“To those who have obtained a faith of equal standing with ours by the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ”
2 Peter 1:1
Simon Peter was one of the most powerful men in the history of the world. While he never gained power through politics or huge sums of wealth, he was indwelled by the Holy Spirit like few others have been. By all human accounts, Peter had the right to boast in his position. Peter has the honor of giving the first gospel sermon at Pentecost. That’s pretty special! He also was one of the most important leaders in the earliest days of the Christian church. Yet look at what Peter says to believers he’s writing to in a letter: “to those who have obtained a faith of equal standing with ours.” Peter is saying here that these believers have faith that is of equal standing, or more accurately to the Greek text, a faith that is equal in honor, to his own faith. That’s incredible! Let’s look at this more closely.
Believers have faith that is equal in honor to Peter’s own faith.
What Is Apostolic Faith?
First, we need to realize that the faith that Peter had and all true believers have is built on the gospel as revealed in the Bible. The first aspect of this faith is sin. Sin is what separates us with God, and it all started in the Garden of Eden, where Adam and Eve directly disobeyed God’s command not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. At the heart of their sin, and the heart of all sin, was an attempt to find satisfaction in anything apart from God. Because of Adam’s sin, everyone who is ever born is a sinner from the moment they are conceived. David attests to this: “Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me.” (Psalm 51:5) From the moment we are conceived, we are naturally opposed to God and at odds against Him. Thus, we rightly deserve the wrath of God, because we looked to sources apart from Him for salvation.
Next, the faith of Peter entailed a Savior. Because of our sin, we deserve hell. The only way that we can have our infinite debt paid for is with the sacrifice of something infinite. This is where Jesus, the Son of God, comes in. Jesus took on humanity, becoming fully man as well as retaining His fully divine nature. Because He was a man as well as God, He could die for the sins of all who’d believe in Him when He went to the cross, making the sacrifice applicable to man (human-nature) and infinite in payment (divine-nature).
Finally, Peter believed in salvation. While the death of the Son of God is infinitely valuable and able to pay for everyone’s sins, it will only be applied to those who have faith in Jesus. To have salvation, man must repent from his sins and have faith in Jesus’ payment for sins (Acts 20:21). When we have faith in Jesus, the Holy Spirit comes inside of us and makes Himself evident (see Galatians 5). This salvation brings eternal life, where we will constantly be worshipping Jesus, growing in joy every day forever because we take in more and more of Jesus. This is what apostolic faith looks like.
The Humbling Nature of the Global Church
Next, we need to see the humbling nature of the global church, that is, all believers. The first thing that this global church implies is that there is only one kind of faith, with not varying levels of honorable faiths. There are no “super-saints.” No, that’s not to say that there aren’t believers who submit to Christ more than others, however there is only one type of faith, that apostolic faith that we looked at. This apostolic faith is the faith that was preached by Jesus and carried on by the apostles. This apostolic faith is believed in by the millionaire in Beverly Hills who uses her talents and wealth for the kingdom with generosity as well as the serial killer who’s given his life to Christ in prison.
The apostolic faith is the faith that was preached by Jesus and carried on by the apostles.
Next, we need to see how this one way to heaven, walked on by the rich and the poor, is encouragement to the weak. While Darwin may have gotten a lot wrong, his survival of the fittest principle seems to show itself in society. All throughout human history, those with wealth and power get it good and those without simply exist as the have-nots. However, with Christ there is life, if only we repent of our sins and believe in His work on the cross for us. No one is too much for Jesus to pay for.
On the other hand, this one way to heaven is humility for the proud. Sometimes those who have been believers for a few years grow the tendency to look down on others. We may think that we have a superior faith, while they have the B-level faith. This is simply not true, and one of the greatest saints in history, Peter, patently denies this. This ought to bring humility and point us to the grace of the Almighty God who is the source of our life.
The Source of Apostolic Faith
Finally, I would be remiss if I didn’t bring up the source of this apostolic faith. While we have alluded to this earlier, it is helpful to look at this again. First, we need to realize that we receive faith. This means that we do not generate it. Often in American culture, we feel the temptation to think that we were the ones who earned our salvation because we believed. In reality, we would have never believed in Jesus had we not been given regeneration by the Holy Spirit. We are dead in our sins, unable to move. Dead people don’t accomplish much. Rather, all credit belongs to God, who is the source of our salvation.
And the last observation from 2 Peter 1:1 is that our apostolic faith is founded upon the righteousness of the God-Man. If Jesus had not been a pure sacrifice, we as believers would still be dead in our sins. Jesus, however, was faultless. When He was crucified, God “made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” (2 Corinthians 5:21) This apostolic faith is built on the righteous Son of God.
So how has this apostolic faith changed you? Do you view other brothers and sisters in Christ as having a faith that is equal in honor as yours? Will this faith encourage you to realize that strength doesn’t come from you, rather from God? And will you be humbled and amazed by the grace of God to save the high and the low in this world?
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