Rid yourselves of all malice.
—1 Peter 2:1
“Rid yourselves of all malice and all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander” (1 Pt 2:1).
If you want a good starting place for removing the garbage from your life, take malice to the dumpster. Malice indicates a desire to hurt another person.
Peter goes on to say that we should also dump deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander. Malice is the whole: deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander are its parts—each a child of malice.
Deceit is an intentional attempt to hide or distort the truth. Hypocrisy is masquerading outwardly as something you aren’t inwardly; it is deceit’s twin.
Peter continues, saying we should get rid of envy and slander, which are also twins. We tend to slander those we envy. Eliminating envy goes a long way toward zipping our lips from slander.
Take bad attitudes to the dumpster.