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Peter notes two more ways we share our lives with the other members of the church. 

Share the Authority 

The New Testament lays out a governmental system, an authority structure, for the church. It has two kinds of officers: pastors (also called elders or overseers, 1P 5.1-3; cf Ac 20.17, 28), and deacons (Php 1.1). Here Peter addresses himself to the elders, giving them two commands: feed the flock (through teaching and preaching, of course), and take oversight (that’s the Greek word episkopeo, which is obviously the root of our word episcopal). The latter is what we call “administration”—organizing and seeing that everything necessary gets done. I should note that this doesn’t mean that the pastor should do everything. 

But Peter places some moderating concepts, some restrictions, on the elders: first, they should not be forced into the job; they should serve willingly (1P 5.2), nor should they serve just for their own financial profit, but because they wish to serve the church genuinely. And second, they should not “lord it over” the flock but should lead by example (1P 5.3). 

This is a tall order. A godly pastor will say with Paul, “Who is sufficient for these things?” (2Co 2.16). But by the grace of God, thousands of pastors have cared for their flocks in just such a way. The aberrations get a lot of attention, of course, but I would suggest that they get that attention just because they are deviants; the good ones simply serve, and they have a reward coming (1P 5.4). 

The sheep get some instruction from Peter as well—and it’s no surprise: he returns to his primary theme of submission (1P 5.5). And we submit not just to the elders, but to everyone around us in the body as well. Again, Peter agrees with Paul on this point (Ep 5.21). 

Share the Mission 

Finally, Peter climaxes his theme of submission by pointing us to the fact that all of us are “under the mighty hand of God” (1P 5.6). Our reaction to that truth demonstrates the relative health of our relationship with God: if we see that statement as threatening, then our understanding of and relationship with our Father is defective. There is no safer place than under the strong arm of a loving Father. 

What is a healthy response? Well, first, we leave the big decisions to him: we humble ourselves before him (1P 5.6), and we trust him to do the right things and to bring us out at a good place (1P 5.7). He does, after all, care for us—both emotionally and practically. 

With that background, we can face the enemy with confidence. We do have an enemy, one whose intentions for us are deeply evil. Being careless in such a situation makes no sense at all. So we take him seriously (1P 5.8), but we face him confidently (“in faith,” 1P 5.9). Not only are we all in this together, but Peter has already established that we have a caring Father with a mighty arm. 

And finally, a healthy response to our Father’s mighty arm is to look for his provision and reward. His unfailing grace certainly will, as John Newton famously observed, “lead me home.” After temporary suffering, God will mature us, bring us to our telos, take us all the way to his lovingly planned end (1P 5.10). And his grace is “eternal” (1P 5.10), “forever and ever. Amen.” (1P 5.11). 

British lyricist Michael Perry captures the concept perfectly: 

And whether our tomorrows be filled with good or ill, 
We’ll triumph through our sorrows and rise to bless you still— 
To marvel at your beauty and glory in your ways 
And make a joyful duty our sacrifice of praise. 

May we all—all—know such a life. 

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Peter has applied his fundamental principle—submission—in the social sphere (government and marketplace) and inside the home. Now he turns to the third arena in which we play out our lives: the church. As it’s often said, we’re called to be in the world, but not of it (cf. Jn 17.11-16), and of course we’re called to prioritize our family. But we are also part of a not-this-world, and another family, which is the family of believers. The Bible calls that the church, the assembled ones. 

Peter begins with the observation that “the end of all things is at hand” (1P 4.7). This is not the ranting of some wild-eyed prophet with a sandwich board; it’s the studied observation of an apostle, passing along what he has heard from Jesus himself. In the biblical history, the church is the result and manifestation of Christ’s climactic work of atonement and resurrection, and it is the outworking of his people’s abundant life that will persist unto the very end of time (Mt 16.18). Ever since the church began at Pentecost, it has been the final stage of God’s temporal plan. 

So we ought to pay attention (“be sober,” 1P 4.7) to the most important things, and we ought to get busy. 

Get busy with what? 

I’d suggest that Peter lays out before this spiritual family several ways in which we can share our standing before God as we await the end of all things. 

Share the Gifts 

Peter is the only New Testament author besides Paul to address the subject of spiritual gifts, and his mention is by far the briefest. Since I’ve written elsewhere on the topic, I’ll move quickly here. 

Peter starts with love (KJV “charity,” Greek agape), as well he should (1Co 13.13), and he elevates it with the phrase “above all things” (1P 4.8). We need to love one another. 

And now follows one way that we demonstrate that love. We show hospitality (lit. “love [phile] of foreigners”) without holding back (1P 4.9). What do you need? OK, here it is. For free. As much as you need. 

And whatever other gift or gifts we have, we exercise them for the benefit of the others in the body (1P 4.10). That’s what they’re for. 

Here Peter names two more gifts—or, I would suggest, two categories into which all the gifts may be organized—namely, speaking and serving (KJV “ministering”) (1P 4.11). Platform, front-of-the-room gifts, and those that work outside of the limelight and typically get little notice. 

When we do that, we edify the church as a whole (cf. Ep 4.12-13), and we bring glory to the church’s head, Christ (Ep 1.22-23). 

Share the Suffering 

Jesus never preached Prosperity Theology. He did say that our needs will be met—fowls of the air, and lilies of the field, and all that (Mt 6.25-34)—but he also said that we would be persecuted: his words about sparrows falling and the hairs on our heads being numbered were spoken in a context of persecution: “I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves” (Mt 10.16; cf 17-33). 

So Peter counsels, “Think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you” (1P 4.12). 

It’s coming. 

So how should we respond? 

Based just on verse 12, we ought to respond with confidence. We’re not shocked; we’re not surprised; we’re not wondering what has gone terribly wrong and why God has allowed this awful thing to happen to us. We square our shoulders, we face the persecutors, and we do not quake. 

Further, we respond with joy (1P 4.13-14). Since Peter knows that’s an odd request, he gives us the reason for it: our joy reflects confidence and trust in God, and the fact that he is worthy of that trust speaks well of him—it glorifies him, or gives his reputation more weight in our eyes, as well as in the eyes of the persecutors (if they have any sense). 

Third, we share the suffering innocently (1P 4.15). We don’t behave in ways that justify the persecution. These days I’m seeing Christians post things—snide, inciteful (not insightful), hateful things—that can result only in giving the enemies of God reason to blaspheme. Peter seems to imply that such people deserve whatever persecution they get. 

We respond with gratitude for our safe standing in God (1P 4.16-18) and with trust in the God who has given us that standing (1P 4.19). 

That doesn’t remove the pain, but it does make sense of it. And it puzzles the persecutors in the healthiest of ways. 

Next time: two more ways we share our lives with the rest of the body, the church.

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I’ve suggested that the historical background is significant here—that Peter is dealing with a situation where lots of marriages have been shaken up by the conversion of just one spouse. But that view raises a question. 

Should all husbands and wives treat each other this way, even if it’s not a religiously mixed marriage? Is Peter’s commandment here more broadly applicable? 

I find it ridiculous to argue that this is a narrow command. Shouldn’t every husband study his wife so as to know her well, thereby indicating that he sees her as valuable? Shouldn’t he want to be able to pray effectively? Shouldn’t every wife have internal character? Shouldn’t her beauty be more than skin deep? Shouldn’t she respect her husband, even as he honors her? 

Of course. 

Having addressed the husbands and wives, Peter extends his focus by considering what submission looks like in general (1P 3.8-12) and then laying out some consequences of the good conscience that such submission produces (1P 3.13-4.6). 

What does submission look like generally? How is it done? 

It starts in the mind (1P 3.8). We care about others; we empathize, we respect. And that mindset leads to certain actions (1P 3.9-11). We don’t seek revenge (because submission isn’t about us); we control our words; we pursue good and peace, not evil and its resultant conflict. And when we do that, sometimes to our great surprise, we find that we “love life, and see good days” (1P 3.10); and like that husband who treasures his wife, we find that our prayers are effective (1P 3.12). 

This is the kind of thinking and behavior that leads to a good conscience. Peter now lays out four long-term consequences of that. 

First, as he’s noted earlier (1P 2.15), good behavior shames those who seek to persecute God’s people (1P 3.13-17). Even if they go on to persecute you anyway, you have the benefit of a clear conscience and confidence in God’s overseeing providence. 

Next, it honors the sacrifice of Christ (1P 3.18-4.2). Again, as Peter has noted earlier (1P 2.21), Christ has suffered unjustly, and when we do also, we are merely following his example and demonstrating our willingness and intention to do so. 

Now, in this paragraph, there are two “difficult” passages. In New Testament Studies it’s a widely amusing irony that Peter says there are things in Paul’s writings that are difficult to understand (2P 3.16), when Peter himself has three of the most difficult statements in all the New Testament—two in this paragraph, and one in the next one. 

A blog post is not the place to explore these difficult passages in detail. A good technical commentary will usually give the arguments on both sides. For our purposes, I’m just going to state my position and leave it at that. 

When Noah was building the ark, he preached to his neighbors, but they did not heed his message—a message that was actually directly from God the Son, who would later suffer and die to rescue sinners, just as Noah was seeking to do with his message and his boat (1P 3.19-20). Good intentions, but the response was persecution—so why should we expect otherwise? 

Just as Noah’s boat was saved by water—lifted up on the waves of the Flood—so our baptism, our confession of our conversion—issues in our state of having a good conscience—though it does not wash away our sins, for only repentance and faith can do that (1P 3.21). 

After Christ was persecuted, God vindicated him through resurrection and exaltation. We, too, can look forward to our own vindication. And given the magnitude of Christ’s sacrifice, we should persist in turning from sin and protecting a good conscience despite the opposition (1P 4.1-2). 

Third, a good conscience delivers us from the fear of judgment (1P 4.3-6). Those who persecute believers are in the same state we once were in, and it makes no sense for us to allow their persecution to pressure us to rejoin them and thereby lie under threat of judgment. Just as God has delivered us, so he has also revealed himself in the past to those who have since died (here’s Peter’s third interpretational difficulty in just two paragraphs), thereby giving them opportunity to repent. He takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked (Ezk 18.23, 32). 

Next time, we’ll look at Peter’s roadmap for submission in a third arena: the church.

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Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 

Peter continues his theme—living out our great salvation through submission—by continuing to zoom in on the arenas where we choose to submit. He began with the king and other government officials; then he moved to the workplace. Now he makes it really personal: he brings it home. 

In a similar passage in Ephesians 5-6, Paul speaks to three parties in the home: wives, husbands, and children. Here Peter addresses just the first two. Like Paul, he speaks to the wives first. 

Given his theme, we’re not surprised by what he commands of wives; “Be in subjection to your own husbands” (1P 3.1). Like the command to submit to rulers and to masters / employers—even the “froward” (1P 2.18)—this one is hard to take. I’ll note that in Peter’s day, when the church was just in its infancy, there were lots of marriages in which both parties were unbelievers, and then one of the two was converted—and just like that, you have lots of “mixed marriages,” where one party cannot comprehend what’s going on in the mind of his or her spouse. Few if any of Peter’s readers had had the opportunity to be raised in a Christian home and marry another believer. 

So here we are. The wife—it’s often the women who are converted first—is a believer and now apparently an enemy of the state. The typical response of the husband is going to be shock, then ongoing concern, then frustration at his wife’s intransigence.  

Marital crisis. 

Peter counsels wisely. Don’t add to the difficulty of the situation, he says. Don’t make this personal. The offense of the cross is enough. Be as cooperative as the Scripture allows. 

We’ve already noted that in faceoffs with the state, Peter himself has refused submission when the state’s directives contradict the Scripture and the commands of Christ. Of course the same applies here. 

But this patient cooperation with the frustrated, unbelieving husband has a higher purpose than just peace in the home, as important as that is. The wife’s calm cooperation is likely to surprise the husband by contrasting sharply with his own behavior—and that, Peter says, is how you win your husband. 

Peter intensifies the effect of this submission by extending it to the heart. To women in a society where appearances meant everything, he says, give attention to the inner person as well as the outer embellishment. Make your beauty about more than your clothes and your hair (1P 3.3). His words remind us of Solomon’s remark about a woman without character, who is like beautiful jewelry in a pig’s snout (Pr 11.22). 

Some Christians take this passage literally as forbidding decorative hairstyles or jewelry or attractive clothing on women. Although I respect their view and their seriousness about honoring the Lord, I doubt their interpretation and application, for a couple of reasons. First, Peter forbids not extravagant clothing, but “putting on of apparel,” which would be, well, impractical. Women ought to wear clothes. Second, given the objective of reaching the husband graciously, it seems to me that looking less attractive in his eyes would be counterproductive. 

Peter strengthens his argument by citing a scriptural example. The women in the Hebrew Scriptures conducted themselves in this way, respecting their husbands (1P 3.5)—specifically Sarah, who called Abraham “my lord” (1P 3.6; cf Ge 18.12). 

This is the way. 

Like Paul, Peter is not laying burdens on the women without speaking also to the men. Husbands, he says, are to “dwell with [their wives] according to knowledge” (1P 3.7). In cases where the husband is a believer, and the wife is not, the husband is responsible to understand his wife and deal with this disagreement wisely. That means he has to pay attention to her; in fact, it means that he must already have been paying attention to her, so he can anticipate her concerns and address them in ways that she will not consider threatening. In doing that, Peter says, he is honoring her—he is treating her as a valued entity. 

Peter adds another benefit to the husband’s care for his unbelieving wife: “that your prayers be not hindered” (1P 3.7). How about that. It turns out that underestimating the value of your wife—both her mind and her outer adornment—will make your prayers ineffective. 

Yikes. 

Next time: are these commands just for “mixed marriages,” or are they more broadly applicable? 

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Part 1 | Part 2 

Now that Peter has established the greatness of our salvation—both because it is God’s work, and because it has completely changed us—he turns to the “so what?” question, to application. How then should we live? How do people whom God has completely changed live in the world, among people whom he has not changed? 

The answer to this question will take up the rest of Peter’s letter. 

He begins with the overarching principle: don’t live like the unchanged. Abstain from fleshly lusts (1P 2.11). Behave yourself excellently, in such a way that even people who want to say bad things about you will have to slander you to do it (1P 2.12). 

What does that look like? Peter begins this section with a single imperative verb—one that we’re going to find driving the lifestyle choices for the rest of the epistle. 

“Submit,” he says (1P 2.13). And for the rest of this chapter, he’s going to focus on how we live in society: in reference to the state (1P 2.13-17), and in reference to our jobs (1P 2.18-20). 

Our lifestyle before the state, the government, is to submit—to do what they say. And “they,” Peter specifies, includes both the guy at the top, the king, and lower-level functionaries, governors (1P 2.13-14). Why should we do that? Well, because God wants us to, and he has an outcome in mind: we can “put to silence the ignorance of foolish men” (1P 2.15). 

In Peter’s day, the locals suspected Christians of being disloyal to Rome because they would not offer a sacrifice to Caesar or call him lord. Because they would not sacrifice to the Roman gods, they were called “atheists.” Peters calls that ignorance and foolishness, and of course he’s right. But how do we disarm the haters? 

Not the way a lot of Christians are acting today. You behave yourself. You do what the leaders say. Now, in our political system, the leaders tell us what to do through laws. And Peter says, you submit. You show a cooperative spirit. You obey the law. 

Now, of course, Peter himself disobeyed authoritative orders when they contradicted the direct command of God (Ac 4.15-22). And we have legal ways to resist ungodly laws. But we do so, Peter says, in ways that evidence goodwill and the desire to respect governmental authority, whether it represents our party or that of the other guys. 

Peter adds one more thought. Our interaction with the government should be genuine, not as a cover for secret disobedience (1P 2.16). We treat everyone with respect, as in the image of God (1P 2.17). 

Now Peter extends the principle to our jobs. We respond to the boss just as we do to civil authorities: we do what we’re told, and respectfully—and even if he’s unreasonable (1P 2.18). We endure injustice, and we find favor with God (1P 2.19-20)—who, it can be observed, has suffered the greatest injustice of all. 

Peter closes the chapter with a summary statement. In these relationships, we follow the example of Christ, who bore that greatest injustice and did so without responding to his revilers in kind. He never “owned the libtards.” He simply entrusted himself to the God who judges righteously and does all things well (1P 2.23). 

And it was this controlled and trusting action that accomplished our salvation—that accomplished all those great effects we’ve read about in chapter 1. 

Our submission to unjust authorities is not going to accomplish anything near that level; the cross work of Christ is unique in the history of the universe. But by giving our maltreaters a picture of Christ, we may well introduce them to him and make them fellow beneficiaries of his work. And the consequences for them will be every bit as eternal as the work of Christ himself. 

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Part 1 

In his first chapter, Peter has been focusing on the greatness of our salvation. After asserting its greatness outright, he advances his first evidence of its greatness: its source in the Triune God and in his Word. 

As he begins chapter 2, he continues this discussion by focusing on the effect of our salvation. 

I’d suggest that the first effect is implied rather than asserted; Peter exhorts his readers to turn from the old ways (1P 2.1) and pursue the Word—the great source that he has just been discussing—in order to grow in this new thing, this salvation (1P 2.2). The implication, of course, is that salvation empowers us to change, to reject the old ways—or as Paul terms this, the “old man” (Ro 6.6; Ep 4.22)—so as to live under the goodness (1P 2.3) of God himself. 

Then he turns to more explicit effects. 

The first two are astounding. God has taken a bunch of sinners, enemies, and turned them, metaphorically speaking, into building blocks in a temple—and second, into priests (to mix his metaphor in a way that expands it and highlights its astounding nature) who offer sacrifices  that are acceptable to God. 

From enemies to priests, welcome in God’s presence and pleasing to him. 

A complete transformation. 

Our forerunner, Christ, is both priest and sacrifice; we are both temple and priest. 

The third effect is no less impressive: because we believe in Christ, the “chief cornerstone” in the temple of which we are a part, we “shall not be confounded” (1P 2.6). We have assurance and confidence because our faith is solidly grounded in the unshakeable Christ. 

A part of this confidence is that our cornerstone will stand against all attackers and in fact will be an offensive weapon, a stone that makes his enemies stumble in defeat (1P 2.7-8). 

The fourth effect, in contrast to the assured defeat of God’s enemies, is our new standing in Christ. Peter has already noted that we’re priests who offer acceptable sacrifices, and here he repeats that idea, but he extends it as well: we are “a chosen generation (race), a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people of his own possession” (1P 2.9). 

There’s much to note here. First, God has given us as a group an identity, just as he did to Abram’s descendants in his great covenant with him. We are, as it were, a spiritual ethnicity; we are a family.  

Secondly, he mentions the priesthood again, but he ornaments it significantly; we’re not just a priesthood, but a royal priesthood. 

We skim over those words without realizing how significant that expression was in biblical times. In Israel, it was impossible to be both king and priest; the kings were from Judah, and the priests were from Levi, and never the twain would meet. King Uzziah tried to usurp the priestly duty of burning incense in the temple—he was the Queen Elizabeth II of his day, having ruled for well over half a century—and he was struck with lifelong leprosy for his trouble (2Ch 26.18-19). 

Two generations before Judah or Levi even existed, Melchizedek, the Jebusite priest of the Most High God, was both king and priest (Ge 14.18), but he was in a unique priestly order, available by special appointment only. Christ, we’re told, is ordained a priest after the order of Melchizedek (Ps 110.4; He 5.10). And now, we find, we are kings and priests as well. 

Remarkable privilege. Remarkable consequence of a divine work. 

The next label on us is “a holy nation.” In the same sense in which we are a spiritual ethnicity parallel to Abram’s descendants, so we are a divinely constituted nation parallel to Israel’s standing at Sinai. Since Abram they had been a people; now, under Moses, they are a nation. 

And so are we. 

The fourth label is “a people of his own possession” (KJV “a peculiar people”). We’re not just a people and a nation; we are a different kind of people, a special people, a people that belong particularly to God. We’re his fine china, set aside in a special china cabinet, one in which he takes great pleasure. 

“Mine,” he says. 

Peter finds a fifth effect of our great salvation. We have been brought out of darkness, he says, and placed in the light (1P 2.9). We can see. We can rejoice, in the same way we rejoice on a warm, sunny day after a cold, dark winter. The brightness in our minds and hearts elevates our spirits and enables us to proceed certainly, confidently, joyously. 

One more. We have obtained mercy (1P 2.10). Mercy withholds from us the terrible consequences that we justly deserve, and it frees us to live, to do, to thrive, without fear and without despair. 

What a great salvation. 

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We all know Peter, the disciple with the big mouth. The impulsive one. The one who made grandiose claims about his own loyalty, but hours later panicked and denied the Lord. The one who went out and wept bitterly. 

But Jesus is not like Peter. Days later, after cooking breakfast for his disciples on the shore of the Sea of Galilee (Jn 21.12), Jesus takes Peter aside for a walk on the beach (Jn 21.20) and redirects him from failure and shame to ministry. As Peter had denied him three times, Jesus tells him three times to “feed my sheep” (Jn 21.15-17). 

And boy, does he. He pronounces Jesus’ victory at Pentecost (Ac 2.14-36), and days later he faces down the Jewish Supreme Court, accusing them of having crucified the Messiah (Ac 4.5-12). And so begins a life of productive ministry. 

Decades later, as an old man about to face his own crucifixion for his faith, Peter writes a couple letters to churches in what we now call Turkey (1P 1.1). I’d like to take a few posts to work through what he says in the first one. 

He opens by attributing the work of our salvation to all three persons in the Triune God (1P 1.2)—and then, logically, turns to detail that astonishing work. 

He first exults in the greatness of its goal: “the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls” (1P 1.9). We have received a confident anticipation, an expectation (KJV “a lively hope”), of good things to come: first, an inheritance, a future gift, that is “incorruptible, undefiled, and unfading” (1P 1.4). This promised inheritance will not—cannot—decay, become soiled, or lose its shine. It’s not fragile, like a rose. It will be there for us. 

But will we be there for it? Peter now describes a second good thing to come: protection, or preservation, or endurance. He says we “are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation” (1P 1.5). This fact he has already implied in verse 4: our inheritance is “reserved in heaven for” us. 

Yes, we’ll make it. 

My Dad presented with dementia at age 85, and I was his caregiver for the last (almost) six years of his life. I watched his memory recede, decade by decade, until he no longer remembered even being in combat in World War II. He even regressed to before the time he was converted in his 40s; he started swearing again. That got me thinking. 

At his graveside service, I came to this passage. We are kept, Peter says, not by our own desperate grip on the Father, but by his almighty power, which is strong enough to preserve, protect, and defend us through whatever trials and obstacles we may face (1P 1.6-9). 

Now Peter turns to exult in the greatness of salvation’s source. He picks up his earlier reference to the Triune God and specifies the part each Person of the Godhead plays, beginning with the Spirit, who empowered the Hebrew prophets to predict a phenomenon they couldn’t understand even as they wrote about it: that the Son would suffer—and die—before he was glorified as Savior and King (1P 1.10-12). Then he praises the Father, the Judge, who planned our redemption (1P 1.17-18) and resurrected and glorified the Son (1P 1.21), and the Son, who accomplished it (1P 1.18-20). 

All of this empowers and motivates us to respond in holiness and obedience (1P 1.13-16, 22). We are infinitely out of our depth. 

Peter exults in another source: the Word of God, his communication to us through the inspiring work of the Spirit. This Word, like our inheritance, is “incorruptible” (1P 1.23) and unfading (1P 1.24). It, too, is not like the fragile rose. 

So here we stand, informed by the Word of God, and saved and kept by the power of God. 

Yes, indeed, we’ll make it. 

Next time: we, too, like Peter, are radically redirected. 

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Part 1: The Greatest Cause | Part 2: The Greatest Consequences | Part 3: Another Greatest Consequence | Part 4: The Greatest Cost

Paying a price in suffering for belonging to Jesus is to be expected, and it’s well worth it, for multiple reasons.

So how do we proceed? How do we prepare for the hardships that will likely come along the way?

There are two sections of this passage that address this question. The first is in verses 13 through 17; the second is in verse 22. This is where the passage becomes largely imperative. How does Peter command us to prepare for the opposition and suffering that so often come to God’s people?

• Get serious (1P 1.13a). Peter’s metaphor, “gird up the loins of your mind,” means simply to get ready to get to work. And with that comes the command to “be sober,” or serious. This is serious business; we don’t approach it as something trivial or a sideline issue. This is focused on the coming “revelation” of Jesus Christ himself. The New Bible Commentary comments, “This phrase pictures not so much the return of one who is absent as the unveiling of one who has been with us all the time” (p 1375). As Daniel’s three friends can testify, God is with us in the fire. We face it with serious determination.
• Take the long view (1P 1.13b). To “hope to the end” is to be focused on a confident expectation of a positive outcome, and an endurance until it comes. This means, of course, that you focus not on the trial, but on Christ, who has sent the trial and who is using it to accomplish his good purposes. As they say, keep your eyes on the prize.
• Reject the past (1P 1.14). You’ve already turned away from the sins that defined your life before salvation; now don’t go back. Remember Lot’s wife.
• Cross the line (1P 1.15-16). You’ve left those old ways to join a new team—or to put it more bluntly and biblically, to become God’s servant and son or daughter. You’ve changed sides; you’re over here now, and you’re not going back; so identify clearly and publicly with your new Master, and take whatever hardship comes.
• Stay serious (1P 1.17). This is a new life, and a lifelong commitment. You’re in for the long haul. So plan to stay on this path, in this relationship, committed to the lifestyle, all the way to the end. Peter says to pass the time “in fear.” Not cowering, defensive, expecting blows and punishment from a master who despises and abuses you—that was the old master, not this one. But rather reverently, delighted with God’s awesomeness, and determined not to think, do, or say anything that that would disappoint or misrepresent him.
• Live out love (1P 1.22). Your new relationship involves more than just God—though he would be more than enough. He has placed you into the body of Christ, the church. And bodies have multiple parts, useful for different purposes, which all work together to accomplish the goals of the head. We’re teammates in the largest project ever conceived. So we cherish one another, help one another, encourage one another, support one another. Peter will develop this concept more in the next paragraph, which is also the next chapter and thus a different series. Which you can read here.

Maybe we’ll face persecution like that faced by the ancient saints, and by our brothers and sisters in other parts of the world. Maybe we won’t. But we’re not promised immunity, and we should be prepared should it come. We make that preparation now, before the time. And as we prepare we determine, with absolute certainty, that whatever hardships may come, the cause is Worth It.

Photo by Jose P. Ortiz on Unsplash

Part 1: The Greatest Cause | Part 2: The Greatest Consequences | Part 3: Another Greatest Consequence

Peter now takes some time to develop the concept of the price paid to rescue us from our sin and to secure us as the Father’s particular people.

He begins with a surprising fact: the suffering and then the exaltation of the Christ is so profound, and so incomprehensible, that the prophets themselves didn’t understand what they were writing:

¹⁰ Of which salvation the prophets have inquired and searched diligently, who prophesied of the grace that should come unto you: ¹¹ Searching what, or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify, when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow (1P 1.10-11).

They wrote what the Spirit drove them to write, but they didn’t understand it—what Christ’s suffering and consequent glory were accomplishing, and when those things would be accomplished. We see an example of that in Daniel, where the prophet expresses his puzzlement, asks for an explanation, and is told to stop asking questions (Da 12.4, 8-9).

It is indeed an enormously incomprehensible thing, calling to mind the words of Charles Wesley:

Amazing love! How can it be
That thou my God shouldst die for me!

Peter may well be thinking of Daniel’s experience when he writes,

Unto whom it was revealed, that not unto themselves, but unto us they did minister the things, which are now reported unto you by them that have preached the gospel unto you with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven; which things the angels desire to look into (1P 1.12).

This is the kind of thing that can’t be comprehended ahead of time; we can make sense of it only in retrospect. The plan of God is like that.

And what is at the center of this great plan?

A sacrifice of infinite worth: the sin offering of the Son himself.

Not temporal, corruptible things like silver and gold (1P 1.18). Not the blood of an earthly lamb, however hale and healthy and perfect.

Not the blood of a fallen human, even an unusually good and kind one—for “all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God” (Ro 3.23).

The blood of Christ, the Lamb of God (1P 1.19).

The blood of a perfect human, who is perfect only because he is also God himself. Divine blood.

We’re well beyond our depth here, speaking of things internal to the Godhead, the mysterious triunity of God. If you think you understand it, there’s something you haven’t included in your model. It’s utterly beyond us.

I don’t know how God could become man, and neither do you. Nor did the church fathers, some of the smartest people in history, who wrestled with this question for four centuries and finally chose to state what happened without explaining it, in what’s called the Creed of Chalcedon.

Peter notes one more fact. This plan, this commitment to rescue, was hatched “from the foundation of the world” (1P 1.20). God did not avoid creating us, though he knew what the cost of rescuing us from our eventual rebellion would be. He did not hesitate. He was all in, from the very beginning.

What a love! What a cost!
We stand forgiven at the cross!
(Stuart Townend)

This cost should give us some sense of the weight of our sin.

I see “deconstructionists” today criticizing the atonement as unnecessary, especially unnecessarily violent. In making that charge they demonstrate their complete lack of understanding of the sinfulness of sin, of the holiness of God, and most especially of the love of God, that he would pay such a price to redeem those who had declared themselves, starkly and viciously and repeatedly, to be his enemies. They blame the only person in the entire picture who is completely not to blame.

And, I add, it is for such people that Christ chose to die.

Peter has one more point to make.

Next time.

Part 5: Making It Worth It

Photo by Jose P. Ortiz on Unsplash

Part 1: The Greatest Cause | Part 2: The Greatest Consequences

So far in the passage Peter has presented four great consequences of God’s work in us: great mercy, great confidence, a great inheritance, and great protection. But as I noted in the previous post, he’s just getting started.

Joy—in Trial

In the next verse he identifies another consequence, one that should not surprise us, at least initially: Wherein ye greatly rejoice (1P 1.6).

In what? In the salvation mentioned in verse 5—the certain, final salvation toward which God’s protection is ultimately keeping us. That’s certainly something in which we can rejoice.

But the verse doesn’t end there, and what it says next surprises us:

Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations (1P 1.6).

At the moment, Peter says, we’re “in heaviness” (“you have been distressed” NASB; “you suffer grief” CSB // ESV NIV). Now, who on earth would rejoice under those circumstances? Has Peter lost his mind? Does he really mean that we can rejoice in the midst of trials? Especially trials such as Peter will describe in this epistle: “suffering wrongfully” (1P 2.19), suffering as Christ our example did (1P 2.21), suffering “evil” and “railing” (1P 3.9), suffering “for righteousness’ sake” in “terror” (1P 3.14), when “they speak evil of you, as of evildoers” (1P 3.16), suffering a “fiery trial” (1P 4.12), being “reproached for the name of Christ” (1P 4.14)?

How can he say this?

I note that Peter is in a position to speak knowledgeably about this; he is “a witness of the sufferings of Christ”(1P 5.1), and he knows that suffering awaits him at the end as well (Jn 21.18-19).

In an act of grace, Peter doesn’t leave us in the dark; he tells us why we can rejoice in suffering:

• First, these hardships are temporary; they are “for a season” (1P 1.6).
• Second, they are necessary—“if need be” (1P 1.6). That is, they are not random or purposeless; they are accomplishing something in us; specifically,
  • They test the quality of our faith (1P 1.7); they show us how we’re doing in the trust department. I’m sure that you occasionally are completely surprised by some reactive word or action that you demonstrate under stress. I am, and I’ve written about that before. We need those experiences to direct our growth; if we don’t know we’re sick, we’re not likely to buy the prescription.
  • They purify that faith, the way a fire purifies molten metal (1P 1.7). As the weaknesses and imperfections are brought to the surface, they can be dealt with and removed. To put it bluntly, the trial makes us a better product.
  • Because the trials are more than we can deal with naturally, they drive us to Christ for grace and strength, thereby demonstrating our faith in him and strengthening in us the habit of seeking him first (1P 1.8). In so doing, they demonstrate the genuineness of our faith and thereby strengthen it. In truth, then, the trials aren’t the direct cause of our rejoicing; our rejoicing is in Christ, and our trials, by driving us to him, drive us to the source of our joy.
  • Let’s not pass over an important phrase in this passage: Whom having not seen, ye love (1P 1.8). Underlying our reaction to our trials—our rejoicing in our trials—is the world-changing fact of a loving relationship. Another accomplishment of trials is that they reinforce the solidity of our relationship with Christ, just as a difficult experience in a marriage—injury, illness, death of a family member—can strengthen the marriage bond well beyond that experienced by those with light, easy lives.

We rejoice when we are in the embrace of Christ. It should be no surprise, then, that we can rejoice when trials come. As Spurgeon supposedly* said,

“I have learned to kiss the waves that throw me up against the Rock of Ages.”

* I have been unable to find this quotation in Spurgeon’s writings. If any reader can, I’d be delighted to know where it is.

Part 4: The Greatest Cost | Part 5: Making It Worth It

Photo by Jose P. Ortiz on Unsplash