People can be mean. Christians can be mean, nasty, evil, hypocritical, petty, and rude. Yes, I know this is a great shock. No doubt, your own experience with Christians has always been positive, Christ-like, and glorifying to our great God and Savior. We all know Christians are sweet, gentle and nice people – all of ’em, right!?. This must be a rude awakening to you. I understand. Take a moment to compose yourself . . .

All better? Good.

As I was saying, Christians can be nasty. Peter understood that – it’s why he wrote us (1 Peter 2:1) and told us how not to love the brethren in our churches. You want to know how to love fellow Christians in your church like the brothers and sisters in Christ they are? Don’t do this list of things.

Of course, there’s more to it than this. Peter also told us how we should love them. But, for today, I only managed to get through a bit of 1 Peter 2:1. I’m disappointed. I wanted to get through the whole passage (1 Peter 2:1-3), because I don’t like talking about this kind of stuff. I’ve seen Christians hate one another, and watched it tear them and a church apart. I don’t like remembering it. But, alas, I didn’t get through all the material.

I hope this discussion is a blessing to you. I pray it will make you consider yourselves, your lives, your motives and thoughts. Does the shoe fit? Then, solve the problem and do something about it. Put these things away.

The updated PDF notes are here. As always, the entire teaching series on 1 & 2 Peter is available here.