Regarding the current circumstances we are in as we face a worldwide pandemic, Sinclair Ferguson recently gave this insight: “People may say, ‘I’ll never be the same again after this.’ The danger is that we will be exactly the same after it.”1 I have been thinking about those words lately and praying that the Lord will not allow me to be the same once this is over. Whatever ways he intends to strengthen my faith, reshape my priorities, and refocus my vision, I want him to do. And while we can probably think of thousands of ways God is working in our hearts at this time, I want to share one in particular that is at the heart of the message of 1 Peter. This letter is, fundamentally, a letter about hope. Peter proclaims the hope of the gospel to believers suffering persecution in Asia Minor. If you want to pick out a verse that summarizes what the whole letter is about, you probably couldn’t do any better than 1 Peter 1:13: “Therefore, preparing your minds for action, and being sober-minded, set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.” I have been pondering those words much more recently, because I have recognized in myself that as this pandemic has unfolded, I have a tendency to let my hope rise and fall with the daily headlines. I am far too tempted to put my hope in returning to normal, and the more or less likely that appears to me at any given moment, the more or less hopeful I become.
I want that to change. I truly want to obey the command of 1 Peter 1:13 and set my hope fully on the grace that will be brought to me at the revelation of Jesus Christ. And I desire that for all of us, namely, that our hope would not be bound to our circumstances, nor to the flimsy systems of this world (which are quite evidently shaken right now), but rather to the transcendent reality of Christ, seated at the right hand of the Father, who will one day be revealed to us in glory. As we come to the end of the letter today, I see Peter’s final words of greeting as words give insights on how we might do just that.
In these last three verses, Peter gives us words that nurture hope and stir us to live in hope. And it is not a hope that belongs to this world, but is rooted in the gospel. May it elevate our vision to things above and remove us from captivity to our circumstances. As we look at these verses today, I want to point out three reasons for hope that Peter gives us and then draw one last conclusion from the hope that we have.
First, notice
All three of these reasons are based on something that is true about us as believers. The first reason for hope is this:
I’m starting at the end here. Look at verse 14b: “Peace to all of you who are in Christ.” That we are in Christ is, for us who are believers, the most fundamental reality about us. In the end, we stand before God in one of two ways: we are either under the covenantal headship of Adam, in which case we stand guilty and condemned, or we are under the covenantal headship of Christ, in which case we stand righteous and justified.
Peter ends his letter with a final blessing of peace upon all who are in Christ. Objectively, peace is an accomplished reality for us. In Christ, we have peace with God. Our sins have been washed away, and we are fully reconciled with our heavenly Father. And out of that glorious reality flows a subjective feeling of inner peace. Of course, we don’t always have that inner peace in ourselves. It’s something we have to fight for. Peter blesses his readers with a prayer for it because it is something to which we as believers are entitled. God has actually promised inner peace to us! Where? To give one example, consider Philippians 4:6-7: “do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” Paul speaks of inner peace coming to us preeminently as a result of our prayers, including thanksgiving and supplication. Or, as Peter has just said a few verses earlier, we are to humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God by casting our anxieties upon him [in prayer], knowing he cares for us (1 Pet. 5:7-8).
The fact that we are in Christ gives us all the hope we need. And out of that hope flows inner peace to face the turmoil of this world. Being in Christ is our preeminent reason for hope.
A second reason for you to have hope is this:
Working back up in the text, I’m drawing this point from verse 13, which reads, “She who is at Babylon, who is likewise chosen, sends you greetings.” That’s a puzzling statement. What could it mean? Let’s start with Babylon. This is not a reference to the literal city of Babylon, which by the time of Peter’s writing had become an obscure city, a shadow of its former self during the days of King Nebuchadnezzar. This is a figurative way of referring to the city of Rome, which was at that time the political, economic, and cultural center of the world. It is called Babylon in order to associate it with the main power in opposition to God and his people from the Old Testament. We might call it the City of Man, a city that exists in every age and encapsulates the prevailing spirit of that age.
So who is “she”? This is not any particular woman but rather a reference to the church in the city of Rome. “She who is at Babylon” is the group of believers in Rome (from where Peter is writing) sending their greetings to the believers in Asia Minor. By identifying this church’s location as Babylon, Peter indicates that believers in Rome are exiles in a strange land. But notice how else he describes them: “likewise chosen.” They are exiles, but they are chosen, or elected, by God. This statement matches up with the greeting Peter initially gave to his readers in 1:1: “To those who are elect exiles of the Dispersion.” That is a good summary of what the church is in this present age.
And what do we learn about ourselves here? We learn that we live as exiles right now in the City of Man. This world is not our home, and we will often feel like strangers in it. We furthermore learn that we are God’s chosen, precious possession. Though the world may reject us, God has made us his own from eternity past. Why is it important for us to see ourselves this way? It will shape our expectations and focus our hope in the right direction. Although we as exiles are called to seek the good of the city in which we temporarily reside, we cannot place our hope in the City of Man. Our hope must rest with the God who has chosen us to belong to him forever.
It is only this kind of mentality that can explain why Paul expressed no fear at the prospect that he might die shortly in Philippians 1:21-24: “For to me, to live is Christ, and to die is gain. If I am to live in the flesh, that means fruitful labor for me. Yet which I shall choose I cannot tell. My desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better. But to remain in the flesh is more necessary on your account.” If we see ourselves as chosen exiles, whose roots are not planted in this present world but in Heaven, we can say with Paul that, so long as we live in this world, we will labor to serve Christ, and when God decides our time is up, we can die knowing that it is far better to be with Christ than to be here. Remembering who we are takes the fearful sting out of a pandemic.
Not only are you in Christ, and not only are you chosen exiles, but there is a third reason for hope in these verses:
On this point I want to point out two things in the text. One is the various people Peter mentions. Silvanus, who is called “a faithful brother” appears to be the one appointed to carry this letter from Peter to its recipients. We have already mentioned the church at Rome referred to in verse 13. In addition, Peter refers to “Mark, my son” in the same verse. This is a reference to a man known as John Mark in the Gospels, the man who wrote what we know as the Gospel of Mark. He was not literally Peter’s son, but Peter is speaking spiritually here. This is one reason we believe that the Gospel of Mark, though not written directly by Peter, nevertheless gives us much information that comes from Peter’s perspective.
The reason I bring up all these people mentioned here is because it is worth noting that they all send their greetings to the believers in Asia Minor, and they do so from a great physical distance. They use the available technology they had in their day (paper and ink) to nurture the bonds of family from a distance. Obviously, sending greetings through a letter is not as good as being together in person, but it was what they were able to do at the time, and it is an encouragement to us as we make use of technology today to nurture our family bonds as a church.
More significantly, I want to draw your attention to the implications of Peter’s last command, which comes in verse 14: “Greet one another with the kiss of love.” This is actually a very significant command in the context of Roman society. The kiss was often used as a greeting, but only between social equals, which especially included family members. But those who were higher up the social ladder did not kiss those below them. If anything, a member of a lower class might kiss the hand, or even the foot, of someone in a higher class, but it was not a mutual form of greeting.
When Peter tells members of the church, indiscriminately, “Greet one another with the kiss of love,” and he is including in his command people from every class of society (including slaves, see 2:18-25), he is telling everyone in the church that one’s social standing in the world does not matter when you are in Christ. You are to regard all of your brothers and sisters as of equal standing with you, and you are to love them and show that by the way you greet one another. This command is actually more radical than we might realize.
Our practices will demonstrate our theology. We confess that in Christ, God has created one new man from every nation, from every social class, from every income bracket. And therefore, we are commanded to embody in our greeting practices the family relationships that are true in Christ. Does that mean we have to greet each other with a kiss? No, the particular form of the greeting isn’t what matters. And since the kiss is widely regarded in our setting as a romantic act, it would probably make most people feel weird and uncomfortable rather than loved and welcomed. So I don’t think we have to kiss one another to obey the intention of this command. I think we do need to extend to one another a warm greeting in ways appropriate to our culture, and in doing so, to make sure we go out of our way to greet those whom we might have a tendency to overlook. Of course, the pandemic is going to affect us here for a while. Contrary to the respected Dr. Fauci, I don’t think handshakes are going to go away forever. I think they probably have to go away for a while, but they will come back. And hugs will be back. Physical affection matters in a church, and we can all look forward to the day when we can greet one another in these loving ways without fear of infection. That day will come, and let us pray it comes even sooner than we expect, and let us be eager to love one another as family when it does.
The realization that we are family nurtures hope in us because it reminds us that we are not alone. We have each other. One benefit I hope comes from this season of being apart is that we will all learn to cherish the gathering of the church even more than before. I lived in the Louisville area for almost seven years. One of the biggest attractions in Louisville is Churchill Downs, where they have some of the biggest horse races in the world. Do you know how many times I visited Churchill Downs during those seven years? Zero. And when I think about why I never went there, part of the answer is probably that I took it for granted. I assumed, “I can visit there whenever I want,” so I never made it a point to go. I think we can become that way with the church. We tend to assume, “Well, I don’t much feel like it this Sunday morning,” or, “We’ll always have another prayer meeting, and I can go at another time.” If that has been your mentality, I hope this time of being unable to gather has been a wakeup call to you. I hope you have felt God saying to you, “If you take the gathering of the church for granted, I’m going to give you a taste of what it’s like not to be able to gather at all.” And I hope the effect has been to fill you with gratitude for the church and with eagerness for the day when we will gather again.
We have reasons to hope. And that hope is what leads us to the main idea command Peter leaves us with in his closing:
Verse 12 reads, “By Silvanus, a faithful brother as I regard him, I have written briefly to you, exhorting and declaring that this is the true grace of God. Stand firm in it.” When Peter speaks of the grace of God here, he is speaking of what he has written about throughout his letter. Moreover, he uses two participles regarding what he has written, namely, “exhorting” and “declaring.” These words are interesting. “Exhorting” refers to moral instructions, or commands about what we should and should not do. “Declaring” refers to doctrinal instructions, giving us truth about God and what he has done for us in Christ. Throughout this letter, Peter has given us both: doctrine and moral instruction that flows from doctrine.
And if you follow the outline of the letter as a whole, you see there is a general movement from doctrine to moral instruction. In the first part of the letter (1:3-2:10), Peter’s main focus is doctrine: telling us who we are in Christ. In the next two sections, he gives instructions: live honorably among the Gentiles (2:11-4:11) and endure sufferings with joy (4:12-5:11). So when Peter speaks of “the grace of God” in verse 12, he is referring to things that are to be believed and things that are to be done. Both are gifts to us from God.
And Peter’s main point is that we must stand firm in these things. Living faithfully before God in a hostile world is difficult, and the devil will try to destroy our faith when we realize how costly it is to follow Christ. But we must stand firm in faith all the way to the end. There are debates among theologians about perseverance in the Christian life. Some argue that we don’t have to persevere in faith in order to be saved. I think the New Testament indicates very clearly that we do have to persevere, and it frequently commands us to do so and warns us not to fall away.
Arminian theologians argue that we must persevere in order to be saved, and some who are Christians will fall away and be lost. I don’t agree with that view either, and one of the reasons I don’t is because of what Peter said at the beginning of this letter. In 1:4-5, Peter wrote that we have been born again “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 a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.” Did you catch that? It is God’s power that guards us. If true believers fall away and are lost, that must mean God’s power has failed. But that will never happen. God preserves in faith all whom he has chosen and called to himself. And so we have from Peter a promise that God will keep us secure in faith, and then we have an exhortation to stand firm in the grace of God. Neither one of these cancels out the other. God has made promises that will not be broken. We must stand firm to the end. God is sovereign over our salvation from beginning to end, and we are responsible for our actions.
So stand firm in the grace of God. No matter what happens in coming days and months with regard to this pandemic or with regard to the kind of society we may have in its wake, stand firm in the grace of God. Let the hope that Peter has given us in this letter carry you to the end.
I do hope and pray for many things in our society to get back to normal soon. But I also hope and pray that, with respect to our own hearts, there is no return to normal, but that God would change us in profound ways. An old song entitled “Home” by the late Rich Mullins expresses this idea beautifully. In the song, Mullins pictured himself as a sailor on a boat who has been through a violent storm, but now sees the calm of a new day emerging on the horizon:
I see the morning moving over the hills. I can see the shadows on the western side. And all those illusions that I had, they just vanish in your light. Though the chill of the night still hangs in the air, I can feel the rush of morning on my face. Though the storm had tossed me, ‘Til I thought I’d nearly lost my way.
And now the night is fading and the storm is past, And everything that could be shaken was shaken And all that remains is all I ever really had.
While all around us the things we have long hoped in are being shaken, may we set our hope fully on the grace to be brought to us at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Amen.