To God's elect, strangers in the world, scattered all over, 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:

You are invited to come to the Wednesday evening prayer meeting and pray. (8:30 PM EDT Wed., Aug. 22, 2001)

Peter is writing to God's elect, the ones God chose through the sanctifying work of his Holy Spirit for obedience to Christ and for sprinkling by his blood. We are God's elect. He has chosen us to obey everything that Jesus taught, just as Jesus obeyed everything his Father taught him. He made us to be pure and innocent, not guilty of any sin, just as Jesus is pure and innocent, through the sprinkling of Jesus's own blood. Peter praises God because of this, "Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ," and spells out in detail what it means.

First, God did what he did through his mercy. He chose each of us to be pure and innocent and obedient because of his mercy. None of us deserved this. When trying to explain God's salvation to someone who seems to have it all together and seems to be living a moral and upright life, we like to quote Romans 3:10: "As it is written, 'There is no one righteous, not even one;" and Romans 3:23: "For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." And these are true statements. It's the word of God. But somehow, when you compare the life of someone who seems pretty good with the life of someone who seems to live only for evil and depravity, it seems like a technicality to say that no one is righteous. But no matter what your life was before you knew Christ, you were God's enemy!

I know a man (whose name I won't mention, but who's probably reading this) who lived a fairly innocent life. But his testimony was this: "At some point I realized that I hated God." It is true for each of us that we hated God. We hated the idea of anyone having authority over us or telling us what to do. Think about it. Isn't it true that you hated God? It is truly God's mercy that he loved those who hated him. Here's what he did.

In his great mercy, God gave us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. Romans 8:7 says, "The sinful (literally, carnal or fleshly) mind is hostile to God. It does not submit to God's law, nor can it do so." Before God gave us this new birth, it was impossible for us to not hate God. But through the sanctifying work of the Spirit, God changed us. Through the Holy Spirit he set us apart from the world to be cleansed by the blood of Jesus Christ and to become like him.

We are born again, through the work of the Holy Spirit, into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. The hope we have is because of the fact that Jesus rose from the dead. The certain knowledge of the resurrection of Jesus was what enabled his disciples to give their lives, even literally, to spread the good news of salvation to all the world. God raised Jesus from the dead and he will also raise us from the dead.

And not only will God raise us from the dead, but he has an inheritance for us, kept in heaven, that can never perish spoil or fade. When we were in the world -- when we were part of the world, all we had were the things of this world, which perish, spoil and fade. Even our own bodies perish, spoil and fade. But now we have an inheritance that will last forever. In the end, when Jesus comes, our salvation will be revealed.

We will never lose God's salvation because we are shielded by his power through faith. That faith is also God's gift. Our salvation doesn't depend on us, but on God who is absolutely faithful.

Peter, speaking by the Holy Spirit, says that we greatly rejoice in this salvation, even though we have had to face many trials and suffer grief so that our faith may be proved genuine. To God, our faith is the most precious thing there is. Our faith is not tested so that God can find out whether or not it is genuine. God knows it is genuine. He knows all things. He is the one who gave us our faith, and he knows that it is genuine. He wants to demonstrate to all of creation and all of the powers of heaven, and to us also, that our faith is genuine. When Jesus comes, this will result in praise, glory and honor. Peter doesn't say who will praise whom, but I think everyone will both give and receive praise and all of us will praise, honor and glorify God. We all will rejoice together with Jesus before God. Are you looking forward to this?

Peter says that even though we have not seen Jesus, we love him; and even though we do not see him now, we believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for we are receiving the goal of our faith, the salvation of our souls.

Do you feel this way? Do you rejoice even when you have to suffer grief in all kinds of trials? Are you filled with inexpressible and glorious joy because you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your soul? Do you know that you love Jesus? Peter says that you actually do all these things. If you don't think so, maybe it's because you have not been thinking about all of the things that Peter is telling us God has done. Think about all that God has done. Put yourself in his place. How would you want to deal with someone to whom you provided everything he needed for life -- and that person still hated you and wanted to have nothing to do with you? Would you, then, instead of taking vengeance on that person, sacrifice your son for him. Praise God who sacrificed his Son for us. He didn't withhold his own Son, but gave him up for us all. Praise the Lord!

Peter says that we love Jesus and rejoice in our salvation. This is the word of God. God is faithful and upholds his word. Brothers and sisters, let us pray to God that we may see these words fulfilled in us more and more.

Come and let's pray for each other as well as for the whole church. Come and encourage your brothers and sisters in Christ Jesus. Love them.

Love in Christ,
Dean

PS: If you absolutely can't make it to the prayer meeting, send your prayer requests back to me by e-mail and we'll pray for them.