Title: Scattered Travelers (Diaspora) (1 Peter 1:1-2)
Contents
In the meantime, we have delivered a series of sermons on the topic of 'Christianity', but today, for the last time, let's think about the Christian identity called 'scattered stranger' or 'diaspora'.
The text of 1 Peter 1:12 is the greeting at the beginning of the letter. There, the apostle Peter refers to the Christians who will receive his letter as 'scattered strangers'. The Greek word for 'scattered' here is 'diaspora'. And originally, the term 'diaspora' was a term used to refer to Jews who had left Judea and were living in various countries around the world. However, in today's text, the people who call Apostle Peter a scattered stranger, that is, a diaspora, do not refer to such Jews. By giving a new meaning to the Old Testament or Jewish term, the Apostle Peter is saying that Christians in the New Testament who live in every corner of the world are the true diaspora.
Then why are these New Testament Christians really diasporas? First, because Christians are scattered all over the world. And no matter where they live, they live longing for their heavenly hometown. A true Christian always longs for his hometown in heaven during his days on this earth. Even though we live with citizenship of one country on this earth, we know that our eternal citizenship is in heaven, so in this world, Christians are people who regard themselves as strangers and long for their heavenly hometown. Because we know that the earth we live in is not our hometown where we will live forever, we must not absolutize the reality of this world and live without clinging to success or glory in this world. In this way, Christians can be said to be diasporas in the true sense of the word because they must live in the same way as a stranger who longs for their heavenly home while living scattered throughout the world.
In addition, there is another important spiritual meaning for us Christians to be called the diaspora. It is the fact that we Christians are the seeds of heaven that God has sown in this world. The Greek word for diaspora is translated into English as scatter, which means a farmer who scatters the seeds of grain. Therefore, it can be said that the spiritual meaning of us Christians as the seeds of heaven scattered in the field called this world is implied in the term diaspora (see Matthew 13:36 et seq.). In this disobedient and rebellious world, God saved us to become a holy people who obey God and serve only God, and He sent us all over the world so that we Christians can spread the gospel and bear much fruit as the seeds of the holy kingdom of heaven. scattered on the