We are such a race, priesthood, nation, and people so that we may tell out the virtues of Him who has called us out of darkness into His marvelous light. The Greek word rendered “tell out” also means proclaim abroad. First we must be born anew and grow in life, and then be built up and serve corporately. Now we need to proclaim abroad, to tell out. To serve corporately is to satisfy God by offering up Christ as spiritual sacrifices; to proclaim abroad is to benefit others by showing forth the virtues of the One who has called us out of darkness into His marvelous light.
The virtues in verse 9 are excellencies, excellent and glorious virtues (2 Pet. 1:3). These refer to what God is and has, and the marvelous light of God consummates in His glory. To and by His virtue and glory God has called us.
The virtues here are excellent attributes, acts, and behavior. God has many virtues. For example, He is merciful. To be merciful is a virtue. God is also loving. He even loves sinners. This love is another of God’s virtues. All the excellent divine attributes are the virtues of God. We need to tell out, to proclaim abroad, these excellent virtues.
In his writings Peter emphasizes the matter of virtue more than Paul does. Peter says in 2 Peter 1:3 that we have been called by the virtue and the glory of God. He says not only that we have been called to God’s glory and virtue; he says that we have been called by His glory and virtue.
When the Lord Jesus was on earth, Peter and the other disciples saw His virtues. At least once, on the mount of transfiguration, they saw the Lord’s glory. Seeing Christ’s virtues was a daily occurrence. Whatever the Lord did was an excellent act full of virtue. Christ’s excellencies are great in number. Every day the Lord Jesus manifested His virtues, and Peter saw this. Later, Peter wrote that we have been called by the Lord’s virtue and glory. This indicates that Peter himself had been attracted by the virtue and glory of the Lord. Furthermore, he was called to this virtue and glory. Therefore, he is one with the Lord in virtue and in glory.
The apostles proclaimed the virtues of the Lord. They preached them, they taught them, and they announced them. Whatever the apostles preached and taught was a telling out of the virtues they had seen and enjoyed. It was a proclaiming abroad of the virtues in which they had participated. This is what it means to tell out God’s excellencies. Today we need to follow the apostles to tell out the excellent virtues of the Lord.
According to verse 9, we should proclaim abroad the virtues of the One who has called us out of darkness into His marvelous light. Darkness is the expression and sphere of Satan in death. Light is the expression and sphere of God in life. God has called us, delivered us, out of Satan’s death-realm of darkness into His life-realm of light (Acts 26:18; Col. 1:13).
In verse 10 Peter concludes this section: “Who once were not a people, but now are the people of God; who had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy.” This word from Hosea 2:23 was quoted by Paul in Romans 9:24-27, referring first to the Gentiles and then to the remnant of Israel, because not all are Israel who are out of Israel (Rom. 9:6). Here Peter, quoting this word, refers to those who received this Epistle, the scattered Jewish believers. They once were out of Israel, but were not Israel. Hence, they were not God’s people in the New Testament sense. Now, after they were called by God, they became God’s people, God’s particular possession, as a treasure to God. They obtained God’s mercy, which they had not obtained before.
When I was young, I was bothered by the verses that indicate that the Jewish people were not the people of God. I wondered how it was possible for them, being Jews, not to be God’s people. If we read Hosea 2, Romans 9, and this verse from 1 Peter, we may be confused, for the same quotation from Hosea is used to denote the Gentiles and the Jews in the flesh. The Gentiles were not God’s people and they had not obtained His mercy. But the same word refers to the Jews in the flesh. In Romans 9 Paul says that not all are Israel who are of Israel. This refers to Jews who had not believed in the Lord Jesus, to Jews in the flesh. But in the sight of God, Israel in the flesh is not the genuine Israel. Only when the Jews believe in the Lord Jesus do they become the real people of God. Before believing in Him, they did not obtain His mercy, but after believing, they have obtained the Lord’s mercy. Now, after much study and digging into the Word, I have seen that the word in Hosea is used in the New Testament to denote both the Gentiles and Israel in the flesh. Israel in the flesh actually was not the genuine people of God, the people who had obtained the mercy of God. But now through believing in the Lord Jesus, they have become the people of God, and they have obtained His mercy.