Some Thoughts On First Peter (1)

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 Pet 1:1–2) 

The text says Peter wrote the letter. I don’t think it would be helpful to go into how we know it was Peter who actually wrote it, so I won’t. But why we should listen to him is an important question for us to talk about, at least for a few minutes. I’ll get to the why we should listen to him in a second, but first let’s talk about why we should listen to him. It’s pretty simple really. We should listen to Peter because he was appointed (and sent) by Jesus to tell the world about Jesus and why he came (Mt 28:19-20). The word apostle simply means one sent or sent one. Other English words that translate the Greek word would be, messenger, delegate, and ambassador. In the book of Acts, we have apostles who were sent by the Roman government and by local churches (Acts 11:22; 16:35). As such, they had the responsibility to tell the folks they were sent to whatever the sending organization wanted them to say (Phil 2:25; 2 Cor 8:23). They also had the authority of the sending organization (Jn 13:16). So, the Roman apostle (or messenger), representing Caesar, had all the authority that Caesar had. In this case, Peter was sent by Jesus and thus he had the authority that Jesus had. We see this authority being represented in the Book of Acts when Peter healed people and cast demons out of people (Acts 3:6-8; 5:16; etc.). So, we should listen to Peter and pay attention to what he said because he was speaking the word of Jesus Christ, who is God.

Next, why we should listen to him is also a valid question. It is clear from this short introduction, that Peter wrote the letter, first to folks who were of Jewish origin and who were on the lam, having been kicked out of Jerusalem and Israel because they had become Christians. Second, these people lived in “Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia.” Third, they lived there in the first century. Most of us don’t qualify in any of these ways. We aren’t Jewish, we weren’t kicked out of Israel, we don’t live in any of those towns, and we aren’t alive in the first century. So why should we read the text as if it were written to us?

One way to begin is to look at the process is like we have been invited to listen in on someone else’s conversation with Peter. Since we’ve already said that what Peter said, Jesus said, we can simply say that we’re listening in on a conversation between God and some folks we’ve not gotten to know yet. Peter wrote them a letter and they passed it on to us and now we get to see what God wanted them to know. So, even though the letter wasn’t a letter written to us, because it was God’s word to them, it is also God’s word to us.

At the same time, because of the differences I’ve already mentioned, when we read the letter, we need to remember those differences and not read the letter in a wooden way. By wooden, I mean that we shouldn’t read it as if it were originally written to us. We always need to remember the context and that includes the context of the original readers as well as the context of the actual text itself. So, the letter was originally written to different people and when what God said to them applies to us, we need to pay special attention.

One place where the difference in context needs to be remembered and applied is in the second chapter where Peter tells the slaves how to live with their masters (2:18-20). They couldn’t leave their masters, but because we don’t have slavery in our day and culture, we wouldn’t necessarily apply the passage in the same way Peter asked his readers to apply it. Still, when we get to that passage, we’ll see that there are still principles we need to apply in our lives.

On the other hand, the really good news is that other than a few passages, we can read the letter as if it was written specifically for us.

So, the apostle Peter wrote a letter to saints who lived a long time ago and who were being persecuted for their faith. They passed the letter on to other faithful brothers and sisters, who passed it on to us. Now, we get to read their letter, read what God had for them, and apply what God wanted for them to our lives, knowing that God wants to apply those same eternal truths to our lives. This is going to be great!

Image by Şinasi Müldür from Pixabay