Chosen, Brought In, & Scattered

“Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, To those who are elect exiles of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in the sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience to Jesus Christ and for sprinkling with his blood: May grace and peace be multiplied to you.”

1 Peter 1:1-2

The question of what exactly is meant by this ‘Dispersion’ (v. 1b) will help us connect the author, the audience, the date, and maybe even what is called the provenance: that is, the place from which it is written. Those five places that are mentioned—‘Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia’ (v. 1c)—are provinces, or territories, not cities. Together, they make up Asia Minor, or what the modern map refers to as Turkey. Some have thought that this dispersion is the typical word used for Jewish scatterings, and since Peter was the apostle to the Jews, this letter has a distinctly Jewish audience, as the diaspora in view was obviously 70 AD once Jerusalem was leveled. The main problem with that is clear. Peter could not have been the author if that was so.1 Others have pointed to remaining Jewish communities from the time Claudius expelled the Jews from Rome in the year 49, so it is reasonable many were still there a decade later.2

The Apostle Peter’s authorship was taken for granted by the early church. He is quoted as early as Polycarp in the early second century, as well as by Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, and Eusebius.3 The author also claims to be “a witness of the sufferings of Christ” (5:1).

One more expression at the end of the letter solidifies not only Peter’s authorship but the place from which he wrote. He says, “She who is at Babylon, who is likewise chosen, sends you greetings, and so does Mark, my son” (5:13). I will read an extended quote from Wayne Grudem’s commentary on 1 Peter, as I think it hones in on a key to understanding the message of this book in terms of Peter’s seat of writing from this “Babylon.”

Here Peter can hardly be referring to the ancient city Babylon in Mesopotamia, the capital of the Babylonian empire, for by the first century it was a small and obscure place. There is no evidence of a visit there by Peter … Nor is there evidence even of a Christian church there at this time … But the name ‘Babylon’ is used elsewhere in the New Testament as a reference to Rome (see Rev. 16:19; 17:5; 18:2; and note 17:9 as an identification of the ‘seven hills of’ Rome). Just as the Old Testament Babylon was the center of worldly power and opposition to God’s people, so in the time of the New Testament Rome was the earthly center of a world-wide system of government and life which was set in opposition to the gospel. By referring to Rome as ‘Babylon’, Peter was carrying through the imagery of the church as the new people of God or the new Israel, which he uses throughout the letter.4

Now, beyond all that, there is plenty of evidence that Peter wound up in Rome for his own martyrdom. Since Peter had learned his lesson at Antioch about the Judaizer error, it is best to conclude that these were churches where Jewish and Gentile believers worshiped together, and were still being reminded that they were “one new man in the place of two” (Eph. 2:15).

There is a paradox that runs through this letter, and it hits its reader across the forehead in the very first words about elect exiles. We can divide it into three parts:

(i.) God’s People are a Chosen People

(ii.) God’s People are a Pilgrim People

(iii.) God’s People are a Scattered People

Doctrine. God’s ultimate chosen people were brought in by being scattered throughout the world.

God’s People are a Chosen People.

The word for ‘elect’ or ‘chosen’ is in the dative plural (Ἐκλεκτοῖς),5 so it is the indirect object, concerning the recipients of the letter—(the direct object being this letter) TO THE ELECT—but it’s plural too: requiring that each is treated as a chosen individual.

The sovereignty of God is displayed in miniature here in the same trinitarian way that it is by Paul in Ephesians 1:3-14, though the order differs. Here, the order is the Father, then the Spirit, and then the Son. Let us take each of these in turn.

This election or choice unto salvation is, he says, ‘according to the foreknowledge of God the Father’ (v. 2a). Paul tells us plainly what this means in that Ephesians 1 passage, “even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world (Eph. 1:4); and the Psalmist tells us clearly what he cannot mean:

“The LORD looks down from heaven on the children of man, to see if there are any who understand, who seek after God. They have all turned aside; together they have become corrupt; there is none who does good, not even one” (Ps. 14:2-3).

To say that election is according to divine foreknowledge is not to say that first He looks, then He knows, then He is caused to choose by what He just learned. Omniscience can “learn” nothing; and He who is immutable cannot change in His knowledge. What follows about the Son and the Spirit follow election. In other words, God’s decree of predestination puts into effect every other part of salvation.

Our salvation is also described as ‘in the sanctification of the Spirit’ (v. 2b). This reminds us that the work of the Holy Spirit is not done when He regenerates us, giving us a new heart, but it is He who dwells in us and empowers us to be conformed to the image of Christ. Just to give one verse: “if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live” (Rom. 8:13)

Two facts are related to the Son here. Remember that it is a continuous thought. Our election is for two things: ‘for obedience to Jesus Christ and for sprinkling with his blood’ (v. 2c). The second thing here is what happens first. The sprinkling of blood was what would happen in the Old Testament sacrifices: “And Moses took the blood and threw it on the people” (Ex. 24:8); “And in the same way he sprinkled with the blood both the tent and all the vessels used in worship” (Heb. 9:21). This is what was prophesied Jesus would do for a people beyond the people of Israel—“so shall he sprinkle many nations” (Isa. 52:15). Now, the emphasis on obedience to Jesus makes sense in any letter, but the reader can detect how Peter shows the Christian life as the display of God’s glory in the world. Jesus’s work on the cross and our pursuit of holiness are linked. As Paul wrote,

Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works (Titus 2:13-14).

So in these ways, God’s people are a chosen people.

God’s People are a Pilgrim People.

The next adjective is in the exact same case and number (παρεπιδήμοις / parepideimois) translated as any of the following: alien, exile, pilgrim, sojourner, or stranger. In other words, the chief emphasis is on one’s relationship to the place in which one currently resides. The chief emphasis is not on how one got there. In and of itself, the word is neutral. So, Abraham was told,

Know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs and will be servants there, and they will be afflicted for four hundred years (Gen. 15:13).

But also to Isaac, “Sojourn in this land, and I will be with you and will bless you” (Gen. 26:3). It marks a distinction between insider and outsider: “whether he is a sojourner or a native of the land” (Ex. 12:19). Although even those foreigners could have their status changed:

If a stranger shall sojourn with you and would keep the Passover to the LORD, let all his males be circumcised. Then he may come near and keep it; he shall be as a native of the land (Ex. 12:48).

Beyond that, as Sproul points out in his commentary, “pilgrims or sojourners was the term used by the Jews to describe Gentiles.”6 That was its dominant usage. So, there was already an outsiders-brought-into-the-covenant trajectory there.

That’s actually crucial here. Yes, Peter relates it to a scattering, but it does not follow that this means that they are being punished by God, as Judah was by its captivity into Babylon centuries before. Why is that important for how we read the letter today? It is because there is battle over what it means for Christians to be pilgrims or exiles in this world. The word “exile,” in the English, has the connotation of a punishment, whereas the English words “pilgrim” and “sojourner” speaks more to the journey—the temporary status. All of this is to say that the Christian’s status as “sojourner” or “pilgrim” or even with the translation “exile” is relative to our primary citizenship with is in the City of God, the spiritual Jerusalem. But as even many pietists will admit, this means a “dual citizenship” between heaven and earth—not a total non-citizenship on earth.

God’s People are a Scattered People.

Let us try to get both of these ideas in our minds. The church can be perfected by God through being persecuted by the world, or put it simply: loved by God and hated by the world. And that means a sanctifying scattering. Peter’s words in 2:9 could almost be seen as a purpose statement to this whole epistle. Notice the link from being chosen to why we remain on the world stage, and why we would be extended across the whole of that world stage. There he says,

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.

Here the words of Exodus 19:5-6 are repurposed from Israel of old to that greater nation that grafts in members of all nations. Yet we are all treated as one people group (believing Jews and believing Gentiles)—chosen by God to bring glory to God in the real world.

There are four separate references to persecution in this epistle:

In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ (1:6-7).

Now who is there to harm you if you are zealous for what is good? But even if you should suffer for righteousness’ sake, you will be blessed. Have no fear of them, nor be troubled, but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect, having a good conscience, so that, when you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame. For it is better to suffer for doing good, if that should be God’s will, than for doing evil (3:13-17)

Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice insofar as you share Christ’s sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed. If you are insulted for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you. But let none of you suffer as a murderer or a thief or an evildoer or as a meddler. Yet if anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in that name. For it is time for judgment to begin at the household of God; and if it begins with us, what will be the outcome for those who do not obey the gospel of God? And “If the righteous is scarcely saved, what will become of the ungodly and the sinner?”Therefore let those who suffer according to God’s will entrust their souls to a faithful Creator while doing good (4:12-19)

Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same kinds of suffering are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world (5:9)

All of this fits with dating the composition during the Neronian persecution in which Peter himself would eventually be seized, imprisoned, and executed, if indeed he was not already at least arrested. Yet some critics insist that because this persecution did not exceed the area around Rome, here we have another mark of later authorship. This ignores the several other persecutions by Jews and other Gentile groups (like at Ephesus) already recounted in Acts. Certainly the Romans did not corner the market or invent persecution, so the objection is pedantic. The idea that Peter can be applying his experience and the experience of Christians in Rome to the experience of Christians being pressed by other antagonists in Asia Minor, seems to escape the mind of these critics. One question I would like to ask genuine Christians who fall for this argument is this: How do apply Peter’s message to us today? If you apply it at all to our own persecution, then you admit that Peter is able to relay a Rome-specific persecution (which is not being experienced by you) to a separate persecution that is being experienced by you. Why then could he not do the same to his wider contemporary audience?

Practical Use of the Doctrine

Use 1. Correction. The identity “exiles” does not mean the kind of stranger to the world that makes no difference in the world. The influence of pietism on evangelical thinking has been a disaster in our land; and one of its main selling points has come with the slogans, “This world is not our home” and “We lose down here” and “That’s not a gospel issue.” Peter, in this letter, will have none of that pseudo-spiritual slop. Peter is not only an apostle to the Jews in Jerusalem, but, as he came to the end of his own sojourning as a prisoner in Rome, he becomes an apostle to the exile, to the pilgrim, to the church brought near by being scattered throughout the world.

And we have to ask as we read this letter—Is this sojourning of the Christian a disembodied detachment from this world while we pass through it? Or, is it an embodied fully-engaged citizenship in the place that I am in from the fully-energizing citizenship I have in the Spirit? More than that, are we embodied locally or “generically”?

That is a bigger application today than ever before because of the delusions of the internet and the “global community.” We covet solutions and influence and appearance and community—where? In a place that is not a place at all—in the ethereal digital show, where people are not actually connected to each other, but scattered. It’s good to be scattered if God does the scattering and makes you realistic about it. It’s bad to be scattered if you’re in denial about it and coveting a false community in the non-local, the non-embodied. Peter’s letter will help us with that embodied God-glorifying life.

Use 2. Instruction. The Christian is on a paradoxical pilgrimage. The way the Bible talks about this is not shallow. It stretches us and keeps us from falling off into two opposite ditches. Both ditches detach heaven and earth from each other. But the one reduces their faith to this world, while the other retreats with their faith from this world. The great “hall of faith” in Hebrews 11 would have neither reductionism nor retreatism.

These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return (Heb. 11:13-15).

See the paradox? Seeking a city that cannot fade, yet that seeking moves things in this world. The first and end cause of Christian motion—heaven; the form and matter of Christian motion—earth. To borrow an expression from one of the commentators I will be drawing from in my study of this letter, Edmund Clowney, in another one of his books, the church is a “colony of heaven.”7 Now a colony is not simply a campsite. The word “colonize” should come to mind. If that is all true, then this little church is an outpost of this colonialization of the world around us. It is not a bunker to hide in, but an armory to advance from.

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1. Arguments against Peter’s authorship include the detail about Silvanus as the immediate writer, or amanuensis, in 5:12—as if such instrumentality and Peter as dictating author are mutually exclusive—and the high Greek style to which, it is assumed, Peter could not have attained. Both criticisms are typically shallow.

2. R. C. Sproul took this view in 1-2 Peter: An Expositional Commentary (Sanford, FL: Ligonier Ministries, 2019), 5.

3. Polycarp, Epistle to the Philippians, 1.3, 2.1, 8.1; Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 4.9.2, 4.16.5; Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History, 3.25.2, 4.14.9.

4. Wayne Grudem, The First Epistle of Peter: An Introduction and Commentary (Leicester, UK: InterVarsity Press, 1988), 33, 34.

5. ἐκλεκτός is an adjective: elect, chosen, choice.

6. Sproul, 1-2 Peter, 2.

7. Edmund Clowney, The Church (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1995),