They Are to Abstain From Fleshly Desires and Let the Light of Their Good Works Shine Before Men (1 Peter 2:11-12).
Their first aim must be to ensure that the world does not become a hindrance to them. They must not let human affairs take control over them. Rather, holding earthly things lightly, they must abstain from anything that might deviate them from their heavenly responsibilities.
‘Having your behaviour seemly among the Gentiles; that, wherein they speak against you as evildoers, they may by your good works, which they behold, glorify God in the day of visitation.'
But he then guards against their misinterpreting the idea of being heavenly minded by stressing that this does not mean that they cut themselves off totally from the world. What it actually involves is that they ensure that they behave in a seemly way ‘among the Gentiles' so that all can see that they are different. (To Peter the church is the true Israel so that any ex-Gentiles who have joined it are no longer Gentiles). They are to remember that even though they are not of the world, they are still in the world, and must behave in a Christlike way towards the world. Jesus did not turn away from the world, and neither must they. How else will the world learn of Christ? And one reason why they are to do this is so that, while for the present certain Gentiles might smear them with a bad reputation as ‘evildoers', (the world always tries to find fault with those who oppose it and show up its failures), they will in the end have to admit that they were wrong and will have to recognise the good works of the Christians, and thus glorify God in ‘the Day of visitation'.
‘The day of visitation.' This could signify the day when all are called to account (Romans 14:10). In this case it is saying that Christians are to so live that when their works are examined in the Last Day, all will agree that what they did was genuinely right and will have to glorify God for the fact even though they themselves are condemned. Alternately ‘the day of visitation (overseeing)' may simply signify the time when during the course of history God has a special ‘overseeing' and sorting out, a time when people are faced up with consequences of things which previously they had misrepresented and are called on to face up to the truth about them (see Isaiah 10:3; Jeremiah 6:15; Jeremiah 10:15), thus having to admit that they were wrong and the people of God were right. We can compare how the prophets were sometimes vindicated even in their own life time, by ‘the day of visitation'. Or it may even refer to the time when such issues have to be faced up to in the course of life, possibly before a court.
Some, however, have seen ‘the day of visitation' as indicating a time when God visits the world in a period of spiritual renewal, with newly converted Gentiles having to admit to the fact that Christians had in reality been genuinely good and in the right after all. Whichever way it is the idea is that, whatever charges are laid against him, the Christian must be able to demonstrate that he is blameless so that God might be glorified.
It is significant that Peter begins this section by drawing attention to the fact that there are already those who are describing them as evildoers (1 Peter 2:12). For it explains firstly why he lays such stress on being obedient to the powers that be and on the need to demonstrate to them their well doing, something that he wants openly to establish, before going on to draw attention to who it is who are calling them evildoers. It is certain masters of householders who are as a result unfairly behaving harshly towards their Christian servants. The obvious reason why this might be so is that there are religious conflicts between them, such as might be expected to arise if masters expected their servants both to honour their master's gods (as well as their own) and to honour the emperor in the popular emperor worship common in the eastern part of the Empire, and the servants refused.
In a letter which would be widely read he obviously could not spell out the latter, leaving it to be assumed that the problem was harsh masters, but he does go to a great deal of trouble to make it clear that Christians are subject to the powers that be, and have done, and will do, nothing which might cause them to be seen as evildoers, and will in fact do the opposite. This explains also why he sees the suffering of the household-servants as being suffering for Christ's sake, and parallel to some extent with Christ's own sufferings.