Now we come to the most accurate-sounding description of Christians as a group, a peculiar people! Yes, when seen from the outside, Christians may appear rather odd. But, I think the general consensus from outsiders (and definitely the media) Christians are not peculiar at all. We are seen as a like-minded collection of uninteresting rubes. From inside each individual congregation, Christians themselves would no doubt observe that believers are just as peculiar individually as any other gathering of individuals. So, why would Peter call Christians a peculiar people, if in the end they are just like any other group of people each with their own peculiarities?
9 But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. 10 Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.
1 Peter 2:9-10
Peculiar people, indeed!
“Aha!” You say. “Peter didn’t call Christians a peculiar people after all.” Well, maybe he did, and maybe he didn’t. The truth is that it was the King James Version of the Bible which translated a people for his own possession, as a peculiar people. I have the ESV quoted above, as that’s the translation I find most clear, and for various other reasons. So, why the title, and why the focus on peculiar people? The truth is I’ve had 1 Peter 2:9 memorized since before I can remember. Why? Because there was a song we sang in worship when I was a child which used the KJV. And, I’m the author of this study, so I can title it as I choose! Plus, there is something wonderful and intriguing about the term. If nothing else, it begs to be investigated.
a peculiar mystery
Anyway, think about it a moment. What is more peculiar than that God chose whom he chose – in spite of their individual peculiarities – as people for his own possession? It is a mystery.
Covenant language
Peter is again using terminology from the covenant relationship between God and the people of Israel to describe the Christian relationship with God. As I have pointed out many times now, this is not because Peter is picking out a metaphor. Peter sees the coming of Christ as the fulfillment of God’s covenants with the people of Israel. So, when he borrows the same language used to describe Abraham and his descendants it is not simply out of familiarity. Peter is applying the covenant language to us because it actually applies.
Peculiar, treasured possession
We covered many of these verses in the past few studies. The reason is, Peter used the language from them wholesale. He didn’t seek out obscure passages in order to put together the list of appellations he wrote in 1 Peter 2:9. Here are a few: (for clarity sake, I will highlight the portions that mirror a peculiar people, that is a people for his own possession.)
2 They set out from Rephidim and came into the wilderness of Sinai, and they encamped in the wilderness. There Israel encamped before the mountain, 3 while Moses went up to God. The Lord called to him out of the mountain, saying, “Thus you shall say to the house of Jacob, and tell the people of Israel: 4 ‘You yourselves have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself. 5 Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine; 6 and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ These are the words that you shall speak to the people of Israel.”
Exodus 19:2-6
For you are a people holy to the Lord your God, and the Lord has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession, out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth.
Deuteronomy 14:2
16 “This day the Lord your God commands you to do these statutes and rules. You shall therefore be careful to do them with all your heart and with all your soul. 17 You have declared today that the Lord is your God, and that you will walk in his ways, and keep his statutes and his commandments and his rules, and will obey his voice. 18 And the Lord has declared today that you are a people for his treasured possession, as he has promised you, and that you are to keep all his commandments, 19 and that he will set you in praise and in fame and in honor high above all nations that he has made, and that you shall be a people holy to the Lord your God, as he promised.”
Deuteronomy 26:16-19
God’s people forever
King David, a peculiar person if ever there was one, marveled at this act of God.
21 Because of your promise, and according to your own heart, you have brought about all this greatness, to make your servant know it. 22 Therefore you are great, O Lord God. For there is none like you, and there is no God besides you, according to all that we have heard with our ears. 23 And who is like your people Israel, the one nation on earth whom God went to redeem to be his people, making himself a name and doing for them great and awesome things by driving out before your people, whom you redeemed for yourself from Egypt, a nation and its gods? 24 And you established for yourself your people Israel to be your people forever. And you, O Lord, became their God.
2 Samuel 7:21-24
Peter knows these verses. He knows that David said God had established for Himself a people to be his possession – His peculiar people – forever. Through Christ we belong to that same people. Through Christ future generations will likewise be numbered among God’s people.
Paul, the most peculiar apostle
Paul uses the same terminology when writing to Titus.
11 For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, 12 training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, 13 waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, 14 who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.
Titus 2:11-14
As a peculiar people, we are to live peculiar lives
Since we are on the final descriptor in Peter’s list from 1 Peter 2:9, I think it’s time to pull in a great quote from Charles Spurgeon. While referring to 1 Peter 2:9, Spurgeon echoes Paul’s words to Titus as regards our conduct. As a peculiar people, we are to live peculiar lives. Our lives should not be identical to the lives of the unbelievers among whom we live. Instead, our lives should proclaim our peculiar status. We belong to God as a treasured possession.
You have national privileges. God reckons you not as a mob or a herd of men, but as a nation, and a nation with this peculiar hall-mark upon you, that you are “a holy nation.” This is the true token of your nationality that you are “holiness unto the Lord,” “a peculiar people” belonging to God alone, marked off from the rest of mankind as peculiarly his. You are not, and you are not to be as other men are, you are “a peculiar people.” Your road is not the broad one where the many go, it is the narrow one which the few find, your happiness is not worldly pleasure, but pleasures at the right hand of God which are for evermore, You are “a peculiar people”
Charles Spurgeon, Spurgeon’s Verse Expositions of the Bible
John Brown again with the closing arguments
Finally, then, as has been my habit since delving into these verse of 1 Peter 2, let’s wrap today’s study up with words from John Brown. I may have mentioned it before, but I love John Brown’s writing. At the same time, it can be difficult to find an applicable passage in Brown which properly distills his thoughts on a subject. Many of his excellent passages span 2-3 pages of his writing, which is not reader-friendly, nor easily reproducible here. The reason for this is an admirable one. Brown fills his writing, not with his own thoughts, but with quote after quote of scripture and the writers of the early Church. All to say, the quote below is an amalgam of quotes which I lifted from six pages of his writing. Nevertheless, I think I was able to capture his sentiments. And, I think his words a proper conclusion to today’s study.
The next appellation that calls for our consideration is, “A peculiar people.” To a mere English reader, these words convey the idea, a perfectly just one, that they to whom they are applied are a people…who have many peculiarities about them…
But the truth is, the English expression conveys very imperfectly the meaning of the original term. It is literally “a people for a purchased possession,” or for a treasure; for the word employed is used in both senses: in the first, in the Epistle to the Ephesians, “Until the redemption of the purchased possession;” in the second, in the passage of the book of Exodus from which this is quoted, “Ye shall be a peculiar treasure to me.” In Malachi it is rendered “jewels,” and on the margin, “special treasure.” …The sentiments which the appellation seems intended to convey are these two: That they are the subjects of the divine peculiar property, and the objects of the divine peculiar regard…
And all the glory, all the felicity, included in God treating them as a people for a purchased possession, a peculiar treasure, is obtained by connection with Christ, and is a further demonstration of his grace to those on whom it is bestowed.
John Brown, Expository Discourses on the First Epistle of Peter Volume 1, 303-308, William Oliphant and Co. 1866
