Bible Text: 2 Peter 1:1-11 | Preacher: Pastor Joe Ricchuiti | Series: 2 Peter, How Faith Grows

The writer introduces himself in verse 1 as Simon Peter. Simon, his Hebrew name, and Peter, the Greek translation of the Aramaic “Cephas,” which means “stone” or “rock”, a name Jesus gave him in John 1:42.
Matthew 16:13-18 is an oft misinterpreted and misapplied passage concerning Peter’s name. Jesus says in verse 18, “And I tell you that you are Peter (Gk. “petros” a masculine noun), and on this rock (Gk. “petra” a feminine noun) I will build my church.” The “rock” that Jesus makes reference to upon which He will build His church is not Peter, as is often taught, but Peter’s confession of Jesus as “the Christ, the Son of the Living God” (verse 16). As Charles Ryrie says, “Christ used a play on words. He does not say ‘on you, Peter’ or ‘on your successors,’ but ‘on this rock’—on this divine revelation and profession of faith in Christ.”
Peter calls himself a servant (Gk. “doulos” often translated “slave”). William Barclay makes the following observations about slaves in that day in the Roman Empire (observations which can be applied to believers as the following shows). A slave is:

-one who belongs to another (“we are bought with a price”)

-one at the disposal of another (we surrender our rights to God)

-one who owes unquestioning obedience to another (“Lord, what would you have me do?”)

-one who is constantly in the service of another (all time is his Master’s time)

Peter speaks of the recipients of this letter as having a faith as precious as his, a phrase which means that they had equal standing and equal access before God as Peter and the Apostles had. Peter and the others did not possess any “secret or special knowledge” which other believers were not privy to. That was a claim of the false teachers which were infiltrating these believers.