A Royal Priesthood Without a Platform

Who Peter Was Writing To, and What He Called Them

The first people to read 1 Peter were scattered. Peter addresses the letter to the pilgrims of the Dispersion across five regions of what is now Turkey, believers living as strangers in cities that weren't friendly to them. He tells them later that they would be spoken against as evildoers, and that some would suffer for the name of Christ. Among them, in chapter 2, are household servants, people who answered to masters, some of them harsh. They had no platform, no title, and no building to stand in front of.

And to them Peter writes this:

But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light. (1 Peter 2:9)

Royal priesthood. To strangers and servants.

Keys and Badges

It's easy to hear "priesthood" as a position, something you hold at an event with a badge on a lanyard. Either you've got the badge, which means you're up front, or you don't, and then you're in the seats. If that's the picture, it's natural to assume you're in the seats. And from there it's a short walk to the second assumption, that standing before God works the same way as standing before a crowd, so that a person who hasn't been recognized hasn't been accepted.

The Bible's priest isn't defined by a platform. He's defined by access. A priest goes where others can't, and he goes there on behalf of people. A badge tells the room who you are, while a key opens the door on the inside. Peter hands the key to strangers, and he hands it to all of them together: you also, as living stones, are being built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood.

And he says what makes it work. Just before this he calls Jesus a living stone, rejected indeed by men, but chosen by God and precious, and says the priests offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. Acceptable through Jesus Christ. The offering is accepted because of the One it comes through, and the quality of the offering doesn't decide it.

The Verse That Makes It Conditional

Peter is quoting Exodus, and in Exodus the sentence carried an if:

Now therefore, if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant, then you shall be a special treasure to Me above all people... And you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. (Exodus 19:5-6)

If you obey, then you shall be. So Peter's readers could fairly wonder whether the priesthood was something they had to keep earning.

Start with what Exodus itself says first. One verse earlier God reminds them, you have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles' wings and brought you to Myself. Redemption comes before the command, even there. But the priesthood was set in a covenant Israel promised to keep, and the story that followed shows how that went.

Peter takes the same titles and states them as fact. You are. And he gives the reason in verse 10: who once were not a people but are now the people of God; who had not obtained mercy but now have obtained mercy. Peter's priesthood rests on a stone God chose, the One who kept the covenant Israel could not, and on mercy already obtained. Peter asks plenty of his readers, and every demand grows out of the standing he's just named.

What Priests Do

So what does a royal priesthood do? The same letter answers. They proclaim the praises of the One who called them. They keep their conduct honorable among people who don't like them. Hebrews describes the sacrifices as the sacrifice of praise to God, and to do good and to share. Nothing there requires a stage.

John says it the same way in Revelation, that Christ has made us kings and priests to His God and Father. Look at the verb. Christ has made us, and the kingship and the priesthood belong to people who were handed them. A congregation doesn't vote them in, and no ordination adds to them.

Peter's own picture of the work is small. He says in 2:12 to keep your conduct honorable among the Gentiles, so that even people who speak against you will glorify God in the day of visitation. The priesthood shows up in how a servant handles unfair treatment and how a stranger stays gentle, long before it shows up anywhere with a podium.

It does ask something, and it won't always be glamorous. Doing good and sharing when nobody applauds is plain, repeatable work, and Peter's readers were doing it under real pressure. A priest in this house isn't working to be let in.

It also gives the ordinary week its dignity. The household servant in chapter 2 who does good under a harsh master is doing priestly work, bringing something to God on behalf of people, and nobody gave him a title for it. If titles are on your mind, Reverend, Father, Rabbi looks at what Jesus said about them.

A lot of believers have spent years waiting to be picked, ordained, or invited up front. Peter wrote to people nobody would have picked and called them royal. He told them what they were before he told them what to do.