Three questions that define the Christian life

Peter answers the questions we all ask — identity, place and purpose.

This post is based on a sermon given by the Rev. David Libbon at Good Shepherd Anglican Church in Cornelius, North Carolina, on May 3, 2026.

The text for this sermon is 1 Peter 2:1-12.

Click here to watch the sermon.

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Most of us spend a lot of time trying to figure out who we are, where we fit, and what we’re supposed to be doing with our lives.

Of course, Scripture answers these questions again and again, but Peter addresses them with particular clarity in 1 Peter 2:1–12.

Peter moves from how we enter the kingdom (1 Peter 1) to how we live in it (1 Peter 2), framing the Christian life around three defining principles that we see in Pastor David’s outline for his sermon.

Three kingdom principles:

1. Know who you are — You are chosen, holy and called into God’s family.

2. Know where you are — You are living as an exile in a broken world.

3. Know what you do — You live honorably so others may see Christ through you.

We also could frame the principles as questions:

1. Who am I?

2. Where am I?

3. What should I be doing?

Know who you are

Who are we? Peter says we Christians are:

• Living stones being built up as a spiritual house (verse 5)

• A holy priesthood (verse 5)

• A chosen race (verse 9)

• A royal priesthood (verse 9)

• A holy nation (verse 9)

• God’s people (verse 10)

David said that these words shouldn’t be a source of pride.

“Instead, they should give us confidence that God in His sovereignty calls us his people. He brings us to himself. It should give us confidence and a boldness — a humble boldness, a boldness that through the Gospel, God has removed sin and has called us his own.”

Know where you are

In verse 11, Peter calls us sojourners and exiles.

Exiles are people who have been removed from their native land.

Sojourners are people who are on a journey — people who are looking for something.

Pastor David said:

“If this world might seem foreign, strange and different, it’s because it is for the people of God. God has sent us into exile, but he’s also sent us to work there, to champion things, to put on display the gospel, to live, and to not shrink back. We are to bless and in return find our blessing.”

Two months ago, David preached on Jeremiah 29, where we find the Israelites in exile in Babylon.

Jeremiah 29 gives Christians a biblical blueprint for being “salt and light” in a society that overall does not follow Christ.

Like the Israelites in Babylon, we are called not to withdraw and isolate, but to seek the good of the places where God has put us.

Know what you do

That leads us to the third Kingdom Principle: Know what you do.

For one, verse 12 tells us to “Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation.”

It’s a similar message that Pastor David gave last week in his sermon on 1 Peter 2:12–3:7, where Peter tells Christians to “be subject to” certain people in our lives with the hope that they will see your good, humble behavior and also want to follow Jesus.

In our “doing,” David leaned on words from Tim Keller, a pastor at Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Manhattan who died of pancreatic cancer in 2023.

Keller often taught that Christians should be like their neighbors in many ordinary ways, yet deeply different in their character and conduct.

David said that Christians must be different than their neighbors in their integrity, generosity, hospitality, sympathy, and willingness to forgive.

“Jesus encourages us to be among our neighbors but be strikingly different,” David said.

Peter brings it back to three things: who you are, where you are, and what you are to do.

The challenge is not understanding them — it’s living them out in the places God has already put you.

That’s where the Christian life happens.