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Nature and Function of the Church and Marks of a Christian LifeBy Dr. Lou Jander - LCMS Texas District - MMF Area D Texas District
Nature and Function of the Church Life in the Shadow of Eternity
INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST LETTER OF PETER The Catholic or General Epistles First Peter belongs to that group of New Testament letters which are known as the Catholic or General Epistles. (i) First Peter itself is written to the strangers scattered abroad through Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia (1 Peter 1:1). It is true that these General Epistles have a wider range than the letters of Paul; at the same time, they all have a definite community in mind. (ii) So these letters were called Catholic or General because they were accepted as Scripture by the whole Church in contradistinction to that large number of letters which enjoyed a local and temporary authority but never universally ranked as Scripture. At the time when these letters were being written there was an outbreak of letter-writing in the Church. We still possess many of the letters which were then written—the letter of Clement of Rome to Corinth, the letter of Barnabas, the letters of Ignatius and the letters of Polycarp. All were regarded as very precious in the Churches to which they were written but were never regarded as having authority throughout the Church; on the other hand the Catholic or General Epistles gradually won a place in Scripture and were accepted by the whole Church. Here is the true explanation of their title. The Recipients of the Letter The form of his name which Peter uses also shows that this letter was intended for Gentiles for Peter is a Greek name. Paul calls him Cephas (1 Corinthians 1:12; 3:22; 9:5; 15:5; Galatians 1:18; 2:9, 11, 14); among his fellow Jews, he was known as Simeon (Acts 15:14), which is the name by which he is called in Second Peter (1:1). Since he uses his Greek name here, it is likely that he was writing to Greek people. The Circumstances Behind the Letter
THE NATURE AND FUNCTION OF THE CHURCH 1 Peter 2:4–10 Peter sets before us the nature and the function of the Church. There is so much in the passage that we divide it into four sections. 1. The
Stone Which the Builders Rejected (i) The beginning of the whole matter goes back to the words of Jesus himself. One of the most illuminating parables he ever told was the Parable of the Wicked Husbandmen. In it he told how the wicked husbandmen killed servant after servant and in the end even murdered the son. He was showing how the nation of Israel had again and again refused to listen to the prophets and had persecuted them, and how this refusal was to reach its climax with his own death. But beyond the death he saw the triumph and he told of that triumph in words taken from the Psalms: “The very stone which the builders rejected has become the head of the corner; this was the Lord’s doing and it is marvelous in our eyes” (Matthew 21:42; Mark 12:10; Luke 20:17). That is a quotation from Psalm 118:22. In the original it is reference to the nation of Israel. A.K. Kirkpatrick writes of it: “Israel is ‘the head corner-stone.’ The powers of the world flung it aside as useless, but God destined it for the most honorable and important place in the building of his kingdom in the world. The words express Israel’s consciousness of its mission and destiny in the purpose of God.” Jesus took these words and applied them to himself. It looked as if he was utterly rejected by men; but in the purpose of God he was the corner-stone of the edifice of the Kingdom, honored above all. (ii) In the Old Testament there are other references to this symbolic stone, and the early Christian writers used them for their purposes. The first is in Isaiah 28:16: “Therefore, thus says the Lord God, Behold I am laying in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tested stone, a precious cornerstone, of a sure foundation; he who believes will not be in haste.” Again the reference is to Israel. The sure and precious stone is God’s unfailing relationship to his people, a relationship which was to culminate in the coming of the Messiah. Once again the early Christian writers took this passage and applied it to Jesus Christ as the precious and immovable foundation stone of God. (iii) The second of these other passages is also from Isaiah: “But the Lord of hosts, him you shall regard as holy; let him be you fear, and let him your dread. And he will become a sanctuary, and a stone of offence, and a rock of stumbling to both houses of Israel, a trap and a snare to the inhabitants of Jerusalem” (Isaiah 8:13, 14). Its meaning is that God is offering his lordship to the people of Israel; that to those who accept him he will become a sanctuary and a salvation, but to those who reject him he will become a terror and a destruction. Again the early Christian writers took this passage and applied it to Jesus. To those who accept him Jesus is Savior and Friend; to those who reject him he is judgment and condemnation. (iv) For the understanding of this passage, we have to take in a New Testament reference to these Old Testament ones. It is hardly possible that Peter could speak of Jesus as the corner-stone and of Christians as being built into a spiritual house, united in him, without thinking of Jesus’ own words to himself. When he made his great confession of faith at Caesarea Philippi, Jesus said to him, “You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my Church” (Matthew 16:18). It is on the faith of the loyal believer that the Church is built. These are the origins of the pictures in this passage. [back to top] 2. The
Nature of the Church (i) The Christian is likened to a living stone and the Church to a living edifice into which he is built (verse 5). Clearly that means that Christianity is community; the individual Christian finds his true place only when he is built into that edifice. “Solitary religion” is ruled out as an impossibility. C. E. B. Cranfield writes: “The free-lance Christian, who would be a Christian but is too superior to belong to the visible Church upon earth in one of its forms, is simply a contradiction in terms.” There is a famous story from Sparta. A Spartan king boasted to a visiting monarch about the walls of Sparta. The visiting monarch looked around and could see no walls. He said to the Spartan king, “Where are these walls about which you boast so much?” His host pointed at his bodyguard of magnificent troops. “These,” he said, “are the walls of Sparta, every man a brick.” The point is clear. So long as a brick lies by itself it is useless; it becomes of use only when it is incorporated into a building. So it is with the individual Christian. To realize his destiny he must not remain alone, but must be built into the fabric of the Church. Suppose that in time of war a man says, “I wish to serve my country and to defend her from her enemies.” If he tries to carry out that resolution alone, he can accomplish nothing. He can be effective in that purpose only by standing shoulder to shoulder with others of like mind. It is so with the Church. Individualistic Christianity is an absurdity; Christianity is community within the fellowship of the Church. (ii) Christians are a holy priesthood (verse 5). There are two great characteristics of the priest. (a) He is the man who himself has access to God and whose task it is to bring others to him. In the ancient world this access to God was the privilege of the professional priests, and in particular of the High Priest who alone could enter into the Holy of Holies. Through Jesus Christ, the new and living way, access to God becomes the privilege of every Christian, however simple he may be. Further, the Latin word for priest is pontifex, which means bridge-builder; the priest is the man who builds a bridge for others to come to God; and the Christian has the duty and the privilege of bringing others to that Savior whom he himself has found and loves. (b) The priest is the man who brings an offering to God. The Christian also must continuously bring his offerings to God. Under the old dispensation the offerings brought were animal sacrifices; but the sacrifices of the Christian are spiritual sacrifices. He makes his work an offering to God. Everything is done for God; and so even the meanest task is clad with glory. The Christian makes his worship an offering to God; and so the worship of God’s house becomes, not a burden but a joy. The Christian makes himself an offering to God. “Present your bodies,” said Paul, “as a living sacrifice to God” (Romans 12:1). What God desires most of all is the love of our hearts and the service of our lives. That is the perfect sacrifice which every Christian must make. (iii) The function of the Church is to tell forth the excellencies of God. That is to say, it is to witness to men concerning the mighty acts of God. By his very life, even more than by his words, the Christian is to be a witness of what God in Christ has done for him. [back to top] 3. The
Glory of the Church (i) God has called the Christian out of darkness into his glorious light. The Christian is called out of darkness into light. When a man comes to know Jesus Christ, he comes to know God. No longer does he need to guess and to grope. “He who has seen me,” said Jesus, “has seen the Father” (John 14:9). In Jesus is the light of the knowledge of God. When a man comes to know Jesus, he comes to know goodness. In Christ he has a standard by which all actions and motives may be tested. When a man comes to know Jesus Christ, he comes to know the way. Life is no longer a trackless road without a star to guide. In Christ the way becomes clear. When a man comes to know Jesus Christ, he comes to know power. It would be little use to know God without the power to serve him. It would be little use to know goodness and yet be helpless to attain to it. It would be little use to see the right way and be quite unable to take it. In Jesus Christ there is both the vision and the power. (ii) God has made those who were not a people into the people of God. Here Peter is quoting from Hosea 1:6, 9, 10; 2:1, 23. This means that the Christian is called out of insignificance into significance. It continually happens in this world that a man’s greatness lies not in himself but in what has been given him to do. The Christian’s greatness lies in the fact that God has chosen him to be his man and to do his work in the world. No Christian can be ordinary, for he is a man of God. (iii) The Christian is called out of no mercy into mercy. The great characteristic of non-Christian religion is the fear of God. The Christian has discovered the love of God and knows that he need no longer fear him, because it is well with his soul. [back to top] 4.
The Function of the Church (i) Christian are a chosen people. Here we are back to the covenant idea. Exodus 19:5, 6 is from the passage which describes how God entered into his covenant with Israel. In the covenant he offered a special relationship with himself to Israel; but it depended on the people of Israel accepting the conditions of the covenant and keeping the law. That relationship would hold only “if you will obey my voice, and keep my covenant” (Exodus 19:5). From this we learn that the Christian is chosen for three things. (a) He is chosen for privilege. In Jesus Christ there is offered to him a new and intimate fellowship with God. God has become his friend and he has become God’s friend. (b) He is chosen for obedience. Privilege brings with it responsibility. The Christian is chosen in order that he may become the obedient child of God. He is chosen not to do as he likes but to do as God likes. (c) He is chosen for service. His honor is that he is the servant of God. His privilege is that he will be used for the purposes of God. But he can be so used only when he brings to God the obedience he desires. Chosen for privilege, chosen for obedience, chosen for service—these three great facts go hand in hand. (ii) Christians are a royal priesthood. We have already seen that this means that every Christian has the right of access to God; and that he must offer his work, his worship and himself to God. (iii) Christians are what the Revised Standard Version calls a holy nation. We have already seen that the basic meaning of hagios (holy) is different. The Christian has been chosen that he may be different from other men. That difference lies in the fact that he is dedicated to God’s will and to God’s service. Other people may follow the standards of the world but for him the only standards are God’s. A man need not even start on the Christian way unless he realizes that it will compel him to be different from other people. (iv) Christians are a people for God specially to possess. It frequently happens that the value of a thing lies in the fact that some one has possessed it. A very ordinary thing acquires a new value, if it has been possessed by some famous person. In any museum we find quite ordinary things—clothes, a walking-stick, a pen, books, pieces of furniture—which are of value only because they were once possessed by some great person. It is so with the Christian. The Christian may be a very ordinary person but he acquires a new value because he belongs to God. [back to top]
THE MARKS OF THE CHRISTIAN LIFE (1) 1 Peter 3:8–12 Peter, as it were, gathers together the great qualities of the Christian
life. All through the New Testament rings this plea for Christian unity. It is more than a plea; it is an announcement that no man can live the Christian life unless in his personal relationships he is at unity with his fellow-men; and that the Church cannot be truly Christian if there are divisions within it. It is tragic to realize how far men are from realizing this unity in their personal lives and how far the Church is from realizing it within herself. C. E. B. Cranfield writes so finely of this that we cannot do other than quote his whole comment in full, lengthy though it is: “The New Testament never treats this agreeing in Christ as an unnecessary though highly desirable spiritual luxury, but as something essential to the true being of the Church. Divisions, whether disagreements between individual members or the existence of factions and parties and—how much more!—our present-day denominations, constitute a calling in question of the Gospel itself and a sign that those who are involved are carnal. The more seriously we take the New Testament, the more urgent and painful becomes our sense of the sinfulness of the divisions, and the more earnest our prayers and strivings after the peace and unity of the Church on earth. That does not mean that the like-mindedness we are to strive for is to be a drab uniformity of the sort beloved of bureaucrats. Rather is it to be a unity in which powerful tensions are held together by an over-mastering loyalty, and strong antipathies of race and color, temperament and taste, social position and economic interest, are overcome in common worship and common obedience. Such unity will only come when Christians are humble and bold enough to lay hold on the unity already given in Christ and to take it more seriously than their own self-importance and sin, and to make of these deep differences of doctrine, which originate in our imperfect understanding of the Gospel and which we dare not belittle, not an excuse for letting go of one another or staying apart, but rather an incentive for a more earnest seeking in fellowship together to hear and obey the voice of Christ.” There speaks the prophetic voice to our modern condition. [back to top]
THE MARKS OF THE CHRISTIAN LIFE (2) 1 Peter 3:8–12 (iii) Third, Peter sets brotherly love. Again the matter goes back to the words of Jesus. “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another. … By this will all men know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:34, 35). Here the New Testament speaks with unmistakable definiteness and with almost frightening directness. “We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brethren. He who does not love remains in death. Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer” (1 John 3:14, 15). “If any one says, I love God, and hates his brother, he is a liar” (1 John 4:20). The simple fact is that love of God and love of man go hand in hand; the one cannot exist without the other. The simplest test of the reality of the Christianity of a man or a Church is whether or not it makes them love their fellow-men. (iv) Fourth, Peter sets compassion. There is a sense in which pity is in danger of becoming a lost virtue. The conditions of our own age tend to blunt the edge of the mind to sensitiveness in pity. As C. E. B. Cranfield puts it: “We got used to hearing on the radio of a thousand-bomber raid as we ate our breakfast. We have got used to the idea of millions of people becoming refugees.” We can read of the thousands of casualties on the roads with no reaction within our hearts, forgetting that each means a broken body or a broken heart for someone. It is easy to lose the sense of pity and still easier to be satisfied with a sentimentalism which feels a moment’s comfortable sorrow and does nothing. Pity is of the very essence of God and compassion of the very being of Jesus Christ; a pity so great that God sent his only Son to die for men, a compassion so intense that it took Christ to the Cross There can be no Christianity without compassion. (v) Fifth, Peter sets humility. Christian humility comes from two things. It comes, first, from the sense of creatureliness. The Christian is humble because he is constantly aware of his utter dependence on God and that of himself he can do nothing. It comes, second, from the fact that the Christian has a new standard of comparison. It may well be that when he compares himself with his fellow-men, he has nothing to fear from the comparison. But the Christian’s standard of comparison is Christ, and, compared with his sinless perfection, he is ever in default. When the Christian remembers his dependence on God and keeps before him the standard of Christ, he must remain humble. (vi) Lastly, and as a climax, Peter sets forgiveness. It is to receive forgiveness from God and to give forgiveness to men that the Christian is called. The one cannot exist without the other; it is only when we forgive others their sins against us that we are forgiven our sins against God (Matthew 6:12, 14, 15). The mark of the Christian is that he forgives others as God has forgiven him (Ephesians 4:32). As was natural for him, Peter sums the matter up by quoting Psalm 34, with its picture of the man whom God receives and the man whom God rejects. [back to top]
THE LIFE LIVED IN THE SHADOW OF ETERNITY 1 Peter 4:7b, 8 When a man realizes the nearness of Jesus Christ, he is bound to commit himself to a certain kind of life. In view of that nearness Peter makes four demands. (i) He says that we must be steady in mind. We might render it: “Preserve your sanity.” The verb Peter uses is soµphronein; connected with that verb is the noun soµphrosuneµ, which the Greeks derived from the verb soµzein, to keep safe, and the noun phroneµsis, the mind. Soµphrosuneµ is the wisdom which characterizes a man who is pre-eminently sane; and soµphronein means to preserve one’s sanity. The great characteristic of sanity is that it sees things in their proper proportions; it sees what things are important and what are not; it is swept away by sudden and transitory enthusiasms; it is prone neither to unbalanced fanaticism nor to unrealizing indifference. It is only when we see the affairs of earth in the light of eternity that we see them in their proper proportions; it is when God is given his proper place that everything takes its proper place. (ii) He says that we must be sober in mind. We might render it: “Preserve your sobriety.” The verb Peter uses is neµphein which originally meant to be sober in contradistinction to being drunk and then came to mean to act soberly and sensibly. This does not mean that the Christian is to be lost in a gloomy joylessness; but it does mean that his approach to life must not be frivolous and irresponsible. To take things seriously is to be aware of their real importance and to be ever mindful of their consequences in time and in eternity. It is to approach life, not as a jest, but as a serious matter for which we are answerable. (iii) He says that we must do this in order to pray as we ought. We might render it: “Preserve your prayer life.” When a man’s mind is unbalanced and his approach to life is frivolous and irresponsible, he cannot pray as he ought. We learn to pray only when we take life so wisely and so seriously that we begin to say in all things: “Thy will be done.” The first necessity of prayer is the earnest desire to discover the will of God for ourselves. (iv) He says that we must cherish for each other a love that is constant and intense. We might render it: “Preserve your love.” The word Peter uses to describe this love is ekteneµs which has two meanings, both of which we have included in the translation. It means outstretching in the sense of consistent; our love must be the love that never fails. It also means stretching out as a runner stretches out. As C. E. B. Cranfield reminds us it describes a horse at full gallop and denotes “the taut muscle of strenuous and sustained effort, as of an athlete.” Our love must be energetic. Here is a fundamental Christian truth. Christian love is not an easy, sentimental reaction. It demands everything a man has of mental and spiritual energy. It means loving the unlovely and the unlovable; it means loving in spite of insult and injury; it means loving when love is not returned. Bengel translates ekteneµs by the Latin vehemens, vehement. Christian love is the love which never fails and into which every atom of man’s strength is directed. The Christian, in the light of eternity, must preserve his sanity, preserve his sobriety, preserve his prayers and preserve his love. [back to top]
1 Peter 4:7b, 8 (i) It may mean that our love can overlook many sins. “Love covers all offences,” says the writer of the Proverbs (Proverbs 10:12). If we love a person, it is easy to forgive. It is not that love is blind, but that it loves a person just as he is. Love makes patience easy. It is much easier to be patient with our own children than with the children of strangers. If we really love our fellow-men, we can accept their faults, and bear with their foolishness, and even endure their unkindness. Love indeed can cover a multitude of sins. (ii) It may mean that, if we love others, God will overlook a multitude of sins in us. In life we meet two kinds of people. We meet those who have no faults at which the finger may be pointed; they are moral, orthodox, and supremely respectable; but they are hard and austere and unable to understand why others make mistakes and fall into sin. We also meet those who have all kinds of faults; but they are kind and sympathetic and they seldom or never condemn. It is the second kind of person to whom the heart more readily warms; and in all reverence we may say that it is so with God. He will forgive much to the man who loves his fellow-men. (iii) It may mean that God’s love covers the multitude of our sins. That is blessedly and profoundly true. It is the wonder of grace that, sinners as we are, God loves us; that is why he sent his Son. [back to top]
1 Peter 4:9, 10 Peter’s mind is dominated in this section by the conviction that the end of all things is near. It is of the greatest interest and significance to note that he does not use that conviction to urge men to withdraw from the world and to enter on a kind of private campaign to save their own souls; he uses it to urge them to go into the world and serve their fellow-men. As Peter sees it, a man will be happy if the end finds him, not living as a hermit, but out in the world serving his fellow-men. (i) First, Peter urges upon his people the duty of hospitality. Without hospitality the early church could not have existed. The traveling missionaries who spread the good news of the gospel had to find somewhere to stay and there was no place for them to stay except in the homes of Christians. Such inns as there were impossibly dear, impossibly filthy and notoriously immoral. Thus we find Peter lodging with one Simon a tanner (Acts 10:6), and Paul and his company were to lodge with one Mnason of Cyprus, an early disciple (Acts 21:16). Many a nameless one in the early church made Christian missionary work possible by opening the doors of his house and home. Not only did the missionaries need hospitality; the local churches also needed it. For two hundred years there was no such thing as a church building. The church was compelled to meet in the houses of those who had bigger rooms and were prepared to lend them for the services of the congregation. Thus we read of the church which was in the house of Aquila and Priscilla (Romans 16:5; 1 Corinthians 16:19), and of the church which was in the house of Philemon (Philemon 2). Without those who were prepared to open their homes, the early church could not have met for worship at all. It is little wonder that again and again in the New Testament the duty of hospitality is pressed upon the Christians. The Christian is to be given to hospitality (Romans 12:13). A bishop is to be given to hospitality (1 Timothy 3:2); the widows of the Church must have lodged strangers (1 Timothy 5:10). The Christian must not forget to entertain strangers and must remember that some who have done so have entertained angels unawares. (Hebrews 13:2). The bishop must be a lover of hospitality (Titus 1:8). And it is ever to be remember that it was said to those on the right hand: “I was a stranger, and you welcomed me” while the condemnation of those on the left hand was: “I was a stranger, and you did not welcome me” (Matthew 25:35, 43). In the early days the Church depended on the hospitality of its members; and to this day no greater gift can be offered than the welcome of a Christian home to the stranger in a strange place. (ii) Such gifts as a man has he must place ungrudgingly at the service of the community. This again a favorite New Testament idea which is expanded by Paul in Romans 12:3–8 and 1 Corinthians 12. The Church needs every gift that a man has. It may be a gift of speaking, of music, of the ability to visit people. It may be a craft or skill which can be used in the practical service of the Church. It may be a house which a man possesses or money which he has inherited. There is no gift which cannot be placed at the service of Christ. The Christian has to regard himself as a steward of God. In the ancient world the steward was very important. He might be a slave but his master’s goods were in his hands. There were two main kinds of stewards, the dispensator, the dispenser, who was responsible for all the domestic arrangements of the household and laid in and divided out the household supplies; and the vilicus, the bailiff, who was in charge of his master’s estates and acted as landlord to his master’s tenants. The steward knew well that none of the things over which he had control belonged to him; they all belonged to his master. In everything he did he was answerable to his master and always it was his interests he must serve. The Christian must always be under the conviction that nothing he possesses of material goods or personal qualities is his own; it all belongs to God and he must ever use what he has in the interests of God to whom he is always answerable. [back to top]
2 Peter 1:1 The letter opens with a very subtle and beautiful allusion for those who have eyes to see it and knowledge enough of the New Testament to grasp it. Peter writes to “those to whom there has been allotted a faith equal in honor and privilege with our own”—and he calls himself Symeon Peter. Who were these people? There can really be only one answer to that. They must once have been Gentiles in contradistinction to the Jews who were uniquely the chosen people of God. Those who had once been no people are now the chosen people of God (1 Peter 2:10); those who were once aliens and strangers to the commonwealth of Israel, and who were once far off, have been brought nigh (Ephesians 2:11–13). Peter puts this very vividly, using a word which would at once strike an answering chord in the minds of those who heard it. Their faith is equal in honor and privilege. The Greek is isotimos; isos means equal and time means honor. This word was particularly used in connection with foreigners who were given equal citizenship in a city with the natives. Josephus, for instance, says that in Antioch the Jews were made isotimoi, equal in honor and privilege, with the Macedonians and the Greeks who lived there. So Peter addresses his letter to those who had once been despised Gentiles but who had been given equal rights of citizenship with the Jews and even with the apostles themselves in the kingdom of God. Two things have to be noted about this great privilege which had been extended to the Gentiles. (a) It had been allotted to them. That is to say, they had not earned it; it had fallen to them through no merit of their own, as some prize falls to a man by lot. In other words, their new citizenship was all of grace. (b) It came to them through the impartial justice of their God and Savior Jesus Christ. It came to them because with God there is no “most favored nation clause”; his grace and favor go out impartially to every nation upon earth. What has this to do with the name Symeon, by which Peter is here called? In the New Testament, he is most often called Peter; he is fairly often called Simon, which was, indeed, his original name before Jesus gave him the name of Cephas or Peter (John 1:41, 42); but only once in the rest of the New Testament is he called Symeon. It is in the story of that Council of Jerusalem in Acts 15 which decided that the door of the Church should be opened wide to the Gentiles. There James says, “Symeon has related how God first visited the Gentiles, to take out of them a people for his name” (Acts 15:14). In this letter which begins with greetings to the Gentiles who have been granted by the grace of God privileges of equal citizenship in the kingdom with the Jews and with the apostles Peter is called by the name of Symeon; and the only other time he is called by that name is when he is the principal instrument whereby that privilege is granted. Symeon has in it the memory that Peter is the man who opened doors. He opened the doors to Cornelius, the Gentile centurion (Acts 10); his great authority was thrown on the side of the open door at the Council of Jerusalem (Acts 15). [back to top]
2 Peter 1:1 (i) To call the Christian the doulos of God means that he is inalienably possessed by God. In the ancient world a master possessed his slaves in the same sense as he possessed his tools. A servant can change his master; but a slave cannot. The Christian inalienably belongs to God. (ii) To call the Christian the doulos of God means that he is unqualifiedly at the disposal of God. In the ancient world the master could do what he liked with his slave; he had even the power of life and death over him. The Christian has no rights of his own, for all his rights are surrendered to God. (iii) To call the Christian the doulos of God means that he owes an unquestioning obedience to God. A master’s command was a slave’s only law in ancient times. In any situation the Christian has but one question to ask: “Lord, what will you have me do?” The command of God is his only law. (iv) To call the Christian the doulos of God means that he must be constantly in the service of God. In the ancient world the slave had literally no time of his own, no holidays, no leisure. All his time belonged to his master. The Christian cannot, either deliberately or unconsciously, compartmentalize life into the time and activities which belong to God, and the time and activities in which he does what he likes. The Christian is necessarily the man every moment of whose time is spent in the service of God. We note one further point. Peter speaks of the impartial justice of
our God and Savior Jesus Christ. The Authorized Version translates, “the
righteousness of God and our Savior Jesus Christ,” as if this referred
to two persons, God and Jesus; but, as Moffatt and the Revised Standard
Version both show, in the Greek there is only one person involved and
the phrase is correctly rendered our God and Savior Jesus Christ. Its
great interest is that it does what the New Testament very, very seldom
does. It calls Jesus God. The only real parallel to this is the adoring
cry of Thomas: “My Lord and my God.” (John 20:28). This is
not a matter to argue about; it is not even a matter of theology; for
Peter and Thomas to call Jesus God was not a matter of theology but an
outrush of adoration. It was simply that they felt human terms could not
contain this person they knew as Lord. Used with Permission from Dr. Lou Jander - LCMS Texas District - MMF Area D Texas District. |
