a friend recently gave me a gift of an apple watch and, and it's kind of fun to wear. I don't, I don't always wear because I haven't really been a watch person, but if you ever, I went from not being a watch person to being one, there's some adjustments. Well, one of the adjustments had to make was that working in the church. Usually my time is spent on projects and people and so if I'm not meeting with people, whether it's counseling or leadership or vision casting or in the community serving, I'm sitting down to write messages and work through curriculum and projects of that nature. Well when you spend a long period of time in front of a computer screen for those that are, are familiar with smartwatches, they, they, they buzzed at you after a little while and I was kind of offended and the reason I say that is because I was working on this project, I was deep in thought and then this is, and it said time to stand up and I was like time doesn't, doesn't think I'm like that out of shape or do you think I'm dead? It's just testing to see like I haven't moved in a while, some of you are laughing because you've gotten a similar buzz. Okay. I was watching netflix. But anyway, it was no, but as you sit there and and if you don't move for a period of time it says, hey checking in time to move time to get up and and now I don't even give you a really a buzz to say, okay, take some deep breaths was like, does it know that I'm stressed, like it's the watch, like I don't know is there cameras, Big Brother watching me? I don't know what's going on, but it sends you these indicators to try to just encourage healthy rhythms in your life. And so the reason I start off with that this morning is that I sometimes wonder if as a church as a whole and especially churches in the american western culture, I wonder if we've been sitting still too long because I believe that it is time for the church not to be known by what and who they are against, but to be known by whom were for and that if God is for us, we can be for our community instead of sitting back and judging culture from a distance, I want to be in the middle of that impacting because you can judge or you can impact, but you can't do both. And I believe church that it is time for us to move, it is time for us to take action because the truth is that the world is filled with struggles, you're gonna face different obstacles throughout your day, you're gonna face different challenges. But the reason that we are not content with our possessions in our jobs and and it doesn't matter how much we go after and how much we obtain that, we always long for more. It's because we have been created for something more and we have been created for someone more and the bible tells us that we are called citizens of Heaven, that this world is temporary, that we've been made for eternity. And the reason we long for more is because we long for God. And so we're gonna dive into the study of first Peter and we're gonna talk about a group of people that were facing immense and intense persecution. Peter who was an apostle of jesus, is writing this letter to people that are scattered throughout what's now known as modern modern day Turkey and they are facing persecution of the early church. So it's about 30 years after the death and resurrection of jesus, there's this guy named Nero who to give you just a story of how intense Nero was that in order to light up his gardens, some historians have noted that he would take christians pour wax over top of them and light these people on fire so that he could have light for his gardens. And this is a historical situation in a reality. So in 64 A. D. There was a massive fire throughout. Rome and Nero needed somebody to blame. Now he wanted to build up something um hire. Some historians actually think that Nero might have even started the fire, they can't prove that, but he wanted to burn something down to build up his own legacy. But when the culture of the city got mad at all these fires that almost burned down the city, he needed a scapegoat, he needed somebody to blame. And so he actually goes out and then, oh, it's the christians, they started the fires and so he blames that. And so now christians get persecuted, so they're being attacked and so now they're spread out there on the run and then peter comes in and he writes this letter of hope and of perseverance and of power and said, I know you're struggling, I know you're hurting, but I have an answer now thankfully we don't live in our society right now where we are physically in danger for gathering here together. Now there are places in the world that that's currently happening. But while we are not facing immense persecution right now, the truth is just as much good for us. Think of it this way, think about those like North Face or those clothing brands that are made for cold temperatures when they make those jackets, they test them in extreme cases. So they, so you have a jacket or, or snow pants or whatever you are gloves. So they test these clothing in extreme temperatures. So they know that it works in the extreme well if it works in the extreme, it also works in the everyday and so we're gonna be looking at a letter that was written to people who are facing extreme difficulties. But if their faith, their hope works in their extreme setting, I promise you. It works in our everyday setting as well. In fact, if you're taking notes, you can write this down that hope inspires action. Hope inspires action. It moves people to do something with it. Hope never just stays with a person, but always transfers on and gets expressed in some way, shape or form. Now, what is hope? You're taking notes, You can write this down, let me give you a working definition. Hope can be defined as the confident expectation that God will do what he promised. It's more than just making a wish. It's not about throwing a coin into a fountain, but it's the confident expectation that God is going to do what he said, he's going to do. And when you have a secured hope and who God is and what he's done, it inspires you to act because you trust that God's gonna come through for you before we jump into our study, let me just give you a little bit of background. So you see this theme, this thread of hope, we've throughout scripture, for example, Jeremiah 29 11, 1 of the most commonly quoted versus in the bible because people love the messaging. It says this that for I know the plans I have for you declares the Lord plans for welfare and not for evil to give you a future and a hope so hope. Just the idea is being offered, being given, being promised to you by God, the prophet Isaiah in the old testament, he said. But those who wait for another translation, same wording says, those who hope for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not be faint. So hope is a source of strength for you to continue on Romans 15 13, Paul writes to the church. He says, May the God of Hope fill you with joy and peace in believing so that by the power of the Holy Spirit, you may abound in hope. So the Holy Spirit that we've been singing about is is really the way that God brings hope into your life, Paul writes in Colossians 127 to them, God chose to make known how great among the gentiles are the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you the hope of glory. So hope is directly tied to our belief. And then one of my favorite passages on hope is actually Colossians 14 and five. He writes that he says he's thanking the church for their faithfulness to God and their love for each other and he's praying for them. And so he praised this in verse four and five because we have heard of your faith in christ jesus and the love you have for all of God's people, the faith and the love that spring from the hope stored up for you in heaven and about which you have already heard in the true message of the gospel. So Hope serves if you think of a diving board, you don't see a lot of those in pools anymore, but because of the hazards behind that, but picture that big old diving board into the pool on a hot summer day. Hope is the diving board that you you get the energy that that spring that comes from, that comes your faith and love. So you have hope. Well what do you hope in? We have hope in the person that's jesus, you have hope in the place, that's Heaven. You then have hope for a purpose that your calling in life and then you have hope and the power of the Holy Spirit. So you believe that jesus has called you to himself, you believe that there's heaven after you die. You believe that there's a reason you live here on earth now and that you believe you have been given power to then go out and do that. Because hope is the confident expectation that God is going to do what he promised. And so now we get to the letter, 30 years after the resurrection of Jesus, you have some other letters in the new testament. There's a guy named john, he's known as the Apostle of Love, He writes about Love and and he's described as that, we walked through last year through the book of first john and we talked all about how we've been called to love other people because God loved us. Then you have paul, paul wrote a lot of the letters in the new testament. He's known as the Apostle of Faith by Grace, you have been saved through faith, talks about fighting the good fight of faith and faith is believing in God and putting the full weight of your life into him and then you have, Peter, Peter is known as the Apostle of Hope, he's the Apostle of Hope and I love that because Peter was a complete and utter hot mess of anybody to write on hope. It was Peter, he was also known as the apostle who would put his foot in his own mouth constantly, constantly, he was doing that, he was Like one moment he's walking on water the next he's falling into the ocean. In one moment he's saying you are the messiah, jesus, he says upon you, I will build on this rock, I will start my church and then a few verses later he reviewed and says get behind me satan. So if you want to talk about extreme arcs extreme cases. In one moment, Jesus says, I will start the church with you. In another moment, he calls Peter satan and I don't know about you, but if your nickname is satan, that's not a good starting point, right? He tells Jesus, he says, I will never leave you, I am your most loyal disciple. In fact, when jesus was going to be arrested, the soldiers came forward and Peter actually chopped off a dude's ear. Now I don't know the proper angle to chop off an ear in fighting, but and my personal guest was, he was like no, jesus, they'll never take you and then the Children's kind of like ducking and then like, and then jesus actually in that moment, the crazy story, he goes in and he says, peter, it's not time he takes the ear, puts it back on the soldier's head and I was like, wait what? And then they arrest jesus, it's not time, Oh by the way, peter, you're gonna deny me three times. No, never jesus, like one chapter later, sorry Jesus, I denied you three times and like a little girl says, hey, aren't you gonna follow and he's like, no, get away. And so like Peter is all over the map, he's like, I will never leave you, he says, I have no idea who you are, he's walking on water, he's like, no, get behind me saying, I mean he is, this guy is just a complete chaotic mess, but yet in the end of the gospel of john, when jesus rises again, he restores Peter, This is really cool story in John 20 and 21 and he calls them together and he says, do you love me more than these, talking about fish and the disciples and then, And he reinstates Peter into the ministry. And then in acts chapter two he preaches the first sermon And he's bold and he goes and he preaches a sermon and 3000 people are saved. They like and they start the church and now he's going, but even in his ministry had disagreements with paul, he had different things. He said, well I'm going to share the gospel with some people, but not all people. And he's like, wait a second, he has died for everyone. Okay, I need to share it with everyone. And so he's like all over the map, but he gets to this place, they're facing persecution. He's seeing God work through miracles. And so he's riding to this group in modern day Turkey who have been hurt all over the place and he says, look, I've been up, I've been down and let me tell you something that ultimately we'll give you hope. And so we pick up his letter. The first two verses basically state that he's writing to this group of scattered persecuted christians and we pick up the story and first Peter Chapter 1: verse three he writes this 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 there it is, that phrase is going to shape the rest of the book that we're gonna be spending the next 67 weeks on his cause is to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of jesus christ from the dead to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled and unf aiding kept in heaven for you. I want to pause for just a moment. He says, jesus has given you this inheritance, this future value, this future wealth, that is imperishable meaning, it's permanent. It cannot be changed. He's writing to a group of people who probably don't have a lot of possessions and he's saying, no, you're gonna get something that cannot be taken away from you. And then he says, it's undefinable meaning that it's pure, it's perfect and unf aiding it will not go away. So, imagine being in that setting your family ties may have been broken, your land might have been taken over. You're you're meeting in quiet rooms and Peter comes in and says, look, there's something coming that it's better and cannot be taken away from you. It is perfect, it is pure and it is permanent. And then in verse five, he says, who by God's power are you are being guarded through faith for a salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time. So he's saying in here that in these first three verses, he's saying that God gives us a hope for our past, for our present and our future. It's for our past, our present and our future. The fact that he has given us given birth into this living hope, meaning that God gave this to you didn't earn it. He gave it to you. He's promising you an inheritance in the future. This picture of heaven, It's more glorious than anything you can imagine, think or dream. But then he also says there in verse five that he is guarding you until that time. So he has made heaven for you. But he's also made you for heaven. And in the meantime, his perfect power that created this perfect places, also guarding you, protecting you, strengthening you. It's a living hope because he is alive. And if jesus is alive, we are alive and therefore our hope is alive and he inspires us to move. See here's how this works, There is this motive, then there's the means that he delivers it and then the merit or the reward that we receive. So the motive is the mercy of God. He does so because this is who he is, he is love, he is mercy. So in view of his mercy, he gives us, or the means through which he gives us living hope is through the resurrection of jesus that jesus dies on the cross and rises again. And if jesus can conquer death, then what are you facing? That? Jesus can't conquer nothing and through the resurrection of jesus, then we have been given this living hope. So you have a cause, the mercy of God, You have the means in the resurrection of jesus and then the reward or the effect is because he did this, we have living hope hope that cannot be taken away from you, hope that cannot be dictated by circumstances. And so this is a powerful, powerful picture, but he doesn't stop there because some of you, when I read that God is going to give you something perfect and something incredible might have in your heart said, yeah, but you don't know what I'm going through right now or Yeah, but today is not good. I know tomorrow will be great. Okay, that doesn't help me right now, john right now I'm going through difficulties in my job right now, in this moment I'm walking through a difficult relationship situation right now, my finances are off right now, I'm battling addiction, I'm battling sin and that's great that we get heaven in the future. But how does that help me Right now, Peter senses this and so he doesn't stop there. He said, let me tell you where living hope really comes in and impacts because here, here's why that's important. You don't need hope in heaven. You don't need faith in heaven actually think about that. What do you need faith for in heaven? You got jesus right there and it's perfect. So you don't need, like he gives us hope because we need it right now. So what does it look like? Let's continue reading in verse six, he says in this, you rejoice though now for a little while, if necessary. You have been grieved by various trials so that the tested genuineness of your faith more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire. It's an incredible picture that 2000 years later still resonates the purity of gold that only becomes pure when the impurities are melted away. That this faith may be found to the result in praise and glory and honor. At the revelation of jesus christ though you have not seen him. You love him though you do not see him. You believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls. So what do we do when there seems no way out? Well, here's the truth is that God gives us a hope to fight our present battles. Living hope means that hope was made for the battle you're facing right this very moment. And if you have a paper copy, highlight verse eight or a digital copy, just highlight that copy that somewhere. Because verse eight is a key to what we do when we're facing a battle or a struggle of some kind. Because he says, even though you do not see him, says you love him. Even though you did not see him right now, you you believe you trust him and you rejoice for what's going to come. And so if you're facing a difficult circumstance right now, I want to encourage you to do those 333 things that are found in verse eight is though you do not see God in this moment, you can love him because love is a choice not a feeling though. You do not see God in the struggle that you're facing right now choose to trust in him based on what he's done and what he said, I was having a conversation one time counseling someone and they made a decision to follow jesus. But then they battled real life and so they came into my office and they were saying john I just, I don't feel it. I don't feel God's presence. And so we opened up the bible and read the same verses. The person read when they accepted christ and said, okay, let me ask you, are those words still true? Oh yeah. Hey, aren't you glad that your salvation is not based on a feeling but on the foundation of truth, that God's word stands forever. In fact, the end of Chapter one, it says that the grass withers and the flowers of the fields fade away. But the word of God stands forever. I am so grateful that our hope is not based on how we feel, but based on the promises of God that will last for eternity. So that when we do not see him, we can love him. When we do not see him in the middle of our mess, we can trust him and that we will ultimately choose. Instead of worry, we will choose worship and we will say God, I'm gonna give it to you. You promise to come back. You promised to get rid of all this nastiness. You promised to purify my faith. So God, whatever this test, whatever this trial, I'm gonna count it as joy Romans eight says God works all things for good. He doesn't say all things are good. No one likes a test. Like have you ever said, okay kids, we're going to the doctor to get a shot. Yay, but you go why? Because it's good for you. And so sometimes the trials are disciplined, sometimes it's persecution, sometimes it's doubt whatever it is that God can work through all things so that you can end up pure and more mature and closer to him. And so if you do not see God in the situation that you're facing, lean into what God's promises are and lean into hope because we have a hope that is alive because jesus is alive and so don't we don't see him, we love him though. We don't see him right now. We believe in him and though we don't see him, we can worship because he is there and he is waiting for us to trust. I recently saw a really powerful movie called just Mercy. Maybe some of you have read the book or if you're like, most people, if there's a movie and a book, you're gonna choose movie because it's a lot easier to do. Um and so well you guys maybe are more educated than myself. So um but we saw this movie, I did not read the book, but it's a true story about a guy named bryan Stevenson who started the equal justice initiative and his job And he's been doing this now for 30 years is to go in and getting legal counsel or support for people that have potentially been wrongly not only placed in jail, but in many cases actually on death row. And so in this story, brian played by Michael B. Jordan's who goes in and he is helping character who's played by Jamie Foxx but walter Mcmillan who's on death row and he comes in because he had been wrongly convicted and he's interviewing him and he's having this conversation and he says this in a movie. And this line stuck out to me. So I wrote it down and so in here because he's about to be executed for something he didn't do and he said, look your life is meaningful and I'm going to do everything possible to keep them from taking it. I love that your life is meaningful. And so I'm gonna do everything possible to keep them from taking it. This is the posture that Peter takes when he's writing this letter. And so he says satan is gonna try to take you the world is going to try to tempt you and take these things away from you. You're gonna experience difficult times, but you have value because you belong to God. You have meaning because you are his child, as evidenced by the fact that jesus died for you. And if jesus died for you, are you willing to live for him? Because whatever you're facing, it might not be as extreme as what they were facing, but if it works in the extreme, it also works in the every day and our hope is not just a phrase we put on a plate or cro crochet into a blanket, it is something that we grabbed hold to and it is alive because he is alive and it is the weapon we used to fight against temptation, it is the power we used to persevere through difficult circumstances because we grab hold of the hope that rests in jesus. So then what has he called us to for those in growth groups, you're gonna expand and cover first. Peter chapter one, But just give you kind of a preview for those discussions you're gonna have in your groups is that he calls us in verse 13-17, he says live holy. That if you've been given this living hope and then they have a sober mind and to be holy as he is holy, he did not give you hope so that you can sit on the sideline he gave you hope so that you could live as jesus lived and then he ends chapter one by saying and then love as jesus loved, I wanna encourage you to read the rest of first peter chapter one, it's a powerful experience to understand that God has given us a living hope and because he gives us his living hope, it should inspire us in our actions because our hope is for our past, our present and our future and our hope is alive, meaning it can help fight our present battles that we can live for him and that we can love others the way that God has loved us now I had the privilege of and and the grace of accepting got into my life at a young age about five or 6, but I kind of wish I had like a cooler testimony, you know, testimony is this when you share your story because you hear these life change stories that are incredible Right? And so you know, I would try to add it into my life and I would say yeah, I was just really into drugs and struggling you know in gangs on the street and then I turned five and they look at me okay and I was like man, I didn't have that incredible story, but I've come to realize that every story is incredible because it means that you were dead in your sin and that you've been made alive in christ If someone were to come up to me right now and say john proved to me that you are alive man, I don't really remember my birth. I know I was there. Um, but I don't have a lot of details. Let me go find my birth certificate. No, you don't, you don't need to go hunt down the birth certificate or or to remember all the exact details. You know what you can do to prove that you're alive, breathe I know that I'm alive right now because being alive matters in this present moment and it's not just where I've been, but where I'm going. I know that I'm alive based on what I see. I see and hear and feel and taste, I see God's creation and I know that he is there. I hear the story of the gospel and how God sacrificed his son for me and I am moved by it. I feel the freedom of forgiveness that comes from battling something offering up to God and to, to feel that sense of freedom that comes. I've tasted the flavor and the fulfillment of reading the word of God and be like, wow, that's amazing. I've breathed in the air of grace, the idea to know that I am loved because I'm a child of God and that I live from my identity, not for it. And knowing who I am dictates what I do not the other way around and when I recognize these things, I know that my hope is alive because he is alive and that hope was given to fight the very battles that I'm in right now. For if you did not see God, he's here and you can love him. And even though you might not see him now, I want to challenge you to trust him. And even though you're walking through a difficult circumstance, you can rejoice because our hope is living, it is active, it is here and it is now because jesus is our living hope. Let's pray dear heavenly father. You've given us living hope God through your son, jesus and that hope should inspire us to act. That we can love people the way that you've loved us, that we can live holy, that we can persevere that we can fight go whatever battle people in this room are facing right now, I pray that they would lean into hope. May we have this confident expectation God that you are present with us, that your spirit is here and that we can be moved by, that when we sing because you are alive and May our hope be alive and fresh and new Today we commit our lives to you jesus. It's in your son's name. We pray amen