ELECT PILGRIMS
Posted by Pastor Greg Allen on August 29, 2018 under AM Bible Study |
AM Bible Study Group: August 29, 2018 from 1 Peter 1:1-2
Theme: In Christ, we travel through a hostile world as God’s elect pilgrims..
(All Scripture is taken from The New King James Version, unless otherwise indicated).
This morning, we begin a study of a remarkable New Testament letter. It was written to a group of Jewish Christians who were living in a time of severe persecution. They were scattered from their homeland, were experiencing hostility all around them, and were seeking to live a faithful Christian life in the midst of a dark and fallen world. It’s a letter that we can certainly relate to! But it’s not a dark letter at all! It is a profoundly encouraging one! It’s a letter in which the troubles and struggles of the Christian life in a fallen world are put into perspective for us in a glorious and victorious way.
A key verse might be 1 Peter 5:12; one in which Peter expresses his purpose in writing. He says, “I have written to you briefly, exhorting and testifying that this is the true grace of God in which you stand…” This letter was meant to encourage these suffering Christians that their suffering for the cause of Christ is not at all in vain; and that they can be confident that they are standing in the true grace of God.
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Now; as Christians, we are called upon to live out our faith in Jesus in an environment that is hostile to that faith. It’s an uphill climb! Taking a quick tour through this letter, we can see the ways that these believers that Peter wrote to had suffered. First, look at 2:11-12. There, Peter writes;
Beloved, I beg you as sojourners and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the soul, having your conduct honorable among the Gentiles, that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may, by your good works which they observe, glorify God in the day of visitation (2:11-12).
The name “Gentiles” in those two verses seems to be a reference to unbelievers. Unbelieving people in the culture around them were ‘speaking against’ these Christians ‘as evildoers’. Look also at verses 20-21;
For what credit is it if, when you are beaten for your faults, you take it patiently? But when you do good and suffer, if you take it patiently, this is commendable before God. For to this you were called, because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that you should follow His steps … (2:20-21).
Many of these early Christians were suffering for doing what is good—just as their Lord had suffered. To this, they were called. We find a similar thing in 3:13-17;
And who is he who will harm you if you become followers of what is good? But even if you should suffer for righteousness’ sake, you are blessed. “And do not be afraid of their threats, nor be troubled.” But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts, and always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you, with meekness and fear; having a good conscience, that when they defame you as evildoers, those who revile your good conduct in Christ may be ashamed. For it is better, if it is the will of God, to suffer for doing good than for doing evil (3:13-17).
Back in these early days of the church, followers of Jesus suffered as “Christians”. That was a name that, originally, was intended as an insult. To be called “Christians”, however, was appropriate; because they were partakers of Christ’s own suffering—as well as of His glory. Peter speaks of the derisive use of the word “Christian” in 4:12-16, where we read;
Beloved, do not think it strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened to you; but rejoice to the extent that you partake of Christ’s sufferings, that when His glory is revealed, you may also be glad with exceeding joy. If you are reproached for the name of Christ, blessed are you, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you. On their part He is blasphemed, but on your part He is glorified. But let none of you suffer as a murderer, a thief, an evildoer, or as a busybody in other people’s matters. Yet if anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in this matter (4:12-16).
They were not to think that it was a ‘strange thing’ that they would suffer for being identified as ‘Christians’. And all of this—so far—was simply said to have been from fellow human beings. But in 5:8-10, the apostle let his readers know where all of this suffering was really coming from:
Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. Resist him, steadfast in the faith, knowing that the same sufferings are experienced by your brotherhood in the world. But may the God of all grace, who called us to His eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after you have suffered a while, perfect, establish, strengthen, and settle you (5:8-10).
We can see from this what a relevant letter this first letter from Peter is for us today. It is hard to be a follower of Jesus in this dark and fallen world. It’s not all doom and gloom, however! This letter was written to encourage Christians not to give up; but to give themselves fully to their walk with Christ in dark times—that this is the true grace of God in which we stand!
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Much of this letter contains remarkable affirmations about this wonderful grace. And we begin by studying the introduction:
Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ,
To the pilgrims of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ:
Grace to you and peace be multiplied (1 Peter 1:1-2).
We should never treat the introductions to the letters in the New Testament as unimportant. This one in particular sets the tone for what is ahead. First, in verse 1, we find the words, “Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ …”; and if we think about the things that these Christians were suffering for their faith, and of their need for the encouragement to rest confidently in the ‘true grace of God in which they stood’, we find that there was …
I. NO BETTER PERSON TO HAVE WRITTEN TO THEM.
There was no one who was more in love with and more devoted to the Lord Jesus than the fisherman Peter. When Jesus said that He was going away and that Peter could not come, he said, “Lord, why can I not follow You now? I will lay down my life for Your sake” (John 13:37). He talked that way often. He loved the Lord Jesus deeply.
And Jesus likewise loved Peter. Peter was the one who declared to the Lord, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God”. And afterward, Jesus said,
“Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but My Father who is in heaven. And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it” (Matthew 16:16-17).
That “rock” was the testimony of Peter concerning Jesus. It’s the foundational testimony of the church. But Peter—the man through whom that testimony was given—wasn’t himself always a very reliable man. He was fallible and prone to give in to the pressures—just like you and I often are. But the Lord Jesus knew, far in advance, that Peter would fail; and He even once told him,
“Simon, Simon! Indeed, Satan has asked for you, that he may sift you as wheat. But I have prayed for you, that your faith should not fail; and when you have returned to Me, strengthen your brethren” (Luke 22:31-32).
After His resurrection, Jesus appeared again to this poor ‘failure’ named Peter. Peter must have been ashamed to stand before the Lord that he had so recently denied; but Jesus asked him repeatedly if he loved Him more than the other disciples. Peter made the earnest affirmation that—in spite of his failures—he did love Jesus. And Jesus told him repeatedly, “Feed My sheep” (John 21:15-17). Jesus even told Peter that, in spite of his denial, he would still nevertheless lay down his life for Him. He told Peter;
Most assuredly, I say to you, when you were younger, you girded yourself and walked where you wished; but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will gird you and carry you where you do not wish.” This He spoke, signifying by what death he would glorify God. And when He had spoken this, He said to him, “Follow Me” (John 21:18-19).
And follow Him he did! Peter was the one that the Holy Spirit used to preach the first great gospel sermon after Pentecost in Jerusalem! And later on, when the authorities told him and the other apostles to stop preaching in the name of Jesus, Peter was among those who said,
“Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you more than to God, you judge. For we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard” (Acts 4:19-20).
Peter truly was the perfect person to encourage suffering believers to stay true to our Lord in times of opposition. He knew what it was like to feel afraid. He even knew what it was like to fail horribly. But he also knew what it was like to be forgiven, and to rise up again in the power of the Holy Spirit and live faithfully for Jesus to the very end. We who suffer for Jesus in this fallen world should listen carefully to what Peter has to say!
Now; not only was Peter the perfect person to write to these suffering Christians; but as we consider the way he spoke of them in this introduction, we find that there was …
II. NO BETTER WAY TO DESCRIBE THEM.
In verse 1, Peter writes “To the pilgrims of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia …” We might get confused when we read the word “pilgrims” in the New King James translation. That word often conjures up the image of those folks with wide-brimmed hats that shot turkeys and ate pumpkin pie. But to be a ‘pilgrim’ in the sense that Peter was speaking of meant to be a ‘wanderer’ and a ‘stranger’; someone who was sojourning in a strange land far from home, and who was living among those who were not his or her people. They were folks who were ‘just passing through’ on their way to their real home.
These were Jewish Christians who had been driven away from their homeland. As you read through this letter, you’ll find that Peter makes many Old Testament scriptural references that would have been particularly familiar to the Jewish people. And here, he specifically says that they were “pilgrims of the Dispersion”—that is, sojourners who had been ‘dispersed’ from their native land by the particularly severe persecution of that day (see Acts 8:1).
But that’s not even the main name that he gives them. If you were to read the original language of what Peter wrote, you’d find that he puts another word first—for emphasis, as it were; and calls them “elect pilgrims”. In spite of all that they may have been suffering, they were—from God’s perspective—a specially ‘elect’ or ‘chosen’ people. In 1 Peter 2:9-10, he writes;
But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light; who once were not a people but are now the people of God, who had not obtained mercy but now have obtained mercy (1 Peter 2:9-10).
What an encouragement this must have been to them! Note the details:
A. First, note on what basis they were God’s chosen people. They were, as verse 2 tells us, elect “according to the foreknowledge of God the Father”. This does not mean that God looked ahead, deep into ‘the corridors of time’, and saw that they would one day believe on His Son. Rather, they were foreknown to God because they were chosen by Him long before time ever was. God’s ‘foreknowledge’ always works in concert with His ‘determined purpose’ (see Acts 2:23); and so, they were ‘foreknown’ in the sense that God always knows what He has purposed to do beforehand. (And by the way—let’s never get hung-up on wrong-headed arguments about “election”. The Bible clearly teaches us that God “elects”—that He chooses some for Himself. All that you and I really need to know about that is this: if we are believers today, then it’s because we were first chosen by God—long before we could do anything to earn His love. And because we are not His on the basis of our own deeds but on the basis of His love, then we can never be lost to Him! What a great thing to know in a time of suffering!)
B. Notice, second, into what means they were chosen. Peter says that it was “in sanctification of the Spirit …” To be “sanctified” means to be set apart from all the others, and marked-out as those that God had chosen for Himself. What’s more, it also means to be made increasingly holy in our daily walk before God as those He has set apart for Himself. God not only chose these ‘elect pilgrims’, but also put His identifying stamp upon them as belonging to Him by placing the Holy Spirit in them. It’s as the apostle Paul once expressed it; that we
were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, to the praise of His glory (Ephesians 1:13-14).
C. And finally, notice what it was they were chosen for. It was “for obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ.” They were “elect” by God the Father, through the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit, unto the predetermined outcome of—one day—obeying the message of the gospel and being sprinkled by the blood of Jesus for complete cleansing in God’s sight. As Peter puts it in 1:22-23;
Since you have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit in sincere love of the brethren, love one another fervently with a pure heart, having been born again, not of corruptible seed but incorruptible, through the word of God which lives and abides forever … (1 Peter 1:22-23).
This truly was the perfect thing to call these Christians in a time of suffering! And dear brothers and sisters; we are the same as they! We are “pilgrims” in this world—wandering far from our heavenly home; living in the midst of a people who are not our own. We are foreigners who are citizens of a different kingdom. We serve a different King. We suffer persecution because of what we are in this world. But we are much more than just pilgrims. We are God’s “elect” pilgrims—chosen by Him from before the foundation of the world, set apart by the indwelling ministry of the Holy Spirit for obedience to our Lord and for cleansing by His blood!
What a special people we are in the sight of God!
And finally, notice Peter’s greeting to them in verse two. He says, “Grace to you and peace be multiplied.” And given all these other things that he affirms about them, there was …
III. NO BETTER WISH TO EXTEND TO THEM.
Peter wished them “grace”; and this emphasizes to them that they are the recipients of God’s unmerited favor. All their sins of the past have been completely forgiven; all the resources of the Lord Jesus Christ are now fully available to them for life and godliness; and all the eternal riches of heaven are theirs and are kept waiting for them in eternal glory. As the next portion of Peter’s letter will declare to them, they truly are recipients of great unmerited favor! God has “begotten” them “again to a living hope”. He has saved them to “an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, who are kept by the power of God through faith for salvation ready to be revealed in the last time” (vv. 4-5). No amount of suffering on this earth could ever take any of that away from them.
And not only that, but Peter wishes them “peace”. That’s a wonderful greeting to give to suffering Christians—and also a very true one. They may not have had the experience of ‘circumstantial’ peace in this hostile world; but they could have an overwhelming ‘internal’ peace while in the midst of it all. As Jesus once said to the apostles—Peter being among them;
“These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world” (John 16:33).
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Dear brothers and sisters in Christ; we are living in dark and difficult times. But as the apostle Peter reminds us in this letter, we are traveling through a hostile world as nothing less than God’s greatly loved sojourners—chosen by Him for a far better and more eternal land!
In Christ, we are God’s elect pilgrims! May He help us to grow increasingly to believe and behave like what we are!
EA
