“Hi! I’m Peter, I Will Be Your Apostle Today”

²who have been chosen and destined by God the Father and sanctified by the Spirit to be obedient to Jesus Christ and to be sprinkled with his blood:  May grace and peace be yours in abundance.   3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! By his great mercy he has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, ⁴and into an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you,

"Grace and peace", this is what Peter is wishing to the Exiles of the Diaspora in the central and northern parts of what is today the nation of Turkey.  And he wants them to have it in abundance.  That is a good, Bible-letter kind of greeting.  Paul says much the same kind of thing when he opens his letters.  It is like a Hebrew greeting of “Shalom”, “Peace”, or, in Arabic, “Salaam Alaikum” “Peace be with you.”

The desire of peace connects all three of the ‘desert religions’, Judaism, Islam, and Christianity.  But what does it mean?  And where does it come from?

Peter pairs peace with grace.  Grace is the free gift that comes upon us through the sacrifice of our Lord Jesus Christ and, as Peter just stated, being ‘sprinkled with his blood…’  That is a nice Christian phrase, but what is ‘grace’ supposed to accomplish?  My understanding of its biblical use is that God’s grace is how God has forgiven us our sins without our paying the judicial price for those sins. Have you heard the rule, “If you can’t do the time, don’t do the crime?”

We’ve done the crime and God has graciously-by His grace-forgiven us and not only kept us from punishment, but ultimately remembers our sins no more.  The process for this is by the substitute of a Lamb, as was the process of Old Testament blood sacrifice, but this Lamb of God is our Lord Jesus.

In a word-grace, Peter is summing up the weight and measure of God’s forgiveness.  And peace?  Peace is the fruit of grace.  We have peace with our God because of the grace provided via the death and resurrection of Jesus. 

Peace with one another?  In the light of how all three faiths express the desire for peace when we greet one another?  In the light of a world where there is terror in Paris and threats to our own nation?  Doesn’t seem likely for us humans.  Thankfully, with God, all things are possible.