Peculiar

Peculiar in its biblical usage does not mean strange or odd but rather one's own special possession. It translates the Hebrew segullah (Exodus 19:5; Psalm 135:4; Malachi 3:17) and the Greek peripoiesis (Ephesians 1:14; 1 Peter 2:9), both denoting a treasured personal possession distinguished from common property. When God declares Israel his peculiar treasure at Sinai (Exodus 19:5), he uses the language of a king's personal jewels — property set apart from the general treasury as uniquely precious.

The New Testament applies the same concept to the church: 1 Peter 2:9 calls believers a peculiar people (laos eis peripoiesin — a people for God's own possession), identifying them as the continuation and fulfillment of the Sinai election. Titus 2:14 adds that Christ gave himself to purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works. The concept undergirds the biblical theology of election: God's choice of a people is not arbitrary favoritism but the constitutive act by which he creates a community to bear his name and reflect his character to the nations.