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1 Peter 5:12<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n By Silvanus, our faithful brother as I consider him, I have written to you briefly, exhorting and testifying that this is the true grace of God in which you stand.<\/span><\/strong><\/strong><\/p>\n Truth to Learn<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n It is only by God\u2019s grace that we can firmly stand in Christ.<\/p>\n Behind the Words<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n The Greek word for the name \u201cSilvanus\u201d is Silounou<\/span><\/em>, which is an alternate spelling of Silon<\/span><\/em> or \u201cSilas.\u201d It is most reasonable to assume that this person is none other than Silas, the one who accompanied Paul on much of his missionary travels. He is mentioned numerous times through chapters 15, 16, 17, and 18 of the book of Acts.<\/p>\n The expression \u201cas I consider him\u201d is an unfortunate translation of the Greek word logidzomai<\/span><\/em>, which means \u201cto reckon\u201d or \u201cto put to someone\u2019s account.\u201d This is the same word that appears in James 2:23<\/span><\/strong> where it is translated as \u201ccounted to him,\u201d<\/p>\n And the Scripture was fulfilled which says, Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him for righteousness, and he was called the friend of God.” <\/span><\/p>\n Peter is not speculating about Silvanus\u2019 faithfulness, he is absolutely confirming it.<\/p>\n Meaning Explained<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n This verse and the two that follow are the closing salutation of this letter. Peter indicates that he believes this is a fairly short letter; \u201cI have written to you briefly\u2026\u201d He tells us at the beginning of this verse that this letter is by Silvanus. As mentioned earlier, this is Silas who is commonly accepted to be the same Silas who accompanied the Apostle Paul during much of his missionary travels. But what does Peter mean, \u201cby Silvanus.<\/span>\u201d Some believe that Silvanus (Silas) was the scribe who wrote the words which Peter dictated to him. Others believe that he was the messenger who carried this letter to the believers in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia (see 1 Peter 1:1<\/span><\/strong>). Either one or both of these may be true, though we don\u2019t really know for sure. It certainly would make sense for Peter to send this letter to these churches by Silas, since he travelled with the Apostle Paul through much of this area (current day Turkey), and these Christians knew Silas.<\/p>\n Peter then tells his readers that he, himself, is exhorting and testifying that which is contained in this letter is a representation of the true grace of God. That is, Christianity is the one true religion, not Judaism, nor paganism, nor humanism, nor any other \u201cism.\u201d It is this true belief in Jesus Christ by the grace of God in which we Christians stand.<\/p>\n Some translations have this last phrase as a command, \u201cStand firm in it!\u201d<\/span> This is because there is a variant reading regarding the tense of the final word of this verse. One Greek version has this as a command and another expresses this in the perfect tense implying completed action with a resultant state of being. The important thing is not the tense of this verb, but the fact that it is only by God\u2019s grace that we can stand firm in Christ.<\/p>\n Application<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n Is that where you are today, firmly standing by the grace of God? Do you recognize that you cannot earn your salvation? The only way we can be righteous in God\u2019s eyes is by His gracious gift of salvation. And, God\u2019s grace, through the blood of Jesus Christ, is greater than our sins.<\/p>\n In God\u2019s service, for His glory,<\/strong><\/p>\n Copyright \u00a9 2009 Will Krause. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –<\/p>\n <\/span>If this message or this link was forwarded to you by a friend and you wish to receive future verses directly to your inbox, you can call the church phone \n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" 1 Peter 5:12 By Silvanus, our faithful brother as I consider him, I have written to you briefly, exhorting and testifying that this is the true grace of God in which you stand. Truth to Learn It is only by God\u2019s grace that we can firmly stand in Christ. Behind the Words The Greek word […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[132,194,195,196],"class_list":["post-799","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-grace","tag-silas","tag-silvanus","tag-stand"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pd5geA-cT","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/799","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=799"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/799\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=799"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=799"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=799"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"signature\"](\"..\/..\/signature.gif\")
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