, assiduously. The argument is virtually this: Since you Christians can do it, since your faith has given you the ability to give proof of its existence in brotherly love, be sure to exercise this ability with all cheerful eagerness.
This love should appear in the entire life of the Christians on the basis of their regeneration: Since you are born again, not of perishable, but of imperishable seed, through the living and abiding Word of God. The new birth, which took place in us when God kindled faith in our hearts, is supposed to have effected a thorough purification of our hearts, has, in fact, done so, if our faith is of the right kind. And so the fruit of this faith will be a genuine, unselfish love for the brethren. Just why the fact of our regeneration should prove such a strong motive to us to give evidence of our faith in love is shown in the description of regeneration, when the apostle states that this new birth in our hearts is not the result of perishable, corruptible seed, as the growth of earthly plants would be, but of an incorruptible, imperishable seed, the Word of God, the Gospel of the Savior Jesus Christ. This Word of God is in itself living, full of life and of life-giving power. And it abides in eternity; even after the form of the Word, in Scripture and preaching, has passed away, the content of the Gospel will remain in eternity. Thus the life which is wrought in the hearts of men through the Gospel is a true, divine, and therefore imperishable life, and it will continue in the life of eternity.
The apostle substantiates the statement just made by a quotation from the Old Testament: For, All flesh is like grass, and all its glory like the flower of the grass; the grass dries up, and the flower falls off, but the Word of the Lord lasts forever. Isa_40:6-8. All flesh, all mankind, as it now exists, with its nature corrupted by sin, is like grass; and of the grass it is true that it withers, it dries up. All the handsomeness, the beauty, the glory which man is able to produce, with which he delights to boast; honor, art, culture, wisdom, virtue, righteousness: all is vain, without lasting value, subject to the same rapid change and decay as the flowers of the field that fall off even before the stalk is withered. They that trust in the things of this world will find themselves bitterly disappointed at the last. For only God's Word has lasting value; it endures throughout eternity, it alone stands firm and unmoved in the midst of this world of death. If we but place our trust in this Word, in the Gospel of Jesus Christ, it will lift and take us safe through the uncertainty and decay and misery and wretchedness of this world to the eternal life of salvation. Once more, then, the apostle calls out: But this is the Word which in the Gospel is preached to you. If we place our trust in this Word, in this glorious Gospel, then we are safe here in time and hereafter in eternity.
Summary.After the address the apostle launches forth in a hymn of praise to God for the gifts of His grace in Christ Jesus, to which he adds an admonition to be firm in Christian hope, in sanctification, and in brotherly love, the motive being the regeneration through the Word of God.