What God Has Done For Refugees (1 Peter 1:3-5)

This sermon was preached on 20/2/2011

Peter, having given his greeting in verses 1 and 2, then gives a statement of praise which runs from verse 3 to verse 9. You may have observed that in these verses Peter uses the well-trilogy of faith, hope and love. He also stresses the experience of great joy that marked his readers. For now, we will consider verses 3-5 which detail what God has done for his people. Verses 6-7 focus on the reasons for the persecution through which Peter’s readers were passing and we will look at these verses next time. And after that, we will think about verses 8 and 9 which describe the emotional life of Christian refugees as they suffer away from their homeland.

How much can be said in a sentence? Peter says a great deal in verses 3b-5 about the benefits of Christian refugees. He mentions God’s mercy, new birth, living hope, guaranteed inheritance, and perfect protection. Peter may have been thinking about the great things God has done for his people. It looks as if this was the reason why he wrote the first sentence of verse 3: ‘Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ!’ This statement is a reminder that Christian refugees are a praising people. So we will think about this detail first before considering the benefits that God has given them.

1. A praising people

No doubt, the reasons for Peter’s praise include the benefits he lists in subsequent verses; it is not possible to praise if good has not been received. What I want us to consider here is not so much why Peter praised, but how he did so. His statement of praise is focussed on the saving purposes of God, especially as it climaxed in the exaltation of the risen Messiah, Jesus. We see his exaltation in the title ‘Lord’ (he was crowned Lord when he ascended and was given the name that is above every name, according to Paul in Philippians 2:9-11). Peter here is exemplifying the desire of Paul in that passage when he said that one goal of the exaltation was the glory of God the Father. And we see the Messiahship of Jesus in the term ‘Christ’. He is the promised Deliverer of the Old Testament and one of his roles would be to bring the dispersed of Israel to the promised land (the dispersed, says Peter in verse 1, are the Christian refugees, and the mention of the title ‘Christ’ is a reminder that their Saviour has the definite purpose of bringing them to glory. So Christian praise rejoices in the position that Jesus now has.

Peter’s praise also includes an awareness of the relationship between God the Father and Jesus. We can see that the apostle describes the first Person of the Trinity as ‘the God and Father’ of Jesus. The easiest way to understand Peter’s description is to remind ourselves that Jesus, the eternal Son of God, relates to the Father in two ways. One way is the eternal relationship within the Trinity (and what that involves is beyond our ability to even think about) and the other way is Jesus’ role as Mediator (this is revealed to us in the Bible and basically means that the Son of God became his Father’s servant without ceasing to be his Son, and his role as servant required that he function as the God-man who regarded the Father as his God). Peter is not saying that Christian refugees need to understand complex theology, but he is stating that they should praise God for the engagement between the Father and the Son that brought about their salvation. This relationship, in which Jesus is the Mediator, will continue for ever, so it has future applications for the believers as well.

A third detail of Peter’s praise is his sense of community, and this awareness is seen in the preposition ‘our’ in ‘our Lord Jesus Christ’. Jesus is not only related to his Father, he is also connected to all of his people. Peter is conscious of the wonderful fact that he belongs to a worshipping community who desire to speak well of (‘blessed’) God. So our worship should consider the position of Jesus today, the relationship between the Father and Jesus as the Mediator, and the communal aspect of sharing in the rich blessings God has given to us as refugees from the eternal homeland.

There is a fourth detail that we should consider when thinking about worship and that is we are always to remember that God deals with us out of mercy. All the aspects that Peter mentions in verses 3-5 are ours because God is merciful. When we think of mercy, we should not only focus on our needs, but also on the One who shows mercy. We can never merit mercy, so God’s kind response is always an expression of his loving sovereignty. He chose to be merciful and he loves to show mercy to his people. God’s mercy is undeserved, and it is also unending as we can see from Peter’s references to the far distant future. Worship takes into account the fullness of God’s mercy as it ranges from pardon to Paradise. Peter here wants us to think of God’s mercy.

2. Possession of a living hope

Peter reminds his readers that they have been born again. New birth is a wonderful doctrine but sometimes we focus on only one angle of it, which is that we used to be dead in sins. Imagine if every time we saw a baby, we said to ourselves, ’That baby used to be inside his or her mother.’ We don’t usually speak about where the baby came from, instead we think about its future prospects. Peter here is doing something similar with the Christian refugees. Instead of only thinking about their past, he also writes in such a way that will cause them to anticipate their future.

Having said, that it is important to stress the necessity of being born again. It is necessary because one cannot enjoy the glory ahead without having experienced new birth from God. And we also have to appreciate the nature of the new birth: it is the result of divine initiative. God comes and gives spiritual life to sinners before they become spiritual refugees.

The new birth is a mystery and no-one can describe how it is brought about. Yet just as we can see signs of physical life, so we also can see evidences of spiritual life. Peter points to such evidences here under the imagery of a living hope. He is contrasting such an outlook with the vain hopes that people can have. Hopelessness is a dominant feature of both ancient and modern societies. No doubt, many refugees have a hope that disappoints and eventually dies. In contrast, the hope of Christian refugees remains lively, no matter what happens.

Christian refugees have a marvellous guarantee that continually strengthens and enlivens their hope, and that guarantee is the resurrection of Jesus. Why did Jesus rise from the dead? Several answers may be given to this question but for now we can note that he rose as the first fruits of his people (1 Cor. 15:23). Paul there is making use of the worship ritual in Old Testament Israel at the Feast of Firstfruits, which occurred on the day after the Sabbath that followed the Passover. On that occasion, a sample of the barley harvest was waved before the Lord in thanksgiving for his provision. The sample guaranteed to the onlookers that there would be a plentiful harvest. In a far higher sense, the resurrection of Jesus guarantees that there will be a harvest of resurrected believers, all like him. Christian refugees are like Israelites who knew that the sample had been presented before God, except the Sample and the harvest is not grain, but Christ and his people.

Earlier we noticed the importance of stressing what happens after birth. The obvious consequence of birth is family membership, which is necessary in order to have an inheritance. Unlike births of infants, each of whom can only be born once, a Christian is reborn into God’s family. There are two ways of interpreting what Peter means by a second birth. This spiritual birth may be second in the sense that one’s natural birth was first; however, it is more likely that Peter means that his Christian friends had been God’s children once in another way (by creation, and this relationship had been lost by the fall) and through the gospel they had come to membership of his family in a higher, permanent way. A Christian refugee is not an orphan. Instead he has become a child of God, a member of his family, and this relationship brings great blessings to Christian refugees.

3. Prospect of an inheritance (1:4)

As God’s children, Christian refugees have the prospect of an inheritance. This inheritance is described as imperishable, undefiled and unfading. One way of looking at this description is to contrast it with the inheritance that belonged to the Israelites as they returned to it from Babylon. Although it was the promised land, its glory was gone, and they returned to a location that was marked by poverty and problems. Or we can imagine an exile from the Highlands a couple of centuries ago who had returned home after years abroad only to discover that the family inheritance was in ruins, and worthless.

In contrast, the inheritance to which Christian refugees are going has no negative features radiant. It is imperishable, which means that it is eternal; it is undefiled, which means it has no impurities; and it is unfading, which means that no part of it disappears or loses its beauty. Furthermore the inheritance is secure – no-one can steal it from us. And each refugee’s share is already allotted, marked out. These four details are given to those who are currently living in exile in a society which does not value such an inheritance. Yet the Christian refugees should be looking forward to the day when they will have their inheritance.

Peter gives another perspective of the inheritance in verse 5 when he calls it ‘a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time’. It is salvation in the sense of final rescue from the presence of sin, from the presence of enemies, from the presence of death. We can imagine problems that refugees would face and from which they would like to be free. So too with Christian refugees.

Peter says that the inheritance is real because he affirms it already exists in heaven. Further it is not in a state of incompletion because he states that it is ready, because God can bring it into existence in a moment. Why the delay? Because all the refugees who will inherit it have not yet been born again and entered God’s family. Unlike earthly situations, we want as many Christian refugees as possible.

It will be a wonderful day when the inheritance will be revealed. When Jesus returns, he will bring with him, as it were, a new universe, the inheritance of the people of God. It will be the opposite of corruption, defilement, and ugliness. Instead it will an inheritance in which God and his heirs will share what he has planned.

4. Protected by God’s power (1:5)

Of course, the thought that will come into a Christian refugee’s heart is whether or not he will see it. The inheritance may be secure and its experience wonderful, but what about the many opponents threatening the refugee? Peter’s answer is that God protects his people from their enemies.

I suppose we can say that Peter here is speaking from personal experience. He knew what it was to be mauled by the enemy when he denied his Lord after he was arrested. Yet although he fell, he was safe because he was still in the hands of God. Peter would have realised that what was wrong with him at that time was not weak faith but strong self-confidence. Weak faith turns to Christ for help, even although not having as much confidence as a person with strong faith. Peter discovered that there has to be a combination of the Lord’s power and faith in exercise in order to enjoy his protection.

Of course, Peter was fully aware of the wide range of enemies that Christian refugees have. Outside them is the persecuting world and the devil, inside them are their own sinful tendencies, and ahead of them is death itself. All of them could attack simultaneously, and the Christians don’t possess the inbuilt strength to defeat them. What they should do at all times is call on God in prayer (even although they are refugees, they have immediate access into his presence) and express to him their dependence upon him. Such a response reveals that they value very highly the protecting presence of God. Even in exile, they know his care.

So Peter lists many reasons for Christian refugees to bless their God. The basic one is he is a God of mercy, and this reality should be a very powerful motive in serving him. We are called to serve the God who is kindly disposed towards us, who expresses his mercy in providing a Saviour, pardoning those who trust in him, protecting those who do from all their enemies, and promising them a great inheritance. No wonder they can join with Peter and say, ‘Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.’