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?

1 Peter series – “Holding onto Hope in a Hostile World”

1 Peter 1:3-5

³ Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, ⁴ and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade. This inheritance is kept in heaven for you, ⁵ who through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealedin the last time.

After seeing God’s provision Peter now reminds us of the:

• PROMISE – VS 4

The promise of a priceless inheritance, Peter reminds us that it is an imperishable Inheritance and he describes it in four ways:

•          Cannot be destroyed – “Beyond the reach of change” Our inheritance will never decay or be destroyed. Nothing can ruin what is reserved for you because it is incapable of corrosion or corruption.

•          Cannot be defiled – “Pure and Undefiled” This refers to being stained with color. No stains will appear on our inheritance because the blood of Jesus has blotted out all our sins.

•          Cannot be decayed –  It will never decrease in value or wear away and grow dim. A study found that 90% of inheritances are depleted by the third generation. This word decay is often used of flowers that fade and fall. But our inheritance will not diminish.

•          It is definite – “kept in heaven for you.” Kept means reserved, its being watched over and protected. Notice here that Peter switches from “us” to “you” to show that this is a personal promise. 

Over the years I have had lots of companies call wanting me to invest money, and they always present you with their best performances but they always attach a caveat, typically in fine print that reads something like this: “Past performance is not necessarily indicative of future results.” Friends, God’s past performance is indicative of future results! You can count on His promises in the future because of His performance in the past. We have a God who guards what He gives, Peter now turns from Gods promises to His:

• PROTECTION – Vs 5

This is not just a past hope or a future hope but a present hope, we are protected in the present. Protected is a military term that refers to a military guard’s protective power. Not only is our inheritance guarded, but the heirs who have been born into that inheritance are also protected by God’s power. This was no doubt very comforting to those being clobbered for being Christ-followers. No matter how much garbage you’re going through God is guarding you and He will keep you and bring you to the inheritance that He is keeping for you. He won’t throw you away, forget about you, or disqualify you. He keeps your inheritance for you and He keeps you for your inheritance. When we start with praise and we remember His provision, promises and protection it should affect our:

• PERSPECTIVE – Vs 6

So be truly glad, there is wonderful joy ahead. Peter calls us to put knowledge into practice. If you truly grasped the tremendous theological truths that are being taught then your response should be one of rejoicing. Knowledge alone cannot produce rejoicing in the face of persecution, as born again believers we are responsible to respond in faith. Faith turns sound doctrine into sound doing, it moves us from principles to practice. Faith acts on the content of theology and produces conduct that corresponds to that content. So here is the most important question, Are you saved, do you know Jesus Christ as your personal Savior, do you have hope? And if you do are you going to live out your hope or hide it? We have a Living Hope not a lifeless Hope and God’s plan is for us to take this hope and live as lights in the darkness. What if we were to stop focusing on the mess in this world and start focusing on the mission?