Experience the Power of Being Born Again! Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. —1 Peter 1:3
New Life
Jesus didn’t die on the cross only for our sins to be forgiven. He was crucified so that we could have a new life. Our rebirth is because of God’s choice to graciously sacrifice His Son!
The Transforming Power of the Gospel
Dr. Constantine Campbell is an ordained deacon in the Anglican Church of Australia, a New Testament scholar, a professor, an author, a musician, and a preacher. He is Associate Professor of New Testament at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, Deerfield, and lives in Illinois with his wife Bronwyn, and their three children.
To order more of New Life or any of over 100 other titles, visit odb.org/discoveryseries.
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Constantine Campbell
introduction
New Life The Transforming Power of the Gospel
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magine that at the age of twelve you learned you would inherit a billion-dollar fortune on your twenty-first birthday. You’d grow up knowing you were destined to become a billionaire. Understanding that such immense wealth awaited you would affect countless choices you’d make. No longer would you base your educational decisions on getting a degree that would generate the income you wanted. That concern would suddenly become irrelevant. You could study just to learn! And you’d study only what you were passionate about. The promise of this coming fortune would shape the way you think about all your major decisions. 1
With financial uncertainty out of the picture, you would be free to make choices based on the longings of your heart. As the apostle Peter explains in 1 Peter 1:4, God has promised us an inheritance that far outstrips a billion-dollar fortune—an inheritance that can “never perish, spoil or fade,” one that can never be spent or squandered. An inheritance that is glorious, beautiful, and eternal. If we really believe this, shouldn’t it shape our decisions? Knowing our eternal future is entirely secure, fear and anxiety-laden decision-making can be relegated to the past. Instead, we can live boldly for him. The problem is we’re not accustomed to making decisions based on eternity. We’re impatient. We’d rather settle for junk today than wait for treasure tomorrow. Rarely do we take sufficient time even to reflect on the unfading inheritance “kept in heaven” (v. 4) for us, much less let it transform our lives. If we truly wish to follow Christ, each day we need to fight our impatient, self-gratifying tendencies. And as Peter explains, it’s more than worth it. Let’s explore how Peter describes the incredible inheritance God has given us through Jesus’s resurrection. We’ll consider how Jesus gives believers not only a living hope but also an incredible, life-changing inheritance that will last forever. Most importantly, we’ll consider how this inheritance could change everything about how we live our lives. Con Campbell 2
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contents preface
Thinking about Resurrection. . . . . . . . . . . . 5 one
New Birth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 two
Living Hope through Resurrection. . . . 15 three
An Unfading Inheritance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 four
Guarded by God . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27 Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
EDITORS: Monica Brands, Tim Gustafson, J.R. Hudberg, Peggy Willison COVER IMAGE: © Shutterstock/Romolo Tavani COVER DESIGN: Stan Myers INTERIOR DESIGN: Steve Gier INTERIOR IMAGES: (p.1) © Shutterstock/Romolo Tavani; (p.5) Jeff Baxter/Our Daily Bread Ministries; (p.9) Ronny Overhate via Pixabay.com; (p.15) Vu Manh Tien via Pixabay.com; (p.21) Itsuro Dry2 via PIxabay.com; (p.27) Katinka Haslinger via FreeImages.com; (p.31) Roni Broering via FreeImages.com. All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. © 2018 Our Daily Bread Ministries, Grand Rapids, MI All rights reserved. Printed in USA
Preface
Thinking about Resurrection
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hen asked, Christians are pretty good at offering explanations of what the death of Jesus means. They might reply that Jesus died for our sins. That he died as a sacrifice. That he died in our place. Believers may know sophisticated theological terms that further explain the meaning of Jesus’s death— words like atonement, substitution, reconciliation, and 5
justification. Sure, not all Christians understand all these concepts, but many do have a grasp of the significance of Jesus’s death as the way our sin was defeated so we could be right with God. Reconciliation describes how a holy God and sinful humans are brought together through the atoning and substitutionary death of Jesus on the cross . Through his sinless life and his death for us, we are justified . Jesus’s death atoned for our sins .
Strange then that it’s sometimes hard to relay the significance of Jesus’s resurrection. We’re not quite sure how to answer questions like, If Jesus’s death made us right with God, was His resurrection necessary for that restored relationship? Or, If Jesus hadn’t risen, what about our lives today would be different? Would anything? Of course Jesus had to rise from the dead. The Bible says that if Jesus did not rise, we would still be in our sins (1 corinthians 15:17). The resurrection proves our faith is on a firm foundation. Without the resurrection, our faith would be nothing but a cruel joke (v. 19). But this reply still fails to answer the simple question why? Why was Jesus’s resurrection necessary? Why would we still be in our sins if Jesus did not rise? Didn’t He already defeat our sins on the cross? Why does the resurrection prove that 6
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Christianity is true? Why would our faith be a cruel joke if Jesus had not risen? These are the kind of questions many Christians cannot answer with confidence. We tend to We tend to have a strong theology of the cross, but a weak have a strong theology of the resurrection. theology of This is a big problem, because the cross, the New Testament says but a weak the resurrection of Jesus is theology of the supremely important. Like resurrection. the cross, the truth of the resurrection is central to our daily lives as believers. Let’s consider 1 Peter 1:3–5, which describes key reasons why Jesus’s resurrection is central to our hope. Questions 1. What role in your thinking does the resurrection of Jesus currently play? 2. What is the relationship between Jesus’ resurrection and our own resurrection? See Romans 6:4-5, 1 Thessalonians 4:14, Romans 8:11 .
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New Birth
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n the 1976 presidential race, Jimmy Carter described himself as a born-again Christian. At the time, this was not yet a widely known term, but it resonated with believers everywhere. President Carter was saying that he wasn’t just a “cultural Christian.” He didn’t merely belong to a denomination. Rather, he was claiming to be truly committed to Christ, the sort of Christian who had really experienced a spiritual rebirth. The phrase born again is common today. Many believers call themselves born-again Christians. But sometimes phrases like these become so familiar we don’t stop to think about them. We fail to ask what 9
they really mean. Let’s explore what Peter intended for us to learn. After his initial greeting (1:1–2), the apostle Peter begins his first letter with this amazing yet incredibly complex confession of praise: Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, . . . (1:3). Here Peter praises God for “his great mercy” giving believers a “new birth into a living hope.” These words— “new birth” and “living hope”—sound beautiful, but it’s not immediately clear to many of us what either phrase means, let alone their relationship to each other. What does it mean to have new birth into a living hope? First, let’s consider carefully what the phrase “new birth” likely conveys. At the most obvious level, new birth clearly suggests that one is born again. After all, every living person has already been born once. So, a new birth must refer to being born a second time. The first New Testament usage of the concept of being born again is found in the description of Jesus’s conversation with Nicodemus in John 3. Jesus tells Nicodemus that not only must he be born again but no one can enter the kingdom of God without such a rebirth (john 3:5). Nicodemus understandably struggles to understand what Jesus means, but Jesus emphasizes that this new birth is 10
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essential for life in God’s kingdom (v. 3). The concept of being born again is hinted at in the Old Testament . In Job 33, Elihu says, “Let their flesh be renewed like a child’s; let them be restored as in the days of their youth . . . that the light of life may shine on them” (VV . 25, 30) . Ezekiel 37 expands on the concept by pointing to the essential role of the Spirit in bringing life where there is no life . “I will put breath in you, and you will come to life” (V . 6) .
Grasping this idea is vital. Birth is about life; each birth is a struggle for life. So being born again must also be about life. But in this case Jesus seems to be referring to a spiritual life—that is, a quality of life more than mere physical existence. Nicodemus’s confusion was due to his assumption that Jesus was discussing physical rebirth. “‘How can someone be born when they are old?’ Nicodemus asked. ‘Surely they cannot enter a second time into their mother’s womb to be born!’” (john 3:4). Jesus clarified that he was talking about being born of the Spirit (v. 8). He was referring to life in the Spirit—that is, eternal life (vv. 15–16). We might respond, why not just call it “receiving eternal life” or something like that? Why does Jesus choose this confusing language of being “born again”? Perhaps because this metaphor is a particularly powerful one. One that is especially well suited to describe what it means to experience salvation in him. New Birth
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Consider how powerful this image is. A child’s birth is a particularly appropriate metaphor to illustrate God’s sovereign power in our salvation. Do you know of any infant who had a choice about whether or not they would be born? Do we give a child credit for its own birth? Of course not. An infant enters the world because of the decisions of its parents. The imagery of birth makes the question of whether our new life is something we can somehow take credit for ludicrous. Like an infant’s birth, our new birth is entirely due to another’s decision: our heavenly Father’s choice to graciously give us a new spiritual life. And that’s exactly how Peter describes it: “in his great mercy he has given us new birth” (1:3, emphasis added). Next, childbirth is a dramatic, intense experience. If you’ve ever given birth or even witnessed one you know what I mean. It’s obviously a uniquely traumatic experience for the mother. But it’s also hard for the father. No, really. It’s not an easy thing for fathers or others to watch their loved ones suffer, to anxiously wait to see if their child will safely enter the world. I remember vividly the birth of my first child, Jasmine. The struggle involved in the delivery was intense. My wife was in tremendous pain, and I was doing my best to comfort and assist her. The stress—a combination of anxiety and anticipation—was more than I expected. My wife had some “happy gas” to help her cope with the pain—but I wanted some too! We both 12
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just so desperately wanted that baby to be born. And then . . . finally . . . she was! But birth is most dramatic for the child being born. Imagine: you’re safe and snug in your warm sac of amniotic fluid, with food on tap and not a care in the world. It’s cozy and comfortable—if perhaps a little boring. But just when you start pondering whether there might be life beyond the womb, you find yourself being abruptly pushed out of your cozy home. Then—just like that—you’ve transitioned from one reality—one that was your entire world—to an completely new reality, one much bigger and more frightening than anything you’ve known. And this is a vivid illustration of what it means to be born again spiritually. It’s incredibly intense, every bit as life changing as your first birth. One moment you’re living in one reality, the only world you’ve ever known, the next you find yourself in an entirely new world: life in the kingdom of God. You’ve moved from spiritual death to spiritual life. I can testify to the intensity of this experience. Becoming a Christian turned my life upside down. I’d been living completely for myself, hoping for fame and glory. I loved—worshiped really—jazz music, and I aspired to be the best jazz saxophonist on the planet. Nothing and no one mattered more to me at that time. Jazz was who I was. But when I came to believe in Christ—when I was
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born again—everything changed. Suddenly, being a musician wasn’t what defined me. No longer did it determine my value or my purpose in life. I now had a higher goal—to live as a child of God, in intimate relationship with my heavenly Father. Just as unborn children have no idea what awaits them after birth, prior to my conversion I couldn’t imagine the richness and wonder I would enjoy through life in Christ. I couldn’t conceive what a joy it would be to know the God of the universe as my heavenly Father. I couldn’t comprehend the profound liberation that comes from being forgiven. I couldn’t anticipate the security I’d find through a new identity in Christ. Children not yet born cannot anticipate the wonders of life outside the womb; neither can we possibly imagine the joyous splendor of being born again until it happens to us. I certainly didn’t. I could never have imagined how life-changing it would be to know I was profoundly loved with an unconditional, everlasting love. Questions 1. Con talks about his experience of being born again as a dramatic experience that “turned my life upside down.” Take a few moments to reflect on how your life is different because you have been born again. Or if you were born again at a young age, take some moments to consider what life might have been like without Jesus. 14
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Living Hope through Resurrection
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ut new birth is just one of three ideas about salvation intricately interconnected in 1 Peter 1:3. The second key concept is that this spiritual rebirth is “into a living hope.” Again, what does this mean? Hope might seem incredibly abstract; we understand being born into the world, or in a certain city, or into a family. But into hope? The word living is the crucial clue to understanding what Peter highlights with these 15
words. He is contrasting our spiritual rebirth with our first birth. With our first birth we’re born into a wonderful world full of sights and sounds, colors and people—family, trees, music, food, sports, sunshine, rain, oceans, and mountains. It’s truly spectacular. But eventually we grow to realize that this world is also a world that is tragically scarred by suffering and death. God’s beautiful creation has been bent out of shape by humanity’s sin and rebellion against God. It’s a world where each of us experiences pain, struggle, and ultimately death. The sobering reality is that every child enters a world marked by death. Every child born into this world will also one day die. In Romans 8 the apostle Paul explains that all creation awaits redemption from sin’s curse (VV . 19–20) . He says, “The creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God” (V . 21) . But for now, “The whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time” (V . 22) .
But when we are born again, we are born into a new life that will not end with death. Though we will still go through physical death, our new life in Christ will continue (john 11:25). And though we will still know suffering and pain on earth, we also know that God is bringing us into a future that is not controlled by death and decay. It’s a future where, with all of 16
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God’s children, we will enjoy our new life with our heavenly Father forever—a life of love, joy, peace, and beauty. That is the new life, the living hope, we are born into. It’s a birth into hope that’s alive because it’s rooted in Christ’s life, a life we can experience now and forever.
Through Resurrection I love Easter Sunday. After the somber remembrance of Jesus’s death on Good Friday, on Easter Sunday we joyfully celebrate the resurrection—when Jesus defeated death once and for all. But many Christians seem more aware of what Jesus’s work on Good Friday did than they are of the full significance of Easter Sunday. This is the final crucial idea that Peter explains in 1 Peter 1:3 when he says that believers are given new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. All of what we’ve described up to now happens through Jesus’s resurrection. How? The word through points us to a central theme found throughout the New Testament, that of participation with Christ. Unfortunately, this concept, despite how crucial it is for understanding salvation, isn’t well understood. Our participation with Christ means that we are connected to him; faith is the bond that unites us
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with his Spirit (galatians 2:20). Through the Spirit, we become one with him. The New Testament explains that, through the Spirit uniting us to Christ, we’re included in certain events that Jesus experienced two thousand years ago as though we had been there too. For example, the Bible describes Christians as those who have died with and been buried with Christ (romans 6:3–4). It also The simple word describes us as made alive and through points raised up with him (ephesians 2:4–6). It even describes believers to something incredibly as seated “with him in the profound— heavenly realms” with God the Father (v. 6). participation This participation with Christ with Christ in through the Spirit means that each aspect of we share in his death. Yes, Jesus our salvation. died for us, but we also died with him. When he died, spiritually we died too: our old, natural self, the person enslaved by sin, was put to death with Christ. In the same way, Jesus’s resurrection has become our resurrection, our spiritual new life. When he was raised to life, we were also raised to life with him. 18
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Now that our old self, enslaved by sin, has died, we’re also raised with Christ as a new creation. Clearly, the simple word through points to something incredibly profound— participation with Christ in each Through Jesus’s aspect of our salvation. Through resurrection, Jesus’s death, our bondage to sin we are free. and death dies. And through his resurrection, we are raised with him to an entirely new life. The resurrection of Christ is as central to our salvation as his death. We might say that the death and resurrection of Jesus are equally essential, like two sides of a coin. We can’t have one without the other. Through Jesus’s death, our sins were dealt with as our old self in bondage to sin was put to death. And through Jesus’s resurrection, the new person we are in Christ was born, no longer ruled by sin or the finality of death. Through Jesus’s resurrection, we are free. Questions 1. Hope is one of the central elements of the Christian faith . Peter says we are born into a living hope, and Paul says that hope is one of the things that remain into the new kingdom . What does hope mean in the present and in the future? Living Hope through Resurrection
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2. Peter says that our new birth and our hope are “through the resurrection of Jesus.” What is one way in which you felt like your life was more connected to the life of Christ? 3. Hope is not wishful thinking. How does Hebrews 11 define hope and how can it make a difference in how you live now?
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An Unfading Inheritance
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hen I turned thirty-five my mother gave me a treasured family heirloom: a gold diamond ring that had belonged to my great-great-grandfather. From the Greek island where he was born, my ancestor had brought it to Australia where I was born decades later. It means a lot to me to wear his ring, a ring that’s now been handed down through five generations. I feel intimately connected to my family history through it. But when I wear my great-great-grandfather’s ring, it also reminds me of his death. And the death 21
of my great-grandfather. And grandfather. And my mother. Family heirlooms are precious reminders of our roots, but they also remind us that our lives are limited. They are passed down because this life doesn’t last forever. Aging is a harsh reality. When I was young, I was in a hurry to get older. But, seemingly out of the blue, there came a point when it all switched around, and I began desperately trying to stay as young as possible. For me, this mental switch happened in my thirties. I woke up one day and thought, How did that happen? One moment I was in my twenties, blissfully oblivious to aging, and then, suddenly in my thirties, the full reality started to hit home. So I decided to get fit. I started lifting weights and training hard in the gym. And at the end of my thirties I was in better shape than I was at the end of my twenties. But now, at age forty-one . . . I’m still getting older. My hair is rapidly going gray. My joints get stiffer and more painful than they used to. There are more lines on my face. No one mistakes me for a twenty-something anymore. Despite my best efforts to slow down the process, the reality remains that I’m aging, which means drawing closer to my own death. What does our hope as believers mean in the face of that grim reality? We’ve considered how 1 Peter 1:3 describes our salvation: that through the resurrection of Christ, we have received a new 22
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spiritual birth into a living hope. But the next verse tells us that our spiritual rebirth is not the only thing we’ve been born into. It explains that we’ve also been born into an incredible inheritance—one that, unlike my family’s heirlooms, which I will eventually pass on to the next generation, is mine forever. Just as at birth we join a family, in our spiritual rebirth we join God’s family. And, like an inheritance from our earthly families, our heavenly Father has promised an inheritance to those who join his family. The promise of an inheritance from God is a rich theme in the Bible. In the Old Testament, the inheritance that God promised to his people Israel was the land of Canaan. Moses summarized this well when we reminded God of his promises: “Remember your servants Abraham, Isaac and Israel, to whom you swore by your own self: ‘I will make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and I will give your descendants all this land I promised them, and it will be their inheritance forever’” (exodus 32:13, emphasis added). When God first made his covenant with Abram he said, “I will make you into a great nation: (GENESIS 12:2) . But he also said, “All peoples on earth will be blessed through you” (V . 3) . God chose a particular people in a particular land to bless with a promised inheritance and then extended this inheritance to all people and all of creation . An Unfading Inheritance
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Here the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (Israel) are promised the land of Canaan as an inheritance. But we also see in the Old Testament that the ability of God’s people to enjoy this inheritance was far from perfect. Their sin and rebellion against God often kept Israel from either receiving or enjoying the land. Eventually, sin caused the Israelites to lose their inheritance, when their ongoing rebellion against God led to the exile. First the northern tribes were carried off to Assyria (722 bc), and then the southern tribes to Babylon (586 bc). Exile is the loss of the inheritance. And though the Babylonian exile came to an end after seventy years, the land of Canaan was never again fully the possession of Israel. All of this is to say that the inheritance in the Old Testament—a land flowing with milk and honey (exodus 3:17)—was wonderful, but it was not perfect. It could be spoiled by sin, bent out of shape. It could be lost. But the heavenly inheritance that Peter describes as a gift for God’s people is entirely different. This inheritance is the promise of a new life in the new, fully restored creation. And it’s an inheritance that lasts forever (1 peter 1:4). • It will never perish: imperishable means that, unlike everything else in this world, it is not subject to decay. 24
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• It will never spoil: our inheritance can never be ruined, polluted, or spoiled by sin. • It will never fade: our coming inheritance will never lose its beauty and glory. It will remain magnificent and glorious for all eternity. Is it hard to grasp a future, an inheritance, like this? Here on earth, we’re all too familiar with how painfully perishable our treasures can be. Take technology for example. I like gadgets as much as the next guy; it’s fun to be dazzled by new technology and its ever-increasing capabilities. Despite the way technology tantalizingly promises to be new and exciting, it’s really only new by also being always old. The newness of technology always replaces yesterday’s newness—and quickly! When The only I bought the original model inheritance iPhone it was an amazing we can share piece of technology. But today beyond death that original model would be is the one Peter considered by most people to be a piece of junk. describes, our The only inheritance we inheritance in can share beyond death is Christ. the one Peter describes, our inheritance in Christ. It’s the An Unfading Inheritance
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only inheritance that will mean anything at all in the end. Instead of focusing on an inheritance that will at most last a few generations, wouldn’t you want to place your hopes on our eternal inheritance? Yet, oddly, most of us struggle to live this way. I truly believe that I’ve been born into an incredible, eternal inheritance. Though I don’t know the details, I know it will mean sharing the gloriously transformed creation with God. Not jewelry or trinkets from a dead relative—however meaningful they may be to us—nor an outdated piece of technology—but the entire universe for all eternity! Yet somehow I keep forgetting to focus on what God has promised to us. Can you relate? If we really believe an amazing inheritance is coming to us, why do we keep forgetting about it? Why do we revert to living for the treasures of this world? Questions 1. How can knowing that we have an inheritance in the future, change our present? 2. What part of your inheritance do you wish you could have more of now?
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Guarded by God
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wonder if part of why we forget to focus on our eternal inheritance is our own doubt and anxiety, our struggle to truly believe it’s real—for us at least. When I send a gift to someone in the mail, I sometimes get anxious about whether it will arrive safely, especially if it’s a precious gift. What if it gets lost in the mail? What if someone opens the package and steals the gift? What if it breaks before they receive it? 27
Does a similar anxiety nag you about your future heavenly inheritance? We’ve been considering how God has promised believers an unfading, eternal inheritance (1 peter 1:4). But could something happen to prevent us from receiving this gift? What if we don’t “make it” to heaven? What if we’re not found worthy of it? If these fears haunt you, don’t despair. Perhaps anticipating just such anxieties, Peter describes Not only is even more good news for there a rich believers. Not only is there a rich inheritance inheritance being kept for being kept for believers, we are being kept for believers, we heaven (v. 5). are being kept Peter explains that through faith believers are “shielded by for heaven. God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time” (v. 5). Pointing to a future day when we’ll finally fully enjoy our eternal inheritance, Peter assures them that, in the meantime, we are not abandoned. Until that day, we are “shielded by God’s power.” There are many reasons we could live in fear. Life in this broken world is dangerous. Temptations can easily trap us, leaving us with severe consequences. 28
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There is evil that wounds our hearts. The evil one intends us harm. We need God’s protection. And that is exactly what we are promised here. The word translated shielded means to protect or guard. It was used in military contexts to refer to how soldiers stood guard over a village at night. It was expected that such guards would give their lives in order to protect the people. So when Peter uses this word to describe God’s protection of us, this is not a light promise. This word assures us that God is willing to go to the greatest extremes to protect those under his care, his children. And as the death of Christ reveals, he was even willing to die to save and protect us from evil and secure our eternal salvation. Our future inheritance is not just a possibility that God has stored in heaven but that could be lost. It’s one God keeps for us, and one God guards us for. Like our salvation, our future joy does not depend on us. The One who died for our salvation and rose for our new life also guarantees this inheritance—a future with him on the coming day of salvation. It’s not going to get lost in the mail, and neither are we. Questions 1. God is shielding our inheritance. Where else in Scripture is God pictured as defending and protecting?
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2. What are some ways that knowing our inheritance is secure could impact our view of the events that come our way? 3. These verses from 1 Peter are confidence instilling. How do you overcome any doubts or fears that may arise?
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Conclusion
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irst Peter 1:3–5 describes a treasure trove of God’s abundant grace and mercy to believers through our participation in Christ: not only a dramatic rebirth from spiritual death to life, but an inheritance we can enjoy eternally with him. How do we respond to such grace? The most appropriate response is found in 1 Peter 1:3: “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ!” As simple as it seems, Peter is offering the most appropriate response to God’s grace—praise. Praise for God’s goodness, mercy, and great love. Praise for 31
our new birth. Praise for our heavenly inheritance. And praise for God’s protection until that final day of salvation. But is praise really enough of a response? In reality, praise is exactly the response God wants from us. It’s the only appropriate way to respond. Our voices and, in fact, our whole lives, are meant to be an offering of praise to God (romans 12:1). Maybe the concept of praise doesn’t always feel very practical here on planet Earth, but, clearly, it means a lot in heaven. And if we will spend all eternity praising God, it seems only appropriate that we start now! God asks for our praise, not because he’s desperate for affirmation (like we often are), but because he delights in us knowing him. We cannot repay God or offer any gift comparable back to him. But each day we can choose to live with profound gratitude and joy for all God has done for us, for our new life with him. And our joy and praise will put a smile on the face of our heavenly Father. Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. In his great mercy he has given us new birth.
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