Monday, July 11, 2016

For some time I have been thinking of doing a study of the New Testament book of 1st Peter. The author identifies himself in the first verse as “Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ.” As one of the twelve disciples Peter once answered this question Jesus raised, “Who do you say I am?” His succinct declaration was, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God!” (Matthew 16:15-16). Jesus affirmed Peter’s declaration as inspired by God and then said, “You are Peter (which in the Greek is petros), and on this rock (in the Greek, petra) I will build my church!” Petros means a detached but large fragment of rock, petra means the massive living rock according to Bible commentator Schmidt. Based on the meaning of these two words Dr. Wuest concludes: “The foundation of the Church of Jesus Christ is that massive living rock, the Son of God seen in His deity, acknowledged as such by Peter. Peter is but a fragment of that massive rock in the sense in which he speaks of believers as ‘lively stones,’ deriving their eternal life from the great Living Stone Himself as seen in 1st Peter 2:4-5.” At the time Peter made this grand declaration he knew who Jesus was, but he didn’t yet fully understand the mission Jesus Christ came to fulfill. It was only after the resurrection of Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit filling him that Peter was sent forth as an apostle, who together with the other apostles, were used of God to establish the church in the world. The record of those historical events is found in the book of Acts in the Bible.