A Living Hope

Human creatures are subjected to all of the buffeting that comes to us from one degree and another, and we long to have something of permanence, something of stability. And what the New Testament says is that anchor for our souls, not for our ships, but for our souls, is this idea of hope. If we're honest with ourselves, we probably think about the things of this world quite a bit more than we think about the things of God.

We look to our stability and comfort in earthly things, our personal or professional accomplishments, our possessions. Today on Renewing Your Mind, R.C. Sproul teaches us the radical difference between the hope of this world and the hope that Christ gives His people. One of my favorite games for sheer enjoyment is trivia.

In fact, as we prepare for these lectures, one of the things that people don't know who aren't in the studio where we do these things is that as a matter of procedure, before we begin each taping, I have to have a trivia question from the staff on baseball, just so that I can warm up the little gray cells, as Hercule Perrault used to say. But I want to begin with a trivia question today, not from baseball but from Bible history, and the question is this. Who was known as the apostle of hope, the apostle of hope?

Let me give you a clue or a hint. He's more customarily known as the big fisherman. He was given a new name by Jesus. He was called the Rock.

Now I think you've got it, haven't you? It's obviously Peter the apostle, who together with Paul emerged as one of the great leaders of the apostolic church. In fact, in the initial days of the church, Peter exercised leadership in Jerusalem, and then tradition tells us that later he moved to Rome to Rome where he was executed by the emperor Nero in the same year of the execution of Paul. Paul was executed by being beheaded, where the tradition is that Peter was executed by being crucified.

And when he faced his martyrdom, he made a special request that he would be crucified upside down because he felt unworthy to die in the same manner as his Lord had died. And Peter, of course, has had a tremendous influence in the history of the Christian faith. He never wrote a gospel as such, although, again, it is the best guess of historic scholarship that the gospel of Mark really reflects the teaching and instruction of Peter, and that Mark more or less served as a kind of amanuensis or secretary for Peter, whose apostolic authority stands behind the gospel of Mark. But we do have two brief epistles that have survived and are a part of the New Testament canon that bear the name of this apostle, Saint Peter. And it's because of his epistles, particularly 1 Peter, that he has been given this nickname, the apostle of hope. Presumably, Peter wrote this epistle in the decade of the sixties in the ancient world at a time when persecution was heating up and that believers all over the Roman Empire were being subjected to all kinds of persecution and suffering. And presumably, the reason why Peter picked up his pen and wrote this epistle was to bring comfort and strength and consolation to the Christians who were faced with so much suffering. Let's look, then, at the beginning of this epistle to the first chapter of 1 Peter, where Peter, after giving his initial greeting in verse 3 of the first chapter, writes these words, "'Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, who are kept by the power of God through faith for salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time.'"

What a statement! Again, we are confident that Peter wrote these words under the supervision and inspiration of God the Holy Spirit, but how much content of theology is packed theology is packed in this one little statement that he makes here. He begins with a doxology, a benediction, where he calls out the blessedness of God, who, he says, according to His abundant mercy, has begotten us again, so that Christians are now regarded or described in this epistle as those who have been re-begotten. Now, the word begotten in the New Testament means to be, to become, or to happen, or to be born. And Peter is here obviously speaking of the work of the Holy Spirit in regeneration, and he's speaking of the grace of God by which His people have, through the power of the Holy Spirit, been quickened to spiritual life. They have been born anew, or to use Peter's language here, have been begotten again.

To what? We have been reborn unto what Peter calls here a living hope. Or we could translate these words a vital hope or an animated hope. It's not a sluggish, inert kind of hope, but it is a hope that is exercised with vibrancy and with vitality. Now, let me just pause for a moment and talk about this word hope as it is used in the categories of the New Testament. The word hope is elevated by the Apostle Paul to one of the three major virtues of the Christian life. You remember in his great love chapter in 1 Corinthians 13 where he said, Now these abide faith, hope, and love, and the greatest of these is love, and so on.

But nevertheless, hope makes it into the top three, into this triad of virtues that receives so much attention in the New Testament. And it's a key concept to biblical Christianity, and it's one I'm going to labor a little bit today because it's a concept that is easily misunderstood because of the use of the term hope in our culture and in our contemporary vocabulary. In our language, when we talk about hope, we talk about a desire or a wish that we have with respect to the future that we desire will come to pass, but we're not sure.

When the NBA playoffs began in 1995 and the Orlando Magic entered into the playoffs, people asked me did I think that the Magic would win the NBA championship. I said, I don't know, but I sure hope so. There the word hope was expressing my desire, my earnest wish that such and such a thing would come to pass in the future. Now, that's not how the word hope is used in the New Testament. In the New Testament, hope refers to the faith or the trust or the confidence that the people of God have for the fulfillment of the future promises of God. Now, if God would speak from heaven and tell us the outcome of the World Series in advance or of the Super Bowl or of the NBA playoffs, we would usually not use the word hope with respect to whatever God has said would take place because that would change all the odds in Las Vegas if the deity himself were heard to us. If the deity himself were heard to utter a prediction about the outcome of a sports contest, we wouldn't speak in terms of hope.

We would speak in terms of knowledge, of certainty, of assurance. Well, in the New Testament, the word hope carries with it that kind of certainty and that kind of assurance because when God speaks and God commits Himself to a future course of action, there is no possibility under the sun that what He has promised and what He has decreed will not come to pass. Now, because God makes such promises to His people and guarantees them by vowing and swearing an oath based upon His own integrity and on His own character, that future promise is certain. So, why does this New Testament speak about hope? Well, hope simply refers to faith as it looks forward.

Faith is called the essence of things unseen and related to that which is hoped for. But one of the metaphors that the New Testament uses with respect to this word hope is the metaphor of the anchor. Hope is called the anchor of the soul.

It's an interesting metaphor, isn't it? Usually, we associate anchors not with souls but with ships and what is the purpose of the anchor, but to give stability to an object that is at the mercy of the winds and the currents of the waters that would move it and buffet it about were it not given the stabilization provided by the anchor that holds it fast. And therein is the whole point of the metaphor that we as fragile human creatures are subjected to all of the currents of life and the buffeting that comes to us from one degree and another. And we long to have something of permanence, something of stability, something that roots us and grounds us in confidence. And what the New Testament says is that anchor for our souls, not for our ships, but for our souls, is this idea of hope.

And again, the hope that anchors the soul is the hope or the trust and assurance that we have that God will bring to pass what He has solemnly promised to bring to pass. Now, the reason why this is so important is because we live in a world of pain and a world of sorrow and a world of great suffering. And these Christians of the first century had very little stability in the culture in which they lived because they were they were hated, they were persecuted, and they didn't know if their lives would last for another week. One of the treasures of church history is the collection of writings that have survived from the first and second century that have been compiled in various volumes, shafts, history of the ancient church, the Library of Christian Classics, and so on.

And it would be a tremendous exercise for any Christian to take time to read some of these writings that are after the time that the Bible was written by non-biblical writers and so on, in many cases the letters of the rank and file of that day. And it's an incredible thing to eavesdrop on the Christians of the early church as they write to one another, Dear Mildred, how are things over there in Antioch? Uncle Fred was martyred last week. Sister Anne is in prison, and we expect her to be martyred any day.

And I hope that you are experiencing the sustaining grace of God due to the loss of your father or so on. And they're talking as casually about martyrdom as we talk about going to the supermarket to buy a loaf of bread. I mean, it was such an integral part of their experience, and they never knew from day to day who was going to be next, whether it was somebody in their immediate family or perhaps they themselves who would be sacrificed on the altar of martyrdom. And so these people hung tenaciously on the promises of Christ, who had promised to go before them into the Father's house and to prepare a mansion, to prepare a place for them. And the early Christians found their strength in their consolation, not in the things of this of this world, but in the promises of God that He has a future for His people and a treasure that has been prepared for them in heaven. And this is the arena that Peter is addressing in his epistle, and he's reminding the people of this hope to which they have been begotten through the resurrection of Jesus Christ. And he says that this living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, comma, verse 4, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you. Doesn't this statement echo almost verbatim the words of Jesus Himself when He admonished His disciples to store up for themselves treasures in heaven where we don't have to worry about rust or the moth or the thief that would come in and steal it because the inheritance is an inheritance that is incorruptible and cannot perish, it cannot fade, it cannot be eaten by moths, it cannot rust, and nothing can assault it or destroy it.

And what a stark contrast that is to the possessions that we store up in this world, all of which are perishable, even as we ourselves are perishable. And so what Peter is telling these people is focus your eyes, focus your heart, focus your hope not on the present trials and pains and torments of this world, for in the world you have tribulation. Just as Jesus had promised, He said, the world hated me, they're going to hate you. Now I've had to suffer, you will have to suffer. And so it was no surprise to the Christians of the first century that they were called upon to participate in the sufferings of Christ and to join Christ in His humiliation. Now how do you endure that? How does one endure persecution, suffering, and humiliation? Peter said you endure it because you understand that it is only for a short time.

It is only for a season, and if you focus your attention on the pain of the present, you will succumb to despair. But if you keep your eyes upon the One who is both the author of our faith and the finisher of our faith, then you will have this hope that is the anchor of the soul. And so he speaks of this inheritance that is reserved in heaven for God's people. And he goes on to say, who are kept by the power of God through faith for salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time? See, there are two things that are preserved here, or reserved, if you will. On the one hand, there is the inheritance that God has reserved for His people in heaven, and God preserves that inheritance.

It's not going to be dissipated or lost or postponed, but not only is the inheritance preserved, but the inheritors, the heirs to this treasure are also preserved by God and are kept by Him for that appointed time of exaltation. And so he says in verse 6, in this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, if need be, you have been grieved by various trials, that the genuineness of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire, may be found to praise, honor, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ, whom having not seen, you love. And though now you do not see Him, yet believing, you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory, receiving the end of your faith, the salvation of your souls.

Do you see how contemporary this is? He's not writing to the first generation of Christians who knew Jesus, who saw Him in the flesh, who witnessed Him with their very eyes. He's talking to those people who, though they've never seen Jesus, they love Him. And in that regard, He's speaking to us, isn't He? And He says, there is a ground for our joy, this hope of the promise of God, though if for the present time, if for a little while, if necessary, we are called to experience grief. Just with these lines, we get a taste of the theme of this epistle and an introduction and an introduction to the big fisherman who lives up to his billing as the apostle of hope. What a comfort to know that we have a confident hope in God. He is our sure anchor, the author and finisher of our faith. We're glad you've joined us today for Renewing Your Mind.

I'm Lee Webb. Our focus this week is R.C. Sproul's series on 1 Peter. The apostle wrote this letter to encourage persecuted first-century Christians. He urged them, and by extension, he urges us to stand fast. And as we heard today, he encourages us by pointing to the firm anchor of hope that all believers have in Christ. I'm reminded of that great hymn, My Hope is Built. The third verse reads, His oath, His covenant, His blood, support me in the whelming flood.

When all around my soul gives way, He then is all my hope and stay. Let me encourage you to request today's resource. It's a helpful, easy-to-read commentary by Dr. Sproul. It's one hardbound volume, and you'll be able to study 1 and 2 Peter in depth. We're happy to send it to you for a donation of any amount to Ligonier Ministries, and we'll provide the digital download of Dr. Sproul's series on 1 Peter, the one that we're hearing this week.

So request both resources when you call us at 800-435-4343. You can also make a request and give your gift online at renewingyourmind.org. Dr. Sproul's commentary is the culmination of 50 years of experience as a pastor and theologian. He takes us through Peter's epistles line by line, and as we lift our eyes from present suffering to our eternal inheritance in Christ, we find the strength to stand firm, endure trials, and rejoice in Christ. So again, request it along with a teaching series when you contact us today at renewingyourmind.org or when you call us at 800-435-4343.

And before we go today, Arsene has a final thought for us. My wife and I, since the kids have grown up and gotten married and so on, we spend a lot of time eating dinner out. In fact, I say sometimes facetiously if my wife, the thing that she likes to make the most for dinner is reservations. She knows how to make reservations. And so we go into various places, and of course in Orlando particularly during the tourist season, most of the restaurants require a reservation or their long lines, 45 minutes, an hour, an hour and a half wait.

I don't like to do that when I'm hungry. And so I take comfort when I know that we have reservations. But beloved, it's one thing to have reservations for dinner. It's another thing to have a reservation in heaven. And that's what the apostle speaks of here, that there is a reservation for each of God's people that has been made by Christ in His Father's house, and no one can take away that reservation. The reservation itself will be kept for the time that we get there, and we will be kept as well by the Father to make sure that we won't miss that banquet feast with our Savior. Well, tomorrow R.C. will turn again to 1 Peter and help us answer this question, What is the Church? I hope you'll join us Wednesday for Renewing Your Mind.