"Elect in the Trinity"
[I Peter 1:1-2]
April 15, 2007 Second Reformed Church
We begin this morning, with the help of God, a study of the book of I Peter. I & II Peter were written during a time of great turmoil, especially for the Church. It was written when, above all else, the people of God needed to know and firmly believe that there is hope. In many ways, it was a time like our time: may God be pleased to instill and affirm His Hope in us.
I & II Peter were written after 33 A.D. and before 70 A.D. We know this because Peter taught the resurrection of Jesus, but did not mention the destruction of the Temple. We can close the dates in further and say that Peter wrote between 54-68 A.D. when Nero was emperor of Rome. During Nero's reign, Christians were persecuted horrifically -- they were hunted down like animals, and for that reason, they ran from Israel and became strangers in foreign lands.
He begins his first letter, "Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ." He didn't need to tell them that he was Simon bar Jonah, called "Cephas," called "Peter." No, they knew who this was simply by the designation of "apostle," because there was only one apostle named "Peter."
What does it mean to be an apostle? According to the Scripture, the apostles were the twelve, plus Paul, who had known Jesus in the flesh -- they had been called by Jesus Himself -- they had been taught by Him and sent out to minister by Him. The apostles were an inner circle who were taught and sent in a way that none of other the disciples, or you and I, experience. They spoke directly for God, in a similar way to the way in which the prophets had spoken. So, the word of an apostle carried with it that same "thus says the Lord" as had the word of the prophets. There were only ever thirteen apostles and the whole of Christendom knew who they were.
So when Peter the apostle of Jesus Christ wrote to them, they knew who this man was. He was that hand-picked servant and student of Jesus whom Jesus had personally sent out with a call and a work to accomplish. This was Peter of the Gospels and Acts -- documents which were circulating and being read.
And this letter is addressed "to the elect/chosen strangers." This letter is addressed to the people whom God chose to save -- out of all the mass of humanity who had damned themselves -- those whom God chose according to His Sovereign Good Pleasure, not based on anything the elect would or would not do. These are those that God chose to save, as Paul explained, those who "were not yet born and done nothing either good or bad -- in order that God’s purpose in election might continue, not because of works but because of his call --" (Romans 9:11). These are the people who God chose and, therefore, they had come to believe in Jesus Alone for their salvation, and now they were living as strangers in a strange land. They had to leave Israel for foreign lands due to the persecution of the Romans under Nero.
Specifically, "of the diaspora in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia." This letter is specifically addressed to the elect of God who had left Israel due to persecution and settled in what we would now call Turkey. These Christians had fled Israel and now were living in the Christian communities, ministering in the churches, of Turkey, and they needed to know, that amidst the persecution, amidst their having to leave their homes and go to a strange land, amidst all of this, they needed to know there was still hope. So Peter began, by addressing them as the elect, the chosen of God -- wherever they were, whatever conditions they were living under -- they were the people that God had chosen for Himself.
Remember Jesus said, "If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of this world, therefore the world hates you" (John 15:18-19).
The Christians were spreading throughout the world, keeping ahead of the Roman sword, and they wanted to know that there was still hope. They wanted to know that God was still their God, working in them and through them. And we want to know the same thing today, as we look at the world, as we look at our Classis and our church.
What's going on? What is God doing? Do we have hope? The world is a mess; pagan religions are gaining followers by leaps and bounds. Many of the churches of our Classis continue to decline. Faithful men of God are being struck down and some are moving out of this area. Ministers are admitting that they don't believe that the Bible is true. Yet, to read our denominational magazine, we're told that the answer is to grow in number, no matter what we have to do. Grow in money, and pay our dues on time, no matter what we have to do. Because if the pews are full and the bank account is full -- all's right with the world!
Then what do we do with those to whom Peter is writing? They're on the run; they're being cut down. They looking for answers; they're afraid for their lives. Sometimes being faithful means leaving, being in the minority, even being willing to die. Understand, we ought to desire and pray that God would bring His people into this church and fill this church and all His churches with His people that He might be glorified by them -- but not to the neglect of our faithfulness.
So Peter addresses the diaspora -- those elect strangers in a strange land -- and begins by telling them -- and telling us -- that God chose them and God chose us for this work, now, in this time, because it pleased Him to do so. The first thing we ought to know, is that God chose us, but not based on who we are or what we would do.
And Peter emphasizes that our election takes place in the Trinity -- The Three Persons of the Trinity are involved in the election of God's people. They are wholly in concert in Their Work in us and through us as the One God Who elects us to salvation.
Peter says that the strangers -- and all those who believe in salvation through Jesus Alone -- are elect "according to the foreknowledge of God the Father." God so movingly told the prophet Jeremiah, "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations" (Jeremiah 1:4b). In a way that is barely comprehensible to our minds, before we existed, God loved and chose us, but not based on our selves or our works. God did not look into the future to see who we would become. God chose us for His Reasons, for His Pleasure. But know this surely, Christian, before you ever existed in reality, God the Father loved you and chose you to be His.
When the devil comes at us and tells us we are nothing, that we are committing the same sins over and over, that we have not lived up to our call, we can respond with surety, "Yes, but God has always loved me and chose me to be His forever, and so I shall be." Our election, our future, our hope is certain, because it is based on God the Father, not us.
Then Peter says that they are we are "in the process of sanctification by the Spirit." God the Holy Spirit is at work in each one of us who believes, changing us, perfecting us, making us holy -- it's a process that will take until the day that Jesus returns, but it is happening -- because we cannot be God's people and remain in our sin. And if we think to ourselves, "I don't know about that. It seems to me that I am more of a sinner, less faithful, further from what I ought to be than I was when I first believed." That may be, perhaps you are unrepentantly engaging in sin. But, it may also be, that you are being changed, and as you are being changed, you are becoming more sensitized, more repulsed, more upset with the sin that still remains in you. If you are constantly at war with your sin, fighting against it, seeking God's help and forgiveness, it is likely that this is one of the fruits of that sanctification -- the process of becoming holy -- that the Holy Spirit is working in you. Look for the evidence -- there will be evidence if God is changing you. Our priorities will continue to change, and we will more greatly desire that God would be glorified in everything that we do, and we will desire to do the good works that God has put before us, denying ourselves the sin that we are tempted to commit. These are evidences of the Holy Spirit at work in us.
So, when the devil causes us to doubt the work of the Holy Spirit in us, let us respond to him, "Christ died for me." For we have been elect "for the obedience to Jesus Christ and for the sprinkling of His Blood;" The good works that we are called to are those that Jesus Christ has set before us, and we are able to do them if we have been sprinkled with His Blood. As Paul wrote, "We are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them" (Ephesians 2:10). Just as the sacrifice made the people acceptable before God, and they were sprinkled with its blood, so we become acceptable to God through the Blood of the Son of God, Jesus Christ, Who sprinkles us down through the ages, that we might be cleansed and live lives pleasing to God. "For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified" (Hebrews 10:14).
And to those who know this, who believe this, who have this hope: "May grace and peace be multiplied to you." Peter prays and believes that those who believe in Jesus Alone for their salvation, are the elect. They are elect in the Trinity: loved by the Father, being sanctified by the Spirit, and, therefore, by the Sacrificial Work of Jesus Christ, enabled do good works in His Name.
Peter opens his letter telling Christians in dire and strange circumstances -- like us in many ways -- that grace has been given, that peace is available, only by the Work of God. So this is their hope and our hope, their future and our future: God has chosen us, loved us, is making us like Him, and causing us to live out His Sacrifice through good works. Do we have hope? So long as God is God.
Let us pray:
May your grace and peace come upon us, O God. You, Who in Your Triune Self has made us a people for You, we pray that You would continue to work in us and through us, causing us to be Your people and Your witnesses here in Irvington. Raise up a faithful Church on earth. And keep us in Your Hope. For it is in Jesus' Name we pray, Amen.
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