2 Peter 1:1 Simon Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christ, To those equal to us in the faith they have received because of the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ: 2 Grace and peace be yours in abundance through knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord.
Introduction
Wishing the Best
When you’re about to leave and you want to say something nice, what do you usually say? Probably the most common parting wish is, “Have a nice day.” That’s a friendly thing to say, right? Not very specific, but generally you want their day to be … nice.
Another one is, “Take care.” Or, I love this one - “Take it easy.” Just make sure you take the easiest possible path – don’t put forth any effort, don’t break a sweat, don’t do any work. You’re just giving them a free pass to take the path of least resistance.
Most of our greetings are along that line. Although, if it’s someone you really love and you may never see them again, you might go for something a little better than, “Have a nice day.” Or how about a toast at a wedding? Now you’re really racking your brain to come up with the best wish you could give them—at least the best thing related to marriage.
If you can’t think of anything, you could just punt and say, “I wish you all the best.” But what is that—what is the best thing that could happen to them? Good health? Prosperity? What do you wish for the people you love the most?
This is actually an important question, because it affects more than just what you say in a greeting. Whatever you regard as the most valuable thing—that thing you wish the most for those you love, that’s what you’ll pray for. And that’s what you will work to bring that about in their lives. And it’s the thing you’ll work hardest to get for yourself. And when you really want to be generous, or you really want to express love to someone, or you really want to help someone who is in trouble, you will give them the thing you regard as most valuable. So this is really a huge question in your life. The way you answer this question will show the direction your life is going to take. We pursue that which we truly believe is most valuable—that’s what steers the direction of your whole life.
So what’s the best thing you can wish on someone? The best way to answer that question is to ask this: What is the main thing God wants for you? We’ll find out in a minute, but first, let’s take a look at verse 1 of 2 Peter.
Three Truths from Greetings
The NT Bible writers started their letters with the same basic format that letters generally had in that culture, but instead of the meaningless boilerplate greetings—the “have a nice day”-type greetings that most people used, the NT writers would put substantive teaching in the greeting. We don’t want to skim over the greetings in the epistles because they teach important truths that we need to hear. Mostly, they teach us three things. The first is the credentials of the writer.
Peter’s Credentials
2 Peter 1:1 Simon Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christ
Those are two very high credentials. Preachers usually say the first one is a humble title and the second one is a high, authoritative role. Actually, they are both high, authoritative roles.
Slave
He calls himself a servant (or slave) of God. Slaves of a king were members of that king’s cabinet, part of the royal court. And if you follow that title “servant of God” through the OT, you’ll see that it’s applied to people like Moses, Samuel, David, and the Patriarchs. A servant of God is a leader God has chosen to have a special place in his household. Peter is claiming that role for himself, which is remarkable. He’s establishing his authority.
Now, we can also say that even though it’s a lofty position in the kingdom of God, there is still an element of lowliness to it because this is the normal word for slave. When you’re a slave, someone else owns you. You’re not the captain of your own ship, you’re not the boss of your own life. You live in a posture of submissiveness and your whole life is lived for the will of someone else, not your own will. That’s not a popular idea in our culture no matter how important your master is. You don’t often hear Christian celebrities use the term “slave of Jesus” as their main credential. Some people claim the title “apostle,” but usually not “slave.”
Apostle
Peter claimed both credentials—slave and Apostle of Jesus Christ. There are two kinds of apostles in the New Testament: Apostles of Christ and apostles of the church. And apostle of the church is a missionary—someone sent out by the church and commissioned by the church for a spiritual mission. An Apostle of Christ is an official spokesman for Christ. And that is the highest office any human outside of Christ himself has ever held. Their words carried the very authority of the Lord himself, which is why their letters are Scripture. Disobey an Apostle and you’re defying Jesus Christ.
So Peter wants us to understand right up front that this is not a casual letter among friends. This is an authoritative pronouncement from the Lord himself.
It’s very, very important to understand that the Apostles spoke for Jesus. You can really put the entire NT in red letters. Jesus told them, “What I whisper in your ear, I want you to shout from the housetops” (Mt.10:27). That’s what they’re doing in the epistles.
If anyone ever disagrees with anything in the whole NT, you can tell that person, “You’re fight is against Jesus. Are you sure you want to disagree with Jesus Christ?”
Most people don’t want to disagree with Jesus. I’ve found that when I’m talking to unbelievers, that will very often give them pause when I tell them, “Your fight isn’t with me—it’s with Jesus Christ.” A lot of times that will catch their attention.
So I’ll say that anytime anyone disagrees with anything in the whole NT, or int the OT for that matter, because Jesus regarded the OT as the Word of God.
Your Identity
So that’s the first thing we learn in these greetings—the credentials of the author. You can have full confidence that everything you read in the Bible is the very word of the Lord Jesus Christ.
The second category is super-encouraging and absolutely critical if you want to be successful in living the Christian life. It’s something most of us don’t give nearly enough attention to (I know I don’t), even though it’s strongly emphasized in Scripture. And if we did give more attention to it, walking closely with God would be much easier.
It’s the portion of the greeting that identifies the recipients. Have you ever wondered why the Apostles devoted so many words to the part of the greeting that says who the letter is written to? When you address a letter, all you’re trying to do is make sure the mailman gets it to the right person. Name … address—that’s all you put. But the Bible writers will often put a big, long description. 1 Peter is a good example.
1 Peter 1:1 Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, To God's elect, strangers in the world, … 2 who have been chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through the sanctifying work of the Spirit, for obedience to Jesus Christ and sprinkling by his blood.
Why so much description? Is it for the mailman? Is he walking all around Asia Minor looking for elect strangers in the world chosen by foreknowledge and sanctified for obedience so he can get the letter into the right hands? No. It’s not for the mailman—it’s for the recipients.
The second purpose of the greetings in the epistles is to teach you the truth about you. Why do I need to be taught about me? I need to be taught about me, and you need to be instructed about who and what you are because if you are confused about who you are and what you are supposed to be, you won’t know how to make decisions in life and your whole life will go the wrong direction.
Think about children who are confused about their gender. Or even worse—confused about whether they are even human. One of the fads within transgenderism is kids who identify as animals.
Think about that for a minute. If you are a human and you think you’re a wolf, how successful is your life going to be?
For one thing, it seems like you’d be incredibly discouraged all the time. I know I would be. If I thought I was a wolf, one thing I would know for sure—I’m a terrible wolf. Easily the worst wolf in the world. I’d be the world’s slowest wolf. I’d have the dullest teeth of any wolf and I’d starve because I can’t hunt with just my mouth. But before I starved, I would freeze to death my very first night out in the woods in the winter because I’m the most under-insulated of all wolves. I’m not even sure I could howl very well.
Pick any animal, and if I were that animal, I’d be the worst one. I’d be the skinniest cow, the weakest horse, the most flightless of all birds. If you think you’re one thing but God designed you to be something else, life will be constant frustration.
We chuckle at the animal illustration, but it’s just as true about things that aren’t so obvious. Just look at the way God describes us in all the greetings in the Epistles, and then look at what most unbelievers think life is all about, and you can see—it’s a night and day difference.
And all those things the greetings teach us—that you’re predestined, strangers in the world, holy to the Lord, servants of Christ—none of that is knowable through observation. If it’s not revealed and if you don’t learn it from those greetings, you won’t know. You won’t know who you are or what you are—what God created you to be, and so you’ll be frustrated in life.
And not only will you be frustrated, but you also won’t make good decisions in life because you won’t even know what direction you’re supposed to be going. If God made me to be a surgeon, but I don’t know that, I might waste half my life getting a degree in architecture or accounting or trying to be a pro football player. Knowing what you were made to be is what enables you to make good decisions in life that move you in the direction toward your sweet spot. All other decisions only move you away from that sweet spot toward frustration. So it’s crucially important that when the Bible teaches you about you, you listen carefully.
So what does Peter want you to know about you in his second Epistle? Look how he describes us.
1 … To those equal to us in the faith they have received because of the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ.
Equal
The way Peter wrote it, the emphasis is on the word equal. Lit: “… to the equal-to-us having received faith ones.” Peter says that to everyone reading the book, which means it applies even to the lowliest Christian there’s ever been. Peter is saying that even the worst Christian out there has a faith as precious as the Apostles’ faith.
Don’t some people have more faith than others? Of course. Jesus spoke of great faith, little faith, strong faith, weak faith—we’re all at different stages of development, but the point here is we all start with the same raw material. An acorn and an oak tree are at different stages of maturity, but they both have the same, fundamental stuff.
Your faith has the same preciousness as Peter’s. The word translated “precious” means honorable, valuable, or privileged. There are no underprivileged Christians. No one in the household of God is at a disadvantage because they started their Christian life with a substandard kind of faith. The lowest of the low start out with faith that is just as precious as the biggest of the bigshots in the kingdom of God.
Why is it important for you to know that? To boost your self-image? “I’m so special—I have faith like Peter’s! I feel so good about myself now.” We need to be careful about importing modern psychological fads into the Bible.
Are you just as amazing as an Apostle of Christ? No. Are you just as powerful? No. Do you have just as much authority? Not even close. The Apostles spoke for Christ, they wrote Scripture, they were the highest authorities in the world-wide Church, they healed people at will, cast out demons, raised the dead. I can’t do any of that.
This verse is not saying that my calling and my giftedness and my authority and my role in the Church is just as high as the Apostles’. It’s saying that ordinary salvation is a far greater thing than Apostleship. And that’s true even for the Apostles.
Peter learned that from Jesus. Remember when Jesus sent out the 72 and when they came back they were all excited about the miraculous power Jesus had given them?
Luke 10:17 Lord, even the demons submit to us in your name.
Jesus’ answer is interesting.
Luke 10:20 Do not rejoice that the spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven.
Having the power to work miracles is really, really cool, but it’s nothing compared to salvation. My role, my power, my authority will never be anywhere near as high as Peter’s was. But Peter would say, “Yeah, all that Apostleship stuff is amazing, but knowing God through faith so that my name is written in the book of life is far, far greater.” And that’s just as true of me as it was of Peter.
Faith is something the lowest Christian and the Apostles have in common because it’s the one thing all Christians have in common because it’s what makes you a Christian. You have faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, you’re a Christian, no matter what else is true about you. You don’t have faith, you’re not a Christian no matter what else is true about you.
This is essential information. You need to know beyond any doubt that you did not come from underprivileged beginnings. You don’t have a defective foundation. The resource that you started your Christian life with and that powers everything to the end is the same for every Christian. That same rocket fuel that enabled Peter and John and James and Paul and all the greatest saints throughout history to do all that they did—God has filled your tank with that exact same brand of rocket fuel.
That’s important because your identity is tied to that faith. Your destiny is tied to that faith. Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ takes you down a road that leads exactly where God created you to be. That faith is what leads you right into your sweet spot. Your identity, your destiny, what defines you, what powers your life—it’s all wrapped up in that gift of faith you have received.
If you don’t realize that, you’ll be like a kid who thinks he’s a parakeet. Nothing in your life will line up the way it should or go the direction it should without that understanding of your identity. What are you? What defines you? Faith.
Received Faith
And notice where this faith came from.
1 … To those equal to us in the faith they have received because of the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ.
The word translated “received” has a very specific meaning. It’s always used of something you end up with because of an outside action that you don’t control. Sometimes it’s used of getting something as a result of casting lots (someone rolls the dice and it falls to you), or of inheriting something after someone dies and wills that thing to you. But one way or another, apart from anything you did, something falls into your lap. Peter describes your faith—your ability to trust God—as something that fell into your lap.
How did it fall into your lap?
1 … the faith they have received because of the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ.
Your faith was given to you by God. This is one of those passages in the NT where Jesus is directly called God.
So Jesus, who is our Savior and who is almighty God, gave you your faith. Just dropped it in your lap.
That’s an unusual way of speaking because the vast majority of the time in Scripture, faith is our responsibility. We are commanded to trust God. And if we fail to believe, that’s on us. The primary way God wants us to think about faith is as something we chose to do or not do. And if we don’t believe, that’s our fault.
However, there are a handful of passages, like this one, that remind us that once we decide to believe, if we turn around and look carefully at what happened, we’ll see that it was God. Peter said this once before in one of his sermons.
Acts 3:16 … It is Jesus' name and the faith that comes through him that has given this complete healing ….
The ability to have faith in Jesus comes to us through Jesus.
Ephesians 2:8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith--and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God.
All of it, including the faith, is a gift from God.
Philippians 1:29 For it has been granted to you on behalf of Christ … to believe on him ….
When I placed my trust in Christ, ultimately, that was God’s doing. Faith is a gift.
There are people who object to that because it’s too Calvinistic for their tastes. But regardless of what you think about Calvinism, wouldn’t all sides would agree that anytime we obey God, it happens because it is God who works in us to will and to act?
Philippians 2:13 for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose.
So if you think of faith as an act of your own free will—great. Faith is most definitely an act of your will. But anytime you exercise your own free will, you still have to acknowledge that it was God who worked in you to will the way you did.
If our faith is not from God, none of our virtues are. All virtues come through faith, so if faith isn’t from God, nothing in the Christian life is from God. But if faith is from God, then all of it is from God.
And I think most Christians understand that intuitively. You look back on your conversion, and you ask, “Why didn’t it happen sooner? What was it in that moment that made the difference?” Most of us can sense, God did something in that moment.
Through Righteousness
So, the ability to trust Christ that dropped into your lap—that ability came from Christ as a gift, and it’s equal in value and honor and privilege even to the Apostles’ faith, why? Because of a specific attribute of God.
1 … To those equal to us in the faith they have received because of the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ.
We could take that one of two ways. It could be saying that Jesus is righteous, he wants us to also be righteous, so he gave us the one tool that can make us righteous—faith. And since God wants all of his people to be righteous, he wouldn’t give any of us defective, sub-standard faith. He gave us all a premium faith that is capable of getting us to righteousness. So in that sense, we received this faith through his righteousness.
The other possibility is that righteousness is used here in the narrower, more literal sense of fairness or justice. So then the idea is we all received the same precious faith because of the fairness of God. God is just, he shows no favoritism, and so we all get the same precious faith.
Both of those ideas are true. I’m not 100% sure which one Peter has in mind here, but I lean toward the first. Either way, you have faith as precious as the Apostles’ faith because it was dropped in your lap because of the righteousness of God.
Keep that in mind. Whenever you have a hard decision to make, whenever you’re picking a direction in life, anytime you face a temptation, remind yourself, you are a person who was given precious faith through the righteousness of God. That’s who you are, it’s what you are, and it points you in the direction of where you belong.
The Best of God’s Gifts
Okay, so the greetings teach us three things:
1) The credentials of the author (you can trust the Scriptures).
2) The identity of the recipients (don’t be like a kid who thinks he’s a ware wolf—learn from God who and what you are).
Now the third. This is the author’s wish for you. And by “author” I mean both Peter and the Holy Spirit. I mainly mean the Holy Spirit because no matter who the human author is, the wish part of the greeting is almost always the same.
2 Grace and peace be yours in abundance through knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord.
Peace
Peace refers to harmony, rest, peace with God, peace with people, peace within yourself. It comes from the Hebrew concept of shalom—good health, overall wellbeing and blessing from God.
Grace
The greater emphasis is on the word grace. That’s the term he repeats at the end of the book.
2 Peter 3:18 Grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord.
If you want the answer of the question we started with—what’s the absolute best thing you could ever wish someone you love, here it is. Grace. I counted thirty-four times in the NT where the Holy Spirit inspired the writer to say to his readers, “Grace to you.” Can you think of anything else that’s repeated 34 times in the NT? Paul says it, Peter says it, John, the writer of Hebrews, it is in the book of Revelation. It is not just one writer's style - you see it in seventeen different New Testament books. God is making a point. There’s nothing more valuable, nothing more profitable or more healthy, nothing you need more in your life than grace.
Definition
I think most Christians have a bit of a reductionistic concept of grace. They think it just means cutting someone some slack or being patient with someone. Or giving an undeserved gift. Those are at the fringe of what grace means—there’s so much more to it.
Grace is a massive concept in Scripture, but here’s the most basic summary I can give: Grace is the favor shown from a superior to an inferior. The grace of God is what happens to you when God smiles on your life.
What is that? Scripture points to a lot of amazing things that happen when God smiles on your life. Sometimes it’s things like salvation, election, or forgiveness of sins. Those are all results of grace. But by far the most common result of grace is empowerment for ministry. Empowerment, or the assignment to do the ministry. I counted 31 different passages where that was the result of grace. Grace is power.
1 Corinthians 15:10 … his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them….
When you receive the smile of God on your life, it results in a lot of hard work because grace is power. We’ll see that as we work through this chapter. Growing in grace is the theme of the book, Peter starts and ends with that. And right after he introduces it verse 2, he immediately begins speaking about divine power.
2 Grace and peace be yours in abundance … 3 His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness.
Grace is spiritual power, and the results of that power in your life are incredible.
Benefits
If you’re into health food, you might read about the benefits of antioxidants, or the benefits of a high fiber diet, or the benefits of exercise. What are the benefits of grace? Here are a few I found in the NT. In addition to eternal salvation (Tit.2:11), when you get grace, people will love you more (2 Cor.9:14). You will have so much joy that will well up in generosity (2 Cor.8:1-9). According to Titus 2:12, grace will increase your self-control. It will give you encouragement and hope (2 Thess.2:16) It will give you satisfaction in life – even when you suffer (2 Cor.12:9). You will be built up spiritually (Acts 20:32). You will be strengthened (1 Cor.15:10, Heb.13:9). You will be made more holy (2 Cor.1:12). You’ll be full of gratitude (2 Cor.4:15). You will abound in every good work (2 Cor.9:8). You will have great success in ministry (1 Tim.1:14, 2 Tim.2:1). When we need something from God, Hebrews 4:16 tells us to approach the throne of grace.
We pray for our loved ones to have safe travels, good health, to get the job they want, a spouse—why don’t we pray more often for them to get more grace? The only possible explanation is that we don’t understand the incredible value of grace. If we did, we would beg God for more of it constantly—for ourselves and those we love.
And again, this is so important because whatever you believe is most valuable is the thing that will steer the direction of your life. Most people probably don’t even realize what their hearts value most highly. They might think it’s family, but deep down, what they crave the most and what steers their life is approval. For someone else, it really is family. For others, money, success, fame, physical pleasure, productivity.
You can tell what you truly believe is most important by the direction of your life. What are you running after, working for, wishing for, praying for—what’s that thing you’re devastated when you don’t get it or elated when you do? If we had any connection to reality, the answer would be grace.
The Pathway to Grace
One last question. If grace is that valuable, and Peter’s main purpose is for us to get more of it, how does that happen? What is the pathway to getting more grace than what you have right now? The long answer is spelled out in the whole rest of the book. The short answer is spelled out in the rest of this verse.
2 Grace and peace be yours in abundance through knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord.
You get more grace by deepening your knowledge of God. We’re out of time now, but we’ll get into this in a lot of detail next time because Peter brings up knowing God again in the very next verse.
3 His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us.
You get more grace through knowledge of God, you tap in to divine power through knowledge of God, and that shows again the connection between grace and power from God. And you can turn on the spigot of grace in your life through knowledge.
Conclusion
This passage hasn’t commanded us to do anything. God didn’t give us this text so you would hear it and then run out and put it into practice. There are no imperatives, no commands. The purpose of the passage is not action, but attitude—to shift your values. God gave us this text because he wants us to have three things:
1) Confidence in his Word.
The writers of Scripture were commissioned and empowered by Jesus. When you read something in the Bible it is always exactly what your Creator wants to say to you.
2) He wants you to understand some things about yourself.
Precious faith has dropped into your lap. You’ve been given the same jet fuel as the best of the best because of Christ’s righteousness.
Let that fact shape your decisions and direction in life.
3) He wants your heart to wrap around the value of his grace.
He wants you to want it. He wants you to want it for yourself and for those you love.
In all the weeks to come, when Peter gives us a whole lot of teaching about how to get more grace from God, it won’t hit you the way it should unless you have a ravenous appetite for grace first.
So let’s spend this month letting the truth sink in more deeply about the faith we’ve been given, and let’s preach constantly to our souls about the staggering value of grace, so that when we get together again next time, we’ll be on the edge of our seats ready for Peter to show us how to use our knowledge of God to get more grace.
