About this sermon
Peter writes to believers scattered across Asia Minor and calls them elect exiles of the dispersion, pilgrims whose final home lies in the age to come. Their trials never meant that God had abandoned them. The church is catholic in the true sense, spread through the whole world among every nation, and Christians should remember their persecuted brothers and sisters. God the Father chose them, the Spirit sanctifies them, and the blood of Jesus Christ sprinkles them for obedience.
Sermon transcript
Just a second. Well, dear friends, please remain standing for the reading of God’s Word. We’ve just begun on the last Lord’s Day a new sermon series in the first epistle of Peter, 1 Peter. And this evening we continue to consider the opening verses of 1 Peter, 1 Peter 1, verses 1 and 2. I’ll read the first nine verses to fill out the context a little bit, but let us hear God’s Word. 1 Peter 1 verses 1-9. Dear friends, this is the Word of God. Hear it with reverence and awe. Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who are elect exiles of the dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in the sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience to Jesus Christ and for sprinkling with his blood, may grace and peace be multiplied to you.
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. According to His great mercy, He has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the tested genuineness of your faith, more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Though you have not seen Him, you love Him. Though you do not now see Him, you believe in Him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls.
Dear friends, the grass withers and the flower fades, but the Word of our God endures forever. Let’s pray for God to bless the preaching of His Word. Almighty, most merciful God, Heavenly Father, once again we would invoke and beseech you for the presence of your spirit to bless the proclamation of your word this evening. We ask that you would make our hearts open and receptive to your word. We pray that you would keep us from all distractions, and may our focus be upon that which the Spirit is speaking to us in your God-breathed word this evening. We ask, Lord, that you would open our minds and our hearts to behold wondrous things from your word, and that your word would find a lodging place in our souls and transform our lives. We pray that you would guard my lips, that I might speak only that which is faithful to your word.
And we pray all of these things through Jesus Christ, your Son, our Lord, and all of God’s people said, amen. You may be seated. This evening, my sermon is entitled God’s Pilgrim People, Part Two, as we continue our consideration that we began on the last Lord’s Day. And children can be listening for the three key words tonight, the words pilgrim, Catholic, and blessing, pilgrim, Catholic, and blessing. Well, dear ones, on the last Lord’s Day evening, as I mentioned, we began to study the New Testament epistle or letter of 1 Peter. Under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, St. Peter the Apostle wrote this letter to a group of Christians who were scattered over a large area north of the Taurus Mountains in what is today known as Turkey. This area included the five Roman provinces that Peter mentions in verse one of our passage, the provinces of Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia.
As we begin our journey through this marvelous portion of God’s holy word, we’ll see that the original readers to whom Peter wrote this letter were facing persecution because of their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. And perhaps this is why Peter begins by addressing these believers as elect exiles of the dispersion. As it says in verse one, Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ to those who are elect exiles of the dispersion in Pontus, Galatia and so forth. Now other translations read strangers in the world or sojourners or pilgrims of the dispersion. Now the term sojourners or pilgrims of the dispersion, these terms remind us of our identity as followers of Jesus Christ. This term reminds us that this present world is not our final home. We are simply pilgrims or sojourners making our journey through this present life to our ultimate homeland in glory, our final home, the new heavens and the new earth wherein righteousness dwells.
As I pointed out on the last Lord’s Day evening, there’s really no reason for us believers to have an identity crisis, for God’s Word tells us that we are the pilgrim people of God. That is our fundamental identity. Our fundamental identity is in Christ, and as those who are in Christ living in this present evil age, we are the pilgrim people of God. Through His sovereign grace, we have been chosen by God the Father, redeemed by God the Son incarnate, and renewed and sanctified by God the Holy Spirit. Therefore, whatever our earthly lot or state may be, we belong to the forever family of God. We belong to the age yet to come. And friends, this truth of our identity as the pilgrim people of God would have been a particularly important truth for the Apostle Peter to stress in writing to his original first century readers, especially as they faced the fiery trials of hostility and persecution for their Christian faith.
These brothers and sisters to whom Peter originally wrote this letter, they needed assurance that the trials and the sufferings that they were facing did not mean that God had abandoned them or that God no longer regarded them as his people or that God was angry with them. I think sometimes when we face trials and persecutions and tribulations and difficulties, we’re tempted to think, well, God must be mad at me or maybe God has abandoned me. But we need to be assured that no, that is not the case. And that certainly was not the case with the original Christians to whom Peter wrote this letter. Rather, their trials and their sufferings were just one more evidence that they were still on their journey to their eternal home. They were still sojourners, pilgrims on the way. and thus that they could be assured that God had not abandoned them, for they still belonged and they would always belong to the pilgrim people of God.” So friends, again, on the last Lord’s Day, we began to consider our identity as God’s pilgrim people, and we considered some of the implications of our identity as the pilgrim people of God.
But for my sermon for this Lord’s Day evening, I want to have us continue to consider this opening section of Peter’s first epistle. And as we do so, I want us, first of all, to consider the catholicity of God’s pilgrim people. That’s the first point in your sermon outline, if you’re following along. Let us continue the catholicity of God’s pilgrim people. Now, let me just pause there, and some of you may be thinking, I don’t know if I like this, Pastor Jeff. You’re talking about the Catholicity. I mean, it sounds awfully Catholic, right? Well, the word Catholic is actually not a bad word. It simply is a word that, at least originally, meant universal. When we talk about the Catholic Church and when we affirm, for example, in the Apostles’ Creed that we believe in the Holy Catholic Church, we’re not affirming belief in the Roman Catholic Church.
Rather, we are affirming belief in the spiritual oneness of all true believers throughout the world. Catholic means universal, means worldwide. It means God’s people throughout the world. And Peter, in terms of how those whom he addresses in these opening verses, shows the catholicity of God’s pilgrim people. As he says, to those who are elect exiles of the dispersion those among God’s people who are dispersed in Gentile parts of the Roman Empire. Remember, Peter, as an apostle of Jesus Christ, was primarily focused on sharing the gospel with his fellow Jews. The apostle Paul describes Peter as an apostle to the circumcised, whereas Paul was gifted by God to bring the gospel of Jesus Christ primarily to the Gentiles. But here Peter is addressing this letter to a group of mostly Gentile Christians who’ve come to faith in Christ from a pagan background.
So in verse 1, again, we observe that Peter writes this epistle to the pilgrims of the dispersion, as the New King James Version puts it, for example. Now, the Greek term that is translated here as dispersion is the term diasporos. Now allow me to quote from the late Bible scholar William Barclay’s commentary where he explains what this term means. It’s actually a very significant term. He explains that diaspora, literally the dispersion, was the technical name for the Jews scattered in exile in all the countries outside the bounds of Palestine. Those exiled Jews were called the diaspora. But now, now under the new covenant, in other words, now the real diaspora is not the Jewish nation. It is the Christian church scattered abroad throughout the provinces of the Roman Empire and the nations of the world.
They are the people whose king is God, whose home is eternity, and who are exiles in the world. And this is very significant. I mean, think about this from a broader biblical perspective. If you go back to Old Testament times and under the Old Covenant, Who on the face of the earth, who were the people of God? Well, under the old covenant, God constituted his church, his people, his covenant community as a theocratic nation. Under the Mosaic covenant, the church and the theocratic nation of Israel were, for all practical purposes, one and the same. But with the coming of Jesus Christ and the new covenant, the church is now reconstituted as an international worldwide community. That is to say, the covenant people of God is no longer confined to the nation of the Jews and to those Gentiles who happen to associate themselves with the Jewish nation, but now the people of God includes Jews and Gentiles from all the nations of humanity who come to believe upon the Lord Jesus Christ and are brought by the sovereign grace of God into the kingdom of God through that faith. with the coming of Christ and the resurrected Christ’s command to his church in the Great Commission to make disciples not just of the Jewish nation or one particular region of the world, but to make disciples of all the nations, all the people groups of mankind.
The church is now Catholic or universal. It is now a worldwide entity rather than merely a national entity. It is inclusive of all who profess true faith in the gospel of Jesus Christ, together, of course, with their covenant children. And this is true whether they be Jews or Gentiles, men or women, slaves or freedmen, and so forth. The true church of Jesus Christ is Catholic in the sense that it is spread abroad throughout the whole world and is represented by many nationalities. So what are some of the implications of this? What are some of the lessons that we can glean from this language that Peter uses in addressing the Christians to whom he’s writing? And of course, the Holy Spirit inspired Peter to write this, and it’s written not just for the original readers, but it also applies to us as God’s church today in the 21st century.
What can we learn from this? Well, first of all, the term diaspora undergirds the fact that Christ’s church is not at home in this present world order. In biblical times, the Jews of the dispersion, the Jewish diaspora, lived as foreigners in foreign lands and under foreign domination. They were the Jews that were exiled from the land of Israel into places like Babylon or Assyria. They were strangers in a strange land, foreigners living away from their homeland. They were scattered abroad. Well, friends, likewise, the Church of Jesus Christ lives in this present world order as those who have been dispersed, those who have been exiled from their true native land and who long for their ultimate heavenly homeland. Friends, though we are called upon in Scripture to be active in this present world, we are to be salt and light in this present world, we are to love our neighbors and seek to bring the gospel to the nations, and we’re to be good neighbors, good citizens, and so forth, but nevertheless, this is not our final home.
Though we have been called to be active in this world as salt and light, this world is not our final home. We’re just passing through. And we need to remind ourselves of that each and every day because the world tugs upon us. The fallen world system around us, we are immersed in it. I’m not being Baptistic here, but we live in a context where this fallen world, it’s all around us. A culture, there are so many pressures to conform to this present world. But as the scriptures tell us in places like Romans chapter 12, do not be conformed to this present world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds. And how are we transformed? Well, we’re transformed by the word of God. That’s why it’s so important to be in the Word, to read it, meditate upon it, study it, and sit under the faithful preaching and teaching of it.
Again, this term diaspora reminds us that as the Pilgrim People of God, we are part of the diaspora of God as we await our final homeland. Another lesson I think we can glean from this language here in our passage for today is that since the Church of Jesus Christ is spread throughout the whole world, you and I would do well to take a deep interest in what God is doing among our brothers and sisters throughout the world. And so it is our custom, as you folks know, as you’re attending the evening worship service tonight, and many of you are regulars at the evening service, you know that before the service, our Elder Jansch gets up and he reads from the telenews. And why do we do that? Well, one of the reasons is to make us aware of the missionary efforts of our denomination and to raise our awareness of what God is doing in other parts of the world. we need to realize that as pilgrims of the dispersion, as God’s people scattered throughout the world, we have a bond, a fellowship, even with brothers and sisters on the other side of the world.
We are one body of Christ. We are a covenant community, even though we are dispersed at this present time. So how do we How do we do this? How do we take an interest in this? Well, I would encourage you, I would encourage all of us, let us regularly pray for our missionaries. Let us seek to learn about them and about their missionary labors. Let us be attentive when the telenews is read. Let’s make an effort to be world Christians, not worldly Christians, but world Christians, Christians who are aware of what the Lord through his church is doing throughout the world. And we can also do this by remembering our persecuted brothers and sisters in Christ. We in this country have been so blessed with religious liberty and freedom, and we sometimes take that for granted, and we sometimes forget that many of our brothers and sisters, like the brothers and sisters that Peter wrote this epistle to, live with the daily reality or the daily possibility of serious, even fiery persecution simply because they love and trust, confess and follow the Lord Jesus Christ.
So let us, brothers and sisters, let us seek to take a deep interest in what God is doing throughout the Christian diaspora, throughout the church around the world. But next, as we move on in our passage, we focused on, in verse one, on this language of exiles being exiles of the dispersion. Next, beloved, especially based on verse two, let us take to heart the blessings which have been bestowed upon us as God’s pilgrim people. That’s the next point in your sermon outline. Let us take to heart the blessings which have been bestowed upon us as God’s pilgrim people. You may have noticed in verse two, well let me read it again and see if you pick up on something significant here. It says that we are elect exiles of the dispersion. We are elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father in the sanctification of the Spirit for obedience to Jesus Christ and for sprinkling with His blood.
Did you pick up on the deep Trinitarianism of this verse? Even as Peter opens up his epistle The language here is saturated with the reality and the truth that God is a triune being, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And the blessings of the triune God are enumerated and fleshed out here. as Peter reminds his readers and reminds us, as the Holy Spirit, through Peter’s writings, reminds us of the blessings that we have received as God’s pilgrim people. What do those blessings include? Well, Peter, in mentioning the three persons of the Holy Trinity, God the Father, the Spirit, and Jesus Christ the Son, He mentions that first of all we are elect or chosen exiles according to the foreknowledge of God the Father. Now we’re going to learn more about the significance and the meaning of God’s foreknowledge in the Lord’s days to come.
But basically, in summary, what this points to, friends, is that God Almighty, in eternity past, had set His everlasting, saving love upon us. And He chose us to be His own people. He chose us. He had us in mind, brothers and sisters, even before He created the universe. He had us in mind. He set His saving, everlasting love upon us even before He created the universe. You know, many Christians are intimidated by the words election, the words predestination, chosen. These are words that many Christians are uncomfortable with, but clearly they are Bible words when we talk about election and predestination and God choosing a people for himself. These are biblical words, biblical concepts, and so we cannot claim to be Bible-believing Christians and ignore this biblical language. But we need to understand, beloved, that the word election, like the word predestination, These words are not intended to scare or terrorize the true believer.
See, the Bible presents the doctrines of election and predestination as truths which are meant to bring comfort, great comfort to true believers in the Lord Jesus Christ. The truth, dear ones, that we are elect or chosen, what this means is that God took the initiative in reaching out to us even before we reached up to him. As the scriptures clearly teach, He chose us before we chose Him. He loved us before we loved Him. In fact, as we are told in 1 John, we love Him because He first loved us. That’s what grace is all about. God takes the initiative. He comes down to us and we respond to that grace with faith and gratitude, but that is a response of grace, not a response of merit. He chose us before we chose Him. We love him because he first loved us.
More on that, more on all of this on the next Lord’s Day evening. But we are identified as the pilgrim people of God as elect or chosen exiles according to the foreknowledge of God the Father. But then he goes on to say in the sanctification of the spirit, sanctification of the spirit, The great reformer Martin Luther once said or wrote, I believe in his small catechism, he said, I believe that I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ my Lord or come to Him. I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ my Lord or come to Him. Even faith itself must be a gift of God, which is produced in the hearts of God’s chosen ones by an act of divine grace and grace alone. And friends, this is why the Holy Spirit is so essential for salvation and for living the Christian life.
Without the Holy Spirit, we cannot believe upon the Lord Jesus Christ for our salvation. Again, to quote from William Barclay, he is correct when he writes, quote, for the Christian, the Holy Spirit is essential to every part of the Christian life and every step in it. It is the Holy Spirit who awakens within us the first faint longings for God and goodness. It is the Holy Spirit who convicts us of our sin and leads us to the cross where that sin is forgiven. It is the Holy Spirit who enables us to be freed from the sins which have us in their grip and to gain the virtues which are the fruit of the Spirit. It is the Holy Spirit who gives us the assurance that our sins are forgiven and that Jesus Christ is Lord.
The beginning, the middle, and the end of the Christian life are the work of the Holy Spirit. Amen. Indeed, we are chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father in the sanctification of the Spirit. And so one of the other implications of this is that we have been empowered by the Holy Spirit for an obedient life. And so Peter goes on to write that we have been chosen by the foreknowledge of God the Father in the sanctification of the Spirit for what? for obedience to Jesus Christ and for sprinkling with his blood. I believe the obedience in view here, the specific obedience that Peter has in view here is not a general obedience to the word of God, but obedience in particular to the gospel call, the call to repent and believe upon Christ, the call to conversion.
The Holy Spirit enables us to answer that general call of the gospel. The Holy Spirit provides the effectual call to the elect through the general call of the gospel. And it is through the Spirit that we are empowered not only to respond initially in faith, but to begin walking in obedience. Your Christian life began when the Holy Spirit regenerated you, caused you to be born again, and therefore enabled you to obey the call of the gospel by repenting of your sin and by trusting in the Lord Jesus Christ alone as your savior from sin. Through the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit, you and I are empowered, brothers and sisters, to grow in the knowledge and in the love of our Lord and Savior. And therefore, we are enabled by the grace of God to grow in our obedience.
And one of the other blessings, wonderful blessings that we have received as the pilgrim people of God and through God’s electing and sanctifying and redeeming work is that we are redeemed through the precious blood of Christ. You notice at the end of verse two, towards the end of verse two, he says that we have been chosen and sanctified for obedience to Jesus Christ, and what? For sprinkling with his blood. Under the old covenant ceremonial system, there were many rituals that involved the sprinkling of blood, the blood of the covenant. It was sprinkled on the people and so forth. And it is through the shedding of blood, Christ’s blood, that we are forgiven of our sins, that our sins are atoned for. Through the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross, our sins have been forgiven. and we have been brought back into a right relationship with God.
Again, we’re gonna go into more detail in weeks ahead about these wonderful blessings that Peter speaks of in these opening verses. And again, I plan to elaborate more on these wonderful blessings that we have received as the Pilgrim People of God in future weeks, so stay tuned. But before I end this sermon this evening, let me ask you, dear listener, are you part of the Pilgrim People of God? If you’re not part of God’s pilgrim people, then you are on what the Lord Jesus described as the broad road that leads to destruction. The Bible says that you, apart from grace, you are a slave to your sin, and that you are headed for eternal punishment in hell for your sins. Your only hope of salvation is the Lord Jesus Christ. According to God’s word, the bad news is that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God and that the wages of sin is death, not just physical death, but this includes God’s righteous sentence of eternal death in hell.
And that’s bad news indeed. If you are not in union with Jesus Christ and thus in union as well with his people, you are under the wrath of God. But the good news is that God the Father sent his eternal son, the Lord Jesus Christ, to pay the penalty for sin by dying on the cross as a substitutionary atonement. He died in our place, in our stead. He rose from the dead three days later, proving that God the Father had accepted his sacrifice for sin. And then he ascended into heaven, where he reigns at God’s right hand, where he intercedes for God’s people as their great high priest. The Bible says that God now commands all people everywhere, that includes you, that includes me, he commands all people everywhere to repent of their sins. And God promises in his word that everyone who turns from their sins in repentance and who by grace trusts in the Lord Jesus Christ alone for their salvation will not perish, but have everlasting life.
If you’ve been in the church many years, you’ve heard this message many, many times, but have you believed upon the Lord Jesus Christ? Have you repented of your sins? As a minister of the gospel of Jesus Christ, I call upon each and every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ to trust in the Lord Jesus Christ as your Savior from sin, not just as the Savior from sin, not just a historical faith, but by the grace of God, may you embrace Christ with a personal trust. May you personally trust him as your Savior from sin. And the Bible promises that if you do, you will be saved. Believe upon the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. For if you confess with your lips Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you shall be saved as God says in his word.
But if you refuse to repent and believe, then the Bible warns you that you abide under the righteous wrath of God. But if God grants you the grace to turn to Christ from your sins, then you can rest assured that you have been called to belong both now and forevermore to God’s pilgrim people. My prayer, beloved, is that all of us would leave this place tonight fully assured of our identity as members of God’s pilgrim people, as those who belong to Christ, those who are elect exiles of the dispersion, those who are elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father in the sanctification of the Spirit and for obedience to Jesus Christ and sprinkling with His blood. May God, in His mercy, grant that it would be so. Amen. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we thank You for the many spiritual blessings that we have received in Christ, and that you have constituted us, O Lord, as your people.
And in this world, we are your pilgrim people. But Lord, may we not grow weary, may we not become discouraged, may we realize that you are working within us and that you are leading us through this present age to ultimate glory in Christ. So Lord, help us to live our lives in hope, that blessed hope, that sure and certain hope that one day we will see our Savior face to face in glory. In his name we pray and all of God’s people said. Amen. As we close our time in worship this evening, we’ll rise and we’ll sing together 404, the church’s one foundation is Jesus Christ, her Lord. Let’s rise and sing hymn number 404.
The sermon text provided above is derived from the sermon audio recording making use of generative tools. It has not been manually edited. While transcription tools have a high degree of accuracy, the output may include generative textual, punctuation, and/or formatting errors.