Seminar on 1 Peter 2:1-10

FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER CONTINUES

THEME: 1Pet. 5:12. “…this is the true grace of God wherein ye stand”

1. 2:1. the “therefore” resumes the exhortation begun in 1Pe 1:22. Seeing that ye are born again of an incorruptible seed, be not again entangled in evil, which “has no substantial being, but is an acting in contrariety to the being formed in us” [Theophylact]. “Malice,” &c., are utterly inconsistent with the “love of the brethren,” unto which ye have “purified your souls” (1Pe 1:22). The vices here are those which offend against the brotherly love inculcated above. Each succeeding one springs out of that which immediately precedes, so as to form a genealogy of the sins against love. “Therefore, ch. 1:18–25, laying. ch. 4:2. Is. 2:20, Ro. 13:12. Ep. 4:22–25. Col. 3:5–8. He. 12:1. Jas. 1:21; 5:9, malice. ver. 16. 1Co. 5:8; 14:20. Ep. 4:31. Tit. 3:3–5, guile. ver. 22; ch. 3:10. Ps. 32:2; 34:13, 1Th. 2:3. Re. 14:5, hypocrisies. Job 36:13. Mat. 7:5; 15:7, Jas. 3:17, envies. 1Sam. 18:8, 9. Ps. 37:1; 73:3. Pr. 3:31; 14:30; 24:1, 19. Ro. 13:13. 1Co. 3:2, 3. 2Co. 12:20, Jas. 3:14, 16; 4:5, all evil. ch. 4:4. Ep. 4:31. Col. 3:8. 1Ti. 3:11. Tit. 2:3 Jas. 4:11.” TSK
2. 2:2 new-born babes 1:23. Mat. 18:3. Mar. 10:15. Ro. 6:4. 1 Co. 3:1; 14:20, the sincere. Ps. 19:7–10—altogether without “guile” (1Pe 2:1). As long as we are here we are “babes,” in a especially tender relation to God (Is 40:11). The childlike spirit is indispensable if we would enter heaven. “Milk” is here not elementary truths in contradistinction to more advanced Christian truths, as in 1 Co 3:2; Heb. 5:12, 13; but in contrast to “guile, hypocrisies,” &c. (1 Pe 2:1); the simplicity of Christian doctrine in general to the childlike spirit^{” JFB} have a yearning desire for,” or “longing after,” a natural impulse to the regenerate, “for as no one needs to teach new-born babes what food to take, knowing instinctively that a table is provided for them in their mother’s breast
3. ^{See the following on spiritual growth.} Like a cedar Ps. 92:12,  calves in the stall Mal. 4:2,  into a holy temple Eph. 2:21, In grace and knowledge 2Pet. 3:18, into Christ in all things–grow.  Job 17:9. Pr. 4:18. Hos. 6:3; 14:5, 7, Ep. 4:15. 2Th. 1:3.
4. 2:3. Taste. Heavenly things to taste. The Lord Ps. 34:8, the word of God Ps. 119:103, Heb. 6:7, heavenly gift Heb. 6:4 and the power of the world to come Heb. 6:5, gracious—Greek, “good,” benignant, kind; as God is revealed to us in Christ, “the Lord” (1Pe 2:4), we who are born again ought so to be good and kind to the brethren (1Pe 1:22). “Whosoever has not tasted the word to him it is not sweet it has not reached the heart; but to them who have experienced it, who with the heart believe, ‘Christ has been sent for me and is become my own: my miseries are His, and His life mine,’ it tastes sweet” [Luther].
5. 2:4 coming—drawing near (same Greek as here, Heb. 10:22) by faith continually; present tense: not having come once for all at conversion/ Is. 55:3, Matt. 11:28, Jn, 5:40; 6:37.
6. 2:5stone—Peter (that is, a stone, named so by Christ) desires that all similarly should be living stones built on Christ, the true foundation-stone; compare his speech in Ac 4:11. An undesigned coincidence and mark of genuineness. Mt 16:18 (compare Mt 16:16, “Son of the Living God,” which coincides with his language here, “the living stone”) He herein confirms Paul’s teaching. Christ is positively termed the “living stone”; living, as having life in Himself from the beginning, and as raised from the dead to live evermore (Rev 1:18) after His rejection by men, and so the source of life to us. Like no earthly rock, He lives and gives life. Compare 1 Co 10:4, and the type, Ex 17:6; Nu 20:11” JFB

• Ye also as living stone-partaking of the name and life which is in “the Living Stone” (1Pe 2:4; 1Co 3:11). “Many names which belong to Christ in the singular are assigned to Christians in the plural. He is “the Son,” “High Priest,” “King,” “Lamb”; they are, “sons,” “priests,” “kings,” “sheep,” “lambs.” JFB, a spiritual house 1Co. 3:16; 6:19. 2Co. 6:16. Ep. 2:20–22. He. 3:6. Re. 3:12, are built, a holy priesthood. ver. 9. Is. 61:6; 66:21. Re. 1:6; 5:10; 20:6. Spiritual sacrifice. Ps. 50:14, 23; 141:2. Ho. 14:2. Mal. 1:11. Jn. 4:22–24. Ro. 12:1. Phi. 2:17; 4:18. He. 13:15, 16, acceptable. ch. 4:11. Phi. 1:11; 4:18. Col. 3:17.TSK “Among spiritual sacrifices the first place belongs to the general oblation of ourselves. For never can we offer anything to God until we have offered ourselves (2Co 8:5) in sacrifice to Him. There follow afterwards prayers, giving of thanks, alms deeds, and all exercises of piety” [Calvin]. Believers are living stones, spiritual house, and a holy priesthood.

7. 2:6 “Because that.” The statement above is so “because it is contained in Scripture.” Behold—calling attention to the glorious announcement of His eternal counsel, elect—so also believers Eph. 1:4(1Pe 2:9, “chosen,” Greek, “elect generation”), precious—in Hebrew, Is 28:16, “a corner-stone of preciousness.” See on Is 28:16. So in 1Pe 2:7, Christ is said to be, to believers, “precious,” Greek, “preciousness.” confounded—same Greek as in Ro 9:33 (Peter here as elsewhere confirming Paul’s teaching, also Ro 10:11), “ashamed.” In Is 28:16, “make haste,” that is, flee in sudden panic, covered with the shame of confounded hopes Is. 41:11; 45:16-17; 50:7” JFB
8. 2:7-8. “Application of the Scripture just quoted first to the believer, then to the unbeliever. On the opposite effects of the same Gospel on different classes, compare Jn. 9:39; 2 Co 2:15, 16, precious—Greek, “the preciousness” (1Pe 2:6). To you believers belongs the preciousness of Christ just mentioned. The disobedient—to the faith, and so disobedient in practice, the stone which … head of … corner—(Ps 118:22). Those who rejected the stone were all the while in spite of themselves unconsciously contributing to its becoming Head of the corner. The same magnet has two poles, the one repulsive, and the other attractive; so the Gospel has opposite effects on believers and unbelievers respectively. The stone of stumbling, whereunto. Ex. 9:16. Ro. 9:22. 1 Th. 5:9. 1Pe. 2:3. Jude 4.—to penal stumbling; to the judicial punishment of their unbelief, also—an additional thought; God’s ordination; not that God ordains or appoints them to sin, but they are given up to “the fruit of their own ways” according to the eternal counsel of God. The moral ordering of the world is altogether of God. God appoints the ungodly to be given up unto sin, and a reprobate mind, and its necessary penalty” &c.—quoted from Is. 8:14. Not merely they stumbled, in that their prejudices were offended; but their stumbling implies the judicial punishment of their reception of Messiah; they hurt themselves in stumbling over the corner-stone, as “stumble” means in Je 13:16; Da 11:19 at the word—rather, join “being disobedient to the word”; so 1Pe 3:1; 4:17, JFB
9. 2:9 Believers are, chosen—“elect” of God, even as Christ your Lord is, a chosen generation—implying the unity of spiritual origin and kindred of believers as a class distinct from the world. A royal—kingly. Believers, like Christ, the antitypical Melchisedec, are at once kings and priests. Israel, in a spiritual sense, was designed to be the same among the nations of the earth. The full realization on earth of this, both to the literal and the spiritual Israel, is as yet future. A holy nation—antitypical to Israel. A peculiar people—literally, “a people for an acquisition,” that is, whom God chose to be peculiarly His: Ac 20:28, “purchased,” literally, “acquired.” God’s “peculiar treasure” above other De. 4:20; 7:6; 14:2; 26:18, 19. Ac. 20:28. Ep. 1:14. Tit. 2:14s JFB. To show forth—publish abroad. Not their own praises but His. They have no reason to magnify themselves above others for once they had been in the same darkness, and only through God’s grace had been brought to the light which they must henceforth show forth to others ch. 4:11. Is. 43:21; 60:1–3. Mat. 5:16. Ep. 1:6; 3:21. Phi. 2:15, 16, the praises—Greek “virtues,” “excellences”: His glory, mercy (1Pe 2:10), goodness (Greek, 1Pe 2:3; Nu 14:17, 18; Is 63:7) Is. 9:2; 60:1, 2. Mat. 4:16. Lu. 1:79. Ac. 26:18. Ro. 9:24. Ep. 5:8–11. Phi. 3:14. Col. 1:13. 1 Th. 5:4–8. The same term is applied to believers, 2Pe 1:5 of him who hath called you—(2Pe 1:3) out of darkness—of heathen and even Jewish ignorance, sin, and misery, and so out of the dominion of the prince of darkness, into his marvelous—Peter still has in mind Ps 118:23, light—It is called “His,” that is, God’s. Only the (spiritual) light is created by God, not darkness. In Is 45:7, it is physical darkness and evil, not moral, that God is said to create, the punishment of sin, not sin itself. Peter, with characteristic boldness, brands as darkness what all the world calls light; reason, without the Holy Spirit, in spite of its vaunted power, is spiritual darkness. “It cannot apprehend what faith is: there it is stark blind; it gropes as one that is without eyesight, stumbling from one thing to another, and knows not what it does” [Luther].
10. 2:10. Ye in time past were not a people Ho. 1:9, 10; 2:23, Is. 65:1, Ro. 9:25, 26, obtained. Ho. 2:23. Ro. 11:6, 7, 30. 1Co. 7:25. 1Ti. 1:13. He. 4:16.