3. A pilgrim mentality develops.

Peter begins his first epistle addressing his audience as “the pilgrims of the Dispersion” (1 Peter 1:1).  A new mindset occurs in the believer about the world. We become like foreigners, feeling out of place and awkward. We no longer seem able to speak the world’s language. Its customs are eerily unfamiliar to us. We long for a new world that is conducive to our love of holiness.

And the world changes toward us. It becomes hostile and hateful. It hated our Master, and therefore it hates us. Jesus said, “If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you . . . If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you” (John 15:19-20).

All of this is about the pursuit of holiness. Holiness is the pursuit of every genuine believer. The Bible makes it very clear the person who does not pursue it is not a new creation. “Pursue . . . holiness, without which no one will see the Lord” (Hebrews 12:14).

A Desire for Truth.

A second mark of a Christian is the desire for truth. A true disciple hungers for more truth about his Master. He has an appetite that hungers for Scripture. The more he feeds that appetite, the more intense it becomes. Jesus said “man will not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.”