The Gospel's Living Hope (1 Peter 1:3-12)

When people bring up the ideas of evil and suffering, they are talking about the need for salvation. This is why we create movies with superheroes. We want someone to come in and save us from our suffering and the forces of evil.

Our world also tries to blame their suffering on someone else to make them feel better. There are many today who look at Christianity with anger inside. These folks claim that Christians are arrogant and hypocritical. They believe that Christians are really what's wrong with the world today. Anyone who created a God to make them feel better and look down on others while they do all the same evil things everyone else is terrible. Christians aren't seen as the solution. They are the root of the problem. They prevent humankind from reaching the utopia that they are capable of reaching. Christians are the source of the world's most significant suffering.

Isn't that sad? If Christians acted like Christ, nothing could be further from the truth. When people talk like that, they include all of the superficial New Age Christians with Bible believers who genuinely love others and work to glorify God. They bundle proud, immature, and legalistic believers with humble servants of Christ.

Today, we are going to study 1 Peter 1:3-12. This text will guide us to a better understanding of suffering and what God has done to overcome it.

1 Peter 1:3--12 (ESV) --- 3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, 4 to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, 5 who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. 6 In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, 7 so that the tested genuineness of your faith---more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire---may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. 8 Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, 9 obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls. 10 Concerning this salvation, the prophets who prophesied about the grace that was to be yours searched and inquired carefully, 11 inquiring what person or time the Spirit of Christ in them was indicating when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glories. 12 It was revealed to them that they were serving not themselves but you, in the things that have now been announced to you through those who preached the good news to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven, things into which angels long to look.

Evil and Suffering Are Common

Verses 3-9 tell us about the gospel or the good news of salvation from suffering. But the first section I want us to look at is verses 10-12. It says that the prophets and angels were looking forward to and trying to understand the salvation that God was revealing to them for thousands of years. Why did they want to understand this salvation so badly?

Prophets

Think for a moment about the prophets. For the prophet, life was hard! suffering and evil were prevalent, and all man could do was hope that God would provide what they needed. The more suffering and evil we experience, the harder it is for us to believe that God is good and more powerful than the forces of evil.

Habakkuk is an example of this. In the book of Habakkuk, we read a conversation recorded between God and his prophet. Habakkuk asks the age-old question, "O Lord, how long shall I cry for help, and you will not hear?" There was a lot of violence, suffering, and evil going on in Habakkuk's day. He lived right in the middle of corruption, greed, murder, and injustice. God answered him, "I am raising up the Chaldeans, that bitter and hasty nation." God told his prophet that he planned to raise the Babylonian army to destroy his people. That doesn't sound like salvation. That sounds like God bringing more suffering. So Habakkuk says, "You surely won't kill us all and make the Babylonians your people. They are more evil than us!" Then, Habakkuk went up to his watch post and watched for the Babylonians to come, waiting for God to respond. God said, "It's going to happen. I will bring the proud low, but the righteous will live by his faith." Then, God says one more fascinating thing. He says, "The earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea."

This is an example of the prophet's interaction and confusion about suffering. They are told to put their faith in God amid their suffering and that the day is coming when everyone will understand how glorious God is. In the darkest hours, God wanted his people to trust him. He wanted them to hope in God's goodness. He will give the righteous eternal life.

In the OT, God made some huge promises to reverse the curse and bring a blessing to all mankind. God assured salvation. However, the prophets were living at a time when they hadn't experienced it. They had received a taste of the promise in the kingdom of Israel, but nothing permanent. It would be easy for righteous men and women to doubt God's goodness and rebel against him. This was a constant temptation.

Angels

But this text in 1 Peter also tells us that Angels struggled with this. Where do we learn about that? The Old Testament doesn't tell us much about that. We see signs of a war going on in the heavenly realm during the time of Daniel, but nothing concrete. Listen to what Jesus and his brother said about angels.

Matthew 25:41 (ESV) --- 41 “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.

Jude 6 (ESV) --- 6 And the angels who did not stay within their own position of authority, but left their proper dwelling, he has kept in eternal chains under gloomy darkness until the judgment of the great day---

Jude and Jesus tell us that they left their position of authority and joined Satan in deserving punishment. Why would they do that? Consider why Judas betrayed Jesus. It's the same idea. They were deceived as they observed what mankind was doing and how God acted toward mankind. The angels were longing or lusting after this understanding. Angels were longing for an explanation, and some doubted like Judas.

Imagine delivering the promises that God was making to mankind. Then, they waited over a thousand years to see its fulfillment. The angel who brought the news of God's promises to Abraham had to wait 1500 years for the fulfillment. Can you imagine?

Evil and suffering in the world are painful for everyone involved and those observing. We have always wanted God to eliminate them. That's why the prophets and angels wanted to know when! The gospel is the good news about God showing us his intention to eliminate evil and suffering!

The Living Hope

Let's go back to verses 3-9 and understand what the gospel says about salvation from suffering. We are going to study this text by looking at each descriptive phrase.

"Born Again to a Living Hope" (3-4)

The first phrase says that true believers are being born again to a living hope. Being born again indicates that there is a transformation or renewal. The person who submits to Christ is renewed from the inside and out. This renewal gives them a living hope. That sounds interesting. How is hope living? Notice the following phrase. He says, "Through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead." God has provided a living hope through a living Savior.

What does that hope look like? Listen to verse 4! Peter describes the living hope as an inheritance that is "imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you."

We suffer because things perish, get defiled, fade, or get taken away. We suffer because everything we have immediately starts falling apart and eventually disappears. Can you imagine buying a car that never gets damaged and needs to be maintained? Can you imagine plants that grow up and weed themselves every year? What about fruit that comes year-round? What about water that purifies itself? This living hope is an eternal blessing. Once you are born again or transformed, that hope is inside you, and no one can ever take it away. You can give it up, but it cannot be taken from you. We have hope that we will be set free from this life of suffering.

"Guarded Through Faith"

In the first part of verse 5, Peter says that God's power guards the born again through faith. The Christian has faith in God's willingness to remove suffering and bring us to live with him for eternity. The more faith we have in God's goodness, the more we are guarded and protected by God's power. Losing faith in God makes us vulnerable to losing salvation from suffering.

When will that happen? Like the prophet, we might be inclined to ask that question. How long must we have hope? They waited for the salvation to be revealed and the whole plan to be described. We wait for salvation to become a reality with faith and hope. Because of this faith, we are willing to do some sacrificial things. Listen to the following verses.

Now We Suffer

Verses 6-9 tell us that we don't expect to experience this utopia, free from suffering, until after this life is over. Right now, we experience suffering. The gospel is not the good news that we won't suffer in this life. That's a fake, new age gospel promoting living your best life now. The prophets didn't predict immediate glory. They predicted that Christ would suffer and then obtain glory. We follow in his footsteps.

Peter tells us that trials are necessary. Why? This is the question that everyone wants the answer to. We want to know why. We want to understand how to stop the trials. Peter says that trials reveal the tested genuineness of our faith. Then, he compares faith with gold. Gold perishes when put through the fire, but genuine faith only grows stronger.

How is your faith holding up if you are going through tremendous suffering right now? Satan wants us to give up on faith, and he tries to distract us from our hope. Don't let go. Look at what Peter says, "The tested genuineness of your faith... may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus." Did you know that the greatness of our faith in trials will result in a great reward?

If you love Jesus and believe in him, you can endure the trial and rejoice in the trial, knowing the outcome is a greater joy than if your faith were never tested!

In 2 Corinthians 4, Paul said it this way.

2 Corinthians 4:16--18 (ESV) --- 16 So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. 17 For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, 18 as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.

Lessons

The gospel is the solution to the problem of suffering. Some people believe that if God were good and all-powerful, he wouldn't allow suffering. That's not true. Suffering is the result of free will. Every evil and source of pain comes from our sin in the Garden of Eden. God didn't choose that for us. He had the power and the goodness to give us a world free from suffering, but we chose differently by rebelling against him.

The gospel tells us that he will bring those who submit to him back into the garden and remove their suffering. If you are suffering from the trials of living here, don't double down on the world. If you're being oppressed by evil, don't give up on faith in the living hope of Jesus.

Application

Does your spouse abuse you mentally? Is your school or workplace hostile and full of social pressure to conform? Have you been diagnosed with an illness that causes physical pain and suffering? Have you lost someone you love or experienced some other significant loss with the perishable things in this world? Have Christians caused you suffering by not acting like Christ?

I don't know what kind of suffering you are going through because I haven't experienced your suffering. But the answer is not to remove God, the Bible, and the church from your life and give in to your carnal desires. The answer is to double down on that faith and hope.

We must believe that God is with us, guarding us through faith. God is watching everything that goes on and wanting to bless us eternally. This light and momentary affliction does not compare to the eternal weight of glory. There is a glory that never perishes. We believe this because Jesus was resurrected from the dead, he received glory after he suffered, he is the author and finisher of our faith, and he promises to share his blessings with us.

Our mission is to shine a light with faith in our living hope through the suffering we endure. The greater the suffering, the more excellent the opportunity for faith to shine. The greater the faith, the greater the eternal glory.

Conclusion

If you choose to disbelieve in God because of suffering, what hope do you have? What hope can you offer the one in pain? What evidence can you provide to back that hope up? We have a living hope. We have a risen savior. Do you or have you rejected him? Perhaps worse, are you abandoning him and his people? Come back before it's too late.