Our Scripture Portion.

1 Peter 1:1‑9
You must open your Bible at the passage indicated and follow this article with the Scripture before you if you would get any real help. Space forbids quotations of any length from the passage as you read, refer to the Scripture and THINK.
If consequently fresh light begins to break in upon you, do not lightly turn from it, but pursue your searching of the Word on the point. It may open up to you a fruitful field of truth and you can resume your rending of the article on another occasion.
WE begin by noticing certain features which characterize the whole epistle: ―
1. It is definitely called in its heading a general or catholic epistle, inasmuch as it is not written to any particular church, nor to an individual, as most of the others.
2. It definitely addresses the “strangers scattered” in the provinces of Asia Minor, yet “elect” —i.e., Peter writes to converted people of his own nation scattered throughout the regions to the north of Palestine. Peter was the apostle to the circumcision (see Gal. 2:7, 87But contrariwise, when they saw that the gospel of the uncircumcision was committed unto me, as the gospel of the circumcision was unto Peter; 8(For he that wrought effectually in Peter to the apostleship of the circumcision, the same was mighty in me toward the Gentiles:) (Galatians 2:7‑8)), yet it was Paul who traversed these lands and evangelized the Jews while carrying the Gospel to the Gentiles; so Peter exercised his ministry towards them by pen and ink.
3. It is a definitely pastoral epistle. Peter manifests throughout it his shepherd care for the spiritual well-being of those to whom he wrote. He gives instruction in Christian truth but even before he concludes his instruction and turns to exhortation, he pauses to deal with the practical state of their souls, as witness verses 13-17 in the midst of chapter 1. In all this Peter was true to his commission to “feed” or “shepherd” the sheep and lambs of Christ (John 21:15-1715So when they had dined, Jesus saith to Simon Peter, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me more than these? He saith unto him, Yea, Lord; thou knowest that I love thee. He saith unto him, Feed my lambs. 16He saith to him again the second time, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me? He saith unto him, Yea, Lord; thou knowest that I love thee. He saith unto him, Feed my sheep. 17He saith unto him the third time, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me? Peter was grieved because he said unto him the third time, Lovest thou me? And he said unto him, Lord, thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee. Jesus saith unto him, Feed my sheep. (John 21:15‑17)).
4. These things being so, there are a very large number of allusions to Old Testament Scripture, with which his original readers were so well acquainted. This is especially marked in chapters 1 and 2, wherein he unfolds the place and condition and hopes which now were theirs as Christians. He quotes plentifully from the Old Testament; but beyond this, almost every sentence contains an allusion to the ancient Scriptures, and it is the catching of these allusions that so greatly helps in the understanding of the Epistle.
Commencing then our reading of the Epistle, we find the opening address in verse 1 and 2. To whom does he write? To “strangers scattered” or “sojourners of the dispersion,” to people who were a standing witness to the fact that the Jew had forfeited his ancient privileges, to folk who had lost all the earthly foothold they ever had, though it was a big foothold as originally granted.
Yet the sojourners he addressed were not by any means all the scattered Jews of those provinces, but such of them only as were “elect,” or chosen of God.
Three things are mentioned as to God’s choice of them, connected respectively with the Father, the Spirit and Jesus Christ. Note the prepositions used:—
“According, to,” indicating character.
“Through,” indicating the means employed.
“Unto,” indicating the end in view.
God’s choice of them—and of us, for both Jew and Gentile come into the same Christian blessings on the same ground, as Paul’s epistles show—was characterized by His foreknowledge as Father. What a comfort this is! How far removed it is from the blind fate which is supposed by some to preside over human destiny. God’s election is never capricious and the idea of a sinner earnestly desiring salvation, and yet prevented by an adverse decree, is a nightmare of human reason and not Scripture. God chooses, knowing the end from the beginning, and therefore His choice is always right and justifies itself in its results.
His choice is made effectual “through sanctification of the Spirit.” The root idea of “sanctification” is “setting apart for God” and the Holy Spirit is He who, by His inward life-giving work, sets apart the one who is the subject of it.
The end in view is that the one so set apart should be marked by the obedience of Christ—that is, obey even as Fie obeyed—and also come under the efficacy of His blood to this end. The words “of Jesus Christ” refer to both the obedience and the sprinkling of blood, but why, we may ask, is this order observed; why not the reversed order, for do we not need the cleansing of His blood before we can obey at all? The answer is, because of the reference there is to Old Testament Scripture.
They belonged racially to the people who were God’s elect nation, chosen in Abraham, and sanctified, that is, set apart, as Exodus 13:22Sanctify unto me all the firstborn, whatsoever openeth the womb among the children of Israel, both of man and of beast: it is mine. (Exodus 13:2) testifies. Now read Exodus 24:3-8,3And Moses came and told the people all the words of the Lord, and all the judgments: and all the people answered with one voice, and said, All the words which the Lord hath said will we do. 4And Moses wrote all the words of the Lord, and rose up early in the morning, and builded an altar under the hill, and twelve pillars, according to the twelve tribes of Israel. 5And he sent young men of the children of Israel, which offered burnt offerings, and sacrificed peace offerings of oxen unto the Lord. 6And Moses took half of the blood, and put it in basons; and half of the blood he sprinkled on the altar. 7And he took the book of the covenant, and read in the audience of the people: and they said, All that the Lord hath said will we do, and be obedient. 8And Moses took the blood, and sprinkled it on the people, and said, Behold the blood of the covenant, which the Lord hath made with you concerning all these words. (Exodus 24:3‑8) and you will observe there the order, first the obedience promised which the law demanded, then the sprinkling of the blood of the sacrifice in ratification. Peter, addressing believers who were very familiar with this, carefully observes this order, only showing that we Christians have these things on a far higher plane in a vital and spiritual way, and the blood of Jesus Christ instead of being like that of the sacrifices of Exodus 24:8,8And Moses took the blood, and sprinkled it on the people, and said, Behold the blood of the covenant, which the Lord hath made with you concerning all these words. (Exodus 24:8) which had a penal force (that is, it indicated that death was the penalty attached to disobedience to the law’s righteous demands is wholly purifying, and the righteous basis of all our standing and relations with God. Sanctified by the Spirit and sprinkled by the blood of Christ we are committed to a life of obedience after the very pattern of Christ. With so exalted a course set before us we certainly need the multiplication of both grace and peace!
Verse 3 opens the apostle’s message in striking a note of praise to God, now revealed as the God and Father of the Lord Jesus Christ, since He has begotten us again to a living hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ. As belonging to the commonwealth of Israel they had formerly had national hopes which centered in a Messiah upon earth, but the light of those hopes was quenched in their hearts when He died rejected, crucified between two thieves. The story of the two going to Emmaus, as told in Luke 24, is a telling illustration of this; but, when those two had their eyes opened and beheld Him risen, a new hope dawned in their hearts which nothing on earth could quench. It was a living hope because centered in a Saviour living beyond the power of death. How aptly the very words of verse 3. would have sprung from their lips as they entered the upper room in Jerusalem to tell the news to the rest after their return journey of three-score furlongs! They were like men who had been born again into a new world of hope and expectation, in the great mercy of God.
Israel’s hopes, when brought out of Egypt, centered in the land that was to be given to them as their inheritance, The Christian’s hope also has an inheritance connected with it, as verse 4. shows but what a contrast is here! Palestine as an inheritance proved a sad disappointment. The land itself was all that a land should be, still it was capable of being corrupted, and consequently it was speedily defiled by those who inherited it, since they were left to their own responsibility. Thus, bit by bit it was forfeited and it faded away. Our inheritance is reserved in the heavens and consequently it is beyond the possibility of corruption, undefiled and unfading; and we, for whom it is reserved, are being kept by the power of God for it. There shall, therefore, be no slip betwixt the cup of the inheritance and our lips!
The power of God keeps us and not our fidelity, yet God’s power works through faith. Faith is our side of the matter. God is sovereign in exercising His power, and we are responsible as to the exercise of faith. Many are puzzled as to how to put these two things, God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility together, and regard them as quite incompatible and irreconcilable. Yet here, in this fifth verse, they are found going hand in hand, preserving the believer to the salvation that awaits him in the last time. The salvation mentioned here is future. It is the final deliverance that awaits the believer at the coming of the Lord. That final deliverance is a certainty before us; yet we cannot await it with self-confidence, for nothing-short of the power of God is needed to keep us, nor can we await it with carelessness, for God’s power is effective through faith, on our side. How then do we await it? Why, with exultation, yet tempered with the heaviness of many trials, as verse 6 declares. The coming glory shone brightly before the faith of these early Christians and filled them with great rejoicing, so that they were like ships with sails set and filled with heaven’s breezes. On the other hand they had plenty of ballast in the shape of heavy trials. These trials are permitted in love, for they only come “if need be.” In one way or another we all do need them if we try to rejoice in the world and its pleasures we need trials to dislodge us from the world by stirring up the comfortable nest we would fain build below. If we are exulting in the coming glory we need them as sobering and steadying ballast, lest our exulting should overbalance us.
The heavy trials, however, are “now, for a season,” even as the “pleasures of sin,” which charm the poor world ling are “for a season” (Heb. 11:2525Choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season; (Hebrews 11:25)). Soon the worldling will say good-bye to his pleasures, and the Christian to his trials.
Moreover, the very trials themselves are profitable as working in us—in our character and lives—the qualities that glorify God. Hence verse 7 declares that faith (which is much more precious than gold) being tested by the fire of persecution, will come out to the praise and honor and glory of God when Christ appears. Many a bold confessor, suffering fiery trial―even to death perhaps―may have been tempted to think that, their light being extinguished, all was lost. The apostle tells them that, on the contrary, all would be found in that day. Christ being revealed in His glory, everything to His praise and honor will come into the light and be displayed.
Then Christ will appear, or be unveiled, as the word is. At the present time He is unseen. These dispersed exiles had never seen Jesus in the days of His flesh for they had been driven far outside the land of Promise, nor were they then looking on Him. Yet they loved Him, and He was the Object of their faith and this caused them to exult with a joy beyond words and full of glory.
We, like them, have never yet seen the Lord, but is faith as active with us? Faith, remember, is the telescope of the soul, bringing into the field of our spiritual vision what is unseen to mortal eyes. Then we see Jesus as a living, bright Reality, and our joy is filled with the glory of what He is and the hope of what He is going to be, which is beyond all human language. Believing we rejoice, and believing we receive the salvation of our souls, for soul-salvation is the end, or result, of faith in the risen Saviour.
Love, faith, joy and hope are all found in verse 8, though the last is inferred and not explicitly named. How excellent must be the spiritual state marked by these things! Yet all produced not by being occupied with one’s spiritual state, but by Christ Himself being the loved Object of faith’s vision.
F. B. HOLE.