Our Salvation is of the Triune God

1 Peter 1:1-2
P. G. Mathew | Sunday, September 11, 2016
Copyright © 2016, P. G. Mathew

 

We are beginning a study of the first epistle of the apostle Peter. Peter wrote this epistle from Rome around AD 64–68, during the reign of Emperor Nero. He addressed it to believers in Jesus Christ, both Jews and Gentiles. He wrote it with the assistance of Silvanus (1 Pet. 5:12). The purpose of his writing was to encourage believers to persevere in the faith as they went through various fiery trials in the will of God (1 Pet. 1:6–7).

This epistle was written to the sojourners scattered throughout the region south of the Black Sea and north of the Taurus mountains, the regions of Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, which cover the areas of modern Turkey.

As the inspired word of the apostle, this epistle is also applicable to all believers today who are scattered throughout the world. Peter is the apostle of hope. He speaks of the sure and certain hope of our final full salvation, which is anchored in Jesus Christ, raised from the dead and reigning in heaven.

 

The Author

Peter begins, “Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ” (v. 1). Jesus himself was an apostle, sent into the world by the Father (Heb. 3:1). An apostle has the power of attorney to speak and write in the name of the sender, the one who commissioned him. The words of the apostles were the very words of Christ the King. So this epistle of Peter is the infallible word of Christ to us.

Jesus gave Peter the Aramaic name Cephas, which means “a rock.” In Greek, it is Petros, so he is known as Simon Peter. Before Jesus gave him this name, Peter was known as Simon son of John of the village of Bethsaida in Galilee. Simon Peter was a very poor, uneducated fisherman.

Peter made an early confession that Jesus was the Christ, the son of the living God (Matt. 16:16–19). This confession was the result of the Father’s revelation to him concerning the person of Jesus Christ. Yet immediately after he made it, he failed to function as a rock when he became the spokesman for the devil. He counseled Jesus not to accomplish redemption for us through his substitutionary death on the cross in behalf of elect sinners, which included Peter (Matt. 16:21–23). Peter also failed to function as a rock when he denied Jesus three times because he feared his own death (Matt. 26:69–75).

Contrary to what some say, Peter is not the foundation of Christ’s church; Jesus Christ is. Isaiah foretold this truth: “This is what the Sovereign LORD says: ‘See, I lay a stone in Zion, a tested stone, a precious cornerstone for a sure foundation; the one who trusts will never be dismayed’” (Isa. 28:16). Paul says the same thing in 1 Corinthians 3:11: “No one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ.” Christ is the foundation of his church. And Peter’s true confession, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God,” is also the foundation of the church. The Bible says the church is built upon the foundation of the apostolic doctrine (Eph. 2:10; Acts 2:42). Neither Peter nor the pope is the foundation of Christ’s church.

After his resurrection, the risen Jesus restored Peter as apostle and pastor to feed the flock of God with the word of God (John 21:15–19). After his baptism in the Holy Spirit, Peter boldly preached the gospel, and God saved three thousand people that day. Peter told the crowd, “You disowned the Holy and Righteous One and asked that a murderer be released to you. You killed the author of life, but God raised him from the dead. We are witnesses of this” (Acts 3:14–18). Like Peter, we are to bear witness to Jesus Christ. We must be filled with the Spirit so that we also may boldly and fearlessly tell people about Christ, the Savior of the world.

Peter was jailed twice, only to be set free by an angel of the Lord both times (Acts 5 and Acts 12). In Acts 12, we read about how King Herod Agrippa I purposed to kill Peter by the sword. As a politician, he wanted to please his Jewish constituency. Peter knew he would be killed in the morning, yet he fell asleep in prison, between two soldiers, bound with two chains. And the angel delivered him, as he had the first time.

God gave Peter abounding grace and peace to live a life of obedience to his Lord. And eventually, as Christ himself had predicted, Peter was crucified because of his love for Jesus. By God’s grace, Peter proved to be a rock for his Savior.

Peter was an apostle of Jesus Christ, yet he also calls himself a fellow elder (1 Pet. 5:1). In the introduction to his second epistle, he calls himself a slave of Jesus Christ (2 Pet. 1:1). If we are Christians, we are bondslaves of Jesus Christ. He is our Lord, and we are to hear and obey him.

Peter was clothed with humility, and he counseled all believers to do the same, saying, “All of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because, ‘God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble’” (1 Pet. 5:5b).

Let us then pay attention to this first epistle of Peter because it gives us infallible apostolic direction regarding how to live a godly life.

 

Salvation Is of the Triune God

 

THE SALVATION OF THE FATHER

In these first verses Peter tells us that salvation is of the triune God. First, he says that God the Father foreknew us: “who have been chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father” (v. 2). “Foreknew us” is a technical term we need to understand. It means that God “foreloved us.”

We find this idea in both the Old and New Testaments. The psalmist says, “For the LORD knoweth the way of the righteous: but the way of the ungodly shall perish” (Ps. 1:6, KJV). In Amos we read, “You only have I known of all the families of the earth: therefore I will punish you for all your iniquities” (Amos 3:2). And in the New Testament, Paul speaks of “those God foreknew” (Rom. 8:29). He also says, “God did not reject his people, whom he foreknew” (Rom. 11:2).

“Foreknow” does not mean that God foreknows from eternity those who will believe the gospel in time and those who will reject the gospel in time. Arminians say that God chose some to salvation on the basis of foreknowledge because he knew who would believe and who would not believe. That is biblically false theology.

God’s foreknowledge means that God loved certain sinners from eternity, before the creation of the world. He foreknew (foreloved) them, that they may be saved. From the perspective of the Fall, known as “infralapsarian perspective,” God foreloved some sinners from all eternity before creation and the Fall (Eph. 1:4). He chose them from eternity to be saved from their sins based on the atoning work of God’s Son Jesus Christ. His foreknowledge had nothing to do with whether we would believe or not believe. So, for example, both Esau and Jacob, like all of us, were sinners. Yet in mercy, God loved sinner Jacob and saved him, but not Esau. All sinners are condemned to die, but God chooses some of them to eternal life, not based on any merit of their own but based on the merit of Christ alone.

If you are a Christian you must apply this truth that God loved you from all eternity. It is based not on your merit but on the merit of Christ alone. Paul says, “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God.” Grace means unmerited favor. We merited hell; he gave us heaven. We merited eternal death; he gave us eternal life. Let us say goodbye to glorying in our own merit, goodness, and righteousness, and rejoice in the salvation Christ has accomplished for his elect. And these elect alone are the Father’s donation[1]to his Son. He died for their sins and was raised to life for their justification (John 17:6–12).

Based on foreknowledge (forelove), God chose from eternity some to be saved, to receive eternal life. So God foreloved, God chose, and God predestinated the elect, as Paul says, to glory. Paul writes, “For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified” (Rom. 8:29–30). These chosen sinners are effectually called, justified, adopted, and being sanctified, so that they may be glorified when Christ comes again in glory.

We are God’s elect. So we have been loved in God’s Son and given grace in God’s Son, before the beginning of time. Paul writes, “[God] has saved us and called us to a holy life—not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace. This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time” (2 Tim. 1:9). The Father loves us even as he loves his own Son. Understand that even when we die, God loves us and he will take us into his presence immediately. Jesus spoke about this, saying, “I in them and you in me. May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me” (John 17:23). God the Father loves us even as he loves Jesus Christ himself.

God loved us before creation in eternity, he loves us now, and he will love us forever (Rom. 8:36–39). All three Persons of the Godhead are involved in our salvation. Therefore, our salvation is sure and certain.

The Father has loved us and chosen us. We are God’s elect. Though we are sojourners scattered throughout the world and though we may experience fiery trials for our faith, we are God’s elect, chosen resident aliens in this world, just as our father Abraham was. We are like the “aliens and strangers” the Hebrews writer speaks about those who “were longing for a better country—a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them” (see Heb. 11:13–16). We are like Paul, who wrote, “But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ” (Phil. 3:20).

We are in the world to be the light of the world. We are not in the world to be conformed to the world. The prophet Jeremiah warned about conforming to the world (Jer. 10:1–3). Paul writes,  “Be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind” (Rom. 12:1). Our minds are renewed by the word of God. We are to be different. We are to be light and salt.

We are in the world as the light of the world and the salt of the earth for the salvation of the world through our gospel life and gospel proclamation. We are to be in the world but not of the world, which is under the devil’s control. We are not to conform to the world, but to live holy, separated lives in belief and behavior. We are to be governed by the Scriptures. We are followers of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has received all authority in heaven and on earth. We are destined for glory, to dwell with God forever in a sinless new heaven and new earth.

Now, we are chosen sojourners. Yet soon, we will live in the city of God, a “city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God” (Heb. 11:10). (PGM) The Hebrews writer also says, “For here we do not have an enduring city, but we are looking for the city that is to come” (Heb. 13:14).

The people of this world are without hope and without God (Eph. 2:11). We are people with hope and with God. We are followers of our Lord Jesus.

Though we are sojourners now and strangers in the world, we belong to the heavenly Jerusalem. And even now we are blessed with every spiritual blessing in Christ. So Paul says, “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will—to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves” (Eph. 1:3–6).

We are chosen to be saved to live eternally in perfect happiness with God, with his holy people, and with the elect angels in the new heaven and new earth, wherein dwells righteousness (2 Pet. 3:13). We are the chosen generation, chosen by the Father, chosen in Christ our Redeemer.

Jesus said, “You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit—fruit that will last. Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in my name” (John 15:16). John writes, “We love because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19). And how do you know that you are chosen by God and that God loves you? You love him and keep his commandments.

It is the teaching of the Bible that there is no one righteous; all are sinners. Yet God cares for all people. All life matters to God, in one sense. Jesus said, “Your Father in heaven . . . causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous” (Matt. 5:45). Yet, in the ultimate sense, God loves the elect only, who are loved from all eternity and for whose salvation alone Christ died. In that sense, only the lives of the elect in Christ from all the families of the earth alone matter.

God will save all his elect and they alone will dwell with God in a new world of perfect righteousness. So let us make one thing sure and certain. Let us make our calling and election sure by this test: Do I love and obey God? Because God cares for the elect of the whole world, let us pay heed to the great commission of Christ to carry out world evangelization, beginning with our own neighborhood, preaching the authentic gospel until God calls us home.

 

THE SALVATION OF GOD THE SON

Peter says we are chosen “for obedience to Jesus Christ and sprinkling by his blood” (v. 2). The second aspect of our salvation being of the triune God is that Christ redeemed us by his shed blood on the cross.

In the Old Testament, the blood of the covenant was sprinkled upon the people of the covenant who agreed to obey the covenant Lord. So we read,

 

When Moses went and told the people all the LORD’s words and laws, they responded with one voice, “Everything the LORD has said we will do.” Moses then wrote down everything the LORD had said. He got up early the next morning and built an altar at the foot of the mountain and set up twelve stone pillars representing the twelve tribes of Israel. Then he sent young Israelite men, and they offered burnt offerings and sacrificed young bulls as fellowship offerings to the LORD. Moses took half of the blood and put it in bowls, and the other half he sprinkled on the altar. Then he took the Book of the Covenant and read it to the people. They responded, “We will do everything the LORD has said; we will obey.” Moses then took the blood, sprinkled it on the people and said, “This is the blood of the covenant that the LORD has made with you in accordance with all these words.” (Exod. 24:3–8)

 

The Hebrews writer says, “In fact, the law requires that nearly everything be cleansed with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness” (Heb. 9:22). But it is not the shedding of the blood of bulls and goats. The blood in the Old Testament point to the blood of Jesus Christ. Peter says this: “For you know 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 forefathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect” (1 Pet. 1:18–19). And John the Baptist introduced Jesus, saying, “Behold, the Lamb of God who taketh away the sin of the world” (John 1:29).

The price of our redemption was the highest price imaginable: the blood of the Son of God. When we understand theology, we will not be anxious. We will have great assurance that God loves us. John writes, “But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all our sins” (1 John 1:7). Paul told the Ephesian elders, “Keep watch over yourselves and all the flock of which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers. Be shepherds of the church of God, which he bought with his own blood” (Acts 20:28).

It is time we appreciated the love of God for us. The Father planned our salvation, the Son incarnate accomplished our redemption by his substitutionary death and resurrection, and the Holy Spirit applied this redemption to us.

 

THE WORK OF THE HOLY SPIRIT IN SAVING US

The Holy Spirit applies Christ’s redemption to each elect of the heavenly Father. Peter says we are chosen, “through the sanctifying work of the Spirit” (v. 2). So the Holy Spirit sanctifies us, beginning with regenerating us, giving us the life of God. He also gives us the gifts of repentance and saving faith in Jesus Christ alone.

Elect believers will prove their faith by obeying Christ our Lord in the Spirit’s power. The Holy Spirit sanctifies the elect in preparation for glorification. What is glorification? It is making us like Christ. Paul writes about it: “[Jesus Christ], by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body” (Phil. 3:21). Paul also says, “For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality. When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: ‘Death has been swallowed up in victory’” (1 Cor. 15:53–54; see also 2 Thess. 2:13).

The Holy Spirit draws us away from sin unto holiness. He makes us like Christ. Do you know why we must be holy? The Hebrews writer explains, “Make every effort to live in peace with all men and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord” (Heb. 12:14). If we are not holy, then we cannot see the Lord. If we are not striving for holiness, we may not be chosen. Chosen, predestinated people will seek to live obedient lives. We are to be perfect even as our heavenly Father is perfect (Matt. 5:48). This is the work of the Holy Spirit.

 

The Purpose of the Spirit’s Sanctification

The purpose of the Spirit’s sanctifying work is “for obedience to Jesus Christ” (v. 2). In other words, we are to live out our confession, “Jesus is Lord,” by obeying Jesus out of our love for him. Because he is our covenant Lord, we are his obedient slaves, those who say, “Speak, Lord, your servants heareth.”

Jesus Christ commands his people to obey him. He told the apostles to make disciples, “teaching them to obey whatsoever things I have commanded you” (Matt. 28:20). Jesus Christ never begs to obey him. He is Lord, and every creature must obey him. And every antinomian Christian, meaning every disobedient Christian, will be sent to hell to experience eternal punishment by the Lord Jesus, the Judge of the whole world.

If any professing Christian does not work out his salvation with fear and trembling by the Spirit’s power, we must conclude such a person is not foreloved and chosen by the Father from eternity, that Christ did not atone for his sins by his propitiatory death, and that the Holy Spirit is not sanctifying him. He remains a child of the devil in spite of his public profession of faith in Christ. Obedience to the covenant Lord is proof of one’s justification.

Peter speaks several times about obedience in this epistle (1 Pet. 1:2, 1:14, 1:22, 24; 4:1–2, 17). Paul speaks similarly, “Because of the service by which you have proved yourselves, men will praise God for the obedience that accompanies your confession of the gospel of Christ” (2 Cor. 9:13). If we are truly saved, obedience must accompany our confession that Jesus is Lord. We obey Jesus because he loved us by dying for us. He himself taught us, “If you love me, keep my commandments” (John 14:15).

The Hebrews writer says, “Although [Christ] was a son, he learned obedience from what he suffered and, once made perfect, he became the author of eternal salvation for all who obey him” (Heb. 5:8–9). If a person is disobedient to Jesus, he is not a Christian. He needs to cry out and ask God to save him.

 

Abounding Grace and Peace

Finally, Peter prays that we may receive abounding grace and peace as we go through fiery trials: “Grace and peace be yours in abundance” (v. 2).  How can God’s people love the Lord Jesus and obey him when they are experiencing fiery trials as they sojourn as pilgrims in this world? The Bible tells us that we can do all the will of God through the risen Christ who gives us strength continually (Phil. 4:13).

Let us stop complaining and start praying. We need abounding grace, and here the apostle Peter is praying for all God’s people: “May grace and peace be multiplied to you to live in obedience to our covenant Lord.” And elsewhere he says, “And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast. To him be the power for ever and ever. Amen. With the help of Silas, whom I regard as a faithful brother, I have written to you briefly, encouraging you and testifying that this is the true grace of God. Stand fast in it” (1 Pet. 5:10–12).

The apostle Paul taught the same thing: “And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work” (2 Cor. 9:8).

When Paul faced hardship, the Lord told him, “My grace is sufficient for you” (2 Cor. 12:9). And the Hebrews writer encourages us, “Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need” (Heb. 4:16). It is not money or health or anything else that we need most. What we need most is grace from God. When we are arrogant, we do not have grace. So if you do not have grace, humble yourself, and God will give you grace.

Grace and peace are twins. Where there is grace, there is also peace. Paul says, “Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Rom. 5:1). He also says, “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (Phil. 4:6–7).

Christ achieved peace for the elect by his atoning death on the cross. Christ is our peace. By his propitiatory death, the wrath of God was taken away and now the Father is gracious toward us. He gives peace to all who approach him in the name of his Son. Grace signifies God’s love in action in Christ to deal with our enmity of sin against God. Our Father did not spare his beloved Son from the death of the cross to spare us, his beloved Isaacs, from eternal death. So in Christ we receive grace and peace to meet our every need as we sojourn in this sinful world. In place of the wrath we deserved, we have received grace and peace that we never deserved. We have received both peace with God and the peace of God.

Consider the words of Jesus: “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid. . . . I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world” (John 14:27; 16:33). We have peace in Christ alone, not in anyone else. We have peace at all times, even at the hour of our death.

Paul tells us, “In all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom. 8:37–39). We are more than conquerors in and through Jesus Christ.

In his commentary on 1 Peter, Professor Edmund Clowney gave the following example of grace and peace:

 

Armando Valladares closes his account of twenty-two years in Castro’s prisons in Cuba with these words, recalling his thoughts as he was released: “And in the midst of that apocalyptic vision of the most dreadful and horrifying moments of my life, in the midst of the gray, ashy dust and the orgy of beatings and blood, prisoners beaten to the ground, a man emerged, the skeletal figure of a man wasted by hunger, with white hair, blazing blue eyes, and a heart overflowing with love, raising his arms to the invisible heaven and pleading for mercy for his executioners. ‘Forgive them, Father, for they know not what they do.’ And a burst of machine-gun fire [followed], ripping open his breast.”[2]

That is what grace is all about. May God’s grace and mercy be multiplied to us as we live as sojourners, scattered throughout the world. May God help us to believe his word and be strengthened by the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit for any fiery trial we may experience.

 

[1] A phrase used by Professor John Murray. See “The Father’s Donation,” Collected Writings of John Murray, vol. 3 (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1982), 204–209.

[2] Edmund Clowney, The Message of 1 Peter, The Bible Speaks Today series (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 1988), 25.