1 Peter 1:1-12, At What Do You Long to Look?

You reading first Peter chapter 1 the first 12 verses.

Hear the word of the Lord.

The Elect Exiles of the Dispersion

Peter an apostle of Jesus Christ to those who are elect exiles of the dispersion and Pontus Galatia Cappadocia Asia and Bithynia according to the foreknowledge of God the Father and 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 a 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.

The Inheritance Kept in Heaven

Concerning this salvation the prophets who prophesied about the grace that is to be yours searched and inquired carefully. Inquiring what person or time the Spirit of Christ in them was indicating when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glories.

It was revealed to them that they were serving not themselves. But you and the things that have now been announced to you. Through those who preach the good news to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven.

Things into which angels long to look. May the Lord has blessings to the reading of his Holy Word. Well, what would you like to see right now. What sight would you long to look at if you could? Maybe it's something you've only seen in pictures, but want to see in person like the Grand Canyon or Yosemite one most beautiful places on earth or Hawaii.

Or Bali. Some want to visit an exotic place, you know. I'd love to see Paris before I die. Some people say maybe the Forbidden City in Beijing or the pyramids or in African Safari. Some would love to see an event in Person that they've only seen maybe on television like the NFL game or the Super Bowl or maybe their favorite band in concert.

With all the politics this year some long to see their favorite politician. Sworn in as president or maybe their least favorite one not to be sworn in. Most of us though long to see something We've seen before.

Something we've already seen in the past, but we want to see again to see the familiar. Maybe some departed loved one or to look at our home again. They want to take a sentimental journey back home. When I was in California in the late 80s I wanted to go back to Alabama and go home.

But just over 30 years now, although I did get to go back home for a few months. But between Christmas of 1990 and then New Year's. My mother drove me to the Birmingham Airport with her oldies music playing and that 40 song came on.

Gonna take a sentimental journey. On my way to take the flight to Singapore where I would soon be married and live and work. After a while there. I wanted to go home again. By September of 1993 rather than going home.

We went to Ethiopia for two years exactly and I long to look again at Alabama to take a flight back there. And I could see in my mind the plane. Coming in to land at the airport looking out the window at home.

Birmingham in the valley Red Mountain in the distance with a Vulcan statue on top. I'd go get some barbecue.

Well, how about you?

You long to look at home again. Americans love to think that all the immigrants who come here just long To be here and to stay here. But the truth is that many of them if they could Would like to go home like to go back to their home where they came from if only they had the opportunities there.

So they'll come they'll come to America with plans to make some money and then after they've made their money to return home. That's probably the plans many of them come with but some some in fact are able to do that.

But what happens with many is they find out that the children that they had here While they were making all that money See this is their home and so they're stuck with this longing to go home Or having to stay here to be near their children.

They always have a little dream of going back home now the Puritans who founded New England thought that they would make Make America the a model of Christian charity that would then change the world Especially England and then once they changed England they could return to England.

And when the English Civil War broke out in the 1640s The Puritans took over for over a decade and many of them did in fact return home. There were more people going back from America back to England than the other way around and but That 1660 when the king was restored things went back to the way they were before they many of them came back to America and after a while They began to feel at home here and then waves of other immigrants the Dutch the Germans the French.

More Germans.

Irish Italians Polish. Did I mention the Germans and then later Chinese Japanese Koreans and Indonesians even and even a couple of Singaporeans? At least one that I know of would experience the same thing a longing to see home again as.

They're just kind of traveling through here. Now in the old days they can only stay in touch with home by letters. An Occasional letter to keep their attachment to the homeland. Now they can instant message their friends.

They can FaceTime our friends still back home. They can watch Chinese TV. They can see videos of their other family back at home. They can listen to music in their native language. They can live in America.

But surround themselves with everything for back home so that so much so they hardly know anything about America. They're here, but they're just so surrounded still in their culture that they don't they don't know what America is except.

Again, it's the children. The children bring them face to face with a reality that they aren't home anymore. You so long to see home again. And maybe you can even make the trip get to visit home and then you get there and then it's all.

It's all gone. The people have moved on the places have changed. The barbecue is not quite as good as you remember it. Home is a memory that you can't see anymore. Well, what do you long to look at. Well here we see what we should be.

Longing to look at in three parts. We see that first the people second the homeland and finally the salvation the people the homeland. Salvation and what do you long to look? Here Peter the Apostle. He's the sent one from Jesus himself.

That's how he introduces himself. That is that's who he is. He's a messenger of Jesus. So he's speaking for Jesus. So these words here have to us the same words as the words of Jesus. It is Jesus speaking to us through Peter since he's Peter is Jesus's messenger and he's writing in place of Jesus and he writes to people that he apparently can't see in person.

Whom he would love to be able to talk to. But he can't and so he sends them this letter now. They are in Pontus Galatia Cappadocia Asia and Bithynia. Only one of those terms sounds familiar and with the one that does Asia is actually kind of confuses us because it doesn't mean what?

We consider Asia. These are all provinces and what we call now Asia Minor or basically Turkey. They are they are believers and that he calls them exiles. Is interesting exiles, which sounds like they they're not natives to their to those areas.

Exiles is like the Jews who have been taken exiled by the Babylonians and he calls them the dispersion or literally the Greek word is diaspora the scattered people. And that fact that he causes these people that's who he's writing to is that your exiles you're the you're the diaspora.

That causes some people to think that he's writing only to Jewish Christians to Jews. Who are believers in Jesus just them not Gentile Christian just Jewish Christians. The Jews had of course the Jews had dispersed now throughout all that part of the world.

So that there were little pockets of Jews here here and there little communities of Jews in almost every city. And in in the middle what we now call the Middle East the Mediterranean area and that's what was called the Jewish diaspora.

Now are these are those the people at least among those Jewish diaspora who happen to believe in Jesus. Are those the people that Peter is writing to now besides the fact that I don't believe an apostle.

Writing for Jesus to the church would write narrowly to one ethnic group of Christians and leave out the others. Okay, that's already a problem. I don't believe he would do that. Besides that later in this very chapter 1 verse 18 Peter says that these people that he's writing to he says they have been ransomed from the feudal ways.

Inherited from your forefathers. Now. I don't think that he would describe the Jews ways as feudal that didn't sound like You the way you would talk about the Jewish culture and their laws as feudal because they inherited from God, but They were confused about it, but he wouldn't describe it as feudal as vain as empty.

That's the way you describe.

Paganism.

In chapter 4 verses 3 and 4. He says that the neighbors of these people he says they are surprised that you don't join them. That don't join the neighbors in debauchery immorality drunkenness and idolatry.

Now, I don't think anyone would be surprised that the Jews don't join in on idolatry. So these people were not just narrowly.

Jews.

Jewish Christians. They were not mostly Jews, but they were all Christians mostly Gentile Christians like us. Which is interesting because then they're natives of these provinces, aren't they of Pontus Galatia Bethany Asia?

They're they're the people of that homeland and yet he calls them exiles. He calls them the dispersion. As though they're from somewhere else. Well, that's important because That means that he's calling Gentile Christians like us elect.

That's the chosen of God and the diaspora. God's people dispersed among all nations. So the Jewish diaspora like the Chinese diaspora today, there's a Chinese diaspora. Now with pockets of Chinese people everywhere and everywhere in the world out of Sabah, Ethiopia.

You can find Chinese community with Chinese restaurants. They're the best restaurants there China towns in the big cities and a Chinese restaurant in almost every strip mall. No, there's not but you may be you may think there's a law that requires every strip mall in the u .s.

To have a Chinese restaurant is not so it's just a spontaneously have done that and that's a picture of how God's people are scattered around the world. God has a diaspora a scattering of his people and they are.

The other sheep Jesus mentioned in John chapter 10 that he is bringing he says he has he says talking about do is to his Disciples, you know, I can say it I have other sheep besides you other sheep around this world that he's bringing to be part of his Sheepfold to be one flock.

They are scattered in America in China in Ethiopia in Indonesia.

Here and there the dispersed.

People of God may be.

Technically.

Natives of their land wherever they are in America here. But they are really still the exiles because this is not their home here. Peter is writing to those dispersed believers here in Asia Minor and of course through.

Through Peter.

Jesus is speaking to us and he calls them cause us exiles. That is temporary residence in a foreign place. People are not really natives. To where they are. That's who we are. We're aliens in a strange land.

Those of you who are or have been residents in a foreign place then have an advantage in understanding who we are as Believers of this world our home is elsewhere. We may be technically natives here, but we're really exiles.

We long for our real home to be able to look out the window and see it the city of God the heavenly Zion. All we long to see it, but for now We're exiles. We're aliens in a strange land residents here for now but away from home.

I Was an alien in Singapore. Sometimes I felt so out of place. Then both Mary and I were aliens in Ethiopia. We would sometimes go to the American Embassy. I guess she was still an alien there, but I wasn't to rent videos and or eat lunch or watch a movie.

Little outpost of home now. She's an alien here a stranger in a strange land. She probably thinks this is sometimes a really strange land. We're also notice elect or chosen now. Elect just means chosen Here chosen by God from out of groups of people who are otherwise not chosen by God.

The Jews thought that their whole nation was chosen. But here Peter is saying that the elect are people not chosen because of their ethnic group because not because of their blood. Not because they're united to people like a common lineage descended from from Jacob or whoever.

No, it's not blood that makes them exiles, but God's choice of them. God chose people from Pontus Galatia Cappadocia Asia, Bethany England America.

Germany.

China Indonesia Singapore.

Wherever and.

That choice that he made. Selecting you to be one of his sheep and then corralling you into his sheepfold the church that divine choice is. What makes you? Elect chosen. Not your choice. He doesn't say no she doesn't say the electing or the choosing exiles does he uses this term very precisely.

You're not the one doing the choosing but it's the elect exiles the elect chosen among. That is elect chosen modifying the word exiles. Exiles who have been chosen and a lot of people hate the idea that their their destiny or their identity is Is out of their hands.

It's based on a choice. That's not under their control. We think we can control everything about us. As though we would make the right choice if we we could control it who we are of course, the reality is that we're all born into families and into ethnic groups.

There are not of our choosing. We didn't get to choose. Choose that who we are here. We're one of the chosen exiles. Because of God's choice were chosen exiles dispersed in a strange land according to the foreknowledge of God the Father in verse 2.

The father and was knew us had foreknowledge of us knowledge of us beforehand and that doesn't mean he just knew about us that he could see the chain of events that would happen in The future and he would know that such a person is coming in such a time.

The term doesn't just mean prior knowledge like you might know there's a baby coming in late February. Oh, we kind of know that but we don't know who that person is yet. Here the foreknowledge means actually knowing the person.

God knows who that person is already. He knew you before you were even born because he's not bound by time here in particular. He knew you and so chose you to be one of his chosen people dispersed Around the world.

That's what the father did then the Holy Spirit. Sanctified you means he set you apart in verse 2 meaning he selected you for himself your mind. He said sanctified. Paul says that the Spirit seals us.

That's like a stamp in those days probably with wax on a document put a seal on it. It shows this it comes from me. The Holy Spirit seals us like a stamp marking you off from others who don't have that stamp.

Showing that you belong to him. That's what the Spirit does then the son Says sprinkles you with his blood. So that your sins are cleansed so that you're bought by him. So notice there. Did you notice what Peter just did?

Father.

Spirit.

Son have you not in the order we used to but that's the Trinity the Trinity the Father Spirit of the Son set you apart. For this is the purpose that he saved you sprinkled you with his blood that he set you apart For your obedience to Jesus he says so that so that he's your Lord.

And You do what he says Because you want to because he's given you a new heart.

So.

People. Here you are. You may be native here, but you're not really native. Here. Are you your exiles people you're set apart? Chosen exiles dispersed in North Carolina and Virginia. May God freely. God God's freely given Amazing grace his peace with him.

You're no longer enemies of God. So the greatest conflict that you ever had to worry about that that's over. So you have peace to make that amazing grace and that perfect peace be multiplied to you to you the people in 2021.

The New Birth Through Christ's Resurrection

And what do you long to look? Home your inheritance. Where is that on the other side of the world? Maybe in Alabama, maybe a house and a plot of land not far from here. Where is home? Here starting verse 3 we have an inheritance a homeland like Israel had an inheritance that they had never seen.

Except for 12 spies, you know for 40 years and this inheritance they this homeland is it was promised to them. They wandered in the desert something to hope for and from God. But it's still theirs even though they hadn't seen it yet.

Blessed is the God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Peter says. Peter praise him. Peter shouts because he's given us an inheritance in verse 4 a homeland a place where we belong even if you're supposedly native here.

You're an exile here. You've been dispersed here. Your real home is somewhere else. You have a homeland. Well, how do you get it? First he says by his.

Great mercy.

Not by our rule keeping not by our religion not by our making the right choices but by his much. Mercy in verse 3 says he has caused us to be born again. Notice that I Just learned that this was in the Bible just this week.

I had no idea. This is a major theological question here. What causes us to be born again. Are we say first and then have faith or. Do we muster up faith and make the right choice and then God saves us.

Because of that technical terms this faith precede regeneration. I Didn't I didn't know that the answer was right here until this week. Study of this passage. First Peter chapter 1 verse 3 he has caused us to be born again.

Now some people have the view the way they interpret John 3 16 For God's whole of people that he made it so that they have a free choice. And if they freely choose to believe in Jesus that that then makes them if they make the right choice born again.

Well, that is we make ourselves born again by making the right choice. Kind of like pushing the right buttons on a machine or flipping the light switch, you know, I think well, okay. I didn't generate the electricity.

I didn't put up the wires up that brought the electricity here. I didn't wire the house. So they could turn on but I it still took me to flip that switch in order to get the lights on. It still depends on me.

Well, no.

Here Peter clearly says that God causes us to be born again. Our choice to believe isn't what caused us to be born again. Our being born again Caused us to believe God is the cause of Our being born again.

He flips the switch so that we'll have he says a living hope a hope that that grows like any living thing. Living things grow and Our hope will grow. So we'll have more of it as time goes on. We have a growing confidence in the Lord, especially as we're approaching death.

Because our hope is alive and it will survive our way through death. He caused us to be born again he says here through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead his physical resurrection caused our Spiritual resurrection that spiritual resurrection.

So we're now alive gives us an inheritance. That inheritance in verse 4. And inheritance is a treasure. We did work for. You know, we didn't earn it inheriting. Something is the easiest way you can get something.

Someone else earned it and then bequeaths it to us. Because of their love for us. We didn't we did nothing. You do nothing to get an inheritance except be loved. In 2011 the last of my grandparents died my father's mother.

She was the only one Able to leave an inheritance. The rest just weren't don't they call him poor, but they certainly weren't wealthy. She was the only one able to leave us an inheritance because her Grandparents or her great-grandparents had been wealthy plantation owners in the Old South.

They had over 50 slaves and we once even heard the reading of a will at 1860 will. Where they were planning our my ancestors were planning on bequeathing the slaves by name to their children. They had like 12 children and they were gonna bequeath their slaves.

They would say whatever the name of the child he gets. Thus and thus of us these slaves by name like that. Everyone bequeathed a certain number of the slaves in 1860. Some families may not be able to give their children much of an inheritance.

Slaves, of course weren't able to earn or save anything. So they couldn't pass on anything to the slaves never could give an inheritance my ancestors. We were plantation owners in Georgia thought that they could pass down all their inheritance.

But soon after 1860, of course, it was nearly all gone with the wind. Often inherited wealth has frittered away because the people who didn't earn it don't know how to keep it. So they'll just do extravagant things with their money.

They'll build exorbitant mansions like the Biltmore just to indulge themselves and a generation or two though. Then all that money is gone. Here though our inheritance is described Three ways in verse four.

It's imperishable. That is it will never be lost. It's undefiled it doesn't spoil and It's unfading that is it doesn't lose its luster. Finally, it's protected in the most secure safety deposit box in the universe.

He says kept in heaven.

For you.

That's pretty secure. Now. Do you long to see your treasure? You might think okay. Well the treasure the inheritance is kept safe in heaven. But what about me, you know, I'm a stranger in a strange land.

I could be the victim I could be maybe you can't destroy my treasure, but you destroy me but Peter says in verse 5 we the inheritors are being guarded by God's power his power protects us. So that we will get that treasure.

That salvation which will be revealed. He says at the end at the resurrection Every one of those scattered sheep that Jesus Said that he's gathering from all around the world into his sheepfold. Every one of them will be kept safe.

He said no one can snatch them out of my hand. So he won't lose one of them. He guards them. He guards us here by God's power and through faith. That's how we're involved in it. That's our faith our through our continuing to trust him our Ongoing faith in Jesus is evidence That he has been guarding us and he will keep doing it.

Until we're home safe.

He will.

Hold us fast. So because of this Peter says in verse 6 we Rejoice, we have a treasure. We can't lose and we can't be kept from getting it. That's something to rejoice about even if we're grieved he says by various trials here.

Probably means some of the persecution some of these people were going through but various means all kinds like the death of a loved one the loss of some treasure we had on earth a relationship a home.

Maybe having to be strangers exiles away from where we want to be. Those various trials test whether we'll continue to be strangers or whether we'll.

Assimilate.

You know whether we'll become like the world. We'll just become like The environment we're in like immigrants to America. Over enough time maybe a couple generations became Americans. Right. The melting pot.

Will our faith preserve us so that we don't melt or will we become worldly. Just as focus on making money. Just as individualistic. Just as unfaithful. So just like worldly people break their promises.

We break ours. Just as often divorced or just as often immoral. We're being pressured by the forces of the world to see if we'll conform various trials. Are whether we'll he'll keep us safe by his power.

Whether we will continue to be exiles hankering for a home far away or. We begin to feel kind of comfortable here. Not really much different at all that that pressure. Which separates us. That pressure test our faith whether we really believe our treasure is in heaven.

Kept in heaven for you. So that it's proven our faith is proven if we if we continue to believe we continue to persevere. We continue to be different. We continue to be exiles in a strange land. I'm not understand why all these people around us doing these things that we know we're just so wrong.

That it proves our faith to be real. It documents our Perseverance. Documents the genuineness of our faith so that it's it's not fake anymore. Not just fake religion. That we use to assuage our conscience.

It's really we just are doing whatever. Whatever we please. When it's proven when it's documented that faith he says is more precious.

Than gold.

Now gold might not tarnish. It might not tarnish for now. But eventually even it Will be destroyed. Even if it's pure gold that proven.

Documented.

Genuine faith will result in Praise and glory and honor. Whenever Jesus is revealed He's revealed here and now in your life or finally when he's revealed at the end when he returns then we'll see him so so far.

We have it. We haven't seen him Peter. I've seen him. But the people he was writing to elect exiles like us Hadn't seen him like we haven't. But Peter says in verse 8 though you have not seen him in the past you love him your proven faith.

Proves that.

Though you do not now See him in the present. You've never unlike Peter seen him in person times in the present. We don't see him. For example, we don't see him in the Lord's Supper. We remember him while he's physically absent in the Lord's Supper.

So though you do not now see him you believe in him. That's been proven. Because you're still exiles. You're still separate. You're still apart and You rejoice he says with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory.

Joy that is so much greater than what I can describe with mere words. That's why we Christians so often sing. Not just to express theology but glorious. Joy, and what do you long to look? Maybe someone precious now lost.

There's nothing wrong with that. That can come through our salvation because salvation includes at the end a Resurrection of a turn to health and life. Now that being the case then. You should long to look at Salvation.

The Prophets, the Gospel, and the Angels

What it is? How great it is? About this salvation in verse 10. About this salvation. That's this whole paragraph of verses 10 to 12 about this salvation that gives us the the gloriously inexpressible joy.

About this salvation the prophets were interested.

They studied it.

The Old Testament is about this salvation. That's what he's saying in verses 10 and 11. Now over the last 200 years some have been teaching that the Old Testament is is for another era. It's about another kind of salvation.

It's just about Israel being saved from their enemies. It all involves literal Israel getting literal land and all that stuff that really doesn't have much of anything to do with us. Maybe we're interested in it for history's sake, but it really not relevant to us anymore.

And so we've been told we can then because of all that we can unhitch the Old Testament from our faith. We can pretty much ignore it. It's just not relevant to us. So some say but here Peter says that the prophets like Isaiah Jeremiah Amos prophesied about the grace.

That was to be yours. Think about that statement. They prophesied about the grace. That was to be yours you elect exiles about that amazing grace. They prophesied about the gospel. Notice that clearly in verse 10 Peter is saying that the Old Testament prophets were talking about our Salvation by grace only through faith only in Christ only now.

Sure, they may have mentioned other things along the way like judgment on ancient kingdoms, but their main theme was about the gospel. Our gospel that about that amazing grace we sang of earlier now. The Bible is one.

Unified.

Story of God saving his people in the Old Testament. Its promises made. About that coming salvation even the prophets like like Isaiah Didn't fully understand what they were prophesying. Peter says here that they searched and inquired carefully.

Those they made an active effort to find out. What does this mean?

Who is this?

Servant of the Lord who is pierced for our transgressions. Who is this? What is this new covenant written on on the hearts? What's that about? Who is this son of man? Bringing in God's kingdom during 70 weeks of years.

What is all that about. They study the scriptures that they had. They asked God. They racked their brains to figure out who and. When this was all about now some say you have to interpret the Old Testament to be about events and People in the Old Testament in their time and their life not about things that they knew nothing about.

But here that's what some people say here. In verse 11 Peter says that the Spirit of Christ.

Was in them.

Was in the prophets and he would the Spirit of Christ Christ himself. In other words was showing them about the sufferings of Christ like in Isaiah 53 the servant who was pierced for our transgressions about the sufferings of Christ and.

The subsequent.

Glories like Amos Amos's prophecy about how God will restore David's fallen tent or the restoration of the Kings from the from the line of David or Jeremiah on how God will write His law on people's hearts or Hosea about how God's new people will be called children of the Living God.

They sought to figure out these prophets sought to figure out how God was going to do this. What what all this means. Because they weren't just preaching sermons on their current events. But they were inspired Peter says by the Spirit of Christ in them.

What do you long to look? Never been so hungry to understand something just so so intrigued. You just crave to to understand something to see what something means. It's a mystery to you get to the bottom.

Of it to learn.

You ever had that so much you you studied you researched you read dense books. Listen to experts. Back to your brain. The prophets were like that with the promises of the gospel. In verse 12 Peter says it was revealed to them the gospel at least Parts of it pieces to the puzzle, but they couldn't put it all together yet.

That's why they were not just addressing events in their day their historical setting. They weren't just serving the people of their time serving themselves. They were serving. Peter says they were serving not themselves, but you you.

You chosen exiles you strangers in a strange land. The Old Testament prophets searched diligently to figure out what these what those prophecies about Christ and the gospel in the church. What it all meant.

But instead God revealed to them What he went. He said to Daniel through an angel. Seal up these things. They'll be playing. They'll be playing in the latter days and these days the days after Jesus was raised in our days.

God revealed to them that they weren't just prophesying for themselves for their nation at that time. But for people yet to come for those elect exiles scattered around the world. The prophets were writing.

For us.

One unified message of salvation. Seen before in the Old Testament and then seen after in the new. The prophets long to look at the gospel but they could only see a.

Piece.

Because they were serving us The chosen exiles Jesus sent out the gospel to his to his dispersed people. He sent it out in preachers in books with parents or with friends Sharing the faith to them who were announcing to us the same salvation that the prophets saw.

Now if we believed it, it's because in the middle of verse 12 the Holy Spirit Empowered them. The Holy Spirit was speaking through them speaking through those preachers or those books or those parents or those friends.

By the Holy Spirit the gospel was announced and we heard what we couldn't hear before and So he caused us to be born again the telling of the gospel.

Brings life.