Our Identity in Jesus

Isaiah 53:4-7, 9                        1 Peter 2:11-3:7                          Matthew 5:13-16

Our Identity in Jesus

We live in a world that is deeply confused about identity. Many people are told to define themselves by their desires, achievements, wounds (professionally diagnosed or self-diagnosed), politics, tribe, work, sexuality (take your pick from a mindboggling smorgasbord of possible gender definitions), family background, nationality, success, suffering, or social media image. The result is often not freedom but fragmentation. If the self must be invented from within, defended before others, and constantly revised according to the expectations of the age, then identity becomes a burden too heavy to carry.

Peter writes to Christians who were living under immense pressure. They were misunderstood, misrepresented, and sometimes slandered. They were accused of being socially dangerous, disrespectful, unpatriotic, and strange. Later Roman writers such as Tacitus and Suetonius would describe Christians as hated for their “abominations” or as followers of a “new and impious superstition.” Yet Peter does not tell the Church to answer confusion with panic, hostility, withdrawal, or self-protection. He calls them to remember who they are: beloved by God, chosen in Christ, exiles in the world, servants of God, and witnesses to the glory of the Father.

This is the central movement of 1 Peter 2:11-3:7. Christian conduct flows from Christian identity. We do not serve in order to become someone; we serve because in Jesus Christ we already know who we are. We are free, yet servants of God. We are citizens of earthly nations, yet our final allegiance belongs to the kingdom of heaven. We are called to honour others, love the family of believers, fear God, and honour our leaders. However, we are not shaped by the confusion around us, but by the crucified and risen Lord who bore our sins and healed our mortal wounds.

Jesus said, “You are the salt of the earth” and “You are the light of the world.” And then he added, “Let your light shine before others, that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.” Christian service, then, is not a performance for applause; it is the visible expression of a settled identity in Christ.

Peter begins, “Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul.” As I said last week, the word “beloved” comes first. Before Peter speaks about abstaining, submitting, suffering, serving, or witnessing, he reminds believers who they are: that they are loved. Their identity does not begin with social rejection but with divine acceptance. They are not spiritual orphans trying to earn a place in God’s household. They belong there because they are his adopted children. They are his beloved.

Yet at the same time, they are also “sojourners and exiles.” That means that although Christians live in the world, they do not belong to the world’s ultimate order. We participate in society, work, family life, civic responsibility, and public service, but we do so as people whose identity is found in God. This creates a holy tension. There are two spheres, two value systems, two visions of life: the kingdom of self and the kingdom of God; the darkness of disordered desire and the clarity that is ours in the light of Jesus.

Peter does not tell Christians to withdraw into private spirituality. He says, “Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honourable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation.” The Church’s answer to slander is not argument but visible holiness. The goal is not personal vindication. The goal is that observers may one day glorify God because of what they observe in our behaviour.

This matters because the early Christians were frequently accused of undermining society. In Acts, Stephen was accused of speaking against the temple and the law; Paul was accused of persuading people to worship God “contrary to the law”; and in Jerusalem the crowd claimed that he taught against the people, the law, and the holy place. Such accusations were not merely theological. They implied that Christian faith produced social disorder. Peter’s answer is that Christian identity should produce the opposite: honourable conduct, faithful citizenship, disciplined desire, and public good.

Peter continues, “Be subject for the Lord’s sake to every human institution.” This does not mean that the state is ultimate, righteous in all its actions, or worthy of worship. No, it means that because God is the Creator and Judge, Christians should not be lawless, rebellious, or careless citizens. Romans 13 teaches us that governing authorities have a real, though limited, role under God: to restrain evil and commend what is good. Daniel 2:21 reminds us that it is God who “removes kings and sets up kings,” and Psalm 75 teaches that political or civic promotion does not finally come from east or west, but from the Lord who judges.

And in this light, the Christian motive is crucial: we are to be subject to earthly authorities “for the Lord’s sake.” We obey earthly authority because we are first under God’s authority. Therefore, Christian submission is never servile worship of power. It is disciplined obedience under the lordship of Jesus. When the state does what is proper, we honour it. When the state commands what God forbids or forbids what God commands, we obey God rather than human beings. The choice may be clear, even though the application of that choice may not be quite so straightforward…and the cost may be high. 

Peter summarizes Christian public life in four short commands: “Honour everyone. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honour the emperor.” Notice the order and distinction. Everyone is to be honoured because all people bear the image of God. The family of believers is to be loved with covenant loyalty. God alone is to be feared. And while the emperor is to be honoured, he is not to be feared as God. While Proverbs 24:21 instructs us to “fear the Lord and the king,” Peter sharpens the Christian confession: fear God; honour the emperor.

This speaks powerfully to modern Christian service. In public life, Christians should be known neither for blind loyalty to political power nor for reflexive contempt. We should be honest citizens, careful voters, truthful speakers, diligent taxpayers, faithful neighbours, and courageous witnesses. We pray “for kings and all who are in high positions,” as 1 Timothy 2 says, so that we may live peaceful, godly, and dignified lives. Our service in society is rooted not in fear of losing influence but in confidence that Christ is Lord.

Peter then addresses household slaves. Now, at this point I think that it is important to say clearly that Peter is not condoning slavery. What he is doing is instructing believers who are already trapped within a harsh social order how to live faithfully before God. In the first-century world, slaves could be treated as property, exposed to exploitation, and punished severely for rebellion. While some skilled slaves could gain freedom, many lived with little security and few rights. Peter speaks into that painful reality without pretending it is good.

His instruction is not based on the worthiness of the master but on the example of Jesus. “For this is a gracious thing,” Peter says, “when, mindful of God, one endures sorrows while suffering unjustly.” There is no glory in suffering for wrongdoing. But when someone does good and suffers for it, and endures because of conscience toward God, that endurance becomes a witness.

Then Peter takes us to the cross: “For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps.” Christian service is cruciform. It takes the shape of Jesus, Peter tells us. He who “committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth.” Here Peter draws from Isaiah 53: “He had done no violence, and there was no deceit in his mouth.” Jesus was innocent, yet he suffered. He was reviled yet did not revile in return. He suffered yet uttered no threats because he entrusted himself to the one who judges justly.

Isaiah had said, “Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows”; “he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities”; “like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth.” For Peter, the suffering of Jesus is not only for our salvation, but it is also our pattern. The silence of Jesus was not weakness; it was trust. His refusal to retaliate was not passivity; it was obedience. And consequently, his wounds were not signs of defeat; they were signs of healing.

“He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed.” Sin separates us from the source of life. Isaiah 59 says, “Your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God.” Death is not merely a penalty imposed from outside; it is the consequence of being cut off from life itself. But Jesus, the sinless One, entered our death so that we might receive his life. He is the wounded Healer whose wounds heal wounded sinners.

Therefore, the bad behaviour of the world is never an excuse for the bad behaviour of the Church. Retaliation may feel natural, but it does not reveal Christ. Jesus was silent before his accusers and before those who mocked him. He blessed rather than cursed. He entrusted judgment to God. In the same spirit, Jesus taught, “Bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you,” and Paul wrote, “When reviled, we bless; when persecuted, we endure; when slandered, we entreat.” Indeed, we pray to be forgiven in the same way as we forgive and, in many ways, we are called to forgive because we are forgiven.

Peter’s teaching here can be applied today in workplaces, schools, hospitals, businesses, farms, offices, shops, public service, ministry teams, volunteer organisations, and homes. Christian employees should work with integrity not only when supervisors are fair but also when circumstances are difficult. Christian leaders should exercise authority as stewardship, not domination. Christian volunteers should serve without needing constant recognition. Christian citizens should seek the good of their communities even when misunderstood. We do not serve because people always deserve it. We serve because Jesus is our Lord, and because others may see our good works and glorify our Father in heaven.

Peter next speaks to wives and husbands, some of whom have become Christians, but have remained married to unbelieving spouses. Now, I think we must handle these verses carefully. The passage is not general, but specific, nor is it a licence for domestic tyranny, spiritual manipulation, or the subjugation of women. Just as Peter’s words to slaves do not condone slavery, his words to those who are married do not condone oppression. He is addressing Christians living in very difficult situations, in this case, those who were married to unbelieving spouses, and he is showing them how their conduct can become a witness to Christ.

The word “likewise” connects this section to the behaviour of slaves based on the example of Jesus. Wives with unbelieving husbands are called to live in such a way that their husbands “may be won without a word by the conduct of their wives.” This does not mean words never matter. It means that persistent argument cannot replace holy character. The beauty Peter commends is not merely external adornment but “the hidden person of the heart” with “the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God’s sight is very precious.”

In the ancient world, external adornment, hairstyles, clothing, and jewellery could communicate status, wealth, and social identity. Peter’s point is not that beauty, clothing, or cultural signs are evil. His point is that Christian identity is not finally displayed by social symbols but by a heart formed by hope in God. The wedding ring, the title, the uniform, the job description, the public profile, or the family role may say something about us, but none of them can carry the weight of our truest identity. That belongs to Jesus.

Peter also speaks to husbands: “Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honour to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered.” In that culture, women were socially vulnerable, often as vulnerable as children and slaves. Peter does not exploit that vulnerability; he commands husbands to honour their wives. He reminds them that women are heirs with them of the grace of life. Before God, husband and wife stand together as recipients of grace.

This is a searching word for every Christian household. Spirituality cannot be separated from the way we treat the people closest to us. Peter says that a husband’s prayers may be hindered by dishonourable behaviour toward his wife. James says that we may ask and not receive because we ask wrongly, to spend it on our passions. Prayer is nourished by humility, faithfulness, and self-giving love; it is hindered by selfishness, cruelty, and contempt.

This means that Christian service transcends our circumstances. If our identity is in Jesus, then our homes and our places of employment must become places where the grace of life is visible: in patience, listening, repentance, forgiveness, protection, faithfulness, and honour.

What, then, does this passage say to us today? It says that Christian service is not primarily a strategy for influence, or a method for gaining approval, or a way to prove our worth. Christian service is the overflow of our identity in Jesus. We serve as beloved exiles. We serve as free servants of God. We serve as people healed by the self-sacrificial wounds of Jesus. We serve as citizens of heaven who seek the good of the earth. We serve as people whose final vindication rests with the righteous Judge.

So the modern equivalents are everywhere. In the workplace, the Christian employee refuses dishonesty, gossip, laziness, and revenge, and instead works as one serving the Lord. In leadership, the Christian employer or manager refuses exploitation and uses authority to protect, bless, and build up. In public life, the Christian citizen refuses both idolatry of the state and contempt for order, and instead honours all, fears God, and seeks justice for all with humility. In marriage and family, the Christian refuses domination, neglect, and selfishness, and instead embodies honour, understanding, and sacrificial love. In online spaces, the Christian refuses slander, outrage, and identity-performance, and instead speaks truth with gentleness and reverence.

None of this is weakness. It is the strength of people who know who they are. The world often says, “Assert yourself or disappear.” But Jesus says, “Lose your life for my sake, and you will find it.” The world says, “Your identity is whatever you can construct and defend.” But the gospel says, “Your life is hidden with Christ in God.” The world says, “Defend your rights!” Peter says, “Follow Jesus, who entrusted himself to the One who judges justly.”

Yes, Peter’s call here is demanding – it is counter-cultural in so many ways – but it is also deeply liberating. We do not have to manufacture an identity out of the fragments of a confused age. We have received our identity in Jesus. We were straying like sheep, but now we have returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of our souls. We were mortally wounded by sin, but by his wounds we have been eternally healed. We were alienated from God, but in Jesus we have been brought home.

Therefore, we can serve without fear. We can honour without worshipping human power. We can submit without surrendering conscience. We can suffer without despair. We can speak truth without hatred. We can be silent without cowardice. We can do good even when misunderstood, because the cross has already defined us and the resurrection has already secured our future.

Jesus said, “You are the light of the world.” A confused world does not need a Church that mirrors its confusion. It needs a Church that knows its Lord. It needs Christians whose identity is so secure in Jesus that they are free to serve, free to forgive, free to honour, free to suffer for righteousness, and free to love without needing applause.

So let us keep our conduct honourable. Let us live as beloved exiles. Let us serve as free servants of God. Let us follow in the steps of the suffering Christ. And let our light shine before others, so that when they see our good works, they may not glorify us, but our Father who is in heaven.

Shall we pray?

© Johannes W H van der Bijl 2026

Standing in the Gap: A Call to Prayer for Europe

Johann and Louise: Training Disciples to Make Disciples in the Netherlands As we look back over the past few months, Louise and I have much for which to give thanks to God. In fact, before we say anything about the challenges before us, we want to begin with praise! Louise continues to be cancer free, and we are profoundly grateful for every prayer that has been offered on her behalf. We do not take this good news for granted but give thanks to the Lord for His mercy and faithfulness. I have also recently received a very encouraging report from the cardiology department. My heart is doing so well that the doctors have taken me off some of my medication because I no longer need it! This is especially significant when I remember what life was like in Africa. There, I was experiencing episodes of atrial fibrillation almost every day, sometimes two or three times a day, and some would last for hours, leaving me completely exhausted. Since moving to the Netherlands, I have experienced only a few very brief episodes, sometimes lasting just seconds, and even those are becoming less frequent. Health-wise, our move to the Netherlands has proved to be a very wise and timely one. But I have come to believe that our move here was about much more than our physical health. Europe is a remarkable continent. Its history has shaped much of the modern world, but it has also been marked by enormous suffering. Two devastating World Wars were fought across this soil. Yet there is another battle taking place…one that cannot be seen on a physical battlefield or measured by military strength and is yet devastatingly real. Europe has become a spiritual battleground. As the number of people who actively follow Jesus continues to decline in many parts of Europe, a spiritual vacuum is developing. Increasingly, as people are turning to humanistic philosophies and alternative spiritualities, other religions are becoming increasingly visible through immigration and demographic change. But we do not believe that Europe is beyond the reach of God. Quite the opposite. We believe God has sent us here to shine the light of Jesus into a place where that light is desperately needed. The odds may sometimes seem overwhelming. The few remaining churches are often small. Christian influence appears to be diminishing. Many believers have laboured faithfully for years without seeing the fruit they long for. But the gospel has never depended upon favourable circumstances. After Jesus' resurrection, the disciples gathered together and devoted themselves to prayer. Then, at Pentecost, the Holy Spirit was poured out, thousands were added to the Church, and the missionary movement that followed spread throughout the world. A handful of ordinary disciples, filled with the Holy Spirit, turned the world upside down in the first century (Acts 17:16). However, it is no coincidence that prayer preceded the outpouring of the Spirit and the pouring out of the Spirit filled. One of the things we sense God doing increasingly in our own lives and ministry is calling us to pray more earnestly and intentionally than ever before. It is fascinating to see how many 24/7 prayer movements and prayer communities are being raised up around the world, and particularly here in Europe. Centres devoted to prayer, meditation, creativity, hospitality and biblical learning are emerging in cities and rural communities alike. Even in our little church here in Heiloo, we sense the Lord drawing us towards a deeper commitment to prayer. We need you to pray with us. Not simply to pray for us, but to pray with us, to stand with us before the throne of God and ask Him to do what only He can do. •    Please pray that God will reveal Himself to the unbelievers around us. •    Pray that He will turn hearts towards Jesus. •    Pray that He will grant true repentance and faith. •    Pray that He will pour out His Holy Spirit upon individuals, churches and communities throughout Europe. •    Pray especially for discouraged believers who have laboured faithfully for years without seeing substantial fruit from their work. Ask God to renew their strength and give them fresh hope. •    And pray that we might see a genuine spiritual awakening…a fresh outpouring of the Holy Spirit that will awaken the Church and draw people who have never known Jesus into His kingdom. Jesus told His disciples that the gates of hell would not prevail against His Church. He spoke of binding the strong man and plundering his house. These are not merely theological ideas for us. They are a call to spiritual engagement. So we are asking you: stand in the gap with us. Pray. Persevere. Believe God for Europe. And we don't want to give the impression that we are simply looking at darkness and despair. Quite the opposite. We are seeing encouraging signs of God's grace. This has been an exceptionally busy summer for us. We have had opportunities to stand in for ministers who have taken their summer holidays, as well as continuing to serve in our own congregation here in Heiloo. Louise and I have been grateful for every opportunity to serve, preach, teach and encourage God's people. We also recently had a wonderful Vacation Bible School, with 18 children attending! It was a joy to see young lives being exposed to the gospel and to watch the enthusiasm of those who helped make the week possible. And then there is another particularly encouraging answer to prayer. A young man who has recently come to faith in Jesus after a background in Humanism and Buddhism has asked to be baptised! What a testimony to the grace of God. Please pray especially for his wife and son, that they too will encounter Jesus and come to know Him personally. These may seem like small things when measured against the spiritual needs of an entire continent. But the kingdom of God often begins with what looks small: one person, one family, one church, one prayer, one act of obedience. We are asking God to multiply those small beginnings. Will you stand with us? Ministry in Europe is not something we can do alone. We are deeply conscious that every prayer, every word of encouragement and every financial gift makes it possible for us to remain here and continue the work to which God has called us. Some of you have supported us faithfully and sacrificially for many years. Thank you. We genuinely could not do this without you. But we are also asking you to consider whether God might be calling you to deepen your involvement with us in this season. Perhaps that means praying more intentionally for Europe. Perhaps it means sharing our prayer requests with your church or small group. Perhaps it means asking someone else to join you in praying. We do not make this appeal lightly. We know that everyone faces personal pressures and that support is a matter of prayer and obedience before God. But we also know that ministry requires partners, people who are willing to stand alongside those who have been sent. Paul reminded the Philippians that their partnership in the gospel was precious to him. Mission has always been a partnership between those who go and those who send, between those who labour on the front lines and those who faithfully hold the ropes. We need you to stand in the gap with us. Europe desperately needs the gospel. We believe God has placed us here for such a time as this. And we believe that what He is doing is far greater than anything Louise and I could accomplish on our own. So would you join us? Pray with us. Give with us. Stand with us. Believe with us. Let us ask God for nothing less than a spiritual awakening across Europe…for churches to be renewed, for discouraged Christians to receive fresh courage, for the lost to encounter Jesus, and for the Holy Spirit to breathe new life into this ancient continent. The battle is real, but so is the power of God. And so is our hope. With gratitude for your partnership and with great expectation for what God may yet do, Johann & Louise van der Bij Support Us Johann and Louise spent two years helping to develop the St. Frumentius Seminary in Gambella, Ethiopia. They then worked in Southern Africa, serving in seven southern African countries, while continuing to work with the Diocese of Egypt, North Africa through engaging in a disciple making movement in order to grow the body of Christ. They are now serving in Heiloo, the Netherlands. We are sent  through the Society of Anglican Missionaries and Senders, a missionary sending community, engaging in building relationships with the worldwide church to experience the broken restored, the wounded healed, the hungry fed, and the lost found through the love and power of Jesus Christ.  Support SAMS Copyright © 2016 Society of Anglican Missionaries and Senders, All rights reserved. www.sams-usa.org      Our mailing address is: PO Box 399 Ambridge PA 15003 Attention to: Johann and Louise van der Bijl Want to change how you receive these emails? You can update your preferences or unsubscribe from this list

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Being a Grace-Shaped Church

Psalm 34:8–18          1 Peter 2:1–12          Matthew 5:31–37

Being a Grace-Shaped Church

One of the many blessings of walking a well-marked trail is the reassurance it gives. Even if the path becomes steep, the weather changes, or the way ahead feels uncertain, the signs keep you oriented. They remind you where you are, where you have come from, and where you are going. Scripture does something similar for the people of God. When life becomes painful, confusing, or even hostile, God’s Word gives us the signs we need to keep walking in faith. 

Peter’s first readers needed those signs. They were new believers who had already endured various trials because of their faith in Jesus. Yet Peter does not begin by telling them simply to grow up, buck up, or keep quiet. He begins by lifting their eyes to the grace of God. In the opening chapter of his letter, he reminds them of the God who saved them, the mercy by which they were born again, the inheritance kept for them, and the living hope secured through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Only after Peter has saturated them in the greatness of the gospel does he turn to address their response. His pattern is important: grace comes before obedience. Identity comes before behaviour. God’s saving work comes before our faithful walk. So when Peter says, “Therefore,” he is not merely using a transition word; he is pointing us back to everything God has already done. Because God has acted in grace, his people are now called to live as a grace-shaped community.

This passage is also filled with Old Testament quotations and allusions. Peter is writing to believers who knew the Scriptures deeply. A single phrase from the Psalms, the Prophets, or the Torah could call an entire passage to mind. In that sense, Peter places trail markers throughout this text. Each one says, in effect: remember God’s grace; remember your deliverance; remember who you have become in Christ.

You see, the Christian life never graduates from grace. Every call to obedience is an invitation to begin again where salvation began…with God’s gracious initiative. 

So, Peter retells the story of Israel in the light of Jesus. God delivers his people, God calls them to be holy, God forms them into a priestly people, and finally God sends them to display his glory among the nations. 

The Church, in many ways, is living the Exodus story again, now fulfilled and centred in Jesus.

This pattern of the Exodus gives our passage from 1 Peter its shape:

In the Exodus, God delivers his people by grace.

At Sinai, God calls them to be a holy nation and a kingdom of priests.

In the wilderness, they must learn to leave behind the habits of Egypt.

Among the nations, they are called to display the glory of God.

So, Peter begins: “Therefore, laying aside all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander, like newborn babes long for the pure milk of God’s Word, that you may grow up into salvation, now that you have tasted that the Lord is good.” The “therefore” here reaches back to chapter 1. Because you have been born again, because you have been redeemed, because you have received an imperishable inheritance, and because you have been purified by the living and abiding Word of God, you must now put away the habits that belong to the old life.

Again, this is the pattern of the Exodus before Sinai. The commandments did not create the new life; rather they described the life that already belonged to those whom God had already made new. God had already taken them out of Egypt and brought them to himself to be his own treasured possession – his own community. 

So, it is not surprising then that Peter begins by naming five sins that destroy community: malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander. It is striking that he begins with relational sins. These are the sins that quietly poison God’s community from within. So, a grace-shaped church cannot cling to the habits that contradict grace…that is self-contradictory.

But notice that Peter does not merely say, “Stop behaving badly.” Rather, he contrasts these destructive sins with a new appetite: “like newborn babes, long for the pure milk of God’s Word.” 

Just as newborn children do not need to be persuaded to desire milk…just as life creates an appetite for life…so grace creates a hunger for the Word of God. 

You see, obedience is not manufactured by guilt; obedience grows from new life. Sinai never comes before the Exodus.

Now, Peter grounds this call on a quotation from Psalm 34: “now that you have tasted that the Lord is good.” 

Psalm 34 speaks of the Lord’s faithful deliverance of his servant. “Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good,” the psalmist says. “Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him.” 

Yet the same psalm immediately connects the experience of God’s goodness with a transformed life, which perhaps is the backdrop to what Peter says here: “Keep your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking deceit,” the Psalmist says. “Turn away from evil and do good; seek peace and pursue it.” 

Of course Peter expects his readers to hear the whole psalm behind the single phrase. “Now that you have tasted that the Lord is good.” Those who have tasted the goodness of the Lord must now become people whose speech, desires, and relationships bear witness to that goodness. 

You see, grace does not merely comfort us; it changes us. The Lord who has delivered us now also teaches us to seek peace and pursue it.

This is why I believe that verses 4–10 form the heart of this passage. Everything before this leads here, and everything after it flows from here. Peter now gathers some of the greatest images of the Old Testament and shows how they come to fulfilment in Christ and in the people joined to him.

Peter says that Jesus is a living stone rejected by men but that is, in the sight of God, chosen and precious. He is drawing on a statement from Isaiah 28: “Behold, I am the one.” God says, “who has laid as a foundation in Zion, a stone, a tested stone, a precious cornerstone, of a sure foundation: ‘Whoever believes will not be in haste.’ And I will make justice the line, and righteousness the plumb line.” In its original setting, Isaiah speaks of judgement on false security. God himself lays the only foundation that will stand.

But Peter is also quoting from Psalm 118: “The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.” Again for his First Century readers, Jewish believers who were primarily oral learners and who had no doubt memorised huge portions of the Old Testament, one line would summon the whole psalm. 

And Psalm 118 is a song of deliverance from oppression, and it is the psalm echoed by the crowds when Jesus entered Jerusalem. The leaders rejected him, but God made him the cornerstone. What human builders dismissed, God established as the foundation of his new creation.

But then comes the astonishing part: believers become what they are joined to. Christ is the Living Stone, and those who come to him become “living stones” being built into a spiritual house. The temple in Jerusalem was built from magnificent but lifeless stones. In stark contrast, God’s new temple is built from living people. His dwelling place is now his redeemed community.

This also recalls the promise of the new covenant. God no longer writes his law merely on tablets of stone. But by his Spirit, he writes his law on living hearts. Ezekiel speaks of this gracious transformation: “I will take you from the nations (remember Peter uses the word ‘exiles’ to describe his readers in chapter 1:1) and gather you from all the countries and bring you into your own land. I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses... And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you... and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh (or a living heart). And I will put my Spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes.”

But Jeremiah builds on the same thought: “I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people.”

So, notice the contrast. God’s law was written on tablets of lifeless stone and the Temple in Jerusalem was built from magnificent but lifeless stones. Peter says God's new temple is built from living people who have the law written on our hearts.

But Peter does not stop with the image of the temple. He also says that believers are its priests: we are “a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.” Israel had been called to be “a kingdom of priests and a holy nation” at Sinai. Although there was a particular priestly order within Israel, the nation as a whole was called to display God’s holy presence before the world. But now Peter applies that calling to all who are united to Christ.

He gathers the language of Exodus, Deuteronomy, and Isaiah into one glorious declaration: “You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvellous light.” 

In Exodus 19, God says, “You shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.” In Deuteronomy, he tells Israel, “You are a people holy to the Lord your God... the Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession.” Isaiah speaks of a people formed for God’s praise. Peter now declares that this identity belongs to the people gathered in and around Jesus.

This is not a break in God’s purposes but rather their fulfilment. Everything Israel was called to become reaches its goal in Jesus and in the people united to him. The Church is chosen, not for pride, but for proclamation; the Church is holy, not for isolation, but for witness; the Church is a kingdom of priests, not for privilege, but for service…for a witness to the nations.

Peter then reaches into the book of Hosea. “Once,” he says, “you were not a people, but now you are God’s people.” Remember, Hosea had named one of his children Lo-Ammi, “Not My People,” as a sign of Israel’s judgement. And yet in the very same text, the Lord also promised restoration: “In the place where it was said to them, ‘You are not my people,’ it shall be said to them, ‘Children of the living God.’” Again he says, “I will say to Not My People, ‘You are my people,’ and he shall say, ‘You are my God.’”

Peter then adds a second allusion also taken from the book of Hosea: “Once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.” Remember, Hosea’s daughter was named Lo-Ruhamah, “No Mercy,” because judgement had come upon a faithless people. Yet God’s final word is not rejection but covenant mercy. What had been “not mine” became “my people.” What had been “no mercy” became “mercy received.”

That is pure grace. Nothing changed because the people had earned it. God acted in covenant love. Peter says that this same story is now our story. Every Christian has been moved by grace from slavery to freedom, from estrangement into belonging, from judgement into mercy, from darkness into God’s marvellous light.

But Peter does not end with identity alone. He ends with what identity leads towards. He ends with mission. After declaring who the Church is, he shows us how the Church must live: “Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul.” Notice the order: “Beloved” comes before “I urge you.” Grace comes before command. Identity comes before behaviour.

Peter calls them sojourners and exiles. That takes us back to the Exodus once more. Israel had been delivered from Egypt but had not yet entered the fullness of the inheritance. The wilderness was not their home. But neither is this present world our final home. Like Peter’s First Century readers, we too are elect exiles of the dispersion. We no longer belong to the kingdom from which we have been rescued, and while it is true that we dwell in the world, we are not of the world.

Just as Israel had been delivered from Egypt, but had not yet entered their inheritance, and the wilderness was not their home, neither is this world as it is now ours. We no longer belong to the kingdom from which we have been rescued, nor do we belong to the wilderness in which we are currently wandering. We are citizens of the promised heavenly kingdom.

Therefore, Peter says, abstain from sinful desires. Not because such desires have the power to undo God’s grace, but because they belong to the former life of slavery to sin, Satan, and death. Grace has changed our citizenship. Grace has changed our appetites. Grace has changed our destination. We are living stones built on Christ. We are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, and we are God’s own people. Our lives must now witness to the truth of what and who we are.

And then finally, Peter turns outward: “Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honourable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation.” The Church exists to make God’s grace visible. We do not live faithfully merely so that the world will admire us. We live faithfully so that, even when misunderstood or opposed, our lives may bear witness to the God who called us out of darkness into his marvellous light.

So, throughout this passage Peter weaves together two threads: grace and obedience. But we must notice which thread carries the weight. Grace does. Every command hangs from a reminder of what God has already done. Every “therefore,” every quotation, and every allusion sends us back before it sends us forward.

Back to God’s gracious deliverance. Back to the cross. Back to the resurrection. Back to the mercy that made us God’s people. Back to the grace that gave us new birth. You see, the Christian life is not a journey away from grace toward maturity. No, it is a life built on grace and based on grace, out of which true maturity grows.

So what kind of church displays God’s grace most clearly? Well, not a church that merely knows the right doctrines, though doctrine matters. Not a church that merely follows the right rules, though obedience matters. 

No, the kind of church that displays God’s grace most clearly is a church built of living stones upon Christ the cornerstone; a church that has tasted the goodness of the Lord and therefore puts away malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander; a church that knows it has received mercy and therefore becomes merciful; a church that lives sacrificially as a holy priesthood in the world so that others may see its good works and glorify God. 

That is a grace-shaped church: rescued by grace, formed by grace, sustained by grace, and sent out by grace to proclaim the excellencies of the One who called us out of darkness into his marvellous light.

Shall we pray?

© Johannes W H van der Bijl 2026

Now in the Hush of Falling Autumn Leaves

Now in the Hush of Falling Autumn Leaves

One day, as you think back on younger days,

when reckless love left little room for thought,

remember laughing in the summer rain,

and dancing through the weighty winter storms.

Two rootless vines, stemming from distant shores,

together grew until what was distinct

was lost in the other. Now, what is yours

is mine as two in one are interlinked.

What once was wild and heady has become 

a love so richly mellowed by the years

that strengthens us to face what is to come

as dusk descends until the dawn appears.

Now in the hush of falling autumn leaves,

we nurture still what love had once conceived. 

© Johannes W H van der Bijl 2026

Grace, Gratitude, and Generosity

1 Peter 1:13-25                                   Matthew 5:21-30

Grace, Gratitude, and Generosity

Have you ever failed in your life? I don’t mean small failures like failing at an exam or failing a driver’s test or failing to be on time for an important event. Nor do I mean a big failures like physically murdering someone or physically committing adultery or physically stealing from someone. 

Of course, these failures are serious and ought to be dealt with if they have occurred, but the kind of failures I have in mind are the more common everyday failures that are more likely to have occurred at some time in your life. Perhaps the failure to be kind to someone who desperately needed to be encouraged. Or the failure to love someone who desperately needed to be assured that they are worth something to someone. Or the failure to listen to those who just needed to be heard. Or the failure to speak up for someone who needed to be defended before your mutual peers or your mutual superiors. Or the failure to give to someone who was in need. Or the failure to forgive someone despite having been forgiven yourself. Or the failure to live out your Christian witness in a hostile environment. 

Have you ever failed in your life? 

Peter knew what it meant to fail. Before Jesus was arrested, Peter was absolutely certain of himself. "Even if everyone else falls away,” he claimed defiantly, “I never will.” He believed his courage would be enough, that his loyalty would be enough, that his resolve would be enough, and that his love for Jesus would be enough.

But we all know what happened, don’t we? Within a few hours he had denied even knowing the Lord he loved.

Now, Peter’s failure raises an uncomfortable question. What causes believers – especially strong, mature believers – to fail? Is it fear? Is it pressure? Is it a lack of commitment? Or is it perhaps an overconfident self-reliance?

You will recall that Jesus had warned Peter long before the soldiers arrived. "Watch and pray, that you may not enter into temptation." Why did Peter not take heed of Jesus warnings? Well, fundamentally, I think, it was because Peter trusted Peter. He believed that the strength of his own commitment and his own dogged determination could and would sustain him.

This type of self-deception has never disappeared. I think we often assume that our Christian behaviour depends chiefly upon the strength of our own tenacity. If I try hard enough, then I will not fail to live out my Christian witness. But, I think, Peter would tell us otherwise.

As you know, after the resurrection, Jesus met Peter on a Galilean beach…not with confrontational condemnation, but with a gentle presence wrapped in a friendly and safe setting, because the object of this meeting was not rebuke, reproach, or rejection, but rather restoration. And in this atmosphere of love and grace, Peter’s denials were undone by three invitations to once more confess his love and devotion to Jesus, combined with a repeated commission based on trust: "Feed my sheep."

It was at that breakfast on the beach that Peter discovered that his future rests not upon the power of his own personal resolve to love Jesus and to follow him, but rather upon the power of Jesus' grace and love keeping him and working in him.

Years later, as a maturing believer writing to new isolated and fearful baby believers scattered throughout the northern provinces of Asia Minor, Peter does not simply tell them to behave better, to try harder, or to buck up and to pull themselves up by their own bootstraps. 

No, he tells them to remember better…because it is possible that the reason believers fail is because they have forgotten what grace really means. It is possible that a deficiency in understanding the God of grace, the nature of grace, and the cost of grace leads to a presumption that is precariously based on self-assurance. 

As we have seen, Peter’s life testifies to a progressive experience of grace that reaches a crisis point after the greatest failure of his life – not only the denial of a friend he swore to protect, but a denial of a friend who exemplifies and embodies grace – one who is the God of grace incarnate. But the Lord’s gracious initiative in his restoration catapulted Peter into a life wholly set apart for the Gospel of grace. 

Clear thinking about the God of grace and his acts of grace leads to a changed life. Peter’s experience of mercy, love, and forgiveness nurtured a transformed mind that resulted in transformed behaviour. 

So, in the opening twelve verses of this letter, Peter celebrates the astonishing grace of God. The Father's electing love, the new birth into a living hope, the inheritance that can never perish, and the salvation secured for them in Jesus Christ. 

And only after having spelled out the greatness of the grace his readers have received, he exhorts and encourages them to prepare their minds for acts that will reveal the certain grace that is theirs in Jesus. Only after he has heaped blessing upon blessing in an explosion of praise does he write, "Therefore...” And everything that follows grows out of the grace he has just described.

I think this shows us that Peter has learned the lesson that his younger self had not yet understood…that right living does not begin with self-determination. It begins with remembering grace.

And I think this is the main reason why believers fail. We fail not simply because temptation is strong and we are weak, but we fail because we tend to lose sight of the grace that is the bedrock of what we believe.

So, through our text for today, I want us to see how Peter now teaches the lessons he learned on his own journey…his own journey from grace, to gratitude, to generosity.

He begins this next section by telling the readers of his letter to remember their spiritual beginning…to remember where their own journey had started.  His emphasis in verses 13–17 is not primarily on a resolve to live better lives, as much as it is about a response to the Father's gracious initiative that enables us to live better lives.

As we have already seen, Peter spent twelve verses describing what the Father has done, and only now comes the "therefore." In other words, what comes after the therefore is dependent upon what came before it. Every command in 1 Peter rests on a clearly stated fact. In this case, the fact that God always acts before we act. Grace always precedes obedience.

In other words, because God has acted on our behalf, we now ought to prepare or to change our minds or to think differently so that we might live out an appropriate response to his gracious acts. You see, when grace is remembered, the way we think changes, and when our way of thinking changes, our behaviour changes. 

Remembering grace leads to gracious and grace-filled living…it leads to a life shaped and ordered by gratitude. And when gratitude is the dominant force directing our behaviour, then a generosity of spirit…a capacity for unconditional kindness, empathy, and grace…an attitude of giving people the benefit of the doubt, celebrating the achievements of others without jealousy or resentment, and offering support without expecting anything in return…when gratitude is the dominant force directing our behaviour, then a generosity of spirit begins to flourish. And when this generosity of spirit flourishes, the holy living God commands becomes the beautiful evidence of the grace he has already given.

You see, a correct understanding of God’s grace will infiltrate, influence, and define the kind of people we are as citizens of heaven living in a hostile world where we are exiles… a correct understanding of God’s grace will cause us to respond appropriately so that we might be holy as the God we follow is holy.

Peter also tells us that we need to remember that this grace was not cheap. We were ransomed…our penalty for sin was paid for in full…but the cost was the life of God’s incarnated Son. The innocent died in the place of the guilty…the pure for the impure…the holy for the unholy…the sinless for the sinful. “For you know,” Peter says, “that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your ancestors, but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect.” 

As such, grace and gratitude and a generous spirit have been the foundation of Christian commitment and transformation throughout history. Lives have been irrevocably changed because followers of this God of grace have responded in gratitude to the call to live generously like he lived and to love generously like he loves. 

This attitude of gratitude – this positive appreciation of who God is and what he has done, is doing, and will do for us, releases an understanding and an experience of the breadth and length and height and depth of God’s immeasurable grace, mercy, compassion, forgiveness, and love, all of which are indispensable marks of the life of those who follow him. The church ought to be filled with people who display their grateful hearts through their demeanour and their conduct. 

Gratefulness to God for his grace and mercy is a powerful motivation for consistent sacrificial service. 

Paul tells us that it was the love of Jesus that compelled him to continue in his ministry despite the many hardships that he suffered. He could never forget the love that met his murderous heart on that road to Damascus. 

Nor could Peter ever forget the love that met his indecisive heart on that beach in Galilee. Both Paul and Peter lived with hearts full of living hope because of past grace, present grace, and future grace. 

Dearest beloved brethren, what have you forgotten that you should never have forgotten? Have you forgotten God’s grace toward you when you were lost? When you were in need of forgiveness? When you had failed? 

Have you forgotten that moment when the unconditional love of a holy God broke through the barriers around your hardened heart? Have you lost your grateful heart? Have the trials of life choked out the gratitude that you once had when you first were confronted with such an immeasurable and incredible love? 

Is it perhaps time to go back to the basics to learn once again the greatness of the grace that is ours in Jesus?

We need to remember God’s grace if we are to recapture the gratitude that ought to be characteristic of the lives of those who have been saved through the sacrificial love of Jesus. This gratitude for grace received will be manifested in a generosity of spirit. As Peter says, “now that you have responded appropriately to the grace of God…now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for each other, (now) love one another deeply, from the heart because you are new creations…you are a renewed people…you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God.”

You see, once we truly understand the meaning of grace and begin to live out a grace-filled life that is dominated and defined by a gratitude for a grace that saved even me, then we will be able to truly love one another like God loves us…then we will be able to love one another earnestly from a heart that is pure. 

Once we realise that all flesh is like grass…that we are all finite and feeble and frail and fallible…that our own glory fades and falls and fails…and that it is only the gracious word of the Lord that stands forever…once we understand our own desperate need of grace from a holy God…then we will be less inclined to behave in graceless or loveless ways towards others. 

Have you failed in your life? Have you failed to love as God loves? Have you failed to live a pure life? Have you felt that your life has dried up and withered and faded and fallen? Have you tried so hard to change something harmful or sinful in your life, but failed?

Peter would say, welcome to the field…we are all grass that withers and fades and falls. 

But the remedy for our failures is not a firmer resolve. Your relationship with Jesus didn’t start that way, did it? So why do you think that you need to continue that relationship doing what you know you weren’t able to do before he saved you from the futile ways of human solutions to life? 

No. The remedy to our failures, is to remember the fullness of his grace…his past grace, his present grace, and his future grace…and to live in the light of that grace in gratitude and a generosity of spirit. This, dearest beloved brethren, is the essence of the Gospel we claim to have received. 

Shall we pray?

© Johannes W H van der Bijl 2026

A Great Gospel Calls for a Changed Life

Acts 2:9-11                     1 Peter 1:1-13                        Matthew 5:17-20

A Great Gospel Calls for a Changed Life

When reading someone else’s mail, especially an ancient letter that was written in a different cultural setting, we have to do a bit of homework before trying to unpack what we read. This is equally true of early Christian documents like 1 Peter. So we approach the letter asking a number of questions. Who wrote it, to whom, from where, and finally what was written and why.

So, let’s start with the most obvious…well, obvious at least to those who hold to the canonical text as received. This letter begins by telling us who wrote it. Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ or Peter, the one sent by Jesus Christ, depending on how you translate the Greek word “apostle” which can indicate a title or a purpose. 

Also, Early Church documents and traditions tell us that it was Peter who wrote this letter, so we will go with Peter as the answer to our first question. 

Now, it is important to know who wrote the letter because once we know who wrote it we can understand a lot more about the author of the letter and that will help us understand more about what he says and why he says what he does. 

However, as with most ancient documents, our answer here tends to be a little more complex. Some scholars have objected to the authorship of Peter because, they say, the Greek prose is too sophisticated for what they believe would be a level too high for a Galilean fisherman and they cite Acts 4:13 where Peter and John are referred to as “uneducated, common men”. 

No, my answer to this objection is a) the evaluation of their education in Acts 4 was made by men who considered everyone who had not studied as they did as uneducated and, b) didn’t Jesus say that the Holy Spirit would give us the words to speak when we needed them? (Matthew 10:19) And we believe that the Holy Spirit inpired these words, do we not? (1 Timothy 3:16; 2 Peter 1:20-21; see also Mark 12:36)

However, there is an even more simple answer to this objection. At the end of his letter, Peter tells us that “by Silvanus (a man whom most scholars believe is Paul’s missionary companion Silas)…I have written briefly to you”…indicating that Peter, like Paul, used a scribe to write what he dictated. 

So, I think we can safely move forward to the second most obvious question and that is, to whom was this letter written. Well, the text says it was written, “to those who are elect exiles of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bythynia.” The places mentioned here are all located in what is today northern Turkey. 

Historically, the term "of the Dispersion" (or of the Diaspora) referred exclusively to the Jewish people who were forcibly scattered across the globe for various reasons, primarily the invasions of foreign nations such as Assyria, Babylonia, Persia, Greece, and in Peter’s time, Rome. But before we look at the ethnic identity of the receipients of Peter’s letter, let’s first see if Scripture tells us anything about people from this area. 

There are only two places in Scripture where we find these areas mentioned together…the one is obviously here in 1 Peter 1:2…and the other is in Acts 2:9-11 where we are told that devout Jews and proselytes (Gentiles who had converted to Judasim) who were residents from (amongst other places) “Cappadocia, Pontus, Asia, Bithynia, and Pamphylia (which prior to AD 74 was part of the province of Galatia) were present in Jerusalem for the Feast of Pentecost. 

Early Church tradition holds that the Pentecost converts who had heard Peter preach in Jerusalem on the Day of Pentecost and had accepted the Christian Faith, and who were perhaps initially discipled by Peter and the other Jerusalem Church Leaders, returned to their home provinces in Asia Minor (modern day Turkey) and established the very churches Peter later wrote to and, I will argue, the very churches he visited on his way to and from Rome.

So it is possible that this word “dispersion” may indicate that the people Peter was writing to were Jewish believers that had been scattered across the globe prior to their conversion to Christianity and who had subsequently returned to their places of residency after Pentecost and had started house churches in their homes.

However, some scholars think that the word “dispersion” may include those Jews who were scattered, not by the past invasions of Assyria, Babylon, Persia, Greece, or Rome, but by the present persecution of Jewish believers by Jewish unbelievers. We must remember that the Early Christians were first persecuted by those in Jerusalem long before they were persecuted by those in Rome. 

Now, we know of at least two references to persecution in Jerusalem that may have led to the scattering of Jewish believers. The first is the great persecution against the Church in Jerusalem that arose on the day Stephen was stoned to death as recorded in Acts 8:1 and Acts 11:19. This persecution ended with the conversion of Saul, the main instigator of hatred against believers. 

The second is the short-lived persecution of the Church by Herod as recorded in Acts 12. However, we do know from Scripture and the writings of the First Century historian, Flavius Josephus, that unbelieving Jews in Jerusalem and elsewhere constantly persecuted believers throughout the Early Church period, at least up until the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70.

So, it is possible that the recipients of Peter’s letter were Jewish believers that had been displaced by both invasion and persecution. 

Now, when did Peter write this letter to these believers and from where? Well I believe…and I stress, I believe because most scholars believe this letter was written later…I believe the letter was written fairly early, perhaps even before Paul’s first missionary journey. Why do I say that? 

Well, firstly because the content of the letter appears to be what would be written to new believers. It is pretty basic Christianity 101 that could be likened to material for a disciple making group or a confirmation class. This doesn’t sound like something Peter would write to a long established mature church. 

My second reason reason is that  Ancient church traditions, often preserved by early writers such as Hippolytus of Rome and recorded by the Church historian Eusebius, claim that Peter first spent time in Antioch, then journeyed through Asia Minor. It may be his first journey took place before what is recorded about Antioch in Acts 11:19 and following because it is strange that there is no mention of Peter in this passage even though he is front and centre before it and after it. 

Remember it is Barnabas who is sent from Jerusalem to Antioch to investigate the explosive multi-ethnic growth in that city, not Peter, as one might have expected. Or it could be that Peter visited (or revisited) these areas after he had fled Jerusalem following his miraculous escape from prison in Acts 12. 

Either way, according to these traditions, Peter ministered throughout these regions before eventually heading to Rome.

This leads us to our final question. Did Peter write the letter from Rome or from Jerusalem? Does the letter say anything about the geographical location of Peter at the time of writing? 

Well, there is only one cryptic reference to location and that is found in 1 Peter 13. “She who is in Babylon, who is likewise chosen, send you greetings, and so does Mark, my son.” Now, most scholars think that the name “Babylon” here refers to Rome because Rome was the great persecutor and oppressor of the Christian Church. 

However, as I said earlier, persecution from Rome came much later. In fact Acts seems to indicate that the Roman State was more interested in keeping the peace than in persecuting anyone. 

Secondly, in this letter, Peter seems to have a favourable view of the Roman government and of its emperor. In 1 Peter 2:13 and following Peter instructs these believers to “be subject for the Lord’s sake to every human institution, whether it be to the emperor as supreme, or to governors as sent by him to punish those who do evil and to praise those who do good”. In fact he tells them to “honour the emperor”! 

Add to this the fact that the earliest extant Jewish text that clearly uses “Babylon” as a symbolic name for Rome, is the Sibylline Oracles, Book V, generally dated to roughly 80-125 AD, long after Peter’s lifetime. “Wretched city,” that author writes, “Latin land… Babylon, you alone shall fall…”

This is generally regarded as the earliest Jewish work in which the identification of Rome as Babylon is explicit.  Prior to that, 70 AD and earlier, Jewish texts overwhelmingly identified Rome with Edom/Esau, Kittim, or the fourth kingdom of Daniel, but never Babylon.

This has caused some scholars to connect the name “Babylon” not to Rome but to Jerusalem because, as we have already seen in Acts, Jerusalem and the unbelieveing Jews are the main source of oppression and persecution of Jewish believers. Also, John in Revelation 11:8 identifies the “Great City”, that he later calls Babylon, as the place “where (our) Lord was crucified” (Revelation 11:8) and the place where “the blood of prophets and of saints, and of all who have been slain on earth” was  found, which is a direct quotation of Jesus’ prophecy about Jerusalem in Matthew 23:34-35. “Therefore,” Jesus said, “I send you prophets and wise men and scribes, some of whom you will kill and crucify, and some you will flog in your synagogues and persecute from town to town, so that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah the son of Barachiah, whom you murdered between the sanctuary and the altar.”

So, personally, I think the Idea that Peter was writing from Jerusalem and not from Rome fits better with the time frame if we believe that Peter wrote this letter prior to the Great persecution of Nero that resulted in his martyrdom in the mid AD 60’s.

However, you will be grateful to know that the geographical location for the writing of this letter does not change what we can learn from the text…so I think we can safely move on to the text itself.

But before we do, I want you to imagine being forced to leave your home and your country because following Jesus had made you unwelcome. Some of your family, friends, and neighbours no longer trusted you. Some even regarded you as a traitor. You could no longer conduct business in the marketplace because no one would buy or trade with you. And then, suddenly, you were told that you either had to deny Jesus or you would be impisoned and put to death.  Where would you look for hope?

As we’ve already seen, Peter is writing to Jewish Christians scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia. They lived in these areas either because of past invasions or present persecutions and so Peter's point is unmistakable: God's people now live as exiles in a hostile world.

But before Peter tells them what they must do and how they must live, he reminds them not only of what God has already done, but also who they are because of what God has already done. Everything begins with identity. In verses 1-2 Peter describes the recipients of this letter as the elect, as exiles, and as those who have been sanctified by the Holy Spirit. 

So, firstly, their indentity is founded upon God's initiative. He elected them and he chose them. We must never lose sight of the basic fact that Christianity begins with grace. They are the elect of God.

Secondly he calls them exiles. Now it may be that Peter was not just referring to their physical displacement, but also to the fact that as citizens of Heaven we should always consider ourselves as a people who belong somewhere else. Not that we are homeless or abandoned, but rather that we are living temporarily in a foreign culture…we are in the world, but we are not of it. We are exiles.

Thirdly, Peter said that they had been sanctified by the Holy Spirit for obedience to Jesus. I do want you to notice the Trinitarian formula used here by Peter. They had been chosen by the Father, sanctified by the Holy Spirit, for obedience to Jesus as they had been sprinkled with His blood. 

This imagery of blood sprinkling no doubt comes from Exodus 24 where Moses sprinkles the people with the blood of the sacrifice after they had promised to obey God. The blood of the sacrifice sealed the Old Covenant then and likewise the sacrificial blood of Jesus seals the New Covenant now.

Which tells us that salvation is not merely about forgiveness, but it includes obedient allegiance. We belong to King Jesus and identity comes before behaviour. Peter never says, "Behave like Christians so that God will choose you." Rather he says, "Because God chose you, you belong to him therefore live accordingly."

Then in verses 3-12 Peter reminds them of what God has given them. These verses are one long explosion of praise. Peter piles blessing upon blessing. Perhaps we can organise what he says around seven things that God gives to his children.

First, he gives us a living hope that is grounded on the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. Because Jesus lives... hope lives. Not wishful thinking. 

Second, God gives us a secure inheritance, which is unlike anything the world can give. Our inheritance cannot perish, cannot spoil, and it cannot fade. And I think it is important for us to take note of the possible contrast here. 

Those whom Peter is writing to have lost homes, their livelihood, and perhaps even family members and friends. What comfort then to hear that God has given them something nothing and no one can ever take away.

Third, God gives us an assurance of his protecting power. Not only has he given us an inheritance that is kept safe. We are kept safe. We are guarded through faith for salvation by God’s power. That is a wonderful statement of reassurance, don’t you think?

Fourth, God grants us joy in suffering. Note that, Peter does not minimise suffering. He acknowledges grief. “You have been grieved,” he says, “by various trials”. Yet neither trials nor grief have the final word. Through these trials their faith has been refined like gold and in that they can rejoice with a joy that Peter describes as inexpressible and filled with glory. And through that faith – faith in one they have not seen and yet one in whom they have believed – they are assured of the salvation of their souls. 

And finally, Peter reminds them of the privilege that is theirs of living in the time after Jesus’ earthly ministry. Before the incarnation the prophets searched and longed to know what has now been made known to us. They predicted the things we now see as fulfilled…things that even the angels who live in the presence of God longed to comprehend. 

So, in summary, in these first twelve verses of his letter, Peter has reminded his recipients of what God has done. Only now, does he give the first command.

Therefore…because of what God has done for you, set you hope fully on grace. Verse 13 serves as a hinge on which the passage turns. 

“Therefore, (because of what God has done for you and) 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.” In other words, you have been born to a livng hope, now live in that hope…live out your calling…live out your identity.

But it is important to note that in order to be able to do this, we must prepare our minds (or gird up the loins of our minds) and be sober minded (or be self-disciplined). In the context I believe this means that we must be careful to base our lives, our thoughts and our words and our behaviour, on the revelation we have received through the Gospel. 

This calls for a diligent study of the Scriptures…to read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest them…if we are to live as people that have received grace upon grace.

In Matthew 5 Jesus repeatedly said, "You have heard that it was said..." Note that he didn’t say “you have read that it was written”, but rather “you have heard that it was said”, no doubt a referrence to Jewish scholarly commentary on the Scriptural texts, in other words what the Scribes and Phariesses were teaching the people. “You have heard that it was said, but,” Jesus added, “but I say..." In other words, do not follow their teaching…follow mine. Or in Paul’s words, “be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is…his good, pleasing and perfect will.” (Romans 12:2)

All visible sin is simply a manifestation of internal sin. Murder begins with anger. Adultery begins with lust. And therefore obedient living must begin in a changed heart and Christian holiness must begin with a prepared or a renewed mind.

So, because of what God has done for you you must learn to think Christianly. Fill your mind with truth. Reject lies. You must be sober-minded, self-controlled, and spiritually alert. Not intoxicated by the world's values. And you must set your hope fully on grace. Christian hope is not optimism…it is confidence in God's promised future based squarely on what God has done in the past and what he is doing in the present.

The world often thinks Christianity is mainly about rules, but Peter says otherwise. He spends twelve verses talking about God and what he has done before saying a single thing about what we must do.

He reminds us that we are chosen, that we are born again to a living hope. That we are recipients of an eternal inheritance that is guarded by God's power.

He tells us that lasting joy comes through suffering. That our salvation was foretold by prophets and admired by angelic beings.

And only then does he say, "Therefore..."

The Christian life is never an attempt to earn God's favour. It is a grateful response to grace already given. The greater our appreciation of the gospel, the greater our desire to obey. Peter tells us that obedience begins internally…he says it begins in the renewed mind…the same humble mind of Jesus. (Philippians 2:5)

This means that if we would live differently, we must first learn to think differently.

So every morning we need to remind ourselves who we are. We are God's chosen people. We also need to remember what he has done for us. He has given us a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus. And then, because of that great and grace-filled gospel, we must prepare our minds for action, because a great and grace-filled gospel will always produce a changed life.

Shall we pray?

© Johannes W H van der Bijl 2026