Our Lively Hope

Park Meadows Church

Subscribe

Download

Share

00

Comments are disabled.

00:00

All righty, good morning everybody. Yes, dad asked me, excuse me, yesterday what

00:08

I'd think about bringing the message again this year. I think I said yes before he was done asking, but at some point throughout the night something came over me.

00:21

I came down with something, so if I sound a little raspy today or if I have to grab a

00:26

Kleenex or something at some point, I hope it's not too much of a distraction. I do apologize for that ahead of time, but I am honored to have this opportunity to deliver a message again on the second

00:38

Easter in a row, so I'm excited about it. Why don't you all open your Bibles with me, we'll get right into it, and turn to 1st

00:46

Peter, the first epistle of Peter, very near the back of your

00:53

Bible, right before the epistles of John, and what

00:59

I'd like to do today is walk through a passage. There are so many different passages we could look at that make reference to this day that we're commemorating, and I picked one in particular that I feel does a beautiful job of describing the effects of the resurrection that we celebrate today, and so I just want to walk through this passage with all of you today, and I imagine it will be edifying as the words of God speak to all of us.

01:35

Let's take a look at it first. 1st Peter, chapter 1, let's start in verse 3.

01:42

Peter says, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to His abundant mercy hath begotten us again into a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you, who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time, wherein you greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, you are in heaviness through manifold temptations, that the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honor and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ, whom, having not seen, you love, and whom, though ye have not seen

02:34

Him, yet believing, you rejoice with joy unspeakable in the full of glory, receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls.

02:48

Heavenly Father, thank you so much for bringing us together this morning. Thank you for giving us the opportunity to celebrate, commemorate the most astounding day in human history, along with all of our brothers and sisters around the world.

03:02

Of course, it's a staggering thought, thinking about the number of believers that are celebrating this day together, as we speak in many parts, have already worshiped together in many other parts of the world.

03:17

We thank you for it. We thank you for the opportunity that you have given us, year after year, for the past 2 ,000 years, to commemorate this day, what it means in the life that it brought to each and every one of us.

03:29

We ask you to be with us today as we walk through some of your word. We ask you to just bless the time together, edify all of us through it.

03:39

And again, we just ask that you bless it and that your spirit be upon us. And we ask all these things in your name, amen.

03:47

As believers in the one true God, we've been given his will in the written form.

03:54

We've been given a vast compilation of his covenant documents, both in the

04:00

Old and the New Testament. And these documents act as our unfailing rule of faith.

04:08

Now, of course, I'm referring to the scriptures. And these scriptures that we have are very succinct, but they're very full.

04:17

And for over 2 ,000 years, we've had giants of the faith that have filled pages upon pages with good faith commentary more than we could possibly ever know what to do with.

04:31

And the reason that they're able to do that is because each and every passage of the Bible reveals more and more about the

04:40

God of our faith in the forms of historical narratives, poetry and proverbs, prophecy, biographies, and practical epistles.

04:48

All of these various ways that God has delivered his word, we learn more about him with each and every one that we study.

04:56

And yet the fullness of these scriptures with all of the distinct doctrines that you could look at, all of the various things that you could study and dive deep into, we have all of these various things that we could look at.

05:09

There is a singular truth, a singular doctrine, a singular historical event that all of the fullness of those scriptures can be reduced to.

05:21

It's an event that proves our faith in the unseen rather than it being in vain.

05:27

It's an event that acted as the model for the day in which our corruptible bodies put on incorruption ourselves.

05:34

It gave us a lively hope of an eternal inheritance. And it's an event that gives purpose to all of the heaviness or sorrow or trials and tribulations that we ourselves may experience in this life.

05:50

The resurrection of our Lord was the seal in space and time of every promise and of every prophecy that we have in the scriptures that have been handed down to us.

06:02

It was the definitive proof of Jesus's deity, as he said himself, destroy this temple, and in three days,

06:09

I will raise it up. I will raise it up myself. And as I said before, just a second ago, it's why our faith is not in vain, as Paul puts it in 1

06:20

Corinthians chapter 15. The resurrection is quite literally everything. Without it, there is no purpose.

06:28

There is no meaning in anything that we study, in anything that we look at.

06:34

And yet God, through his mercy, as we'll see here in just a moment, gave us this particular event at a particular point in time, so that all of those things could be proved and sealed, and that none would be in vain.

06:47

Now, as we're together today in celebration of this preeminent event, I want us to consider what

06:54

Peter calls our lively hope, which comes to us only through this resurrection, the resurrection of Jesus Christ over 2 ,000 years ago.

07:05

And as we turn back to our main passage, I do want you to look at this passage of 1 Peter a little bit more closely with me.

07:11

I want us to briefly discuss really quick what Peter is even writing about in this epistle in the first place.

07:17

So just for a little bit of context, we're starting pretty much at the beginning. But Peter is writing to Christians that are scattered all over the place.

07:25

We learned that in the first couple of verses. They're scattered during a particularly troubling time in church history.

07:33

And so Peter is going to give his fellow believers encouragement, and he's going to be reminding them of why they will be sustained through everything that they go through.

07:43

Peter wants his brothers and sisters, and that would include us here today as well, to remember to always look past all of the things that come upon us in this life.

07:56

And that includes both the material blessings, so the good, but the material pain as well.

08:03

There are times when we need to look past all of it and look to the end where we will find

08:08

Christ and an eternal inheritance that is laid up for us. Look at verse three one more time with me.

08:15

Let's look at these verses a little bit more closely. He says, Blessed be the God and Father of our

08:20

Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

08:34

Now, all of us were born as vessels of wrath. We were born with an angry and rebellious spirit that was maturing much quicker than our bodies were.

08:47

It doesn't take long for the little human being to start displaying a rebellion against that which is trying to constrain him, trying to put him on a proper narrow path, you might say.

09:03

And so we were all born in this particular state, exponentially getting worse with each passing season of life on a war path to have a hardened heart that would be beyond repair.

09:17

If it weren't for the grace and the mercy of God our Father, that is what would be the end game for each and every human being that has been born since the time of Adam and Eve.

09:29

And yet, as Peter tells us here, we were begotten again. It's a beautiful phrase there in verse three.

09:37

Of course, we typically use the phrase born again, and this is one of the verses by which we get that phrase from.

09:44

It's the gift of a spiritual birth or a rebirth, you might say. And it's by definition an act of, as Peter puts it here, look at this verse with me,

09:56

God's abundant mercy, according to his abundant mercy, as he says.

10:02

And it's because of the state that we were born in, living in nothing but the false hope of a fulfillment without God and without the constraints of his word, that is the state we were living in.

10:15

And yet, God came to us and in his abundant mercy begotten us again.

10:22

Now, while in this state, the state that was in rebellion against God is when he shed that abundant mercy upon us, regenerating us into a new true and living hope, not a false hope, but a lively hope.

10:39

Now, we know that this gift of regeneration or salvation is by God's mercy, but look at verse three closely because Peter takes an opportunity to emphasize the mode or the channel by which this mercy rained down upon his people.

10:57

In that last phrase, he says, according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again into a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

11:11

So the father gave us abundant mercy, but he would not do so in any other way than through the resurrection of his beloved son.

11:21

Time and time again, as I alluded to earlier, the Bible points us back to this reality.

11:27

All other doctrines flow through the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Again, if we were to reduce the fullness of all of God's revelation that we have,

11:36

Genesis to Revelation, it would come back to this singular event, this singular doctrine of the resurrection.

11:44

Now, we're going to come back to this. Obviously, we're going to talk about the resurrection a little bit more, but first I want you all to just contemplate what

11:51

Peter is saying in these following verses. What follows? What are the effects of this event that took place of this resurrection?

12:00

Look at verse four with me. He says, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled, and that fadeth not away reserved in heaven for you.

12:11

Now, the key word in verse four here is inheritance. After stating that we have this inheritance, that this inheritance is waiting for us,

12:21

Peter states it, and then he goes on this cascade of descriptors for the inheritance that is waiting for us.

12:29

He describes this inheritance, amplifying it more and more and more until he pulls all of it back into focus, and he reminds us of where this inheritance is waiting in the first place.

12:39

It's reserved for us in heaven. Now, we all know what an inheritance is.

12:45

It's something given to a child from a father as a gift. It's a love gift.

12:51

It is a part of the identity of the entire family. It's a legacy. It's not earned.

12:57

It can't really be purchased by anyone else. It's simply a gift that's handed down as a symbol of your birth into a particular family.

13:06

That's what an inheritance is. Now, what's beautiful about this, the word, the

13:11

Greek term that Peter chooses to use here in this context is that Peter isn't referring to just a mere promise of an inheritance.

13:19

He's not talking about just a title that was given to us after the resurrection that says someday this will be realized.

13:27

That's not what he's talking about. The Greek term that he uses is rather something that is already owned or possessed by those who it's been given to.

13:38

The Greek term kleronomia, it refers to a property that's been given as a possession, and so this is the lively hope that Peter is talking about.

13:51

He's talking about an inheritance that we already possess and that we will someday see, and this is when

14:00

Peter begins his cascade of descriptions. This inheritance is incorruptible. It can't decay.

14:06

It's immortal. He then says it's undefiled. It can't be soiled or deformed by entropy or by time, and it won't fade away, and the

14:17

Greek term, if you look at verse 4, it says fadeth not away. That three -word phrase is all a single

14:23

Greek term. It's the only time in the whole New Testament that that word is used, and its root word means to extinguish a fire, and so what

14:34

Peter is saying when he says it fadeth not away, he's saying that our inheritance can't be extinguished.

14:41

It's safe from the harm of the fall. It's safe from the attempted plunder of the devil. Our inheritance awaits us in heaven.

14:49

It's reserved for us in heaven as he ends the verse with, but what is the inheritance exactly?

14:56

Now, we can have ideas of what it is through a number of scriptures throughout the Bible. Old and New Testament make reference to the hopes of the future and what they will hold for us, but right here,

15:11

Peter does give us a little bit of a hint of what this inheritance encompasses in the next verse.

15:18

Look at verse 5 with me. He says, well, let me read verse 4 and 5 together.

15:24

He says, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you, in the verse 5, who are kept by the power of God through faith.

15:35

So it's us that is the object here. We are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time.

15:48

Now, we all know that there's a point in time where we all call upon the name of the

15:54

Lord. We are justified, and our eternal security is anchored to that moment of justification for the rest of our lives.

16:01

So there's a sense in which our salvation was a past event because that happened, you know, it could have been weeks, months, years, decades prior when we called upon the name of the

16:11

Lord the first time. But there's also a continual sense of our salvation as well. Paul, in the first chapter of Corinthians, just as one example, mentions those that are being saved in the continual sense, and of course, that's a reference to our sanctification.

16:24

We are continually being purified, made more holy, made more like God himself, being conformed to the image of his dear son, as Paul tells us in Colossians.

16:34

So there's a continual present sense in salvation as well. But what

16:39

Peter is talking about here is he's talking about a future salvation. What he's talking about is the completion of our salvation.

16:50

He says, and you can see it in the phrase, he says, unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.

16:55

This is something out in our future that hasn't happened yet. We all know that we sit here today, if we have professed the name of the

17:02

Lord Jesus, we sit here saved with our salvation sealed in the eternal security that we rest in.

17:10

And yet, even still, we can look to the future, unto his salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time.

17:19

Now, we can ask the question, he's talking about this inheritance in verse four, he's talking about being incorruptible and undefiled and it doesn't fade away.

17:26

And this is all beautiful. But what good is an inheritance that is reserved for us in heaven, transcendent in a way, not really, but kind of.

17:39

What good is that while we're in a world right now that so thoroughly shakes us up and is just casting us down all the time?

17:48

Of course, you think about the audience that Peter is writing to, they're going through severe persecution. And he's talking about the glory of this future inheritance as if it's supposed to make them feel a little bit better.

17:59

And they think, well, that's great. And we do have hope in that. But what about right now? Well, Peter expects this question, and he quickly addresses it himself.

18:11

Because in this verse, what he's saying is, you are kept by the power of God through faith.

18:18

He talks about the inheritance and then he immediately follows it up with this phrase, you are kept by the power of God through faith.

18:26

Yes, we are exposed to great danger in this life. But what's interesting about it is when he says that we're kept by this power of God through faith, that Greek word literally means to guard something.

18:41

It means to guard a castle against an invading army. It means to protect something. And so he's saying that we're guarded by our faith in him.

18:52

So think about that for a second. Faith is talked about in such simple terms throughout the

18:57

New Testament. It's beautiful the way that we have these expansions of the salvation experience for people where you have these deep doctrines that go into great detail about the steps that have taken place that leads to our salvation from regeneration.

19:13

It talks about justification, it talks about sanctification, our eventual glorification. It goes into all these details.

19:19

And yet there are other times where we have these reductions where the whole of salvation is reduced to a singular phrase such as call upon the name of the

19:27

Lord and you will be saved. It's so simple. And so we know that there is a simplicity in the faith of God's people.

19:35

And yet that faith, as Peter tells us here, is our guardian. It's our protector.

19:41

It's what keeps us safe and able to bear the persecutions and the tribulations and the sorrows and the pain that we have in this life.

19:50

So yeah, Peter's talking about this glorious inheritance that we will have that has been purchased by the blood of Jesus and consummated by his resurrection.

19:58

That's what he started everything with. But we still go through tough times and Peter takes that head on and he says, you are protected, you are guarded by the power of God through faith.

20:12

Now, I said a moment ago that Peter's going to give us a hint as to what this inheritance is that he talks about in verse four.

20:19

Look at this one more time with me. This is verse five. Let's read it really slowly.

20:25

He says, we are kept or guarded or protected. We're guarded by the power of God through faith.

20:33

So our faith is a guardian for us in this life. And then what does he say after that?

20:39

What is this faith unto? It is unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.

20:46

That is our inheritance. It is our salvation in its full consummated form.

20:53

The complete salvation process, starting at the point of Christ's redeeming work, then to our justification all the way through our life, the

21:07

Christian walk, sanctification, to the moment that we enter heaven and are glorified like he is.

21:14

That's the inheritance that Peter is talking about. We think we understand our salvation now and we can certainly get an idea of its power by God's grace through studying his word.

21:26

We see all of this fleshed out in so many beautiful ways. But what we see in this life, what we feel, what we experience in this life, even as saved people, as saved believers, what we think, see, feel, experience, it will all be eclipsed by what is, as Peter puts it, to be revealed in the last time.

21:51

That's our inheritance. That is the consummation of our salvation. The fullness of eternal salvation in the eternal presence of God is our incorruptible, undefiled inheritance that cannot be extinguished.

22:07

Now, why is Peter hitting this idea so hard? Why is he being so specific? Why is he structuring his encouragements the way that he is?

22:18

Why is he pressing his brothers and sisters to think forward, to look beyond where they are right now and into the blessed future of their internal inheritance?

22:28

We'll look at verse six. He says, wherein you greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, you are in heaviness through manifold temptations.

22:42

This is really interesting. At first glance, this seems a bit odd because Peter first says, in this you greatly rejoice.

22:51

He's talking about a positive emotional response to something. Of course, the response to this inheritance that he is talking about.

22:59

He begins with the positive, but then he recognizes that there are seasons of grief.

23:07

There are seasons of sorrow, of heaviness that Christians go through, even though they are in the process of rejoicing that blessed hope, that lively hope out into our future.

23:19

These emotions, while opposites, you have joy, you have sorrow, they're opposite emotions, but they're not mutually exclusive.

23:28

They can and often do coexist, especially in the life of the believer. The reason

23:35

I say especially isn't necessarily to say that we need to walk around sorrowful all the time, but the point is when we do experience sorrow and we do experience grief, there's something that sets us apart from the rest of the world.

23:49

That is, in that moment still, we can have joy. We can see that lively hope out in the future and know that even though temporally we are going through this devastating time, whatever that may look like for any particular person, there is something that awaits us and we have the

24:07

Lord still with us. He has not forsaken us. This is a reality that only believers in Jesus Christ get to experience, and so around us we see grief and sorrow everywhere, and Christians are not immune to it, but the difference is we have this lively hope in the midst of that as well.

24:23

Now, go figure, by coincidence, just some coincidence, this morning at Sunday school,

24:30

Dave was in a particular psalm, and so this was not in my notes, but I want you to look at it.

24:35

This is what Dave covered this morning. Look at Psalm 31 with me, just as a quick rabbit trail. Just to illustrate this reality, this strange paradox is what it feels like sometimes, where you have the simultaneous existence of joy but with sorrow sometimes, with tough seasons in life.

24:59

David, in psalm after psalm, expresses this to us, and he shows us what it looks like, and more importantly though, he shows us how to get through it.

25:09

Where is his trust? Where is his faith? It continually goes back to his creator. Look at Psalm 31, just as a quick taste of what one believer in the one true

25:20

God went through. Look at verse 7. I'm not going to comment on these verses. That'll be Dave in the coming weeks as he goes verse by verse through this psalm.

25:28

He covered verse 7 this morning, but look at it. I will be glad and rejoice. So what is that? That is the positive emotion.

25:34

That is the joyfulness. That is rejoicing in the moment, being content in all things, just like the apostle

25:40

Paul talked about in Philippians chapter 4 centuries later. I will be glad and rejoice in thy mercy.

25:47

Notice, what is the fountainhead of this joy? God's mercy. We're about to see an interesting, well, we see already an interesting parallel with the passage we're in today.

25:56

His abundant mercy that he showed by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

26:02

I will be glad and rejoice in thy mercy for thou has considered my trouble. There's the sorrow, there's the pain.

26:09

Thou has known my soul and adversities and has not shut me up into the hand of the enemy.

26:16

Thou has set my feet in a large room. Have mercy upon me, O Lord, for I am in trouble.

26:21

Mine eye is consumed with grief, yea, my soul and my belly, for my life is spent with grief and my years with sighing.

26:32

My strength faileth because of mine iniquity, because of my sin and my bones are consumed.

26:39

Now, the reason we are put in this very unfortunate situation where we are grounded by this joy that comes and flows from the fountainhead of God's mercy, while at the same time experiencing what

26:55

David just talked about, which sounds terrible. The apple of God's eye going through this kind of grief. Well, what did he say it was from?

27:05

It was from his iniquity. It was from his sin. That which is antithetical to the very holiness of the

27:11

God of our salvation. Of course there's grief. Of course there's sorrow and pain. We asked for the knowledge of good and evil, and we got what we asked for, and so we have sorrow and pain in this life.

27:24

But we have to remember that pain, sorrow, and being joyful are not mutually exclusive emotions.

27:32

They can coexist. They often do. And in the moments when we're going through that sorrow, we can look back to God's mercy, where the joy flows from.

27:44

So we're looking at verse 6. Go back to 1 Peter with me again. These emotions greatly rejoice, he says, though for a season, if need be, you are in heaviness through manifold temptations.

28:00

These emotions can coexist, and they often do. This is why even in the midst of great sorrow, perhaps even the anticipation of martyrdom, like many of these

28:12

Christians would have experienced, those that Peter is writing to, his immediate audience, of course the

28:18

Holy Spirit was inspiring these words. He was carrying Peter along to write these for our benefit 2 ,000 years later.

28:25

These words were written to us, but Peter did have an immediate audience, and that immediate audience were our brothers and sisters in the first century after the resurrection, after the ascension of our

28:37

Lord, experiencing egregious persecutions. To the point of martyrdom in many cases.

28:46

And so, Peter, you have to think about this through the lens of these Christians that Peter is writing to. He's saying even in the midst of that, even in the midst of anticipating your potential martyrdom, you can rejoice.

29:02

They can still see that living hope that was purchased for them by the blood of their

29:08

Savior. But the sorrow would still be present, and Peter recognized this.

29:13

He doesn't cast it off. He doesn't say, don't grieve because that's a sin. Of course, that's absolutely not true.

29:20

Grieving is a gift. It's a grace that God gave us, and it's something we should lean into in times of sorrow.

29:27

We can't do that unanchored from Christ himself, because that can be dangerous.

29:33

There can be a spiral, for sure. But when grief is anchored to Christ, and we recognize his sufficiency in our lives, then all of a sudden that grieving can be a grace.

29:43

It can be a gift. That sorrow would still be present, and Peter recognizes this, no doubt, having experienced it himself many times.

29:54

Many trials of different kinds will find all of us as believers, but Peter offers us the consolation that it is but for a short time.

30:03

He says for a season. It's something that we can look beyond, because it's something that's not going to last forever.

30:11

It's short. But why can the Christian have joy even through the pain?

30:16

We've obviously alluded to it a number of times here. Why is that such an important aspect of our

30:22

Christian walk? Well, I've said a couple of things that can tie back to that idea, but Peter himself addresses it here in verse 7, and it is a very magnificent reality.

30:33

Why do we have to go through the sorrows and the pain? Why do we have to experience these things as Christians, and why can we do that while having joy at the same time?

30:41

Look at verse 7, that the trial of your faith being much more precious than gold, than that of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honor and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ.

31:01

That word trial there at the beginning of the verse literally means that by which something is proved.

31:07

So another way you could read this is the proof of your faith, the proof that your faith is a real thing.

31:15

While immaterial, it is real. It is just as real as the material realm. Yes, it's tested.

31:20

Yes, it's tried by fire, but it's proved through all of that. These trials literally prove our faith, and to what degree?

31:31

The pain and sorrows of life prove that our faith is much more precious than of gold that perisheth.

31:38

Now, our faith is tested. It's proved. It grows as we grow. That's one of the reasons why Peter is addressing these things.

31:45

And to what end? He says that it might be found unto praise and honor and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ.

31:54

That's how he ends verse 7. So he answers the question, why as a believer do I have to go through these things?

32:00

Well, it's because it proves your faith. It's what shows the world that you have something within you that is real and that actually is life changing, that is actually something that renews, something that provides a new birth, something that totally changes and transforms your life.

32:19

If it weren't for the sorrows that you go through and your ability, given that supernatural peace and comfort from the

32:26

God of all comfort, if it weren't for that, where we can move through these times of sorrow, still holding fast to that joy that Peter started with, that is what shows people that we're different and that we have something real within us.

32:43

It's what proves all of it. What is the end of all of this? That we might find praise and honor and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ.

32:52

That's the purpose. Our faith is proved through sorrow so that we will be prepared in the proper manner at the appearing of our

33:01

Lord's second coming. We're talking about the resurrection today, but there will be a second coming as well.

33:08

And at that time, all of these things will prove our faith, preparing us to be the person that we need to be at that moment.

33:15

Now look at verse eight with me. Whom having not seen, this is beautiful. Whom having not seen, you love.

33:24

In whom, though now you see him not, yet believing, you rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory.

33:33

There's that joy again. Joy unspeakable and full of glory.

33:40

And what's the cause? Peter tells us that our joy is unspeakable because we love a person that we have never seen.

33:49

Because we believe a person that we've never seen. Now we all know that love and trust in any relationship will yield a bountiful harvest of joy between the two parties involved.

34:02

When you love and trust a person and they reciprocate and there is genuine love and trust there, there's nothing more like heaven on earth than when you have that, than when you have people in your corner that have earned those two things.

34:18

And of course, the spouse is the pinnacle. But how much more heavenly is it to love and believe someone that you've never seen, yet is so trustworthy and so sacrificial that you love him and trust him anyway?

34:36

Well, Peter believes that that is the case strongly. That's why he is bringing all of this up.

34:43

It's why he's reminding them of this reality. Look, I have seen the Lord. I have walked with him.

34:49

I was called by him. I was there at the Mount of Transfiguration. I was there when the Father spoke from heaven, saying that I am pleased with him.

34:58

I saw him after his resurrection. I saw his ascension. But you haven't seen any of that.

35:04

He's writing to believers that have not seen any of that. And he's telling them these things to give them the encouragement that they need to realize, look, the fact that you love him and trust him anyway, though you have not seen what

35:19

I have seen. You have taken the words of scripture and of Christ's apostles to heart.

35:27

This will bring a joy that's unspeakable and that's full of glory. It's incredibly unique.

35:34

Like Peter said, he believes this strongly. And we can know this through the phrases that he uses, joy unspeakable, full of glory.

35:42

And then in verse nine, he says, receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your soul.

35:47

So there is one more kind of callback to that consummated salvation that I was talking about earlier, that which is our incorruptible inheritance.

35:59

Remember what I said earlier, that inheritance that awaits us is the consummation of our salvation. We have to remember that.

36:05

The journey is certainly not over at this point in time. It's by God's great mercy that we attain these things, that we have been born again to a living hope, to a lively hope, an expectation of a future inheritance, incorruptible, undefiled, unfading, and reserved in heaven.

36:27

We ourselves, Peter says, are guarded by God's own power through faith until we can see this inheritance with our own eyes, the inheritance of the fullness of our salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time.

36:42

It's waiting for us. We have joy unspeakable and full of glory, even though the sorrows and pain of life, which proves and tests our faith, because we love him and because we believe him, though we don't yet see him.

36:59

Now this is all wonderful. It's surreal in many ways. We can feel the effects of our salvation here today, but still find these truths incomprehensibly beautiful.

37:13

And where did they all start? Where did these truths begin? I said earlier that the joy that we can have springs from the fountainhead of God's mercy, but what were the means of God's mercy?

37:28

Where did all of this start? What was God's temporal moment in time and space that made all of these things possible?

37:38

Well, it's where Peter started at the beginning of this whole passage. Back in verse 3, he said,

37:46

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

37:59

So it's the resurrection of our Lord that is the foundation of all of Christian life.

38:07

It is the ultimate witness to the defeat of sin and death and the restoration of God's image bearers for the purpose of eternal communion with him, what we were created for.

38:19

The apostle Paul in Philippians 3 .10 speaks of the power of his resurrection, the power of his resurrection.

38:26

What is that? It's the seal of his redemptive work that he set out to do at the moment that Adam took the fruit from his wife and ate it.

38:35

The raising of Christ's body from the grave was the father's acceptance of his son's ransom price for that redemption.

38:44

It was an efficacious price that was paid. That is why he was able to be raised by his own power, but also by the power of the father and by the power of the spirit.

38:54

The first Adam hurled humanity down the pit of sin and death. The last

38:59

Adam redeemed humanity and gave his people a life of purpose and of joy unspeakable and full of glory as we prepare for eternity with him.

39:11

Now, again, passage after passage after passage throughout the New Testament that calls back to this singular event.

39:21

Everything is tied back to it. This is just one of many. My hope is that by going through this passage and you've seen just getting a taste of some of the effects that come from this event that we celebrate today, that you'll be edified by it, encouraged by it, and that at each and every time we go through times of grief, times of sorrow, times of turmoil of varying degrees, that we can remember that it was through that event that we have a lively hope, a living hope in an incorruptible inheritance that is waiting for us, and all of it was sealed by that resurrection, by that event.

40:04

It all comes back to that. And so, again, hopefully you guys were able to be encouraged by that little passage in God's word.

40:13

Let's go ahead and pray together. Heavenly Father, thank you so much for this day. Thank you for bringing us all together, not only, once again, just on the

40:23

Lord's day, giving us this opportunity to fellowship and to dive into your word, to abide in it together, and to be encouraged by it, but we thank you all the more for bringing us together on this day, on this particular

40:36

Lord's day, where we commemorate the preeminent event of all human history that sealed all of the promises and all of the prophecies that came before it, and they give us this living hope that your apostle tells us that we have in our future.

40:55

It's not something that we're hoping for in the negative sense. It's not guesswork. It's not something that, you know, we feel is a possibility, but rather it is a joyful expectation of something that is certain, something that is sure, something that has been purchased by you, and Lord, we thank you for your redemptive work all the way through, from the moment that you made the promise to redeem your people in the

41:28

Garden of Eden, all the way through your incarnation, your provision of your people up until the incarnation, and then your earthly ministry, your death, your burial, your resurrection, according to the scriptures, and now sitting at the right hand of power as our advocate, as our mediator.

41:47

We thank you for these things, Lord. We ask you to be with us for the remainder of our services today, just fellowshipping together, breaking bread together.

41:55

We ask you to bless this time. Be with all of us for the remainder of the week, for the remainder of the year, and remind all of us of that joy that is before us so that we don't ever fall into temptation.