Good to be with you all today. Please join with me in Worship.
Let us sing: Lord of all hopefulness.
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1 Peter, chapter one verses 3-5, he says:
Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,’ ‘In his great mercy He has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead and into an inheritance that can never perish or spoil or fade. It’s kept in heaven for you, you who wait through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of that salvation that’s ready to be revealed in the last time, even though for a little while you’ve had to suffer some various trials!
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As we join together in prayer let us sing: Here I Am To Worship
Let us pray
Lord, help me to hear you saying, "I am your hope" over all the other voices. Lord, your word says, you are our hope, so I'm running to you with both hands stretched out and grabbing on to you. Fill me up with hope and give me a tangible reminder today that hope is an unbreakable spiritual lifeline. God, you know those things in my heart that I barely dare to hope for, today I give them to you, I trust them to you, because I know that you can do more than I could ever guess, imagine or request in wildest dreams. God, you are my hope and I trust you. Amen.
Please remember to take time to pray for your family, loved one's and friends. For our country and world.
Please share with me in the Lord’s Prayer
Our Father, who art in heaven,
hallowed be thy name;
thy kingdom come;
thy will be done;
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation;
but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom,
the power and the glory,
for ever and ever. Amen.
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Let us join together as we sing: My hope Is built On nothing Less
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Hope In God
A funny thing hope. What does hope mean? Hope is a joyful and confident expectation that something good is going to happen, and when we lose hope, when we stop believing that something good is in fact going to happen, well life becomes even harder.
You know, when we hope in something we just believe in our heart of hearts that it’s going to happen but when we don’t have that hope anymore it’s a sad thing. When hope turns into uncertainty, well, that’s sad because hope is the opposite of uncertainty. Hope becomes a desperate thing instead of a certain thing. Hope is a fading thing rather than something that shines brightly. There has been times in my life when I lost hope that something good would happen. You know it was such an incredibly dark place to be in. But Hope is like a light in the middle of a storm. Uncertainty is this nagging fear, this sick feeling in the pit of your stomach, uncertainty drains the life out of you. We all need to hope in something, we all do hope in something because without hope we couldn’t keep going, without hope there’s no tomorrow. But what do we hope in? Who or what do we put our hope in? It’s important because that’s where we get our confidence from, that’s where we get our sense of stability, our optimism for the future. When life is going up and down like the share price in the stock market, if we put our hope in those things then our sense of confidence and uncertainty is going to take a plummet.
Two thousand years ago an Apostle called Peter writes a letter to some people who have been exiled through persecution, they’ve been dispersed. These were tough times. These Christians were going through brutal persecution, and this is what he writes in the first chapter of his letter 1 Peter, chapter one verses 3-5, he says:
Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,’(what a strange thing to say to people who are being persecuted. But anyway it’s what he says), ‘In his great mercy He has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead and into an inheritance that can never perish or spoil or fade. It’s kept in heaven for you, you who wait through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of that salvation that’s ready to be revealed in the last time, even though for a little while you’ve had to suffer some various trials!
I think this is a very strange portion of scripture. These people are in the middle of persecution and Peter says, “Praise be to God.” Something we often don’t feel like doing because when life’s tough, when I’m down, when the drought continues, I just want to hide away. But we can praise God in the middle of the drought; we can praise God in the middle of the exile; we can praise God in the middle of the difficult times because He’s up to something good. We can’t always see it, but actually, it’s got nothing to do with whether or not the drought breaks, it’s got nothing to do with whether our circumstances change it’s something much bigger than that. Look at what he writes.
In his great mercy He has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
See, in the middle of these people’s persecution, in the middle of their trials and their pressures Peter’s saying, “It’s not about what you’re facing it’s about God’s mercy.”
And you know something? God’s given you a new start, new birth a fresh start in the middle of it all, into a living hope, not some hope that’s faded, not some hope that will ever die, not some hope that fades. It’s a living hope, a certain thing, something that doesn’t ever fade or fail; because it’s based on the resurrection of Jesus, a historical fact and reality. Whether or not the drought breaks, whether God changes the circumstances that we’re facing at the moment, one day we will stand before Him with a new body, with a new life, with an eternal life because we have this inheritance that is being kept in heaven for us. It can never perish; it can never spoil; it can never fail.
It’s not like the stock market. It’s not like waiting for the rain to come to break the drought; it’s not like waiting for whatever it is in your life that’s causing you uncertainty and fear, to change. No, it’s not like any of those things. It’s an absolute certainty, something that we can put our confidence in. See if we put our trust, if we put our hope, if we put our whole desire to the future in people, in things, those people and those things one day will fail us; one day they will fall short; one day they won’t be what we expect them to be.
The only thing that’s certain, the only thing that we know, the only person who will never fail us is God. We know that because of what He did for us on the cross through Jesus Christ. He has given us a new beginning into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead and into an inheritance that can never perish, that can never spoil, that can never fade, that is being kept in heaven for you. Who through faith are protected by God’s power until that salvation happens.
So on top of the fact that God is being merciful; on top of the fact that He gave us His Son; on top of the fact that I know that I too will stand before God when I leave this earth; the fact that I know I’m going to have an eternal life; on top of all of that we have God’s protection. In the meantime, we are being protected by the power of God, even though we have to suffer trials, even though we have to go through difficulties.
If we put our hope in things that are going to fail us we are going to live an uncertain life. But, if in the middle of all those uncertainties, if in the middle of all those trials, if in the middle of the fears and the adversities of life we put our confidence in Jesus Christ He will never fail us. Amen
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As we close our time together let us sing: The Power Of Your love
The Lord bless thee and keep thee
The Lord make His face to shine upon thee
And be gracious unto thee
The Lord lift up His countenance upon thee
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