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“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you, who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.” 1 Peter 1:3-5.
In this passage the apostle Paul glorifies God that through His great mercy, by raising Jesus Christ from the dead, He has restored us to a lively hope that will be revealed in the last days in its fullness.
All people are prone to hope
The wise man Solomon said: “For to him that is joined to all the living there is hope…” Eccl. 9:4.
The student goes to school hoping to become an able man. The tradesman opens his shop early in the morning hoping to have good business throughout the day. The sick man calls for his doctor hoping to get relief from his pain and healing from his sickness. So every man hopes.
Some prominent men, like Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, Charlemagne, Napoleon I, and others, cherished hopes for great accomplishments. They hoped to conquer the world through mighty victories. But where are those men whose fame reaches even to this day? What has become of their hopes? Their hopes have sunk into the ground, together with them, dashed in pieces.
When man thinks about the changing nature of people and their plans, he has good reason to ask: What are the hopes, what are the plans that mortal man is building?
The vain hope of the ungodly
According to the Scriptures, the hope of the ungodly is vain – all his hope goes out with his death (Proverbs 10:28; 11:7). Men who reject the promises of God and do not believe in Him who has the power to snatch them out of the kingdom of death, are to be pitied because of their hopeless state.
For those people who are holding only to this temporal life and put their trust only in the earthly, perishable goods, talks the Savior in His parable of the unreasoning rich man (Luke 12:16-21) who after his fields gave rich harvest said to himself: “Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry.” Of such a self-deceit, Jesus concluded: “So is he that layeth up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God.”
And so, those who forget about God, in reality, have no hope because, at best, they can only enjoy the fruit of their labors until the end of their lives. The hope of the child of God, however, is lively, because it reaches unto eternal life and God Himself guarantees its fulfillment.
The Bible tells us about the tempter in the Garden of Eden who inspired false hopes in the first couple. God had commanded Adam and Eve: “But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.” Gen. 2:17.
But the wicked deceiver told the woman: “And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die: For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.” Gen. 3:4-5. But the hope of those things brought a terrible disappointment. Instead of becoming like God, man turned to dust. This is confirmed by the following statement in the book of Job: “But the eyes of the wicked shall fail, and they shall not escape, and their hope shall be as the giving up of the ghost.” Job 11:20.
The lively hope of the Christian
There are people today who talk today in their unbelief, like an ancient Greek philosopher, saying: Hope is the daydreaming of man who is awake, so it is nothing more than a dream. This statement actually refers to those who reject God and the everlasting gospel. On the other hand, there is another hope that the apostle Paul calls “lively” (or “alive”). It is the bread of many poor people who have been suffering and sorrowing, whose hearts are fed every day by it.
But we have the right to ask what is such a happy and sure hope based upon. Paul answers this question in his first epistle to Timothy:
“Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the commandment of God our Saviour, and Lord Jesus Christ, which is our hope…” 1 Tim. 1:1.
He who has accepted Jesus Christ through faith and is born again through the Spirit of God has a hope that has been confirmed, and that is sure, of the fulfillment of the Holy Scriptures for him individually. And he will not be disappointed because with this living hope, with this faith, he may taste the eternal life even now, through communion with Jesus.