Sermon Devotional: Finding Enduring Safety

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. 1 Peter 1:3

Life. It is our most precious gift from God. I do not say “our most precious possession” for it is a gift which is, ultimately, not in our hands but in the good hands of God. Life. Without it, we don’t exist. For each of us as individuals, it is the gift upon which all else depends. It is a gift in both body and spirit. And these few verses (1 Pet 1:3-6) are all about life.

While, as Jesus explains to Nicodemus, it is not possible for anyone to be born or reborn to life by reentering their mother’s womb, it is possible to be “born again,” to be “born of the Spirit,” by believing in Jesus (Jn 3:3, 8, 15). Peter knows this and, speaking to Jesus-followers, proclaims that “In his great mercy he [Jesus Christ] has given us new birth into a living hope” (1 Pet 1:3). How is this even possible? Peter tells us: it is possible because Jesus Christ rose from the dead . . . to life (1:3).

Yet as we know all too well, life, our lives, are subject to death. Any day, any time. It is for this reason that “memento mori” has long been regarded by many Christian spiritual teachers as wise counsel: each day “remember that you will die.” For the Christian this is not dispiriting because there is hope for life beyond earthly death. Jesus has conquered death. Jesus has risen. Jesus has ascended and is seated at the right hand of the Father. Jesus is alive! And for those who are joined to him through belief in him, through entrusting themselves to him, he is keeping “an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade” (1:4). Moreover, these heirs of this inheritance are now “shielded by God’s power” (1:5). Thus, Peter rightly leads his readers in great rejoicing (1:6)!

At the same time, Peter—as the authors of scripture always do—squarely faces the realities of life between now and receiving our heavenly inheritance. Just as many of the Christ-followers to whom Peter wrote “had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials” (1:6), so too we may now have to suffer grief in many kinds of trials. New birth in Christ does not remove us from this world. However, it does bring us into a new quality of life, a new character of life, a form of life that, because of Jesus’s victory over death, will never perish, spoil or fade.

In Christian theology the word “hope” has a distinctive and important meaning. When we use the word in normal conversation it usually means something like “wish” or “desire” or “plan on” or “intend.” These qualities of human “hope” are important and, properly understood, they are part of Christian hope. However—a very important “However”—Christian hope consists in much more. Christian hope is confidence, certainty, assurance—not because of any virtue or power that we might have, but because of Jesus’s already-accomplished victory over death (1:3; also see 1 Cor 15:3-20). Because Jesus is already keeping “an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade” (1:4). We may “suffer grief in all kinds of trials” but nothing and no one—nothing and no one (see Rom 8:31-39)—can or will keep us from entering into the glorious fullness of eternal life with Christ who himself is now alive with our Father in heaven.

Christ has come. Christ has lived. Christ has died. Christ has risen! Christ has ascended and is seated at the right hand of the Father. Christ will come again. Hallelujah!

Consider
╬   What difference does it make to you that Christ is alive, rather than still in the tomb? What would your life be like if Jesus’ dead body was still in the tomb?

╬   What difference does it make that, in addition to being desired, our “hope” in Christ is absolutely certain, assured?

╬   Thank you, Father, for sending Jesus. Thank you, Jesus, for being obedient to the Father all the way to death on the cross. Thank you, Father, Son, and Spirit that Jesus was raised from the dead and is alive! In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.