Honorable Conduct (1 Peter 2:12)

The “builders” rejected God’s “cornerstone,” which became to them a “stone of stumbling” (1 Peter 2:6–8). This stumbling occurred because they “disobey the word” (v. 8). However, the obedient were found to be “a people for his own possession” (v. 9). Thus, Peter instructs them on how to live as the people of God in a pagan world (vv. 11–17). “Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation” (v. 12). Gentiles (Gk., ethnos) refers to people groups who do not worship the true God (Deut. 32:8, 9).

Believers are to live life in keeping with God’s reputation. That is what it means to be honorable (Gk., kalos, “powerful,” “vigorous,” “excellent”). To be kalos is to have everything in proper order; thus, to reflect God’s character. This is important when believers are maligned as offenders. The accusations come because Christ is offensive to pagan principles. If one claims to be a Christ follower but is not spoken against, he is not living the Christ-life. The obstruction to his witness may be that his soul has surrendered to his fleshly passions, obscured his calling (v. 11). The Lord gave the Holy Spirit to believers in order for them to manifest the fruit of the Spirit in every situation of life (Gal. 5:22–26), especially when they are reviled (1 Pet. 2:23; Matt. 5:11).

The obligation of God’s people living among the pagans is to be a witness against them on judgment day because those being judged will have no excuse. They will have seen a Christ-like proper response (Gk., kalos ergon, how one does excellence) to their malicious accusations, forcing them to “glorify God”—to reluctantly admit that the Lord is just in their condemnation.

What follows in the next verses is instruction on how to live honorably in an evil culture. First, believers must be law-abiding citizens. They are to submit to every God-ordained human institution for the Lord’s sake, and this submission includes authorities at every level (v. 13). God instituted human authority for the welfare of the race by encouraging good behavior in a fallen world (Rom. 13:1–7). Remember, Peter wrote this instruction during the reign of Nero and with considerable personal experience in persecution (Acts 4:19; 5:29). The principle here is that authorities must be obeyed except when they claim for themselves what belongs only to God.

It is God’s will that believers’ doing good—properly responding to reviling—foolish ignorance (used only twice in the NT, meaning the willful rejection of the Word of God, 1 Cor. 15:34) will be silenced. The foolish are those who deny God any place in their scheme of life (2 Pet. 3:5, 8). The truth is self-evident but is overlooked when people refuse to investigate the facts (Acts 26:26).

Second, believers are to live free by not covering up evil (v. 16). Freedom is not the absence of restraint but willing submission to God’s plan to restore true liberty in Christ. Ironically, this freedom is enjoyed by those who become the slaves of God, not self (Rom. 6:16, 17).

The People of God (1 Peter 2:9–12)

Peter uses terminology that once identified ethnic Israel as the sole people of God. For example, “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession” (1 Peter 2:9). The reference is Exodus 19: 5, 6: “You shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine; and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.” It would appear that Peter was writing this letter to the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He referred to his readers as “the elect exiles of the dispersion” (1:1). A wrong understanding here can lead to confusion when it comes to correctly interpreting Peter.

Most commentators lean towards Hebrew Christians as Peter’s target audience. He was the apostle to the circumcision as Paul was to the Gentiles, was he not (Gal. 2:7, 8)? However, Peter also uses language informing his readers that salvation brought them into a new covenant relationship with God that so they were no longer to “be conformed to the passions of [their] former ignorance” (v. 14). Ignorance was a term used of Gentiles outside the old covenant community (Ephesians 4:18; Acts 17:30). Also, note that verse 9 is followed by this: “Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people” (v. 10, citing Hosea 6:9, 10). Paul cites the Hosea passage in Romans 9 to argue that Gentiles were also being called as a people for His name (vv. 24–26). The gist of the Hosea text is that Israel’s unfaithfulness made them like the Gentiles, “not a people of God.”

The confusion of many is due, quite frankly to dispensational error that insists that God has two separate and distinct peoples: the nation of Israel and the church of Jesus Christ. They teach that while Jews are being saved in this gospel age, most will not have God’s particular attention until the end times when He will remove the church and focus again on the nation of Israel. (I do believe that God will save a remnant of the Jewish nation when Christ returns as per Zechariah 13:8, 9.) This confusion is particularly noticeable in interpreting end-time prophecy.

Paul’s discussion in Romans 9 is key and pertinent to defining who the people of God are. In verse 6, Paul’s problem is stated: God’s promise and covenant to the seed of Abraham seems to have failed and His Word voided because, save a few, God’s people rejected their Messiah. Paul’s response is that God never intended to save all of ethnic Israel (vv. 6–13). He will save a remnant, but not all ethnic Israel is to be included into spiritual Israel, the true people of God.

The purpose of ethnic Israel was to bring in the true Israel, Jesus Christ. The gospel privilege was never intended to be limited to the Jewish nation but to include Gentiles as well (Eph. 2:11–22). The New Covenant people of God are not an extension of the Old Covenant community but a new creation in Christ Jesus (2 Cor. 5:17; Gal. 6:5).  

The Lord’s Goodness

Peter presses the value of the Word of God as the source of the gospel message of salvation. It is only through the hearing of the Word that the Spirit grants faith to believe the message (Rom. 10:17). It is only through the living and abiding Word that the divine seed has produced the new birth in the spiritually dead (1 Peter 1:23). Because the Word is eternal, being the Word of the eternal God, it produces that which returns eternal fruit.

In light of this truth, Peter urges his readers to “put away all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander”—all motives and methods of carnal and worldly scheming for successful living in a sinful world (2:1). Instead, the new-born saint is to find his nourishment in the unmixed, unadulterated, pure Word that produces guileless people without dishonest intent (v. 2). It is only by this means that true believers will mature into the full and complete salvation Christ has prepared for them.

This operation of God’s Word, however, does not produce the same effect in everyone. Therefore, Peter adds, “If indeed you have tasted [experienced] that the Lord is good” (v. 3). This is taken from Psalm 34:8, “Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good!” The writer of Hebrews applies the psalm in this way, “You . . . have tasted the goodness of the word of God” (6:5). One cannot taste and see that the Lord is good unless he has tasted Him through the revelation of Christ in the Word. The Puritan, Stephen Charnock, wrote:

“Prize and study the Scripture. We can have no delight in meditation on him unless we know him, and we cannot know him but by the means of his own revelation. When the revelation is despised, the revealer will be of little esteem. Men do not throw off God from being their rule till they throw off Scripture from being their guide; and God must needs be cast off from being an end when the Scripture is rejected from being a rule.”

Have you experienced the Lord’s goodness—His gentleness and usefulness? Jesus invites us, “Come to me . . . take my yoke . . . and learn from me . . . for I am gentle and lowly in heart” (Matt. 11:28–30). This invitation comes after Jesus declared, “No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.” He had just expressed wonder and delight in the fact the Lord of heaven and earth had willed to hide these truths of salvation from the “wise and understanding” but, instead, revealed them to “babes” (Matt. 11:25). No doubt Peter had this text in mind as he penned the exhortation to “new born infants” and that they should “long for pure spiritual milk” (2:2).

“As you come [are coming and keep on coming] to Him [having tasted of His goodness]. . . you yourselves are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ” (v. 4). 

The Lord's Portion

“When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance when he divided mankind, he fixed the borders of the peoples according to the number of the sons of God. But the Lord’s portion is his people” (Deut. 32:8, 9).

Believers are instructed, “As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance” (1 Pet. 1:14). Paul echoes this admonition: “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed” (Rom. 12:2). The issue here is huge. It is not that we must stop enjoying a few morally questionable habits for an austere life of joyless conformity to God’s law. If that is your view of the Christian life, you are not a Christian.

True believers have been born again to a whole new life (1:23) from a former existence compared to grass that withers and perishes. The new life is like the seed that produces it—eternal life (1:24, 25). The powerful image described here is the operation of the living God. His word, spoken by the Spirit, is the creative force that brought all things into existence (Psa. 33:6–12). “For God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Cor. 4:6). “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation” (2 Cor. 5:17).

The point is that the Lord is gathering out of the world a new race, a new nation, a new people, the Lord’s portion (2:9, 10). Each believer is a “stone” in the construction of God’s spiritual house (v. 5). The purpose of the house—a temple with priesthood—is to “offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.” This purpose “stands in Scripture” (Gk., to surround or encompass). In other words, this project of the Lord’s gathering His portion is the central subject matter of Scripture.

Jesus Christ is the focal point. Peter quotes from Isaiah 28:16, to which he applies, “You believers see His value, but unbelievers stumble over Him” (1 Pet. 2:7, 8). Why is this? It is because, as Peter declares, “You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people of his own” (v. 9). Every new creature in Christ now enjoys a glorious new privilege and opportunity. Believers, by their transformed lives, are to “proclaim the excellencies of him who called [them] out of darkness into his marvelous light” (v. 9).

Believers have received mercy. They were once lo-ammi, “not a people” (Hosea 1:9, 10; 2:23; cf. Jer. 30:22) now they are the people of God. What a responsibility! Peter started the passage by urging believers to put away malice (Gk., to lack something, thus, be incapable), deceit (Gk., crafty), hypocrisy (Gk., to wear a mask), envy, and slander. Instead, they are to long for “pure spiritual milk” in order to grow into salvation, the transformation they were saved for (v. 1). He finishes the passage with the same charge (vv. 11, 12). You do this if you have “tasted that the Lord is good” (v. 3; Matt. 11:28-30).

Joyfully Redeemed (1 Peter 1:18-23)

The focus of the believers' quest for joy cannot be that God would relieve them from suffering. It is necessary that before the appearing of Christ, believers will be called upon to suffer various tests (vv. 5, 6). What makes them jubilant (literally, “much leaping”) is that salvation works for them even in the midst of their trials. The trial itself will cause grief (“sorrow”), so how do believers balance the command to be joyful with the sorrows that suffering brings? The answer is found in understanding salvation’s glorious hope in the end.

First, they needed to understand that trials reveal the genuineness of faith (v. 7). Saving faith always results in praise, glory, and honor at Christ’s revelation because fiery trials prove Christ faithful. Seeing God faithful in trial results in love for Christ, continued trust, and settled joy (a state of being as compared to the act or expression of emotion, v. 6), waiting faith’s full revelation (v. 9).

Second, they needed to understand that this salvation is a work of such grace that it captivated the attention of the prophets and angels to whom it was first revealed. They saw that their message was serving future generations of Gentile and not merely their own Israelite peoples. So, they were driven to search it out deeply (vv. 10–12).

Third, they needed to understand the purpose of this salvation to produce a holy and obedient people who refused to shape their lives by the passions that ruled them in their former ignorance. They were now to be governed by godly fear, protecting them in their sojourn (vv. 13–17).

Fourth, they needed to understand how this salvation accomplishes the purpose just stated (vv. 18-23). These believers needed to know that they were liberated from the slavery of futile ways inherited from their forefathers. This is a reference to v. 14 and their having been enslaved to the sin-conforming immoral passions of their pagan past. Redemption or ransom means that a payment was made to free them from sin’s bondage. The ransom payment consisted of Christ’s own blood. Here is the wonder that captivated prophets and angels: the sinless Son of God became the perfect sacrificial lamb, bearing the sins of His people. How can this be?

Our election (v. 1) rests on the election of Christ (“foreknown before the foundation of the world,” cp Acts 2:23). Foreknowledge cannot be understood here as God’s foresight of something Christ would do. It was determined before the first man sinned that the Lamb would die for sinners (note verse 21). Christ shed His blood and because of that, God raised Him from the dead so that, through Him, we can believe to salvation.

Now you see why we can jump with joy in the midst of trial. Our faith and hope are in God so that in the test our souls are purified through obedience to truth. The clear mark of sonship is obedience to Christ, manifesting genuine love from a pure heart (John 14:18–24). We do this because we are born again (vv. 22, 23; 1 John 3:9, 10, 16–18).

True Faith (1 Peter 1:3-9)

       Believers in Christ Jesus have a glorious inheritance that is being reserved for them in heaven while they, the heirs, are kept on earth by the power of God (vv. 4, 5). This inheritance pertains to the complete deliverance from the effects of Adam’s fall. Such prospects are worthy of rejoicing in the anticipation (v. 6).

       Faith itself is nothing but trust in an expectation from another outside of us. The real question involves what we are expecting. This problem is illustrated for us in Luke 22. In verse 29 Jesus informed the disciples that they were appointed a place in His kingdom and that they would sit on thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.

       The very next thing Luke records is that Jesus turned to Peter and informed him that Satan wanted to sift him in the brutal mill of trial. Satan would destroy Peter, but Jesus prayed that his faith would not fail in that hour (v. 32). In fact, his emergence with faith intact would be the means of strengthening others, which seems to be the purpose that God designed in his trial. I wonder if this incident was the foundation of what Peter wrote in this chapter.

       Peter’s faith did not fail because of the intercessory work of the Great High Priest (Heb. 4:14, 15). The test came against Peter’s own self-assurance (v. 33). In spite of his insisted loyalty, he denied the Lord as predicted (v. 34). Discouraged by his own failure, Peter attempted to return to his former fishing career, only to fail again (John 21:1–3). However, when Jesus prays that your faith will not fail, He takes it upon Himself to assure that end (John 21:4–14).

       On the other hand, there is faith that rests on false assumptions. While God does not withhold what He promises, no one can force Him to grant what He never promised. This principle is illustrated in Matthew 13. When people hear the word of the kingdom, they must also understand what they hear (v. 19). Understanding is a work of the Spirit (1 Cor. 2:14 and 12). Nevertheless, the Word was readily and joyfully received (v. 20). Why was there joy? That is not explained, but we may assume that hope was set on what God never promised. And, as with Peter, Satan was there, testing faith with tribulation. The false believer fell away. Why? His faith was not supported by the prayers of the Great High Priest. Believers are not kept by their faith but by the power of God (v. 5).

       Faith that flourishes in the fire is like refined gold, resulting in praise, glory, and honor at Christ’s appearing (1 Pet. 1:6–9). Tested faith increases love for Jesus, trust in the Word, and inexpressible joy in the experience of waiting for faith’s outcome. As A. W. Pink observed, “The best is yet to come.”

       We have been appointed a kingdom. We are preparing now for that kingdom. Although it is often very difficult here, true faith enables us to rejoice in suffering, understanding that we are destined to share in the glories of our overcoming Lord.

Obedience

Paul Tripp wrote about the importance of obedience in his blog recently.* He addressed the fact that our attempts at obedience could never gain God’s favor. Nevertheless, the Scripture is full of commands, laws, ordinances, and exhortations for us to obey. In light of this, Tripp wrote:

“We all live under the same weight of the law, crippled by the inability of sin. We’re better at rebelling than submitting, more inclined to arrogance than humility, more skilled at making war with our neighbors than loving them. We leave a trail of evidence every hour that we’ve fallen short of the glory of God one more time.*

So, does God really require obedience? Yes, He does. Peter refers to the believers as “obedient children” (1 Peter 1:14). Indeed, the whole context presses believers to obedience in light of the glorious change in us wrought by Christ’s salvation. The grace that saves is the same grace that enables obedience. That is why He saves. God intends to restore His kingdom on earth, so, the disobedience that characterized our fallen condition should also be reversed.

Peter calls upon believers to prepare their minds for action (obedience) in three ways (vv. 13–16). First, they are to set their minds fully on the grace that is to complete their salvation when Christ returns (v. 13). They do this by refusing the old desires that shaped them in their ignorance and disobedience. However, if the grace of salvation is to conform believers to the image of Son, then conforming to the image of the world must stop.

Second, what negatively controlled their desires before salvation, causing them to obey the desires of their evil hearts, must be replaced with the positive control of the Spirit in new desires to be holy, as God is holy (vv. 15, 16). The term that Peter uses (anastrophe, translated “conduct” [ESV], “conversation” [KJV]) refers to deportment—one’s manner of living or life-style. One’s life must demonstrate the change wrought by grace (Eph. 4:22; 1 Peter 1:18; 2:12; 3:1, 2, 16; 2:7; 3:11). The point is simply this, if salvation takes away the old heart of rebellion and replaces it with a new heart of submission, should not obedience to God characterize our life-style before the world. If we are children of God, then, we must act like it (1 John 3:7–10).

Third, even though we are saved from the penalty and power of sin, we, as God’s children, still face God’s judgment (v. 17). He will impartially judge all on the basis of their works (Rom. 14:12). So, let us be motivated to living that conforms to God’s righteous standards and holiness. Our life-style will be scrutinized by God, not for salvation, but to weigh our progress in becoming more like Jesus. Let us “perfect holiness in the fear of God” (2 Cor. 7:1). This fear is necessary because of remaining sin. Thus, a continual awareness of God’s purpose of grace in us and His careful attention to us and supervision of us should make us careful in our obedience before the world as His witnesses.

*http://www.paultripp.com/wednesdays-word /posts/why-obedience