In 1:20 Peter speaks of Christ: “Who was foreknown before the foundation of the world, but was manifested in the last times for your sake.” Christ was foreordained, prepared, by God to be His redeeming Lamb (John 1:29) for His elect according to His foreknowledge before the foundation of the world. This was done according to God’s eternal purpose and plan; it did not happen accidentally. Hence, in the eternal view of God, from the foundation of the world, that is, since the fall of man as a part of the world, Christ was slain (Rev. 13:8).
In 1:2 Peter speaks of the foreknowledge of God the Father, and in verse 20 he says that Christ was foreknown before the foundation of the world as the redeeming Lamb. In the New Testament the root of such words as foreknowledge, foreknow, and foreknown is know. To this root a prefix is attached. The Greek prefix pro means before or beforehand. In New Testament Greek, words such as foreknow, foreknowledge, and foreknown imply more than what we would understand from the English translations. The Greek root for these words includes the meaning of appreciation, approval, and possession. If we approve something, we shall appreciate it. Then we shall want to take possession of it and own it. Sometimes “I do not know” means “I do not own that” or “I do not want that.” Furthermore, in the Bible the word “know” is also used for the relationship between husband and wife. For example, concerning the relationship between Joseph and Mary, Matthew 1:25 says that Joseph “did not know her until she brought forth a Son.” This, of course, does not simply refer to Joseph’s knowledge of Mary. It refers to his taking her and owning her as his wife.
The foreknowledge of God spoken of in 1:2 implies that in eternity past God approved us and appreciated us. It also implies that in eternity past He took us over, possessed us, owned us. We may even say that, as Joseph married Mary, God in His foreknowledge married us in eternity past. (There is no time element with God.) All of this is included in the connotation of the word foreknowledge.
For Christ to be foreknown means that He was foreordained by God. To foreknow is to foreordain, to ordain beforehand. In his expanded translation of the New Testament, Kenneth S. Wuest uses the words “foreordained” and “foreordination.” According to this translation, verse 20 says, “Christ...was foreordained before the foundation of the universe was laid,” and verse 2 says that the believers are “chosen-out ones, this choice having been determined by the foreordination of God the Father.” God’s foreknowledge, therefore, means not only that He knew us in eternity past; it also means that He ordained us. We all were ordained by God the Father in eternity past. We do not need any other kind of ordination.
Do you know when you were ordained by God? You were ordained by Him before the foundation of the world. Hallelujah, God’s foreknowledge includes foreapproval, foreappreciation, foreacknowledgement, foremarrying, and foreordination!
Christ was foreknown before the foundation of the world. This means that in eternity past God approved Christ and appreciated Him. Then God also ordained Christ to be His anointed One. God has ordained Christ to be the One commissioned to fulfill in time all that had been planned by God for the accomplishment of His eternal purpose. At the same time God foreordained Christ, He also foreordained all the believers.
When some hear that they were foreordained with Christ in eternity past, they may be rather doubtful and say, “This is just the preaching of Brother Lee. Just as a salesman sells his goods, so this preacher is trying to sell me his concept.” If this is your attitude, I encourage you to wait until we are in the New Jerusalem in eternity. I have the assurance that when we all arrive there, you will praise God and say, “Hallelujah! Now I see that I truly was foreordained by God the Father before the foundation of the world!”
We may say that in eternity past God held a ceremony of ordination. In that ordination ceremony He first ordained His Son to be the Christ. Then He ordained all of us, the believers in Christ, to be Christians. In an eternal ordination ceremony before the foundation of the world, we all were ordained when Christ was ordained. When He was ordained to be the Christ, we were ordained to be Christ-men. He was ordained to be the Anointed of God, and we were ordained to be the little anointed ones. How marvelous that Christ and we were ordained at the same time in eternity past! Christ was foreknown by God the Father, and we also were foreknown by Him.
Do you believe that you were foreknown by God when Christ was foreknown, and ordained by Him when Christ was ordained? If you see this and believe it, you should not hesitate to declare it. Perhaps you are reluctant to say that you were ordained before the foundation of the world when Christ was ordained. You may feel uneasy about speaking such a thing; you may think that others would consider you beside yourself if you said this. Oh, we all need to see the revelation in 1 Peter 1 concerning God’s foreknowledge and foreordination! It is a marvelous spiritual fact that we and Christ were foreknown and foreordained by God the Father in eternity past!
Verse 20 says that Christ was foreknown, foreordained, and verse 2 indicates that we the believers were chosen according to the foreknowledge, the foreordination, of God. Therefore, verse 20 matches verse 2. When Christ was ordained, we were foreknown and chosen. This is possible because there is no time element with God.