1 Peter 2:9-10: The Privileges of God’s People (Part 2)

1 Peter 2:9-10: The Privileges of God’s People (Part 2)

We’ve been working our way passage by passage through the book of 1 Peter, and today the next passage we come to is 1 Peter 2:9-10. It says,

9 But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. 10 Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. 

May God bless the reading of his Word.

Let’s pray: Father, we come to you with all kinds of needs this morning. But we believe that, by your Spirit and through your Word, you can minister to every need we have. So please do that and, above all, draw us into a deeper relationship with you. It’s in Jesus’ name we pray, amen. 

One of the most fundamental desires that people have is a desire for significance. We want our lives to count for something and to feel like we really matter in the grand scheme of things. In fact, I think we could even say that, assuming all of our physical needs are met, this search for significance is often what defines us. 

And there are a wide variety of things that people look to for significance. Many look to their career in order to feel significant. They live as though their worth as a person is directly tied to their professional achievements. Others try to find significance in a romantic relationship or by accumulating money or material possessions or by being physically attractive or by having a large following on social media or by engaging in various creative or artistic pursuits or—and this is big one nowadays—through political activism. 

Or maybe someone directs their focus toward their children in their search for significance and tries to live vicariously through their children’s achievements. A couple of weeks ago, our family went to the Children’s Museum. And there was a piano in one of the large lobbies there. And we saw these two young kids—I’m guessing maybe ages 5 and 6, a brother and sister—playing the piano. It was available for anyone to play, so they were playing it. And I’ve never seen any child play the piano this well in my entire life—at least not live and in person. It was definitely the kind of talent you’d expect to see on TV or on a YouTube video with millions of views. Not surprisingly, everyone in the lobby was absolutely riveted and enjoying the performance and taking pictures and videos. It really was remarkable. 

Yet after these young children had finished playing a couple of songs, the mother took the girl aside and began to scold her for several minutes. I’m not sure exactly what the mother said, but it was obvious that she was very unhappy with the quality of the little girl’s performance and was giving the girl a detailed critique what she did wrong. And the little girl—again, about 5 years old—was just standing at attention the whole time as she dutifully listened to her mother’s critique. 

And I obviously don’t know the mother’s heart, but that seems to be an example of the fact that people are searching for significance—either directly in their own lives or, at times, through their children and their children’s achievements. Again, the search for significance is often what ends up defining us and being what our entire lives center around. 

And to be clear, I don’t think it’s wrong that we want our lives to have significance. The problem is that we often search for significance in the wrong ways and through the wrong things. As a result, we inevitably come up empty. Even if we find a measure of significance in various earthly things, there always seems to be something lacking. We always seem to come up short. Not only that, any sense of significance we do manage to experience from various earthly things is incredibly fragile and short-lived. Careers inevitably end, relationships turn sour, possessions wear out, physical beauty fades away, political movements fail, and children rebel—especially if we’ve been putting an unhealthy amount of pressure on them. So, any time we try to find our ultimate sense of significance in these earthly things, we’re going to be disappointed.

However, there is a place where we can find significance and not be disappointed, and that is in a relationship with God. The significance we find in a relationship with God is immeasurably deeper and more durable and secure than any significance that’s rooted in these earthy things. So, true significance is found not in ourselves and what we achieve but rather in God and God’s love for us and the various privileges and blessings he graciously imparts to us. 

And that leads us to what we find here in our main passage of 1 Peter 2:9-10. Now, if you were here last week, you may remember that we looked at verses 4-8 and explored several magnificent privileges that Peter mentioned. And we see more of the same in verses 9-10. So, this week’s message is really part two of last week’s message. And just like last week, the main idea we’ll see this morning is that Christians enjoy incomparable privileges in and through Jesus. Again, Christians enjoy incomparable privileges in and through Jesus. And these privileges are what give our lives meaning and significance. 

So, let’s look at what Peter says here. Remember that he’s writing to Christians who are enduring persecution because of their allegiance to Jesus and could really use some encouragement. So, Peter reminds them in verse 9, “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.” Don’t those privileges sound magnificent? “[A] chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, [and] a people for [God’s] own possession.”

Looking at the first of those four privileges, “a chosen race” is a reference to the fact that God’s chosen us to be his own. At the very beginning of 1 Peter, Peter referred to his readers as “elect,” meaning that God had elected them or chosen them for all of the privileges and blessings they enjoyed. And we now find that same concept again here in chapter 2. 

And this phrase, “a chosen race,” is one that’s actually rooted in God’s description of his people Israel back in the Old Testament. In Deuteronomy 7:6-8, Moses publicly declared to the Israelites, 6 “For you are a people holy to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession, out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth. 7 It was not because you were more in number than any other people that the Lord set his love on you and chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples, 8 but it is because the Lord loves you and is keeping the oath that he swore to your fathers….” So, God’s choice of the Israelites had nothing to do with their impressiveness or merit or worthiness of any kind. Instead, we read in verse 8 that God chose them not because of who they were but because of who he is—because of his love for them and his faithfulness to the promises he had made to their forefathers. 

In a similar way[1 Peter 2:9], we’re told in numerous places throughout the New Testament—such as Romans 9 and Acts 13:48—that God’s choice of individuals today to be among his people and to be the recipients of his saving grace isn’t based on their personal worthiness but is instead based solely on his own sovereign will and his undeserved love for them. 

And I’ll tell you what: I’m not sure there’s there any doctrine in the Bible that crushes our pride the way the doctrine of election does. This truth that God choose us simply because of his unmerited mercy rather than because of anything in us is a truth that takes a wrecking ball to our pride. It humbles us by reminding us of how unworthy we are of anything better than hell and simultaneously exalts God by shing a spotlight on his breathtaking mercy and love and grace. It’s also a doctrine that gives us immense comfort since we know that God never changes and therefore that his sovereign will won’t ever change. This means that our eternal future in heaven is unshakably secure because it rests not on our own fickle will but rather on our unchanging God. 

Then, moving forward, as we look at the next three privileges Peter lists in our main passage, we discover that these privileges also have very clear roots in the Old Testament. Not only do we find similar language in Deuteronomy 7 that we looked at just a few moments ago, we find phrases that are even more similar in Exodus 19:5-6. Right before God gives the Ten Commandments to the Israelites, he says to them through Moses, 5 “Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine; 6 and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation….” Notice the phrases “treasured possession,” “kingdom of priests,” and “holy nation.” These three phrases in Exodus are virtually identical the next three phrases Peter uses to describe the privileges Christians enjoy. So, Peter takes what’s said of Israel and applies it to the church. 

In verse 9, he calls them “a royal priesthood.” Now, the priesthood is something we touched on last week. During Old Testament times, priests had several responsibilities, the most important of which was offering sacrifices on behalf of the people. Priests were the only ones God permitted to offer sacrifices. In addition, only the priests were allowed to go into the room called the Holy Place within the temple compound. So, priests had unique access to God and functioned essentially as intermediaries between God and the rest of the Israelites. 

And it’s intriguing that, in what we just read from Exodus 19, God expressed a desire for the Israelites ultimately not just to have a priesthood but to be a “kingdom of priests”—meaning that every one of them would be a priest. That was never entirely fulfilled in the Old Testament, but we do find that fulfilled in the New Testament—as we can clearly see here in verse 9 of our main passage. Every Christian is a part of this “royal priesthood.” We all have direct access to God and the privilege of being able to enter his holy presence and enjoy the closest of relationships with him. 

Yet, notice in the text that we’re a part not just of any priesthood but of a “royal priesthood.” This is actually something that’s strikingly different than what was the case in the Old Testament—because in the Old Testament, the priestly line was completely separate from the royal line. Priests came from the tribe of Levi, while kings came from the tribe of Judah. So, nobody was able to be both a king and a priest. It was impossible. 

Yet, the Bible teaches that Jesus actually holds both offices. Jesus is identified in numerous places as the ultimate fulfillment of the offices of both king and priest. And since Christians have been united with Jesus, we also enjoy the privilege not only of ministering as priests but of reigning as royalty. This is also confirmed in Revelation 5:9-10 and in Revelation 20:6. In both of those passages, we find statements of Christians being priests and also reigning as royalty with God. Both of those concepts are found in both of those passages.

Then, moving forward a bit more quickly now, Peter also says that Christians comprise “a holy nation.” This is identical to the way God described Israel in Exodus 19. And it speaks of the fact that, just as Israel was separate and set apart to God in the Old Testament, Christians are separate and set apart to God today. That’s what the word “holy” means. 

And, finally, Peter refers to Christians as “a people for his own possession”—that is, of course, for God’s own possession. Again, Peter’s employing the language of Exodus 19, where God calls the Israelites his “treasured possession among all peoples.” The term translated as “possession” in 1 Peter often referred to acquiring a piece of property through the payment of a price. For example, someone might purchase a field and be said to have acquired “possession” of that field. 

Likewise, Christians also have been purchased—but not with money. As Peter reminded us back in 1 Peter 1:18, 18…you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, 19 but with the precious blood of Christ…. In a manner of speaking, Jesus paid for us at the price of his own blood through his death on the cross. Even though our sins deserved God’s punishment, Jesus suffered the full force of that punishment in our place on the cross. He paid the ultimate price to rescue us from our sins, before being raised from the dead three days later. As a result, we now belong to him. In the words of verse 9, we’re “a people for his own possession.”

And friends, I can’t think of anything else that satisfies our desire for belonging as much as this right here. You know, it seems that one thing we all have in common is that we desire to belong to something. You can see this desire exhibited pretty much from middle school onward. In fact, it’s often the most obvious in middle school. Kids from that age group are continually, it seems, trying to figure out how they can fit in with their peers. 

Thinking back, one of the ways I tried to fit in with the “cool kids” as a middle-schooler was by wearing a ridiculous amount of hair gel. I mean, if you saw me, you’d think someone had just dumped a bucket of water on my head. And I’d spend about 20-40 minutes every morning putting that stuff in my hair—because it had to be perfect. The large spikes of hair that came down my forehead had to be formed just right. Because if they weren’t, my coolness factor for that day would be seriously diminished. It would throw off my whole day. That’s how important it was for me to be accepted by a certain group of my peers and to feel like I belonged to that group.   

And even though that desire to belong might be especially obvious among middle-schoolers, make no mistake: adults have that same desire. We want to feel like we belong. And usually, our desire for belonging is oriented toward a particular group of people—namely, those who are most like us. The business leader wants to be accepted and respected among fellow business leaders, the university professor wants to have the respect of university colleagues, and the union laborer wants to be accepted and respected among what’s often referred to as the “brotherhood” of their labor union. 

And it doesn’t have to be career-related. The homeschooling mom wants other homeschooling moms to accept her into their circle. The person who goes to the gym every day wants to fit in with others at the gym. The college student wants to be accepted by others in their fraternity or sorority. The athlete wants to be accepted by the rest of the athletic team and be regarded as an important part of that team. And the devoted political activist is often seeking a sense of belonging in whatever political movement they’ve identified themselves with. 

So, just about everyone has a desire to belong—and usually to belong to a certain group or movement. Yet what we read here in 1 Peter is a great reminder for us that deepest and greatest way in which our desire for belonging can be satisfied is in God and the fact that’s he’s paid the price to redeem us from our sins so that we’re now “a people for his own possession.” We belong to him and are forever and irrevocably included among his people. 

So, those are the privileges that Christians enjoy. We’re “a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for [God’s] own possession.” And again, all of these are drawn from the Old Testament. Peter’s taking privileges that were originally meant for Israel and is applying them to the church. And that raises a huge theological question. Has the church now replaced Israel in being God’s chosen people? Has God cast Israel aside and instead replaced them with the church so that it would be appropriate to refer to the church as the “New Israel”? There are many who would argue that and point to 1 Peter 2:9 and as a key biblical passage that teaches that view. 

However, I don’t think that’s the meaning of this verse. Peter isn’t saying that the church has replaced Israel but simply that the church now enjoys many of the same blessings Israel enjoyed. In Romans 11, Paul speaks of it as the Gentiles—or non-Israelites—being grafted into the vine, as it were, and coming to share in the privileges that belong to the people of God. 

So, Israel was God’s chosen people in the Old Testament, and God still has plans for them in the New Testament. We learn later in Romans 11 that there’s going to be a massive revival among the Israelites in the future in which the vast majority of them will turn to God and embrace Jesus as their Messiah. So, even though Israel is no longer front and center in the New Testament, God still has plans for them. The focus of the New Testament, though, is indeed on the church, which is comprised of believing Israelites and believing Gentiles brought together to form the one people of God. So, again, the church hasn’t replaced Israel. Instead, believing Gentiles have been grafted into the vine of believing Israelites in order to form the one people of God which is the church. So, there you go—centuries of debate in church history solved in under three minutes. 

And even if that entire debate kind of makes your head spin, one thing we can hopefully all appreciate is simply how rich and glorious these privileges here in 1 Peter 2:9 are. To say that they’re magnificent would be an understatement. These privileges are beyond magnificent. In reality, they’re nothing less than astounding. Brothers and sisters, this is how much God loves us. He loves us so much that he allows us to enjoy these privileges and even sent his own Son Jesus to purchase these privileges for us through his death on the cross. If there’s one thing we should take away from this verse, that would be it—these privileges as an expression of the depth of God’s love.

Yet that’s not all. As we continue reading in verse 9, we see that there’s a purpose for which God’s given us these privileges and a result he expects them to have in our lives. Look once more at what Peter writes: “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.”

In other words, God’s saved us from our sins and given us these astounding privileges so that we can “proclaim [his] excellencies.” That’s our central calling and therefore what should be central in our lives. Proclaiming God’s excellencies. Declaring both with our lips and with our lives the greatness and glory of God. That’s why God created us in the first place and also why he redeemed us—so we could make known to all creation how great and glorious he is. 

Obviously, that’s a lot different than the mindset we had before we became Christians. But that’s a key element of what becoming a Christian is all about. We might say that it’s about experiencing a Copernican Revolution of sorts. Before the Copernican Revolution, of course, everyone thought the planets all revolved around the earth. However, because of the work of Nicolaus Copernicus and several others after him, the scientific community gradually came to accept the fact that everything revolves not around the earth but around the sun. It was a radical change in the way people viewed the universe—which is why it’s called the Copernican Revolution. 

Similarly, becoming a Christian is about experiencing a kind of Copernican Revolution with our own hearts and lives. Instead of us being the center of our universe, God becomes the center of our universe. Everything in our lives begins to revolve around glorifying God—and not merely as a duty, either. Instead, it becomes our delight to glorify God. In the words of Peter, it becomes our delight to “proclaim his excellencies.”

And there are two ways in which we do that. Most fundamentally, we do that in worship. We proclaim God’s own excellencies back to him. We praise him for his holiness, we marvel at his love, we rejoice in the grace he’s shown, we extol his wisdom and power and faithfulness and mercy. We give him glory as the one who, as Peter says, has “called [us] out of darkness into his marvelous light.”

Yet we also proclaim God’s excellencies not only to God himself in worship but also to the people around us—especially those who aren’t yet Christians. We make known to them what God’s done for us in rescuing us from our sins, and we seek to help them see how glorious he is and know him as we’ve come to know him and love him as we’ve come to love him.  If you’ve been a recipient of God’s saving grace in the gospel, there should be something within you that yearns to share that with others. It should be the most natural thing in the world for you to “proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.”

By the way, when Peter speaks of God “calling” us in this way, he’s referring to what’s often known as the effectual call to salvation. Theologians distinguish between God’s general call to salvation and his effectual call. God’s general call goes out generally to every single person in the world and invites them to put their trust in Jesus and be saved. And unfortunately, this general call is often ignored. Yet, there’s also an effectual call that’s directed only toward the elect. And this effectual call is always effective. God not only invites us to put our trust in Jesus, he also works in our hearts in our hearts in such a way that we have an overwhelming desire to do that very thing. We might say that God’s effectual call imparts to us all of the grace that’s necessary in order for us to come to faith. 

A good illustration of the effectual call to salvation is when Jesus called out to Lazarus to come out of his tomb. Lazarus had died several days prior to that and had been buried in a tomb. Yet when Jesus called to him to come out, life entered Lazarus’s body once again, and he came out. That physical occurrence is a lot like what happens spiritually when God calls someone to salvation with an effectual call. And that’s the kind of call Peter’s talking about here in verse 9. 

And Peter says that God’s called us “out of darkness into his marvelous light.” We were once in “darkness” in the sense that we were both spiritually ignorant and morally deviant. That is, we were unable to spiritually comprehend the truth of the gospel, and we were enslaved to our sinful desires. We were living in darkness. And truth be told, we actually didn’t just live in the darkness—we loved the darkness. That’s that John 3:19-20 tells us. It says that we “loved the darkness rather than the light” and that we actually hated the light and refused to come to the light lest our sins be exposed. 

However, in his mercy, God called us out of that darkness and into his marvelous light. And friends, let’s never allow ourselves to forget how marvelous this light truly is. You know, when it comes to physical light, some lights are obviously much brighter than others. Picture, for a moment, the light of a match. If you’re in a very dark room, the light of a match might be sufficient to help you see where you’re going. However, the light of a match isn’t anywhere near as helpful as the light of a high-powered LED flashlight. You can see much better and farther with the light of that flashlight. And yet, the light of a flashlight is nothing compared to the lights you find illuminating a football stadium. And the lights of a football stadium, in turn, are nothing when compared to the blinding light of the sun. 

And I think that’s helpful as we seek to understand just how marvelous the light of the gospel is. There are many other places in which people in our society search for illumination. They might seek the light that comes through education, the light that comes through philosophical reasoning, or the light that supposedly comes from meditation and mindfulness. Yet, in reality, any light that we ever get through our own unaided efforts is no better than the light of match, whereas the light we have in the gospel is brighter than the sun. It truly is a “marvelous light”—a light that makes any other light seem like a tiny match in comparison. And when the Holy Spirit shines this light into our hearts, we see how marvelous this light truly is and wonder how we never saw it before. 

So, praise God that he’s called us “out of darkness into his marvelous light.” The darkness was indeed a dreadful darkness. But hopefully that helps us appreciate even more just how marvelous this light is. It would be similar to someone who had been born blind having some type of sophisticated new surgery and, as a result, being able to see the light of the sun for the very first time. What a wonderful and glorious sight that would be! And for those of us who are Christians, that’s the sight we have as redeemed sinners—as those whom God’s called “out of darkness into his marvelous light.” What a wonderful thing!

Peter then continues to contrast what we were in the past to what we are now in verse 10. He writes, “Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.” Praise God for the mercy we’ve received! And I want to emphasize that if you haven’t yet received God’s mercy, it’s available for you even this morning. In fact, all of the privileges and blessings we’ve talked about today are available to you—if you’ll stop trying to live life your own way and will instead give your life to Jesus and put your trust exclusively in Jesus to rescue you from your sins.