Living Hope: Living Hope

How do you live with hope?

How do you live with hope?

When I look around us at the world today, as a parent, I can be tempted to feel hopeless about my son's future.

Any parents with me on that one?

Maybe you feel stuck in your job, and you feel like there's no escape.

There's no other option for you.

Even though you want something different, there's nothing available.

Maybe in the last few days, weeks, months, your hope has been dashed, has been crushed because of sickness, disease, suffering, grief.

You know, God's word is very clear about the reality that we face.

James tells us that we will face trials of many kinds, right?

That encompasses everything.

Paul told young Timothy that all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted.

There's nothing left out of that will.

It will happen.

And we all live in a world that shows the effects of God's curse on sin.

You don't even need to watch the news to feel hopeless.

Maybe you are still young and you haven't yet suffered much.

God bless you.

Or perhaps you are so filled with optimism that you exist in a bubble of hopefulness.

I get that.

Solomon once said, and I agree with him, I was once young.

This is important for young people.

It's important for those in the middle ages, and it's important for those who are not quite as young.

You will face suffering and trials someday.

Maybe you're in the midst of it right now.

You need to be ready for it.

How will you make your way through the trials that come in life with hope?

I want to spend some time with you in the book of 1 Peter.

I once heard a pastor say something to the effect of it shouldn't be too long in your life before you reconnect with 1 Peter.

The reason for that is that 1 Peter is fundamentally life-giving and applicable.

And it's a place to go, to walk in for a while in order to establish our hope.

Peter is sometimes called the apostle of hope because he spoke of God's work of giving his people a living hope.

Not a dead hope, not an occasional hope, not a weak hope, but a living hope.

And we need to be the kind of people that display that living hope in the midst of a hopeless world.

You know, one of the greatest testimonies to a watching world is a suffering Christian who walks through the trials of life with a living hope.

So with that being said, I would like you to open your Bibles to the Gospel of Matthew.

You heard that right.

I want to set before us this morning an overview of Peter's first letter to the church.

But I think that that overview is best seen in Matthew chapter 10.

Matthew 10 · chapter mention

Many biblical scholars are in agreement that what Peter wrote in his first letter has Jesus' instructions to his disciples in Matthew chapter 10 as a background.

Matthew 10 · chapter mention

Maybe Peter was thinking about this as he was writing his letter.

We don't know.

Someday we can ask him.

But in order to get the big picture of 1 Peter, we need to get to the heart of Matthew chapter 10.

Matthew 10 · chapter mention

And it's here that we see five actions that we need to take to set ourselves on the road of hope.

Matthew chapter 10 begins with Jesus setting apart the twelve disciples for ministry.

Matthew 10 · chapter mention

As his disciples, they were instructed to communicate his message.

They were granted his authority to do that.

They were given very explicit instructions as to how to go about this particular season of ministry.

Then came the jolting part of being a disciple.

Matthew chapter 10, verse 16.

Matthew 10:16

Behold, I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves.

I've seen the result of deer, elk, cattle, and sheep being in the midst of wolves.

It's not a sight that you want to see right before mealtime.

Jesus then continues to unpack that statement in verses 17 through 23.

And he tells us that the wolves are people who inhabit this world.

Specifically, people opposed to Jesus and opposed to the message of Christ.

Those who are opposed to Christ and his messengers will act like wolves act towards defenseless sheep.

Peter most likely wrote his letter sometime in the early 60s A.D.

Depending on exactly when it was circulated, Christians would have been facing either everyday persecution from society, or they would have been facing systematic government-fueled persecution.

So the first people to hear Peter's letter were Jesus' sheep facing the wolves of their time.

They were suffering, they were enduring trials of many kinds, and perhaps rapidly losing hope.

Beginning in verse 24 of Matthew 10, we see a slight change in Jesus' instructions to his disciples.

If it's possible, he offers encouragement to the sheep when they're surrounded by the wolves.

Look with me, beginning at verse 24.

A disciple is not above his teacher, nor a servant above his master.

It is enough for the disciple to be like his teacher, and the slave like his master.

If they have been called if they had called the master of the house Beelzebuble, how much more will they malign those of his household?

So have no fear of them, for nothing is covered that will not be revealed, or hidden that will not be known.

What I tell you in the dark, say in the light, what you hear whispered, proclaim on the house tops.

And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul.

Rather, fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.

Are not two sparrows sold for a penny?

And not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your father.

But even the hairs of your head are all numbered.

Fear not, therefore, you are of more value than many sparrows.

So every one who acknowledges me before men, I also will acknowledge before my father who is in heaven.

But whoever denies me before men, I also will deny before my Father who is in heaven.

Amen.

Jesus has plainly declared that persecution will come to those who follow him.

This doesn't apply just to persecution.

It applies to suffering, to trials of many kinds, as the half brother of Jesus, that is James said.

We will face trials and sufferings and pains of many, many, many kinds as the sheep that belong to Jesus.

But we should not fear what will come in this world, the Savior says, because he is sovereign over life.

In the context of the instructions to the disciples in chapter 10, verses 24 through 33 function as a means of encouragement to those twelve disciples who would become the twelve apostles.

Jesus has sort of shoved them into a cold shower of sorts to wake them up to the reality of life as a disciple.

Life as a Christian, Jesus says, will likely be one filled with pain, suffering, trial, rejection, running, even perhaps death.

You live in a sin-cursed world, and you must face the effects of sin on the world.

You must face the effects of sin in its people.

Perhaps, at times even worse, we have to face the effects of sin in our own heart, soul, mind, and body.

But take heart, Jesus says.

He is sovereign over your life.

So how can we as Christians be encouraged with the prospects of life being so dim?

We do that by setting ourselves on the road to hope.

We get on that road to hope by embracing five realities.

First, I want you to embrace the consequences of your identity.

The consequences of your identity.

In verses 24 and 25, we see a normal pattern of teaching from the first century world.

This is what you would hear from basically every rabbi, every disciple, anybody who would be trying to teach or trying even to debate.

This example is one that goes from the lesser to the greater.

Common argument.

Arguing from the lesser to the greater.

In this case, the disciple is the lesser, and the teacher is the greater.

The servant is the lesser, and the master is the greater.

First, he says, a disciple is not greater than his teacher.

Now that was the hope of every first century disciple was to become as great as his teacher.

But while under the instruction of his teacher, the disciple was not greater.

So Jesus says to the twelve, including Peter, you are my disciples.

I'm the teacher.

You're not greater.

And the same is true of a servant and a master.

Whatever the situation, servant or disciple, there is an implied lesser and greater status.

And in these images, Jesus is represented by the teacher and the master.

And he tells us if we want to be like him, that's a good thing.

He wants us to grow, to mature as his disciples, to become like him.

That's something that he's doing in us.

But it comes at a price.

Those who follow him can expect no greater treatment than that given to the teacher.

They can expect no greater treatment than that given to the master of the house.

As an example, Jesus says, if they have called the master of the house Beelzebuble.

Now he's using an argument here that assumes something is true.

Let's assume for a moment, he says, that the master of the house is called Satan.

By the way, later on in Matthew, Jesus is called that very term.

He's called Satan.

So let's assume then that the master is called Satan, or a worker of Satan, or a disturber of the peace, or a bane of society.

If the master is considered in such a way, then those who are in his home will receive the same kind of treatment.

Even the servants in the home should expect that kind of treatment.

If the teacher is called Satan, what should the disciples expect?

Now, in that statement is a veiled encouragement.

The encouragement is this.

As followers of Jesus, we should not be surprised by the undesired issues in life.

Because we will only endure what he has already endured.

Beloved, he's been down your road.

He's walked it, he's lived it.

What we go through in this life as believers in Christ has already been experienced by the Lord Jesus Himself.

There's some comfort in that.

What we face is not so different from what our Lord has already endured.

It may be a surprise to us, but it's not a surprise to him.

So to be encouraged when life throws us lemons, we must embrace who we are.

We must embrace that we belong to Christ the Lord.

But it doesn't stop there.

We must also embrace the message of his kingdom.

Look at verse 26 and 27.

So have no fear of them.

Them referring to the wolves that are surrounding the sheep.

Have no fear of them, for nothing is covered that will not be revealed or hidden that will not be known.

But I tell you in the dark, say in the light, what you hear whispered, proclaim on the housetops.

There's a beginning here of a series of do not fears.

So we see in verse 26, have no fear.

Verse 28, do not fear.

Verse 31, fear not.

Jesus said to his twelve disciples, and he says to us as well, look, don't stress about it.

Don't worry about people or what they can do, because I've been there.

Don't worry about life, I've lived it.

Don't worry about trials or burdens because I've carried them.

Based on the fact that the Lord's followers can expect nothing better than what he has received, he says, therefore, have no fear of them.

Have no fear of them.

The desire of sinful humanity is to squash the Word of God.

The world in its sinfulness does not understand the gospel.

And it does not want to hear it.

Suffering and persecution will come because sinful hearts are confronted with the gospel.

And rather than embrace their need to trust in Christ, their desire is to abolish the message and do away with the messengers.

But in spite of the world's attempts, the gospel cannot be destroyed.

What the world seeks to hide, Jesus says, is going to be uncovered.

What the world seeks to destroy will thrive.

Understand, this is in the context of disciples going out into the world and proclaiming the message of the kingdom of God.

People will use every method in their power to cover or to hide or to destroy the messengers of Christ and their message.

They may try to shut you up.

They may fire you.

They may cut out your tongue so that you cannot speak.

They may confiscate your scriptures.

They may simply kill you.

But take heart, Jesus says.

That won't stop the word of the Lord from going forth.

Maybe you know this is the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation.

I've been reading a book related to that about the history of Anabaptism and Anabaptist movements.

The free church actually has some connections to that movement.

Anna basically means re, re-baptism.

So that was an opposition to Roman Catholicism and Lutheran doctrine of infant baptism.

So Anabaptists came along in that Reformation time period and said, hey, we're going to follow what Scripture says, where the Scriptures say that people are baptized after expressing faith in Christ, not simply as infants.

Well, as a result of that, the Anabaptists were persecuted terribly.

Some of them had their tongues cut out.

Some of them were tied up and tossed into lakes and rivers to drown.

Some of them were tortured in just unimaginable ways.

That may come because of the message of the kingdom.

Now we might ask, how is that an encouragement during persecution and trials and suffering?

It's a fair question.

The persecution, the pain, the suffering, the trials are still there, right?

Well, this point of encouragement presupposes the first one.

If we truly consider ourselves to be servants of Christ, the only thing that matters is what the master says.

The only thing that truly matters is the teacher himself.

If he is our sole joy, if he is our ultimate desire and drive in life, then we will want to see his will accomplished, and we can be encouraged that that joy will happen, not because we're working extra hard, but because of the sovereignty of Christ in this world.

When we embrace our identity, we can then embrace the Lord's message and have hope in the midst of that.

Because that message then motivates and guides us.

Where does it guide us to?

Home.

Which is our next item to embrace.

We need to embrace eternity and the sovereignty of God.

Do not fear those who kill the body, but cannot kill the soul.

Do not fear those who kill the body.

That goes against every fiber of our being.

We don't want to die.

In fact, we are often fearful of dying.

But if we suffer or are persecuted or even die for the cause of Christ, we're not to fear.

We're not to fear the uncertainties of tomorrow, whatever they may or may not bring.

Because there's encouragement there.

Jesus has already walked that road.

Even in death, he will never leave us nor forsake us because he has conquered that enemy.

What's the proper perspective on human life?

Proper perspective is that God has given humanity the power to take away physical life.

Peter will talk about that in the second half of his book.

God has Granted some authority to human beings in the arena of physical life.

But even there, God's sovereignty is established.

If God did not grant the ability, mankind would not have it.

So God is holding the trump card over your life.

There are any number of ways to die in this world, but God is the one who has the power and the authority over our body and our soul.

So our response then is not to choose between being courageous in the face of death or suffering, or fearing death or suffering, but of who we will fear more.

Will we fear people?

Will we fear the wolves around us?

Will we fear the trials of life?

Will we fear the uncertainties, the sufferings of life?

Or God?

We have no need to fear even physical death because we know that's not the end.

The sovereignty of our Lord over all of life is clearly displayed here.

And the encouragement comes when we become eternity-minded.

The problem is our pride severely limits our eyesight.

Human beings are by nature nearsighted.

What I mean by that is we focus on the here and now.

We naturally see what is right, smack dab in front of us, and that's it.

But when we begin to have the sight that comes through Christ, when we begin to be encouraged because there is an eternity in front of us, and God is sovereign over all of that, even if it means I go through trials of many kinds, suffering, or even physical death, I can have hope.

Because I know what's down there.

I was talking with Pastor Scott this week about remodeling.

It is a terrible, painful, patience testing ordeal.

I don't recommend it.

But sometimes it is one that you endure because you know that the end result will be worth it.

You know that going through all of the dust and the disaster and the waiting is going to be worth it because of what is coming at the end.

Why can we not see life that way?

Christ is the ultimate authority.

I will not die unless he desires it.

And if he does desire it, then I can know and have courage in the fact that he has power over eternity as well.

I can face today, I can face tomorrow, and I can face the future because he holds it.

That is an encouraging thought.

It becomes even more encouraging when we embrace the Father's care for us.

Jesus gives us two illustrations here.

One is of sparrows or small birds of some kind, and the other is hairs on our heads.

Sparrows could be any one of a number of small birds that were sold in the markets, usually in pairs or in groups of five.

These small birds were often roasted and sold as snacks, or they were purchased by the very poor for their entire meals.

In contrast, those who were wealthy would purchase these birds as pets.

So they were the cheapest commodity on the market.

The price was a penny, an asarion, the equivalent to less than one hour's wage.

Generally speaking, a day's wage in the first century was a denarius.

An asarion was one sixteenth of a denarius.

One sixteenth of a day's earnings would buy you two birds.

The point is that they are insignificant in the eyes of the world.

They're readily available and extremely cheap, mostly unneeded except by the extremely poor.

And yet, those creatures that are ignored by human beings are watched by a Father.

A Father who is in heaven.

And not one of them falls to the ground, probably a picture of death, without God the Father knowing that that insignificant creature fell.

Comparatively, God knows how many hairs we have on our heads.

Now, granted, that's an easier task for some of us than for others.

I won't point fingers.

I'm losing them too.

But God still knows.

The point, though, is not how many hairs are on our heads.

The point is that God knows.

He knows.

We are not to fear what comes in this life because just as Christ is sovereign over the sparrows, he is sovereign over our lives as well.

And how much greater value are you than little birds?

We are worth more to God than little sparrows.

Can God use sparrows for his glory?

Absolutely.

But we are of much greater value for his glory than sparrows.

If then he cares in a fatherly way for those sparrows, how much more those who are his?

Be encouraged then.

We can't see tomorrow.

It may be filled with the greatest of sorrows or the greatest of pains, it may be filled with death.

But do not fear because he cares for you.

If the sparrow cannot fall to the ground without him knowing it, neither can you lose a hair without him knowing it.

And his care will follow us even to the darkest of places.

Embrace the Father's care for you.

Finally, embrace your confession.

So everyone who acknowledges me in verse 32 before men, I will also acknowledge before my Father who is in heaven.

But whoever denies me before men, I also will deny before my Father who is in heaven.

The willingness to confess Jesus publicly demonstrates the relationship with Christ.

Jesus is sending his disciples out into a world in which they will be surrounded by ravenous wolves, and he tells them, You must stand in those wolves and confess me publicly.

When Jesus says acknowledge, here as it's translated in the ESV, he used the word for confess.

The point here is whether or not we will declare openly an association with Jesus who is called the Christ.

We're going to 1 Peter.

We know from Peter's experience that it's possible to not give a public confession, don't we?

But we know from Peter's experience in denying the Lord in public that we should not view this as a temporary failure under pressure because Peter was forgiven and restored.

Rather, this is speaking of those who, as a matter of heart, are changed and willing to follow Christ and who receive his commendation in the end.

Now, ultimately, what decides a person's destiny is what Jesus says about them before the Father.

That's what he says here.

Those who through faith in him stand with him will have the Son of God standing in their defense.

Peter was one of those disciples who heard Jesus say this.

As you may know, Peter struggled to embrace the truth.

After suffering many things, I'm going to die.

And Peter said, Oh no, you're not.

Peter struggled to embrace the truth.

He was not about to let Jesus go to Jerusalem and suffer many things and die.

He would rather cut off someone's ear than allow that to happen.

And rather than embrace his confession, he denied Jesus.

And later, after Jesus' ascension to the Father, Peter even struggled to embrace the full message of the kingdom because of pressure from certain people.

He had to be corrected by the Apostle Paul.

Someone has written Peter could speak convincingly to people who were struggling with problems because he himself had such an interesting record as a stumbling, faltering, sometimes failing disciple.

There were times when he must have almost lost hope, but the Savior was always with him to revive that hope.

Does that sound familiar?

It describes me.

But grace changed Peter.

Grace set Peter on the road to living hope.

And grace can do that for you.

Bible teacher Bob Deffenbaugh wrote, Peter changed.

He changed from a man who sought Jesus for power, for prestige, and for prosperity to a man who counted rejection, suffering, and death for Christ's sake to be a great privilege and a blessing.

If there was hope for Peter to change, there is hope for anyone.

God could change Peter.

And he can and he will change those who belong to him.

And so decades later, Peter could write about the God of all hope.

May He be your God as we walk with Peter together.

Let's pray.

We confess that so often we are hopeless.

We feel hopeless.

We feel alone.

Oh, forgive us of that.

Set our eyes fully on the hope to come.

Keep our eyes focused on you from where our help comes.

And we trust and we believe and we confess that we will one day see you in all of your glory and rejoice with you that we were counted worthy to suffer.

Give us hope as we do that, a living hope that trusts in you.

Amen.