'... That ye should show forth the praises of Him who hath called
you out of darkness ...'--1 Peter ii. 9.
The _Revised Version_, instead of 'praises,' reads _excellencies_--and
even that is but a feeble translation of the remarkable word here
employed. For it is that usually rendered 'virtues'; and by the word, of
course, when applied to God, we mean the radiant excellencies and
glories of His character, of which our earthly qualities, designated by
the same name, are but as shadows.
It is, indeed, true that this same expression is employed in the Greek
version of the Old Testament in Isaiah xliii. in a verse which evidently
was floating before Peter's mind. 'This people have I formed for Myself;
they shall show forth My praise.'
But even while that is admitted, it is to be observed that the
expression here does not merely mean that the audible praise of God
should be upon the lips of Christian people, but that their whole lives
should, in a far deeper sense than that, be the manifestation of what
the Apostle here calls 'excellencies of God.'