Untitled Sermon

SCRIPTURE

Peter,

an apostle of Jesus Christ:

To those chosen,

living as exiles dispersed abroad in

Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia,

chosen according to

the foreknowledge of God the Father,

through the sanctifying work of the Spirit,

to be obedient and to be sprinkled with the blood of Jesus Christ.

May grace and peace be multiplied to you.

Setting/Possible Intro

Many people in the ancient world regarded Christians as strange, superstituious, and disloyal to Roman society:

They gathered in secret

Practiced strange rituals

And practiced a countercultural lifestyle

In addition, as a corollary to 1 Peter’s development of the church as a holy nation, the epistle (like much of the New Testament) develops the theme of the church as family—for example, God is the Father, and Christians are the children (1 Pet 1:14; 2:2–3). First Peter 5:1–5 seems to develop the concept of “older sibling/younger sibling,” and 1 Peter 5:9 explicitly refers to Christians as part of the same “brotherhood” (adelphotēs), no matter their geographical location (Davids 2014, 173–74). Since church is more than just a club, but rather a nation and a family, then, as Catherine Gonzaléz (2010, 3) aptly points out, “The church is absolutely basic for the Christian. Contrary to contemporary thought, the church is not an optional gathering for those who enjoy it.”

Theme

Victory over suffering as exemplified in the life of Christ.

Suffering is repeated 16 times in this letter.

Clearly, 1 Peter does not paint a naive picture of the Christian life, full of fun and flowers. To the contrary, some sort of suffering—whether official persecution or simply social pressure—is considered normative (1 Pet 4:12).

Purpose of Letter

The apostle wants his readers to recognize the sweeping scope of new life in Christ and the implications for how they view themselves now that they have been born again by the mercy of God the Father through the resurrection of Jesus Christ (1:3). They must no longer think of themselves and their relationships to family and society in the same way they did in their former life (4:3).

1 Peter has the single focus of encouraging Christians to exhibit faithfulness under the pressures arising from persecution. The believers to whom Peter wrote were in the mist of such "fiery trials." The culture in which they lived scorned their faith, criticized their morality, and mocked their hope. Peter calls on readers to respond to this pressure with a renewed commitment to live out the grace of God, both to please God and to bear witness to his grace.

In summary, 1 Peter was written to churches struggling under harsh external pressure to remind them of who they are in Jesus Christ and how they should live.

Peter

He wasn't the same impulsive man who was full of weakness.

Stronger, wiser, has been challenged and strengthened by the many years of suffering.

In writing this letter Peter is obeying two commands which Jesus gave him:

To encourage & strengthen the brothers (Matt 22:32)

To feed the flock of God (Jn 21:15-17)

Which he also encourages/commands in this letter (5:1)

Elect Exiles

Hebrews 11:13 says that all the heroes of the faith from Abel to Abraham acknowledged that they were "aliens and sojourners on the earth."

A better phrase for "exiles of the Dispersion" is "those who reside as aliens" (NASB), this captures the idea of temporary residence away from one's homeland.

Many of Peter's readers would hear in the term echoes of its use in the OT to refer to God's chosen people, Israel, and would conclude that Peter thought of them as having a privileged status before God at least equal to that enjoyed by the chosen people whom God protected, preserved and blessed in the Old Testament.

The phrase, 'elect exiles' thus becomes a two-word sermon to Peter's readers; they are "exiles" not in an earthly sense (for many no doubt had lived in one city their whole lives), but spiritually; their true homeland is heaven and any earthly residence there fore temporary. Yet they are the "elect" exiles ones whom the king of the universe has chosen to be his own peopl,e to benefit from his protection, and to inhabit his heavenly kingdom.

Foreknowledge

The related verb "foreknow" can refer not just to God's knowing a fact, but to his knowing people with a personal, loving, fatherly knowledge. Thus "according to the foreknowledge" suggests, "according to God's fatherly care for you before the world was made."

This implies that their status as sojourners, their privileges as God's chosen people, even their hostile environment in Pontus, Galatia, etc., were all known by God before the world began, all came about in accordance with his fatherly love for his own people. Such foreknowledge is laden with comfort for Peter's readers.

Father, Spirit, Jesus

The same content in verse 1, namely, the entire present status of the readers, is further modified by two more prepositional phrases, "sanctification of the Spirit", for obedience to Jesus Christ and for sprinkling with his blood."

Just as God's foreknowledge refers to past time, "sanctification of the Spirit" speaks of a present influence and "for obedience to Jesus Christ...looks forward to accounting future activity or goal.

Holy Spirit: Sanctifying work, he is gradually working in Christians to free them more and more from remaining sin and to make them increasingly like Christ in holiness, faith, and love.