1Pe 1:1 Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, To those
who are elect exiles of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia,
Asia, and Bithynia.
Peter’s first epistle is written the Christians to encourage
them to be patient when they aren’t being treated fairly through persecution
and also to persevere through the everyday trials of life. He uses the term “elect exiles” which
immediately points out that we are to see our purpose in this life differently
than the lost around us. We are in a
sense alien life forms. We look like the
average human being but our true home is up above and our loyalty is not to
this world but to our Supreme Leader who sent us here for his purposes and
there is a day of reckoning coming in which we will have to give an account to
our time spent in this “foreign world”.
We are in the world but not of the world because we live for a different
cause than the lost; we live for a God that this world rejects.
I think Christianity can also be compared to being a spy
sent by a government to infiltrate a country they are at war with. A spy participates in the activities of the
country he is in but not for the same reason the normal citizens do. He is there to undermine and compromise the
country he is in for the good of his homeland.
What he cannot do is to forget why he is there and get a job and start
living for the good of that country and become a loyal citizen and fail to send
back reports to his government.
Everything he does is to be with his homeland in mind and if he gets so
caught up in his “cover story” that he doesn’t have time to his undercover
work, he basically becomes a traitor to those that sent him.
So it is also a little like an undercover cop sent into deep
cover to infiltrate a criminal organization.
The whole organization is illegal and it is just a matter of time before
it is all going to be brought to justice.
He is there to help this along, and it would be against his whole reason
for being undercover if he actually started helping the organization in its
criminal activity and failed to report back and follow orders from his boss.
The point I am trying to illustrate is that very often
Christians forget who sent them into the world and why they are here and they
start to act like all the rebels around them.
We get so caught up in life that we don’t work for our homeland and our
King. Of course, one big difference
between my illustrations and being a Christian is that we aren’t undercover
spies. We are here to tell everyone that
they are in a rebellious kingdom that is going to be destroyed. We are to tell them that this whole crime
family is about to be arrested and condemned and that they had better get right
with the Law Giver before it is too late.
Peter, Paul and Jesus all make the point that this will turn
most citizens of this present world into our enemies but don’t worry this is
all part of the plan.
Joh 15:18 "If the world hates you, know that it
has hated me before it hated you. Joh 15:19
If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but
because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore
the world hates you. Joh 15:20 Remember
the word that I said to you: 'A servant is not greater than his master.' If
they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they
will also keep yours.
Joh 16:1 "I have said all these things to you to
keep you from falling away. Joh 16:2
They will put you out of the synagogues. Indeed, the hour is coming when
whoever kills you will think he is offering service to God. Joh 16:3 And they will do these things because they
have not known the Father, nor me.
1Th 2:14 For you, brothers, became imitators of the
churches of God in Christ Jesus that are in Judea. For you suffered the same
things from your own countrymen as they did from the Jews, 1Th 2:15 who killed both the Lord Jesus and the
prophets, and drove us out, and displease God and oppose all mankind 1Th
2:16 by hindering us from speaking to
the Gentiles that they might be saved—so as always to fill up the measure of
their sins. But wrath has come upon them at last!
It is our duty to think and act like we are citizens of
heaven and not of this world or we undermine our message that this world is
going to be judged. How can we who are
dead to sin continue to live in it? If we
tell the lost that this world is passing away and we live like there is nothing
or no one more important then why should they believe what we are saying?
1Jn 2:15 Do not love the world or the things in the
world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 1Jn
2:16 For all that is in the world—the
desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from
the Father but is from the world. 1Jn 2:17
And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does
the will of God abides forever.
