But *ye* [are] a chosen race, a kingly priesthood, a holy nation, a people for a possession, that ye might set forth the excellencies of him who has called you out of darkness to his wonderful light;
Peter gives ordinary believers four titles at once. Each one stands as plain fact, not as an offer — and the verse goes on to say what such people are for.
Under law, what Israel might become came with a condition attached. Peter names these titles with no condition at all. One writer sets the two arrangements side by side.
The contrast between law and grace is complete. Law says, in effect, "If you obey, you shall be." Grace says, "You are, and because you are, certain things should mark you." That is the drift of this verse in Peter's letter.
Peter names "chosen race" first. The same writer asks how his readers came to hold that title.
How did it come about that those to whom Peter wrote were a chosen generation? The first chapter answers this question. They were "elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father"; they were "ransomed... with the precious blood of Christ"; they were "born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God" — and that, as we learn elsewhere, by the Spirit of God. The Triune God had acted to produce a race of a new order — a generation not in Adam but in Christ.
One writer takes the last three titles in turn. Each points a different way.
"A royal priesthood" is the counterpart of "a holy priesthood" (v. 5). Holy priesthood looks toward God; royal priesthood looks toward people. It is royal character to carry God's witness to the world... "A holy nation" is in contrast to Israel in the flesh, in her unholy disobedience. It speaks of a vital sanctification for the glory of God, a setting apart to Himself. "A peculiar people" means a people belonging to Him alone. They are bondslaves who belong to a master, not hired servants working for wages — which is how Jews under law thought of themselves.
("Peculiar people" is older wording. The ESV says "a people for His own possession.")
Verse 5 has already called these believers a holy priesthood. Verse 9 adds a second word: royal. One writer shows what each side does.
As holy priests, we draw near to God and present the sacrifice of praise. As royal priests we go out among the people around us, in all the details of daily life, to show the virtues of Christ — His grace, His lovely moral features. Every movement of a royal priest should give off the fragrance of the grace of Christ.
The same writer finds both priesthoods at work in one night in a prison — a song, and then a word to the jailer.
They had what was better, even "the virtues of Him who had called them out of darkness into His marvellous light." And where do these virtues shine out? In those moving words to the jailer: "Do not harm yourself." That was the voice of a royal priest, just as the song of praise was the voice of a holy priest.
Christ will show these virtues perfectly in a coming day. His people are called to show them now.
The second priesthood the apostle speaks of is to show the virtues of Him who has called us out of darkness into His marvellous light... God had formed the people for Himself: they were to show forth all His virtues, His praises. Christ will do this perfectly in the day of His glory. The Christian is called to do it now in this world. He is to reproduce Christ in this world.
So what was the darkness they were called out of? One writer traces it back to the way God met Israel under the law.
Turn back to Exodus 19. The Lord said to Moses, "Behold, I am coming to you in a thick cloud" (verse 9). Later we read, "Moses drew near to the thick darkness where God was" (Ex. 20:21). Under the law, thick darkness hid God. Under grace He is in light — light so different that it can be called "marvellous."
How marvellous that light is can be measured by what it does to the people standing in it.
On a clear night at full moon we enjoy the moon shining in the light of the sun. How marvellous the sunlight must be, if it can make a dark body shine like that! The world is still in the dark, for its back is turned towards God. We are in the light of His truth and grace — the light of the knowledge of Himself. You can see how marvellous that light is. It takes dark, unattractive people like us and makes them show His excellence and reflect Him.
- Chosen — Peter names this title first. God's foreknowledge, redemption by blood, and new birth make a race "not in Adam but in Christ."
- Called — The call is out of darkness. Under law, God stayed hidden in thick darkness. Grace now states as fact what law only offered, with no "if" attached.
- Consecrated — Holy nation and God's own possession mean a real setting apart to Him. Think of a bondslave who belongs to a master, not a hired servant earning wages.
- Commissioned — One priesthood works two ways. Holy priests carry praise up to God. Royal priests carry the character of Christ out to people — a song and a word to the jailer, in one night.
- Conspicuous — The point of it all is display. Christ will do it perfectly in the day of His glory. His people do it now — dark bodies made to shine by a marvellous light.
who once [were] not a people, but now God's people; who were not enjoying mercy, but now have found mercy.
Peter has just listed what his readers are; now he reminds them what they were not. Both phrases — no people, no mercy — come from an old prophecy of judgment, so how can God's sentence be reversed?
The phrases are not Peter's invention. They come from Hosea, a prophet who announced that Israel had lost their place.
These words come from Hosea 2. Because of their wickedness and sin, God had said that Israel should not get mercy, and were not His people (Hosea 1:6). The nation has lost the blessing through their disobedience. In the second chapter, the Lord promises to give it back. God says: despite their sin, their disobedience, their unfaithfulness, and My judgment too, I will bring them into blessing in due time. In the very spot where I judged them, there they will be blessed (Hosea 2:23). Judgment has passed, and mercy triumphs over judgment, because even disobedience cannot defeat God's purposes of grace.
"Not a people" describes something that happened in history. A whole nation lost a title, and has never recovered it.
He is speaking of the loss of their title to be the people of God. Israel suffered that loss at the time of the Babylonian captivity. They then stopped being visibly God's people. So their land became the possession of the Gentiles; and so it has gone on to this day. From that day to this there has never been a real recovery. There was only the return of a remnant, for special purposes, for a time.
The titles in the previous verse were first offered at Mount Sinai, but only if Israel obeyed. Israel failed, and the blessing came anyway.
"You are," he says, "a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for His own possession." These are almost the words of Exodus 19. He goes on to speak of those who once were not a people but are now the people of God, who had not obtained mercy but have now obtained it. These are the words of Hosea 2. This sets before us, in the most interesting way, the principle on which the blessing is founded. In Exodus the people were to have this blessing if they exactly obeyed the voice of God. But Israel had not obeyed... yet, after their unfaithfulness, God Himself has laid in Zion a Stone, a chief cornerstone. Whoever believes in Him will not be put to shame. They had lost everything. It is grace that God gave them through Jesus what was promised to them at first on condition of obedience.
Everything turns on the word "now." Faith in Christ did not take these readers out of the people. It was the one thing that made them a people.
The Christian does not belong to the world, and so is not bound by accidents of time. He has everlasting life now, and is a heavenly person even while on the earth. This is Christianity. So he says to the Jews addressed that they were not a people (that is, in the days of their unbelief), but are now. So far was their believing in Christ from taking them out of the people, that it is then alone that they became a people.
Both Peter and Paul use Hosea, but they wrote to different readers. Peter also leaves out one line.
Peter also quotes Hosea, and he was writing to a remnant of Jews only. Paul, in his own proper place, was writing to Gentiles. Peter, however, though he quotes Hosea, leaves out the words, "They shall be called the sons of the living God."
Commentators differ on how far the verse reaches. Kelly reads it as spoken to believing Jews only. Others apply the same "once, now" to every background.
All was darkness for us, whether God called us out of Judaism, out of paganism, or out of a nominal and corrupted Christianity. Now we are in a light which is marvellous. We are the people of God, and we have obtained mercy.
Peter does not say they earned this standing or won it back. He calls it mercy, and that word says something about the people who receive it.
Mercy assumes guilt in the person who receives it. If there were no offence, there would be no need of mercy. In the world as it is, anyone who denied his need of mercy would be a strange person indeed. It matters little that some owe five hundred pence and others only fifty. All alike are bankrupt. All depend on the mercy of God to escape eternal ruin.
- Once — because of their sin, God said Israel were not His people and would not get mercy.
- Now — that sentence is reversed today. Believers do not wait for a future age to be God's people.
- Mercy — the word assumes guilt, not merit. Only people with no claim can receive it.
- Grace — Sinai offered these blessings for obedience. Here God gives them outright, resting on the Stone He laid in Zion.
- Result — mercy makes the people. Every title here is a gift, never a wage.
Beloved, I exhort [you], as strangers and sojourners, to abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul;
Peter calls his readers sojourners and exiles — "strangers and pilgrims" in older translations. He then warns them of a danger that works from the inside, and tells them what to do about it.
The letter changes gear here. Privilege gives way to appeal:
After this (1 Peter 2:11), the apostle begins his exhortations. Whatever privileges the Christian may have in his position, he is always seen as a pilgrim on the earth. And, as we have seen, the constant government of God is what fills the apostle's mind. But he warns them first about what is inward. He warns them about the sources from which corruptions spring. Under that government, those corruptions would dishonour the name of God and even bring in judgment.
A believer can be a stranger for two opposite reasons:
In the first verse of the letter the apostle calls the believing Jews strangers. They are outcasts from the land of Israel, scattered among the Gentiles. Here they are strangers and pilgrims along with all believers, because they belong to heaven. In the one case they are strangers because the judgment of God had driven them out of their earthly inheritance. In the other, they are strangers because the grace of God had called them from earth to heaven.
The two words are not a repetition. Each points a different direction:
"Strangers" connects with what is around; "pilgrims" with what is before. A stranger is one who shows that he does not belong to the place where he happens to be. A pilgrim shows that he is journeying on to what lies ahead of him. He has no desire to settle down until he reaches that place. Israel were strangers in Egypt; pilgrims in the wilderness.
Being away from home is not the same as having no home:
A fugitive is a man who has fled from home. A vagabond is a man who has no home. A stranger is a man who is absent from home. A pilgrim is a man who is on his way home.
Notice who does the fighting here. The passions wage the war; Peter asks for something else:
He does not say, "War against the passions of the flesh." He says, "Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul" (1 Peter 2:11). If we abstain, there is no warfare. If we do not, the enemy stirs these passions up powerfully, and they war against us. They entangle us with the very things that hinder our march on toward the possession of our inheritance.
The same writer points this outward:
The flesh in the believer wars against the spiritual progress of the soul. So we are told to abstain from the passions of the flesh, not to war against them. It is hardly our business to fight drink or impurity or other evils in the world. Our part is to show the excellencies of Him who has called us out of darkness into light.
The danger rarely announces itself. It often arrives dressed as something warm and good:
How often, through lack of prayer and watchfulness, fleshly lusts spring out of sincere respect and pure affection! The affection slides into something sensual before anyone notices... How easily little fond familiarities follow, step by step, as the closeness of Christian love ripens into unholy freedom, if not into the worst evil. Lust may take another direction and form, such as greed or any other indulgence foreign to Christ. Men praise many of these fleshly desires as doing well for self, but they war against the soul and are detestable in God's sight.
The casualties here are inward, and often small enough to overlook:
"Abstain from the passions of the flesh," says the apostle. Peter is talking about the inner life of the soul, about those thousand and one little things that come in to spoil communion with God, and to hinder growth and the knowledge of Christ.
Abstaining is not a matter of willpower. It follows from where the heart already lives:
If our heart is where He is, if our affections are set on things above, if we lose sight of the "vain things" that charm the natural man, if we grasp by faith the heavenly calling and the heavenly home — then we shall not fight the lusts of the flesh. We shall abstain from them gladly and willingly, and flee them, as Paul urged Timothy.
- Beloved — Peter appeals; he does not command. He turns here from what believers are to how they walk.
- Stranger — grace made you foreign here, not misfortune. A stranger is absent from home, not without one.
- Pilgrim — the same grace gave you a destination, so you look ahead instead of settling down.
- Abstain — the passions do the warring; your part is to hold off. Decline the fight and there is no war.
- Soul — these small things spoil communion with God and hinder growth and the knowledge of Christ. A heart set above them abstains gladly.
having your conversation honest among the Gentiles, that [as to that] in which they speak against you as evildoers, they may through [your] good works, [themselves] witnessing [them], glorify God in [the] day of visitation.
Peter has warned his readers about the wrong desires inside them; now he points to the watching world outside. Three questions follow: what life Peter asks for, why the slander comes, and what the "day of visitation" means.
Hamilton Smith ties this to the warning just before it, and shows what good conduct is for.
Having warned us against sinful desires within, the Apostle now urges us about our outward conduct before the world. We are to be careful to act with complete honesty, so that our good works prove false the hard words that call us evildoers.
ESV says "honorable" where older translations say "honest." The word covers more than being trustworthy.
In the New Testament these words are not limited to trustworthiness, the way we commonly use them today. They extend to any honourable conduct.
Kelly names both the source of this conduct and the aim behind it.
So the call is to have their behaviour attractive (Greek kalen) among the Gentiles... The spring of this conduct is the faith that looks to the Father and calls on Him. But it is also a duty to win over the unbelieving and hostile by living in a way that matches Christ, giving no opening to those who are looking for one. People of the world suspect the motives and the ways of the faithful. Yet they have a strong, if not well-informed, sense of their responsibilities, and they are always on the watch for them to stumble and fail.
The slander had a shape. Critics looked at Christian meetings and noticed what was missing.
It was an early and common accusation among the Gentiles that Christians must be atheists, because they turned from idols. In their meeting places you saw no image of gold, silver, stone, or wood, and no picture made by human hands. The Jews knew perfectly well that this was only because the living and true God had won these believers away from such empty things, to serve Him.
Darby points to the real target behind the attacks.
Christians bore the name of God. People's minds were hostile to His name. They tried to disgrace it by blaming Christians for the evil conduct they themselves practised without remorse. At the same time they complained (1 Peter 4:4) that Christians would not join them in the same excess and disorder. The Christian had only to follow the path of faithfulness to God.
Commentators differ over what this day is. Some read it as God visiting in grace, when trouble drives people to look for help.
Does this mean a visitation in judgment, or the visitation in grace? It means the second, though a visit by the chastening hand of God is not ruled out. When sorrows come, when hopes on earth collapse, when sickness makes it impossible to enjoy material things, unbelievers often turn to the people of God for help and comfort. God's grace then shows itself in the day of visitation, and this glorifies God.
Others read it another way, starting from how Scripture uses the phrase elsewhere.
It is a mark of Scripture that you can only find the meaning of a phrase from its context... For example, the words in Luke 19:44, "the time of your visitation," clearly mean the day of grace for Jerusalem through the presence and testimony of our blessed Lord... But when we come to Peter's words, "the day of visitation," the thought is judgment rather than grace — whatever effects, gracious or otherwise, the "visitation" has on the people who go through it. We take it that this is not about one particular time or day. It is any time when God steps in and shows His power openly before the eyes of men, forcing them, in one way or another, to glorify Him and to prove His people right.
Both readings end in the same place. The accusers themselves finish by speaking for God.
In the day when God visits men, these slanderers will have their will broken and their pride subdued by God's visitation. They will be brought to confess that God had acted in these Christians, and that He had been present among them. What brings them to it is the good works which, despite their slanders, had always reached their consciences.
- Watched. People of the world suspect the motives of believers. They watch for them to slip.
- Beautiful. ESV's "honorable" means more than trustworthy. It covers any conduct that looks attractive.
- Slandered. Expect the charge of being an evildoer. Critics often pin their own conduct on the people of God.
- Silenced. The reply to hard words is not argument but good works, which contradict the accusation.
- Glorified. When God visits, the accusers confess He was at work in the people they attacked. Commentators differ on whether that visit is grace or judgment.