Deuteronomy 7:1-11, The Elect Nation

When you read 1 Peter 1:1-2 how do you understand it?  Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, To the pilgrims of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia, elect acc. to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ: Grace to you and peace be multiplied.  We might come to words like “elect” and “foreknowledge” with the definition of those words that our theology requires. 

I want to bring together three passages, from the Old and New Testaments.  See what you think.  I’ll ask three basic questions.

·       Who are the elect? They are “the pilgrims (temporary residents) of the dispersion.” They are Jewish believers in Christ.  So Peter is not describing the Churches of Judea that Paul refers to in 1 Thess 2:14f or Luke in Acts 8:1-3; 11:27-30 (and that I think were the original readers of the Epistle to the Hebrews).  Nevertheless, these Jewish believers are part of the nation of Israel as far as Peter was concerned; that’s why they were “pilgrims”, temporary residents of Pontus, Galatia, etc. They belonged to the nation as much as the Messianic believers of Judea and Jerusalem.  Thus, Deut. 7:1-11 applies to them! Peter used terms in 1 Pt. 2:5,9 that fit the holy people of Deut. 7:6, the nation God chose. These “Messianic believers” are both in the nation AND in the Body of Christ.  Don’t just assume they are individually chosen by God for salvation.  Peter means they are part of the elect nation.

·       What were they chosen (elect) for?  The answer is: the NEW COVENANT.  All that Peter describes – sanctification of the Spirit, obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ – is New Covenant truth.  Deut. 30:1-6-10 promised the New Covenant to Israel before they even entered the land.  Peter was telling them that they had received, in Christ, the blessings of the New Covenant, and in that sense were truly fulfilled Jews, unlike their Jewish brethren who persecuted them.

·       Therefore, what did God foreknow? Again, don’t assume He knew whether or not they would believe.  God foreknew His plan to send His Son to earth to die, to bring about the New Covenant.  We know this because Peter said so in Acts 2:22-24: Him being delivered up by the determined purpose and foreknowledge of God.  And note further in that passage what the men of Israel did: you have taken and crucified and slain.  All these verbs are the Greek active voice, actions done by men without any “outside” help.

With respect to Deuteronomy, what I’m saying is that it helps us understand what Peter is saying when he calls these Jewish believers “elect.”  The nation was elect, of all nations.  That is not an issue of individual salvation.  God chose a nation, a nation that was stiff-necked and rebellious, but a nation He loved.  Those “pilgrims” were part of that nation, the part that was in Christ.