Revealed in these Last Times for You
Before the foundation of the world…..God had a plan
“He indeed was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you who through Him believe in God, who raised Him from the dead and gave Him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God.” (1 Peter 1:20-21)
These verses struck me as I was listing to my audio bible and I wanted to dig deeper into its meaning!
The Wuest Greek translation says: “Who indeed was foreordained before the foundation of the universe was laid, but was visibly manifested at the closing years of the times for your sake, who through Him are believers in God, the One Who raised Him out from among those who are dead and gave Him glory, so that your faith and hope might be in God.”
J Vernon McGee has a practical note writing that "When we begin to deal with words like foreordination, election, predestination, foreknowledge, etc., I feel that we, with our finite minds, treat God as if He were a great big computer. He isn't that at all. He has a heart bigger than the whole universe. When I was in seminary studying theology, it seemed pretty important to know whether or not foreknowledge comes before foreordination; but, frankly, since that time I have not been concerned with which comes first. I realize now that the important thing is that Christ was "foreknown before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you." To put it very simply, the Cross of Christ was not an ambulance sent to a wreck. Christ was the Lamb who was slain before the foundation of the world because God knew all the time that Vernon McGee would need a Savior, and He loved him enough to provide that Savior. I don't need a computer to go over this. I only need a God with a great big heart of love who provided redemption by His grace.”
Peter is teaching that God foreknew the Messiah would become the Savior of the world because the triune God had so ordained it.
Or as Barnes says "the plan was formed, and the arrangements made for the atonement, before the world was created (Barnes' Notes on the New Testament)
📜BUT HAS APPEARED:
Paul writes to Timothy of this appearing in what seems to take the form of a hymn
"And by common confession great is the mystery of godliness:
He who was revealed (phaneroo) in the flesh,
Was vindicated in the Spirit,
Beheld by angels,
Proclaimed among the nations,
Believed on in the world,
Taken up in glory. (1Timothy 3:16)
John 1:14-“And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.”
2 Timothy 1:9-10- “Who has saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was granted us in Christ Jesus from all eternity("before the beginning of time", NIV or "before the world began", NKJV) (10) but now has been revealed by the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.”
📜IN THESE LAST TIMES FOR THE SAKE OF YOU
The last times in this context signify that God executed His plan of redemption at the proper time.
Peter used a similar expression when quoting from Joel in his description of the Day of Pentecost and the coming of the Holy Spirit declaring "This is what was spoken of through the prophet Joel: ‘And it shall be in the last days,’ God says, ‘that I will pour forth of My Spirit on all mankind” (Acts 2:16, 17)
Paul uses a more general expression writing that "when the fulness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law." (Gal 4:4) This was the moment by which the whole pre-messianic period was completed. God sent forth His eternally preexisting Son when the time for His purpose had come.
Kenneth Wuest explains why Paul referred to the "time" as "full" in Galatians 4:4…
This point of time marked some outstanding events in the history of the human race.
First, it was the moment which God had ordained for Messiah’s coming. To Daniel was given the date of His coming, 483 years after the edict of the Medo-Persian government to rebuild Jerusalem.
Second, the Mosaic law had done its educational work, showing to the world that the most highly-favored nation on earth, the Jewish nation, was, despite all of God’s blessings and mercy, totally depraved, giving the Gentile portion of the race a picture of its own totally depraved heart.
Third, the Mosaic law in its three sections, the ten commandments, the laws governing social relationships, and the Levitical system of sacrifices, was done away with as a legal system, to be superseded by the gospel of grace centering faith in an historic Saviour.
Fourth, the Roman empire maintained world peace. Roman roads made travel for missionaries easy. The universal use of the Greek language made the speedy propagation of the gospel possible. The earth-stage was all set for the greatest event in the history of the human race, the incarnation, sacrificial death, and bodily resurrection of God the Son.
He did this for our sake!
Others waited and longed for this revelation of Christ (1Pet. 1:10-12); the church (indicated by the collective "you") has received it and benefits from it. This sense of their place in God's plan, their privileged status, along with their sense of the impending end, should strengthen these believers!
As they came to believe in Christ, they also believed in God. "No man can actually believe in God without believing in Christ; otherwise the God in whom he believes is not the God of revelation." True knowledge of God is mediated to us only through Christ, the Mediator (John 14:6; 1Jn 2:22-23). His redemptive work has once for all opened up man's approach to God (3:18; Rom. 5:1). "Without Christ we should only dread God; whereas through Him we believe, and hope, and love" (Wesley)
📜WHO RAISED HIM FROM THE DEAD AND GAVE HIM GLORY
Charles Spurgeon - “Jesus Christ, from the dead, and this is our joy to-day. This is one of the facts, which are proved beyond all question, that Jesus Christ, who died upon the cross, and was buried in Joseph’s tomb, did actually rise again. This is the corner-stone of the Christian faith; one of the great facts upon which we found our confidence as to salvation by Jesus Christ.”
Wuest explains that “Dead refers not to the state of death, but to individuals who are dead. It is a plural noun in the Greek. Our Lord was raised out from among those who were dead. They stayed in that condition called death, whereas He was given life."
He entered the realm of the dead when He gave His life as a ransom. Without His resurrection, we would have no assurance that His ransom had been accepted. His resurrection eloquently proved that the God of the Christian gospel is truly the Living God.
📜SO THAT YOUR FAITH AND HOPE ARE (continually) IN GOD:
What is the purpose of Christ's being raised out from among the dead?" Peter says this truth forms the basis for our belief and our hope. In other words, the foundation for a Christian's faith and hope is the resurrection and glorification of our Lord Jesus Christ.
John MacArthur explains the combination of faith and hope - Faith enables believers to trust God for necessary grace in the midst of life’s present circumstances, struggles, and anxieties and hope enables belief in future grace, to be revealed for them in heavenly glory!
Christ had promised that where he is there should his servant be; he had prayed that those whom the Father had given him should be with him where he is, to behold his glory. He is in heaven, on the right hand of God. Thus the Christian's faith assumes the attitude of hope; he hopes to be where Christ is, to see him as he is, to be made like unto him. This is "the hope of glory" for which we offer our thanksgivings!
Maranatha! -Dustin
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