CONTENTS
The Apostle, after opening his Epistle with Salutation, immediately establisheth the fundamental Truth of the Covenant in Christ, and breaks out into an Hymn of Praise for the Divine Love. He shews, that Redemption by Christ is nothing new. He dwells most delightfully on the infinite Preciousness of Christ's Blood; and finisheth this first Chapter with an affectionate Exhortation.
Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to the strangers scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia,
Nothing can be more proper than the Apostle's putting his name and office, and the glorious Person's authority from whom he received his Apostleship, at the opening of this Epistle. This puts an end to all dispute. For when we read the divine truths contained in those writings, the mind is immediately directed to enquire from whom, and by what authority are these things said? Here is at once the answer. It is Peter, the Apostle, and especially called to the office of an Apostle by Christ himself.
The persons to whom Peter (directed by the Holy Ghost writes, are the strangers, meaning God's Israel, scattered as God's Israel are scattered throughout the earth, that they may be gathered: Compare Jeremiah 32:37-44 with Genesis 49:10, with John 11:52. And these several provinces of proconsular Asia, were intended to take in and comprise all the places where the Lord had a people. See Matthew 24:31. Reader! pause and consider. Is not this precious book of God intended for all strangers by nature to the covenant of promise, who from everlasting were given of the Father to the Son, redeemed by Christ in the time-state of the Church, and through the Spirit are brought nigh by the blood of Christ? Ephesians 2:11-13
Do they not prove their interest in it, by the sweet teaching and application of it to their own state and circumstances? If all the children are to be taught of God, and from hence a child of God receives instruction, can anything be higher, in proof, both that they are children, and herein learn divine teaching? Isaiah 54:13.