At Home Worship

This weeks At Home Worship Guide:

Check out our video if you missed the live stream. Video

Suggested Worship Clips:

It Is Well With My Soul - Audrey Assad

Pat Barrett - The Way

“The God of All Comfort”

Background: 1 Peter 1:1-12

Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ: To those chosen, living as exiles dispersed abroad in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through the sanctifying work of the Spirit, to be obedient and to be sprinkled with the blood of Jesus Christ. May grace and peace be multiplied to you.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Because of his great mercy He has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead and into an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you. You are being guarded by God’s power through faith for a salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time. You rejoice in this, even though now for a short time, if necessary, you suffer grief in various trials so that the proven character of your faith—more valuable than gold which, though perishable, is refined by fire—may result in praise, glory, and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Though you have not seen Him, you love Him; though not seeing Him now, you believe in Him, and you rejoice with inexpressible and glorious joy, because you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls.

10 Concerning this salvation, the prophets, who prophesied about the grace that would come to you, searched and carefully investigated. 11 They inquired into what time or what circumstances the Spirit of Christ within them was indicating when he testified in advance to the sufferings of Christ and the glories that would follow. 12 It was revealed to them that they were not serving themselves but you. These things have now been announced to you through those who preached the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven—angels long to catch a glimpse of these things.

Our focal text for today is 1 Peter 1:1-9. Peter is going to give us so much in these twelve verses. The video and these notes will cover the first nine verses. I encourage you to discuss these points among your family members, or if alone, spend some time meditating on what God is telling you There are really two points I want to focus on: Authority and Assurance – His Authority and Our Assurance.

1.     His Authority (vs. 1-2)

Peter opens his letter by telling us not only his name (by the way this is the name that Jesus gave him), but he uses the title, “an apostle of Jesus Christ.” An apostle in its literal sense is messenger, but here the idea is that Peter is one of the twelve apostles, specially chosen by Jesus himself for that office. [1] Being an apostle of Jesus Christ, Peter speaks and writes with the authority of God Himself.

Peter then describes his audience. These are Believers who have been spread out across the region because of religious persecution. He calls them “exiles,” “sojourners,” “strangers,” or “pilgrims.” This is important, and we must get hold of this truth right here at the beginning in order for the rest to hit home. The idea is that God’s people, wherever we find ourselves are NOT home. We are only passing through for a short period of time, and then we will go home.

Peter seems to clinch the point of authority by explaining God is in control and how He relates to us,  His children. Peter speaks of a great biblical doctrine of Omniscience when he speaks of “foreknowledge of God the Father.” God knows where you are and what you are going through! Paul drives home this point as well when he writes to the Roman believers. He says in Romans 11:2, “God has not rejected his people whom he foreknew.” Peter is writing under the Authority of God Who knows all things and more importantly, He has a plan. We may not see the end play, but we have a Creator God – our Father – who knows us!

We have hope because of this great Authority, and this gives us Assurance!

2.     Our Assurance (vs. 3-9)

The first point of our Assurance is the

2.a.     The Source of Our Assurance. (v. 3)

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Because of his great mercy He has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead  

It is only through Jesus and what He did, namely His resurrection from the dead, that we have this new birth. He… is our Hope!

2.b.    The Security of Our Assurance (vs. 4-5)

and into an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you. You are being guarded by God’s power through faith for a salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time.

Because of Who Jesus is and What Jesus did, we have an inheritance equal to His that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you. And if that wasn’t enough, You are being guarded by God’s power… Wow!

2.c.     The Fruit of Our Assurance (vs. 6-7)

You rejoice in this, even though now for a short time, if necessary, you suffer grief in various trials so that the proven character of your faith—more valuable than gold which, though perishable, is refined by fire—may result in praise, glory, and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.

Yes, we are going through some uncharted waters right now, quite frankly, scary trials. But so far, we are not being persecuted for our faith. In fact, it is our faith that we can use to produce fruit for the kingdom. We can turn this testing and trials into building the character of our faith. When we stand firm in our Assurance, we will be able to give testimony to others of this assurance, which will result in praise, glory, and honor of Jesus Christ as He is revealed as our Assurance!

2.d.    The Realization of Our Assurance (vs. 8-9)

Though you have not seen Him, you love Him; though not seeing Him now, you believe in Him, and you rejoice with inexpressible and glorious joy, because you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls.

Peter writes of another deep, theological truth about the completion of our salvation. This is not to be confused that our salvation is obtained in steps. No, when we believe Jesus is who He said He is, and we believe and confess this truth, and that He rose from the dead, we are at that moment saved from our sin. Our salvation is secured!  What Peter is eluding to is the process of working out our salvation. As we walk in the faith, we grow in our faith, which in simple terms, is growing in our salvation. This will go on until we enter Heaven at which time our salvation will have been made complete.



[1] Thomas R. Schreiner, 1, 2 Peter, Jude, vol. 37, The New American Commentary (Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 2003), 49–50.

 

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