Meyer Minute for July 31
Do you sometimes feel alienated from the world around you? Yesterday at a stop light I looked over at the car next to me. The driver and passenger, both teens in a parent’s expensive car, were preoccupied with their phones. When the light turned green, I let them get away from me. More and more I feel like an old fuddy-duddy. It’s more than tech and teens. Have you ever imagined how you’d be ridiculed if your true religious beliefs were known? I believe in heaven and hell, in a six-day creation, that Jesus means it when He says He’s the only way to heaven (John 14:6), and other old-fashioned beliefs. Put those beliefs out in public and you’ll be laughed at. Decades ago America was nominally Christian, public morality followed the Ten Commandments more or less, and the beliefs of the church were largely accepted in public life. No more. When our beliefs are known today, many people think we’re peculiar.
1 Peter was written to “sojourners and exiles” who lived in Asia Minor (1:2; 2:11). Are those words literal or figurative? Were those Christians literally outsiders, like today’s immigrants, or is it just figurative, “I’m but a stranger here, heaven is my home”? Many scholars favor a literal understanding. Those early followers of Jesus were not a majority of the population; they were a very, very small minority who were ridiculed because they didn’t agree with popular morality, didn’t believe all roads lead to heaven, and tended to keep to themselves. They felt alienated from the world around them.
You can worry about Christians who don’t feel some sense of alienation from today’s public life. They’re not understanding the distinctiveness of following Jesus Christ. And should you feel alienated because the beliefs you espouse in the safe surroundings of your church are not the beliefs you bump into during the week, then you are blessed. You are experiencing in often uncomfortable ways that following Jesus Christ in head, heart and conduct is distinctly different than blending into today’s public spirituality. Yes, you are “peculiar” in a special sense of that old word. You are claimed by the heavenly Father to be His own. The King James Version translated 1 Peter 2:9, “Ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people.” The ESV translates “peculiar” as “a people for his own possession.” Out of step with today’s world? Let the reason be you’re following Jesus.
