Live in Hope!

I Peter 1:3-12 "The unsaved person is "without hope" (Eph. 2:12); yet the believer has a living hope because he has a living Savior. Christ is our Hope (1 Tim. 1:1), and we look for His soon-expected return. The Christian does not work for this hope; it is a part of his spiritual birthright. We are born again (John 3:5) into this living hope. This hope is not only a living hope; it is a lasting hope (vv. 4 - 5). It is reserved in heaven, where it cannot decay ("incorruptible"), be defiled, or lose its beauty and delight. But not only is the hope reserved; the believer too is kept (guarded as by a soldier) by the Lord! We are kept by God's power because of the faith we have placed in Him. Eternal security is not based on the faith of men, but on the faithfulness of God. The believer is saved; he is being saved daily (through sanctification); and he will be saved completely when Christ returns (Rom. 8:15 - 25). The end (completion, perfection) of our faith will be the complete salvation of the believer (v. 9), who will inherit a new body. However, until Christ returns, the believer must go through testing. A faith that cannot be tested cannot be trusted. Our suffering is but "for a season" as the Lord sees it ("if need be"-- v.6); but the glory will be forever. Verse 7 compares the trial of our faith to the testing of gold. The word "trial" means "approval." The comparison suggested by Dr. Kenneth Wuest is that of a prospector bringing ore in to be tested. The assayer gives him a certificate stating that the ore contains gold. The certificate is the approval of the ore, and this paper is worth much more than the little sample of ore that was tested. In the same way our faith is tested, a "sample" at a time; and the approval of our faith means that there are more riches to follow. The suffering we endure here will result in more glory when Christ comes. Knowing this, we love Him the more. In vv.10 - 12, Peter reminds us that the OT prophets spoke of this salvation we enjoy. They did not, however, fully understand the time or circumstances in which it would appear. They saw the cross and the kingdom, but they did not anticipate the "valley" in between, this present age of the church." WARREN W. WIERSBE Wiersbe's Expository Outlines on the Old Testament and New Testament