1 Peter 2:10

1 Peter 2:10 Meaning and Explanation

Which in time past were not a people, but are now the people of God: which had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy.

King James Version (KJV)

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Once they were not a people and had not received mercy; now they are God's people who have received mercy.

What Does 1 Peter 2:10 Mean?

Peter measures the distance his readers have traveled in a single line. They were once no people, without belonging or claim; now they are the people of God.

The hinge of the change is mercy. They had not obtained it; now they have. Nothing in them earned the new standing; it was given. Peter borrows the prophet Hosea's words about a rejected people restored, and applies them to a church that knows what it is to be outsiders. The God of mercy makes a people out of those who were nothing, and that mercy is the whole of their hope.

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What does 1 Peter 2:10 mean?

Once they were not a people and had not received mercy; now they are God's people who have received mercy.

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