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Duty of Man Elder Philip N. Conley

I Peter 2:17, "Honour all men. Love the brotherhood. Fear God.
Honour the king."

Morning Thoughts July 1, 2014

This morning, people spend tremendous sums of money for professional help to
answer basic questions like "Who am I?" and "Why am I here?" There are doubtless
cases when people are truly confused about the meaning of basic things in life as psy-
chiatric depression is as real an illness to the mind as diabetes or cancer is to the body.

However, many today look for an "out" for not doing something they know they
should do, and some want to smooth over and cover their laziness. Society today
almost fetes laziness sometimes hiding behind the curtains of "I just didn't know."

Sadly, God's children can fall victim to this mindset as well. True story: a minister
visited a couple on an occasion to talk to them about some behavior in their decorum
that could bring a reproach upon the church. After laying out the problem, the minis-
ter was accosted verbally by the wife with, "Preacher, if you would just preach on
this, we wouldn't do it." While softly trying to express that these concepts were

declared and expounded regularly from the pulpit, the woman got madder and
madder as her "cover" for their slackness was falling to pieces. Our duty is not a hard
concept to understand, but regrettably, we fail to accept and follow it a lot of the time.

Our study verse is structured as 4 simple sentences, and when collectively consid-
ered, the whole of our decorum can be vividly seen. While each sentence is a subject
unto itself, the collection defines our duty easily and succinctly. Before we consider
these individual parts, we first need to understand that Peter's main course through
this portion of his epistle is to show that our example - Jesus Christ - is supreme in all

aspects of decorum. Verses 21-24 declare our Example's conduct as clearly as our
study verse shows the duties of our conduct. Therefore, we will frame these indi-
vidual parts against the backdrop of Him in all things.

"Honour all men." Peter's first declaration is to give all men the respect befitting of
our graciousness in the Lord. The word "honour" here literally means to give value or
estimation to something or someone. Now, it is plain from Scripture that there are
people in the world that are not part of God's family that will spend an eternity in

shame and contempt through punishment. Matthew 25 describes these people as
goats that the King will tell to depart from Him. These people have no goodness in
them, and faith is an alien concept, action, or thing to them. (II Thessalonians 3:2) So,

continued