Category: 1 & 2 Peter

Ethical Eschatology (2 Peter 3:11–18)

“Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness… (2 Peter 3:11).”

Eschatology is that field of theology that concerns the study of the eschaton, that is, the end. Eschatology has fallen on hard times and most often evokes an “Eek!” or and “Eh?”. I believe there are two primary reasons this is so:

First, we fail to remember that all the New Testament is eschatological. Jesus inaugurated the last days. This is why the gospels tell us that the kingdom has come, Peter preaches that Joel’s prophecy concerning the last days is being fulfilled, the author of Hebrews tells us that these are the last days, and John tells us it is the last hour. The eschaton is here now, but not yet fully here.

Second, I lay the bulk of the blame at the feet of Bible-prophecy man, who with his abundance of charts, outlandish interpretations, and flopped predictions has caused many to become cynical. These Chicken Littles have cried “Shepherd!” so many times that we’re no longer on guard against wolves. Because true Biblical eschatology isn’t taught, we’re more prone to accept a counterfeit, so long as it doesn’t get Left Behind weird.

None of this is to say that we don’t think of the end at all, only that, as a result, we don’t think about it seriously. We now reflect on the end only in light of the inevitability death and only enough so as to pacify our conscious and comfort our sorrows. True eschatology though not only gives us hope in death, it gives us grace to live.

It has been said, “You can be so heavenly minded that you are of no earthly good.” To this we might add, “you can be so focused on the future that you lose the present.” There is a sense in which these are true, but they obscure a greater truth. If your meditation on heaven and focus on the future cause you be worthless in the present, you’re doing it wrong.

The fruit of Bible-chart man’s teaching often bears bad fruit indicating that he doesn’t know how to garden eschatology so as to bear the fruit God intended. Whenever he leads you through Revelation the result is often anxiety, panic, and fear of the wrong sort. This is because eschatology is not a mystery to be solved, but a truth to be lived out. Readiness for the coming of Christ isn’t a matter of chronological awareness but ethical preparedness. Eschatology is ethical. Every time eschatology is taught in the New Testament, there is an ethical bent to it.

Instead of trying to solve the mystery, live as though it were true and you will find peace instead of anxiety.

Antecedents, Don’t Forget Your Antecedents (2 Peter 3:1–10)

“The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance (2 Peter 3:9 ESV).”

Many try to deny the first chapter of Peter’s first letter by appealing to the last chapter of his second letter, but I find the arguments for election in 1 Peter 1 to be pretty thick and the arguments against it from 2 Peter 3 to be pretty thin.

Peter addressed his first letter to “elect exiles… according to the foreknowledge of God” (1 Peter 1:1–2). “Knowledge” here refers to God’s covenant love as I’ve argued here. Of those God chose, Peter goes on to say, “He caused them to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead” (1 Peter 1:3). Jesus’ atonement doesn’t simply make all men potentially savable, it accomplishes the salvation of God’s elect.

Rather than try to deny this plain text by another shouldn’t we attempt to harmonize them? I find the Arminian counter with 2 Peter 3:9 to be a weak punch for two reasons:

First, let’s take the passage at its basic meaning without reading any extraneous theology into it. It simply says that God in some way desires that all men repent. No Calvinist would say otherwise. God commands all men to repent. It is the duty they owe to God.

Theologians have long spoken of there being two wills in God. Sometimes these are referred to as his secret and revealed will, or they might be called his decretive and preceptive will. God’s secret will, or His sovereign, is what is. He wills, it is done. He says let there be light and there is light. He decrees the end from the beginning, and so it will be (Isaiah 46:9–10). But we also see in the Scriptures God’s will of command. God says “You shall not murder” and yet murders abound, but only in such a way as to accomplish God’s sovereign plan. It was sin for man to crucify Christ, that is, it was a violation of God’s revealed will; and yet, that great sin did nothing more than achieve God’s secret and eternal purposes. God’s preceptive will is that all men repent. His decretive will is that the elect repent.

Second, I don’t think this interpretation, which is true in itself, is true of the text. What is the antecedent of “all?” If I announce to Meridian Church next Sunday, “All are invited to my house” none would take this to mean I am inviting the whole world. When Paul says in Romans 11:26 that “all Israel will be saved” no orthodox Christian understands him to say that all ethnic Israelites will be saved. The context makes clear that he is speaking of true Israel—meaning those he has chosen, as Romans 9–10 makes clear.

Peter here is not talking about God’s patience towards all humanity but towards His people. He is patience towards you, not wishing that any of you should perish but that all of you should reach repentance. This is further confirmed when in 3:15 he tells them to “count the patience of our Lord as salvation.” Again, it is the church that is to count God’s patience in not returning immediately as their salvation.

There are then two ways we could take this text. Peter may be saying that God is patient towards all His people, the elect, delaying His return until the full number is gathered in. The other option is that God is patient giving those who may be following the false teachers he warns of time to repent.

2 Peter 3:9 says nothing contrary to 1 Peter 1; rather, it is addressing the very same audience, God’s elect.

The Way to Deepest Darkness Is Found in the Light (2 Peter 2:17–22)

“For them the gloom of utter darkness has been reserved.” —2 Peter 2:17 (ESV)

Dante’s Inferno sets forth nine circles of hell, with the innermost being the most hellish. Working our way in those circles are Limbo (where virtuous pagans reside), Lust, Gluttony, Greed, Wrath, Heresy, Violence, Fraud, and Treachery.  Though The Divine Comedy is imaginative it is fitting that we find Socrates in Limbo and Judas near the center just shy of Satan. 

While Dante’s work is fanciful, here we learn who the “gloom of utter darkness” is reserved for—false teachers. Not false teachers as in pagan philosophers, like Plato, nor those false teachers of false religions who never learned of Christ such as Gautama Buddha. They are in hell, but not the hell of hell. Peter is speaking of false teachers who have risen within the church. Inside the church, one finds the door to the darkest pit of hell. There is no safer place for the saints than the church, and, there is no more dangerous place for hypocrites than the church.

False teachers are overcome with a particular and tragic kind of slavery. Having come within inches of freedom, they reject that freedom for slavery. It is one thing to walk in the darkness, another to refuse the way of righteousness. When an Ammonite king burned his child as an offering to Molech it was a horrid evil, but it was far more evil when Manasseh did likewise, for he, knowing the way of righteousness, turned from the holy commandment of God. False teachers exchange a slavery of ignorance for a slavery that rejects the true knowledge of Jesus Christ.

It is worse to sin in the light than in the dark. It is a sin worthy of an eternal hell to sin against the light of the finite Sun, that is, the light of natural revelation as it declares the glory of God. It is a sin worthy of the hell of hell to sin against the more radiant light of the eternal Son, the light of special revelation, the light of the glorious gospel of Christ.

The way to deepest darkness is found in the light. Be warned not just of false teachers, nor only of heeding them, but of becoming one. Before any are false teachers, they are false believers. As you sit under the preaching of the gospel, that gospel will be either your great salvation or your great damnation.

“They’re (like) Animals” (2 Peter 2:10b–16)

“But these, like irrational animals, creatures of instinct, born to be caught and destroyed, blaspheming about matters of which they are ignorant, will also be destroyed in their destruction” (2 Peter 2:12 ESV).

Long before President Trump described the members of MS-13 as animals, Peter used that word to describe a far more deadly gang. False teachers are like animals in that their behavior is irrational and instinctual. Paul spoke of this instinct which we all have in Adam as the “passions of the flesh” and “the desires of the body and the mind.” This impulse in false teachers is set loose and wed to audacious arrogance (2 Peter 2:10). Some false teachers may appear intellectual and have many academic accolades but what really drives them isn’t the mind, but an animal like lust, craving, and desire.

Additionally, their blasphemy, for that is what their false teaching is, is a further expression of their animal-like, irrational instinct for they blaspheme “about matters of which they are ignorant.” Consider how often false teachers make a big deal of obscure and vague passages in the Scriptures. Their claims of new revelation are really just a cover-up for ignorance. One of fresher laid piles of heresy is known as the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR). People like Bill Johnson of Bethel Church in Redding California are regarded as new apostles, just like those of old. John MacArthur quips concerning the NAR, “It is not new, it is not a reformation, and it is certainly not apostolic.” Their arrogance is a guise to veil their ignorance—blasphemous ignorance.

Because our theological walls are down, these animals are allowed to arise within the church (2 Peter 2:1). Peter pulls back the sheep’s clothing to reveal the hideous wolf beneath. Peter’s description of these animal-like predators is meant to revolt, somewhat like watching a predator tear into its prey on a nature documentary. This is not a pleasant chapter, but it is a most necessary one.

We Must Pummel (2 Peter 2:1–10a)

“But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing upon themselves swift destruction” (2 Peter 2:1 ESV).

In the second chapter of his second letter, Peter unleashes, not on false teaching, but false teachers. One commentator aptly captures the tone writing, “ ‘Refuting’… is not quite the word for Peter’s language; pummeling, denouncing, castigating, condemning, attacking, and assaulting are more accurate descriptions of what Peter does to his opponents. He offers a few arguments in response to false teaching in chapter 3, but chapter 2 is mainly occupied not with refutation but denunciation of the most severe sort.”

Though Peter is writing this letter near his death (1:14), the apostle could still grow fiery hot, though now, in contrast to his youth, we see the beauty of a sanctified flame. The potentially dangerous wildfire has become a useful blowtorch. This is the most extended and intense treatment of false teachers in the New Testament and it is blessedly brutal.

How far are we from making any denunciations of false teachers that approach this? Something is seriously wrong if you think Peter unloving or unChristian. That so many do think this wrong demonstrates how unloving and unChristian we are.

Consider how incapable the contemporary church is of even identifying or understanding the danger. The late R.C. Sproul well diagnosed the epidemic upon us writing:

“We are living in perhaps the most anti-intellectual period in the history of Christendom—not anti-academic or anti-scientific but anti-mind. I doubt if there has ever been a time in church history when professing Christians have been less concerned about doctrine than they are in our day. We hear almost daily that doctrine does not matter that Christianity is a relationship, not a creed. There is not simply indifference toward doctrine but outright hostility, which is exceedingly dangerous and lamentable. We cannot do even a cursory reading of the Word of God without seeing the enormous emphasis accorded to doctrine and that unsound doctrine and false teaching are not merely errors in abstraction but are profoundly destructive to the life of the people of God.”

We cannot identify the false because we don’t know the true, nor do we care.

In addition to animosity towards doctrine, we are indifferent to history. Few Christians have any knowledge of heresies such as  Arianism, Pelagianism, or Unitarianism. The church has fought heresy, condemned it, and crafted creeds and confessions in response, but we’re so ignorant that these weeds are allowed to sprout up again and again unnoticed. If we will not learn from history, we must be prepared to be one of her lessons.

False teachers will rise, and false teachers will fall. We must know this, and must recognize them lest we share in their destruction.

Remember, Remember, Remember… (2 Peter 1:12–21)

“Therefore I intend always to remind you of these qualities, though you know them and are established in the truth that you have. I think it right, as long as I am in this body, to stir you up by way of reminder, since I know that the putting off of my body will be soon, as our Lord Jesus Christ made clear to me. And I will make every effort so that after my departure you may be able at any time to recall these things” (2 Peter 1:12–15 ESV)

Though the saints instinctively know they need the word of God, I’m afraid many go astray in realizing how it is they need it. Many go to the Bible seeking some kind of mystical experience. It is as though they’d rather hear something through the Word rather than simply understand the intended meaning. Certainly, reading the Bible is a supernatural experience. Through the word God creates life. Through His word He sustains life. But what if I told you that one of the principal reasons you should read and study the Bible is to remember? Would you be let down? Are you wanting something more? Is this too plain and simple for you?

When I take time to seriously study the Bible I almost always learn something new, and yet, more than that, I am remembering afresh. Approaching the Bible always looking or something new is a dangerous venture. Heresies are born that way.

Here Peter writes to remind those who are established in the truth. Unfortunately, many have sat under such poor teaching that they are not established in the truth. Even so, those who are truly children of God know enough so that their biggest problem is not what they don’t know, but what they’ve forgotten.

We all need to grow in knowledge, a knowledge that is essential to our spiritual vitality, still, the greatest threat to our spiritual health isn’t what we have yet to learn, but what we might forget. How many of your sins involve forgetting that God is holy? How often do you act as if God were not omnipresent? How frequently do you respond to life as though God were not sovereign? Likewise, how often do you forget the Father’s unfailing covenant love and mercy to you in the Son? How often do you forget that the saints stand justified by the imputed righteousness of Jesus Christ?

Oh how great is our forgetfulness. It is not as though these are minor details. We’re not forgetting to brush our teeth. We’re forgetting to breathe. Beyond forgetting the weather forecast, we forget that the Sun has risen. Indeed, our greatest problem isn’t ignorance, but forgetfulness.

But there is grace. A grace to remind us of grace. The Bible is a book of reminders. Gather on Sunday to sit under the preaching of the word to be reminded. Sing to one another to remind each other. Partake of the Lord’s table to remember. Read good books to remember. Listen to and sing songs rich in Bible theology to remember. Read and study your Bible every day to remember. Meditate on the Scriptures throughout the day so that you remember. Memorize Scriptures so that you might recall them. Work through your catechism again and again to remember. Listen to good sermons or podcasts while you drive, exercise, or work to remember.

Martin Luther knew all to well our propensity to forget. I leave you with these words from his commentary on Galatians.

“It [the gospel] is also the principal article of all Christian doctrine, wherein the knowledge of all godliness consisteth. Most necessary it is, therefore, that we should know this article well, teach it unto others, and beat it into their heads continually.”

These because of Those (2 Peter 1:5–11)

“For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love” (2 Peter 1:5–7 ESV).

Before you deal with these, you must remember those. These because of those is a fundamental principle. Before you make every effort, you must see the reason why you should do so, namely, the two grants mentioned in vv. 3–4.

“His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire (ESV).”

You are not to make every effort to gain the grants; you are to make every effort because you have the grants.

Many churches are thick on command and thin on promise, which means they get neither. If you don’t understand the promises of vv. 3–4, you can carry out the command of vv. 5–7. Paradoxically to some, it is that church that is soft doctrinally that is more about law than grace. Show me a church that is atheological and I will show you one that is anti-promise. To teach the promises of Scripture you must teach doctrine. Doctrines like election, calling, substitution, propitiation, redemption, and covenant are essential to understanding God’s promises. You don’t need any doctrine at all to teach five steps to a better marriage. You don’t even need God’s law. Because we don’t teach God’s promises, we don’t teach God’s law either. We’ve substituted those of man in both instances. Thus it is that we get neither grace nor law.

When God gives His law to His people it comes as grace on top of grace. This means that there must be grace for the law to come on top of. If there is no foundational grace, then the only kind of grace the law conveys is not constructive but destructive as it shows us our need of Christ. But to those redeemed by the blood of the Passover Lamb, God prefaces His law in this way, “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me” (Exodus 20:1–3).

Peter is writing to those who stand righteous by faith in Christ (1:1). The Christ in whom they stand has granted them all things that pertain to life and godliness (v. 3). He has granted his great and precious promises through which they partake of the divine nature (v. 4). For the reason of those two grants, we are to make every effort at these virtues. All our effort then is an expression of faith in Christ. Before you make every effort at these virtues, make sure there is a faith to supplement first, faith in the Christ of those promises.

Those Who Have All and Those Who Have Not (2 Peter 1:3–4)

Fill in the blank. 

The pastor announces, “Hey church, Jesus has given us everything we need for ____________!”

So what’s rattling in your noggin? I bet most Evangelicals would have answers related to either evangelism and growth or finances and buildings. Jesus has given us everything we need to be BIG. I think many responses would indicate just how deeply the prosperity heresy has infiltrated the ranks. Of course, she is dressed up as a sexy spy rather than gaudily made up—prosperity soft rather than prosperity over-the-top. That said, how few would answer godliness?

“His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire” (2 Peter 2:3–4).

All we need for life and godliness, Christ has granted us by His divine power. If you’re checking the Scriptures for an exchange policy, hoping for some measurable bigness instead, I’m afraid you’ll find you don’t have an authentic receipt. You’ve received no grant from Christ at all. You don’t have to make godliness attractive to the saints.

Still, though the saints rejoice at this promise, godliness remains one of those words we throw around but seldom pause to define. Our text speaks of “life and godliness.” The pairing links them together as one. Godliness is a way of life. Godliness is life. As sin is death, so godliness is life. In this way we see that godliness is akin to holiness and righteousness. It is a way of looking at the same thing from a different angle. 

What particular aspect is brought to the fore by speaking of godliness? The original could be translated as “piety” or “devotion.” The reason godliness is such a good translation is that these are the words used to define what godliness means. Unfortunately, we think of a pious person as one who puts on a show of religious devotion. Though the hypocrite is devoted, it is only to the religion of self. But true piety is godliness—a life devoted to God. The only alternative to piety then is idolatry. Calvin defined true piety in this way: 

“I call ‘piety’ that reverence joined with love of God which the knowledge of his benefits induces. For until men recognize that they owe everything to God, that they are nourished by his fatherly care, that he is the Author of their every good, that they should seek nothing beyond him—they will never yield him willing service. Nay, unless they establish their complete happiness in him, they will never give themselves truly and sincerely to him.”

The verity of Calvin’s definition is born out by this text. True piety is the result of God’s goodness, not the cause of it. This motive distinguishes true piety from false. Godliness is a gift, not an attempt to garner God’s gifts. Here we have gospel-godliness—a godliness that flows from the grace of God in Christ our Savior.

You can never be more devoted to Jesus than Jesus is to you. Any devotion you demonstrate to God is a gift. You can never out give Jesus, for all your giving is a gift. We are like toddlers trying to splash our dad more than he splashes us. Our hands are so tiny and his are so large. God gives oceans and we return thimbles which we have filled from His oceans.

Jesus gives us everything needed for life and godliness. An earthly and benevolent king may desire to give his subjects many things, peace and safety chiefly, but no matter how great his power, he is limited. There are always threats. Jesus divine power grants and there are no threats nor thresholds. A good father may promise a good thing to his daughter that is well within his ability, yet a thousand evil may prevent him still. But the one who gives what is requisite for godliness is God incarnate. Limitless power grants you limitless resources—everything you need for life and godliness.

This promise thrills the saints and outs the ain’ts. If this promise doesn’t thrill you, then the promise of a new heaven and a new earth, everything true and beautiful you are seeking in your prosperity-soft harlot minus the lies, is not for you. As J.C. Ryle so clearly put it:

“Most men hope to go to heaven when they die; but few, it may be feared, take the trouble to consider whether they would enjoy heaven if they got there. Heaven is essentially a holy place; its inhabitants are all holy; its occupations are all holy. To be really happy in heaven, it is clear and plain that we must be somewhat trained and made ready for heaven while we are on earth.”

No Backwater Fishing Hole (2 Peter 1:1–2)

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“Simeon Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christ, To those who have obtained a faith of equal standing with ours by the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ: May grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord.” (2 Peter 1:1–2 ESV).

2 Peter is regarded by some as a backwater fishing hole, aptly, but inaccurately attributed to the uncouth fisherman from Galilee. “2 Peter has been termed the ‘ugly stepchild’ of the NT,” writes Peter Davids. “It is not just that the extended prophetic denunciation is unpalatable to some people and the apparent description of the destruction of the universe in ch. 3 is disturbing, but that many readers wonder whether the book is genuine and belongs in the canon at all.”

It might be surprising to learn that the first two seemingly innocuous words of this letter are likely it’s most controversial and among some of the most contested in the New Testament. There are multiple arguments against Petrine authorship, but I’ll just pick out only a couple since they’re all equally ridiculous.

Some say there are too many unique terms in this letter for it to have been written by Peter. Some 57 words are found here and nowhere else in the New Testament. We have two short letters bearing Peter’s name, each with a different focus, and from so small a sampling can we draw such a conclusion? When R.C. Sproul received his first assignment for doctoral studies in Holland it included 25 titles in Dutch, a language of which he knew nothing. He painstakingly began the task by consulting his Dutch-English dictionary and writing each Dutch word that he came to on one side of a card with a corresponding English word on the other. The first day he worked through just over a page. The first two books Dr. Sproul read in this way were by the same author on the same subject and when the final tally was in, there were over 5000 words in the second volume that were not in the first. Such objections make me think of Dr. Budziszewski’s remark that, “Though it always comes as a surprise to intellectuals, there are some forms of stupidity that one must be highly intelligent and educated to achieve.”

Akin to this, others say that the style of 2 Peter is too different from 1 Peter for him to have written it. Many critical scholars also argue that the Greek of 1 Peter is too refined for Peter to have written that letter. So we have the same pool of scholars telling us that Peter couldn’t have written 2 Peter because its style is too different from that other letter he didn’t write. Huh? Further, it is not as if the church has never known someone who could write children’s fantasy, adult science fiction, popular apologetic works, and critical academic pieces. No, C.S. Lewis could not have written the Narnia tales, the Perelandra series, Mere Christianity, and Studies in Medieval and Renaissance Literature.

Let’s turn from the opinions of modern scholarship to that of the church. The best Biblical scholarship has historically been done within the church. The Trinitarian orthodoxy of the early creeds cannot be improved on or matched and it was produced not by some isolated scholars operating in institutions of education, but by churchmen serving the church. Michael Allen and Scott Swain argue that “Christian theology flourishes in the school of Christ [meaning the church]… The Spirit of Christ teaches the church in sufficient and unmixed verity such that the church need not seek theological understanding from any other source or principle.” They liken the church to the Spirit-cultivated field God designed theology to grow in.

Though some in the church have wrestled with the authenticity of 2 Peter the overwhelming testimony has been that of affirmation. We should listen to this testimony not because the Bible is determined by majority vote, nor because the church stands over the Word as Rome argues. We should listen to the opinion of the church because it is to her that the self-authenticating Word bears witness. Sheep shouldn’t ask goats for their opinion concerning food. 

Scholars who deny the authenticity of 2 Peter are the scoffers Peter goes on to speak of.

“This is now the second letter that I am writing to you, beloved. In both of them I am stirring up your sincere mind by way of reminder, that you should remember the predictions of the holy prophets and the commandment of the Lord and Savior through your apostles, knowing this first of all, that scoffers will come in the last days with scoffing, following their own sinful desires. They will say, “Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all things are continuing as they were from the beginning of creation” (2 Peter 3:1–4 ESV).

Such scoffers speak with a snake’s lisp asking, “Did God really say?”

This is no backwater fishing hole. It is an ocean of grace upon grace (1:2). It is scoffer-scholars who would have us drink from the stagnant waters of human autonomy.

Nicely Packed (1 Peter 5:5–14)

1 So I exhort the elders among you, as a fellow elder and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, as well as a partaker in the glory that is going to be revealed… 5 Likewise, you who are younger, be subject to the elders. Clothe yourselves, all of you, with humility toward one another, for ‘God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.’ —1 Peter 5:1, 5 (ESV)

Do not make the mistake of thinking that the authors of the Bible are as bad of Scripture-writers as we are Scripture-readers. We often read the Bible as if it were a buffet, looking for what we like, picking a bit here and there. So it is that lo mien comes to sit alongside mac and cheese.

The Bible’s authors planned feasts. There is a theme to the meal. Things are tied together. There is a logical order to the courses.

As you come to the end of this letter, you may think Peter is just filling the empty space on his plate with the victuals he’d like. You theorize that Peter had some extra space on this parchment and means to fill it up like the poor preacher who looks at his watch and thinks, “Hey, I’ve got twenty more minutes!” and conjures up the favorite bits he returns to again and again.

Peter began a new section in 5:1 addressing the elders, but that section starts with “so” linking it back to the previous one where Peter was again expounding the theme of the letter, nicely summarized in 4:19, “Therefore let those who suffer according to God’s will entrust their souls to a faithful Creator while doing good.” Elders are to do the good work of shepherding the flock of God among them, despite present suffering in hope of eternal glory. Peter then ends his exhortation to elders holding forth this promise of glory (5:4)

In 5:5 Peter turns to address the saints as a whole. He begins with the word “likewise.” He is now exhorting the church for the same reason he exhorted elders, because of present suffering, and future glory, and the good they are called to do. Peter ends his exhortation to the church holding forth the same hope of glory (5:10).

Peter has not neatly packed his suitcase up to this point only to randomly cram the remaining empty space with whatever else he thinks might be handy. Even in every element of his closing (5:12–14) Peter relentlessly returns to his theme. I would unpack this for you, but my exhortation here is simply for you to notice that things are exquisitely packed. Let’s endeavor to be as tenacious in our reading as Peter was in his writing.