1 Peter 4:3-5 For the time past of our life may suffice us to have worked the will of the Gentiles, when we walked in lasciviousness, lusts… The Roman soldiers, at the sacking of Jerusalem, entered the temple, and went into the Sanctum Sanctorum; but seeing no images there, as they used to have in their own idolatrous temple, gave out in a jeer that the Jews worshipped the clouds. And thus because the pleasures of righteousness and holiness are not so gross as to come under the cognisance of the world's carnal senses (as their brutish ones do), therefore they laugh at the saints, as if their joy were but the child of fancy, and they do but embrace a cloud instead of Juno herself, a fantastic pleasure for the true; but let such know that they carry in their bosom what will help them to think the pleasures of a holy life more real, and that the power of holiness is so far from depriving a man of the joy and pleasure of his life, that there are incomparable delights and pleasures peculiar to the holy life, which the gracious soul finds in the ways of righteousness. (J. Spencer.) Parallel Verses KJV: For the time past of our life may suffice us to have wrought the will of the Gentiles, when we walked in lasciviousness, lusts, excess of wine, revellings, banquetings, and abominable idolatries: |
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