1st Peter 1:1-9 CHOOSE JOY V.1-2. There are good reasons for living even when suffering. Perhaps one of the best is that we gain a perspective through suffering that we learn in no other way. A life without suffering is frivolous and purposeless. Peter's apostleship gave him a reason for living beyond catching fish to feed his family and others. He had gained a worldview from the Lord Jesus Christ that fit in with the divine purposes of God. Peter knew where he belonged in God's scheme of things and this letter was part of the responsibility of his work as an apostle of Jesus Christ.
The early Christian believers to whom Peter wrote likely included some who had been saved on the day of Pentecost according to the place names in the first verse of chapter one. Now his spiritual children were facing persecution. Nero had focused his attention on them because they would not worship him as a god, nor would they go into the pagan temples which were a money-making business that needed people to attend and pay. The immorality of pagan and/or false worship is well known today where people set up the opinions of men and women in the place of God. Even in "Christian" churches people charge money for the slightest things in an effort to enrich the organization. They also have removed the moral standards of the word of God and replaced them with laws made by governments to please the people and accommodate to the debased moral practices in which people want to be engaged.
The "strangers scattered" across the Roman Empire would stand out wherever they were found even thought they were comparatively speaking few in number. Those who follow the Lord and scriptural teaching are misfits in modern secular society. Even religion is more concerned about money and social acceptance then what the Lord wants and the eternal welfare of the souls of men and women.
1Peter 1:1-2. “Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to the strangers scattered abroad throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia; elect according to the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ: grace unto you, and peace, be multiplied.”
PILGRIMS. To be passing through a foreign land, One has to know on what you stand; And why you are different from those around, From how they look and how they sound; To the way they dress and how they act; You need to face it as a fact.
You are a pilgrim just a-passing through, And those around will be watching you; To see if you truly walk the walk: Or if you’re like some others – just full of talk. The difference is there, it should be plain to see; The pilgrim is from sin set free!
It started first when God did choose, From His knowledge long before we knew The Father; and the Spirit too, Had fixed their interest right on you. The Spirit had set you each apart, And the Father knew right from the start, That when you heard how Christ had come, And died for all – not just for some; The cleansing blood that for sin did flow, Would make you to the Savior go. What He did for you on the cross that day, Would stir your souls to Him obey.
As strangers here we don’t belong, To all the ways of this worldly throng. Our citizenship and the place we love, Is in our Father’s house above. We don’t quite fit with all around, And still it’s here that we are found To live the Gospel, and preach it too; And when we can, to win and woo The families and friends we have, That they in Jesus will believe. We’re “elect” for that, so let us show; By love to others how much we owe.
Pilgrims are those who, though here, are found; Are moving on to “higher ground.” They are moving on with faces set, On future times not reached as yet; Where their true home above is waiting there, For them to come, and with God to share The place prepared, a mansion-home; Where we will be when He shall come. Saints who suffer here below, Will in that place God’s blessings know In a way they never had before, When at last they’re home on the heavenly shore.
So while we are here in this foreign land, We move on through guided by His hand. There may be suffering and trials sore, Because of sin that increases more As each day goes by in intensity, And faith seems to fade into obscurity. But when the traveling time is done; We will know that faith is held by them Who had known God’s grace, as well as peace; And found that passing through this place They were safe because in Christ they hide;
And all they needed was multiplied.
“O God of the traveling saints: guide us each day that we may never take a wrong turn into some smooth lane that seems so attractive. Keep us with eyes fixed like the Savior’s were when He was on Him way to Jerusalem. Ours needs to be fixed on Thee right through all the attractions of this situation we are passing through. In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.”
The believers who are baptized as a public testimony to their faith in Christ, often faced with personal persecution from friends and family because they are charged with abandoning "the faith of our fathers." The reality is that instead of returning to the faith of our fathers who were committed to the word of God and followed its teaching, they have accepted the ideas of men, and adopted man-made practices. Consequently, there are comparatively few who are found where the word of God only is the source of information for our doctrinal teaching, our guide for conduct and the instruction for church practice. Christians everywhere are subject to misunderstanding, ridicule and harassment by those who feel judged by the holy living of those who follow the scriptural teaching of the Bible.
Peter knew his responsibility as an apostle and he wanted the believers to know who they were. "Elect according to the foreknowledge of God" would assure them that the Lord they obeyed would not abandon them in the trials they were enduring. The Lord did not then, nor does He today, promise to keep His people from suffering. Instead He promises to be with them through the suffering. "When thou passeth through the waters I will be with thee."