1 Peter 1:24 - Meaning and Application

After the apostle has described the excellence of the renewed spiritual person, born again, not of corruptible seed but of incorruptible seed, he now shows the emptiness of the natural person, even when that person has every outward ornament and advantage. “All flesh is like grass, and all the glory of man like the flower of grass.” Nothing can make a person a firm and lasting being except new birth by the incorruptible seed, the word of God. That word changes a person into something truly excellent, with a glory that does not fade like a flower but shines like an angel, and this word is placed before you each day in the preaching of the gospel.

Learn from this that a person, even at the height of beauty and success, is still a fading, dying creature. Consider a person by himself: “all flesh is grass.” In his coming into the world, in his life, and in his fall, he is like grass (Job 14:2; Isaiah 40:6-7). Consider him in all his glory, and even that is only “the flower of grass.” His intelligence, beauty, strength, energy, wealth, and honor are all like the flower of grass, which soon withers and is gone.

The only way to make this passing creature firm and lasting is to receive the word of God. That word is eternal truth, and when it is received, it preserves a person for everlasting life and stays with him forever.

The prophets and the apostles preached the same message. The word that Isaiah and the other Old Testament prophets delivered is the same word the apostles preached in the New Testament.