Pondering the Word
For God’s own people
By Daniel Hertzler
The letter of 1 Peter was written to Christians under pressure in hostile environments. Most of us can take its exhortations to stand firm in the face of opposition quite casually since our neighbors are generally friendly. But many believers throughout the world would identify more directly with the original readers.
As I write, leaders in Vietnam’s Mennonite Church are imprisoned. In Colombia, Mennonites who advocate for the poor and the oppressed are also being harassed. Those of us who attended Mennonite World Conference in Zimbabwe in 2003 found that fellow believers there are oppressed by a corrupt government. For all Christians who take their status seriously, tension with their social system may develop at any time.
The letter of 1 Peter bristles with theological themes, but three stand out in particular: identity, perseverance, and hope. The issue of identity appears right at the beginning where the letter is addressed to “the exiles of the Dispersion.” Those of us who cross the Canada-U.S. border for short stints are conscious of our identity. How much more would our identity matter if we were to live continuously as exiles!
Knowing who you are
Who were these exiles? It appears that Peter was using this term as a metaphor and comparing Gentile Christians with Jews of the Diaspora. Since the first Christians were Jews, for a time the Roman Empire assigned them the same status as Jews—generally tolerated but not always appreciated because they did not participate in pagan activities. When numbers of Gentiles became Christians, they too became identified as people who were different— who refused to worship at the pagan shrines.
Peter encourages these Christians by enabling them to feel confident and to flourish in spite of opposition. In Peter’s view, the yearning for something new expressed by the Hebrew prophets has come to fruition in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. These new Christians are on the ground floor of this new creation. Indeed, it is a “new birth into a living hope” (1:3).
Their identity as God’s people comes into sharp focus in 2:9-10 where Peter draws on Hosea 2:23 to indicate that those who once were “not a people” now are “God’s people” (2:10a). Peter asserts here as throughout the letter that the promises made to the Hebrews now apply to Gentile Christians.
Most Christians find it challenging to make a clean break with their culture. Stanley Hauerwas and William Willimon developed this theme at length in their book Resident Aliens (Abingdon, 1989). I met Hauerwas during the run up to the Iraqi war. He said that he felt “very lonely.” Most of his Christian friends followed what Walter Wink has described as the “myth of redemptive violence” and thus supported the Bush administration in its campaign against Saddam Hussein. To be exiles and aliens is sometimes an uncomfortable position.
Staying true
But a second theme in 1 Peter is a call for perseverance in spite of whatever opposition may appear. Researchers have not found evidence of widespread systematic persecution during that time. More likely there were local outbursts of opposition because of the Christians’ unwillingness to support the local pagan system.
Accordingly, Peter repeatedly stresses the importance of a lifestyle consistent with their status as “God’s own people.” Throughout the letter Peter alternates between references to the believers’ new status and to the responsibilities this presses upon them. The exhortations begin early: “Discipline yourselves” (1:13) and “rid yourselves...of all malice” (2:1). These exhortations become more pointed in 2:12: “Conduct yourselves honorably among the Gentiles.” “Even if you do suffer for doing what is right,” he says in 3:13, “do not be intimidated.” And again in 4:12, “Do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal that is taking place among you.” Peter’s readers should be ready for anything.
Holding to hope
They can be ready because of the third theme, hope. It is introduced at the beginning as “a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance and perishable, undefiled, and unfading” (1:3-4). Like anyone recruiting people for a cause, Peter offers a reward. But it may not have been what some expected.
Some scholars think that Isaiah 65 and 66 figures in the thinking behind 1 Peter. If so, the passages were not to be taken literally—or these Christians would have been transported to Jerusalem. While the land of Israel is of great importance to the writers of the Old Testament, New Testament writers show little interest in the literal land. The “exiles” of 1 Peter are promised an “inheritance” of a different order. It is “kept in heaven for you” (1:4). In 1 Peter, as in Revelation, heaven and the earth seem to be in conversation.
Some today may worry about offering this kind of hope to the poor and persecuted as a “pie in the sky.” At the least, we who are not persecuted and have resources to share should not use 1 Peter as an excuse for not attending to the needy. Yet there is a kind of hope here that provides perspective and encouragement in any situation.
Erland Waltner, in his commentary, 1 and 2 Peter and Jude (Herald Press), cites the experience of Jurgen Moltmann, a German soldier in World War II who came to despair in a prison camp but obtained a copy of the Bible and began to read the Psalms. “Step by step his faith and hope grew.” Eventually he began a “highly productive ministry as a theologian, teacher, and author whose ‘theology of hope’ has had worldwide impact.”
Identity, perseverance, and hope—these are the gifts that flow from the resurrection of Jesus, which we celebrate this season. They bear us up in any season of our lives, but especially when we’re feeling the pull of the competing values and pressures of the world around us.Daniel Hertzler is instructor for “The Biblical Story,” Unit 2 of Pastoral Studies Distance Education of Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary. He is also author of the memoir A Little Left of Center (Pandora Press US, 2000).