28.September.2026
Peter did not describe the life before Christ as sin in the way we usually think of it, a list of bad choices that someone made on their own. He described it as something inherited, a whole way of living that was handed to a person before they were ever old enough to choose it for themselves, the same way a family passes down their name or a way of doing things without anyone sitting the child down to ask if they agreed.
Knowing that you were not redeemed with corruptible things, like silver or gold, from your aimless conduct received by tradition from your fathers.
I Peter 1:18
Aimless conduct received by tradition from your fathers. That sentence is doing a lot of work. It means the way of life Peter’s readers had been living was not something they invented on their own. It was passed to them, generation to generation, and accepted simply because it was familiar, never because it was actually examined. An empty way of living can be inherited as easily as a name or a trade, and most people never stop to ask whether what they received was worth keeping.
Jesus never lived that way, and it is important to look at how He changed it from empty tradition showing what actually looked like in practice, because it was not chaos. It was consistency of a different kind.
Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever. Hebrews 13:8
He never repeated a method. Spit and clay for one man, a word spoken from a distance for another, sometimes a touch, sometimes silence, sometimes nothing but a command. There was no script, no fixed routine anyone could point to and say, this is how He always does it. And even when unbelief pressed in on every side, He still would not be stopped from loving.
And he could there do no mighty work, save that he laid his hands upon a few sick folk, and healed them. And he marvelled because of their unbelief.Mark 6:5-6
Few is not none. Unbelief could shrink the room He had to work in, but it never once emptied His hands or changed what was in His heart to do. That is what real freedom looks like from the inside. Not a different set of rules to keep, but a heart so unchanging that it no longer needs a fixed method to stay consistent.
The inheritance Peter described did not start with our own fathers, either. It goes all the way back to the first one.
For as by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, so also by one Man’s obedience many will be made righteous. Romans 5:19
We did not choose our way into that condition any more than Peter’s readers chose the aimless conduct handed down to them. But we are not left there. We are made completely righteous by Jesus, not by our own effort and not by inherited tradition either. That righteousness cost us nothing and cost Him everything, and a gift that expensive was never meant to be handled carelessly. We came into sin because of one man. We are free, and free to choose, because of One who obeyed all the way through.
Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage. Galatians 5:1
A yoke is built for repetition, the same motion performed the same way every time. That is precisely what makes inherited, empty tradition so dangerous even after freedom has been purchased. Freedom does not erase old muscle memory. It has to be chosen, actively, the way Jesus chose it, led by His Father, His heart fixed, His mind set apart, His method free, or the return to what is familiar happens almost without a decision at all.
What inherited pattern have I stopped calling bondage simply because I have worn it my whole life?
If you have never given your life to Jesus Christ, you can do that right now. Pray this with me:
Dear Heavenly Father,
I confess that I have sinned, and I believe Jesus died for my sins and rose again on the third day. I ask Jesus, come into my heart and be my Lord and Savior. Thank You for saving me.
In Jesus’ name,
Amen.
Make today count and see you tomorrow.
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