1 Peter 1:6-12

⁶ So be truly glad. There is wonderful joy ahead, even though you must endure many trials for a little while. ⁷ These trials will show that your faith is genuine. It is being tested as fire tests and purifies gold—though your faith is far more precious than mere gold. So when your faith remains strong through many trials, it will bring you much praise and glory and honor on the day when Jesus Christ is revealed to the whole world.⁸ You love him even though you have never seen him. Though you do not see him now, you trust him; and you rejoice with a glorious, inexpressible joy. ⁹ The reward for trusting him will be the salvation of your souls.¹⁰ This salvation was something even the prophets wanted to know more about when they prophesied about this gracious salvation prepared for you. ¹¹ They wondered what time or situation the Spirit of Christ within them was talking about when he told them in advance about Christ’s suffering and his great glory afterward.¹² They were told that their messages were not for themselves, but for you. And now this Good News has been announced to you by those who preached in the power of the Holy Spirit sent from heaven. It is all so wonderful that even the angels are eagerly watching these things happen.

Today as we continue in our series “Holding onto Hope in a Hostile World” we are going to talk about trials and together we will discover that as tough as they are, trials can fortify our faith. Peter begins this section with these words: “So be truly glad” “So” refers to what we’ve learned in the first five verses. First we are scattered strangers strategically positioned in a strange land to sow the seed of the gospel. Second we have a God who guards what He gives, we can praise Him for His provision, His promise and His protection. The word glad here means to rejoice, and we can rejoice even in the midst of persecution because we are a people with purpose, we get to sow the seed of the gospel. We don’t just have a message we have a mission, we are not just milling around wasting our lives, we have the joy of sharing Jesus. You are not a waste of skin, you are significant because you are a servant of the Savior. Why do we rejoice because we have been called and commissioned by Christ the King. Now as we are growing up and as we go through school people repeatedly ask us: “what are you going to do when you grow up?” “What are your plans for the future?” and we intuitively know that they are talking about jobs, work, careers. Our world points and positions us to find our purpose in our jobs. Is it any wonder that many of us make the focus of our lives our jobs instead of Jesus, that we make it more about our career than we do Christ. Is it any wonder that while we become proficient at work we are pathetic in our witness? Yes we have jobs to do but what’s the goal is it getting or is it God? Is it the money or is it magnifying the Master? When we make it solely about money we lose focus on the mission. Is it any wonder that many of us are miserable, because we have missed the mission. Peter reminds us that our joy is found in Jesus not in our jobs not in the junk, unfortunately many sons and daughters of the King have substituted the Savior for the secular. But Peter reminds us that we can “greatly rejoice.” This is what I call jumping joy, ecstatic joy. Joy is different than happiness, happiness is related to what’s happening while joy is rooted in Jesus and what He has done for us. That’s why Jesus could say in Matthew 5:12 that even when we’re persecuted and reviled and hated we can: “Rejoice and be exceedingly glad.” Are you focusing on the joy or the junk?