Elect Exiles

by Jonathan Lacy

If you were to be in a race it would be important to know what kind of race you’re in. If you’ve been training your whole life to run, and then on the day of the race you find out it’s a swimming race you probably won’t go too far. Yes, you trained extremely well, but you were preparing for the wrong event. In a similar way, Hebrews 12 reminds us that we have a race to run. If we’re unaware of what that race is, we can run and train and work all we want and just end up looking like a man trying to run in a swimming pool.

Our High Schoolers previously this semester went through a series in 1 Peter. Here the Apostle Peter’s main message is that Christians are what he calls “Elect Exiles”. This has a double meaning:

1) Elect: We have been chosen by God to receive the gift of salvation

2) Exile: The living church is currently living in a place that’s not their home

As Christians, we must understand both of these realities to truly understand the race that we’re in. Say you were taking a plane from Miami to Tokyo. While on your long trip you decide that you want to do some remodeling. So mid-flight you take out some tools and begin to redo the floors and the walls. It probably wouldn’t be a pretty sight! This isn’t to say that remodeling is terrible, but rather it’s to say that the plane is in FLIGHT and it’s not the place for that. That aircraft isn’t your home so you’re expected to act one way there and another way later. In a similar way, we aren’t home. This changes how we think about this world. We should now be both detached and attached to this side of eternity.

You would think after considering these truths Peter would tell us to act like Buddha and keep our thoughts and actions far away from this world, but that’s not his conclusion. Rather, throughout Peter’s letter, we see we’re called away from some things (like “the passion of our flesh” or “things that perish”) while clinging tightly to other things (like “brotherly love”). There are temporary things we can do in this life that matter eternally. This is the only time in your eternal life when you can use you weakness and need to glorify God and love your neighbor. Yet, if we spend 90% of our time on things that won’t matter in 80 years we’re running the wrong race. We wouldn’t spend our whole life investing in a bank account that has a 100% chance of losing all our money in 80 years. Yet, we do this when we pretend (to use the analogy) that the plane is our home.

So what race are you running? What are you investing your life into? Our investments in this life aren’t necessarily wrong,

but are the things consuming our time eternally important? Are there any events upcoming in your life that if Jesus was returning tomorrow would make you want to say: “Hey Jesus could you return in a couple of months from now?” Be reminded today that if you are in Christ YOU ARE IN EXILE, yet you are an elected and loved daughter or son of God. Home is coming soon and very soon.

Jonathan and his wife, Kara, have been with Park Road since 2020. Jonathan serves as the Director of Youth Ministries here at Park Road Pres. If you would like to contact Jonathan, you can email him at Jonathan@parkroadpres.org