Finding Hope - Week 1
April 5, 2009
Who Cares?
1 Peter 1:1-2

WHO CARES?

Find hope when I don’t feel important

 

Today we are starting a new three part series: Finding Hope. A lot of people are looking for hope these days. We are certainly living in challenging times. But I want you to know that hard times, difficult moments, stress at home, financial struggles, wayward kids, aging bodies, these are nothing new. Those things have been around for a while. And God’s word isn’t silent about the frustrations in life. God’s Word isn’t like some time of nice devotional book filled with inspirational saying that ignores the reality that life is hard sometimes. In fact, God’s Word is very up front about hard times.

TROUBLE

Job, one the guys who suffered the most – if you think on your worst day that you have it bad, just sit down and read about job. This guy was wealthy, he had property, big family, he was a righteous man, "the greatest man among all the people of the East" – he had it all going on and then it all turned on him. In the span of a few verses he had some messengers come to his door. One said, "Hey Job, all your oxen and donkey were grazing and an army of the Sabean attacked and carried them all away. They are all gone!" The next messengers comes up, "That not all, I was standing there watching when a fire from heaven fell down and burned up all your sheep and your servants with them." Before all that could sink in a third messengers says, "The Chaleans (another raiding people) swept down and carried away all your camels and killed all your servants and I was the only one to escape." And while he was catching his breath, a fourth guy [at this point I would have said, "don’t open your mouth, I don’t want to know!"] He gives the worst news of all – "All your kids were having a party at your sons house and a tornado hit the house and it collapsed, all are dead." In a matter of moments, everything he had was taken away from him. (v20) "At this, Job got up and tore his robe and shaved his head." He was broken, overwhelmed, hopeless.

Hard times, crisis, sudden down turns, financial failures, loosing your job –these are part of the uncertainty of life. And if you let it, it can overwhelm you. It can take you down to discouragement, it can drag you to a dark place. It can whisper in your mind "God has abandoned you, God has forsaken you, your all alone, God doesn’t care about you anymore!" When Job was there he asked a question. "Where then is my hope? Who can see any hope for me?" Job 17.15

Where do you find hope when things are taken from you? Where do you find hope when you find yourself in a dark place? Over the next few weeks we are going to looking at where to find hope. I want you to turn to I Peter chapter one.

DEFINING HOPE

Before I go any further, let me nail down something very important. Hope isn’t just wishful thinking. It’s not just say "I hope things will get better". It’s not "somewhere over the rainbow" kind of thinking. Hope isn’t a warm fuzzy concept – "We just have to have hope". No! Hope (in scripture) is a rock solid confidence in God and his promises. It is confidence that God will make a way even in dark times! Let me tell why that is important – because without God there is no hope. Man, if you are looking for hope in anything besides a real, personal relationship with Jesus Christ, you won’t find it. It will be empty. Your career, savings, government, economy, relationships –they all come up short when it comes to hope. And that is why all the way through the Bible we are told to find our hope in God. Let me show you what I mean:

Psalm 33.18-20 "God’s eyes are on you when your eyes are on him!But the eyes of the LORD are on those who fear him, on those whose hope is in his unfailing love…we wait in hope for the LORD; he is our help and our shield."

Psalm 42.5,11 (Ps 43.5) "Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God."

Isaiah 40.31 "Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint."

Micah 7.7 "But as for me, I watch in hope for the LORD, I wait for God my Savior; 
       my God will hear me."

If you haven’t gotten it yet, God is a God of hope!

THE GREAT ENCOURAGER

I want to look at I Peter because he is called the apostle of hope. He is called that for two reasons.

 

His own personal experience.

Peter understands failure, he gets feeling all alone. Peter knows what its like to be on top one minute and at the bottom the next. Peter, fisherman, came to Christ by this brother, left his fishing business to follow Jesus, Peter got a front row seat to miracles, spent every waking moment with Jesus – did some amazing things, but he also faced some of the most dismal failures. On the night Jesus was going to be arrested, Peter said "Lord I will never leave you" Jesus said before the rooster crows you will deny me three times. "No way, Jesus – that will never happen." But it did. Jesus was taken into custody, Peter got fearful – a woman asked him, "Aren’t you one of Jesus’ guys?" No –asked him again. No! -asked him again – "I tell you I don’t know him" – the he heard the rooster crow. And the Bible says that Peter ran away and hid. At that moment, he had lost hope. If there was a moment, when Peter thought "I’ll never measure up, I’ve blown it now, God can’t ever use me, I wasted my life, I’m done" It would have been then. But he was wrong. On the other side of discouragement, failure, brokenness, confusion – Peter found hope. He went on to be the one who preached in Jerusalem and 3000 were saved, Peter emerged as the leader of the apostles, Peter was the one God chose to preach the gospel to the Gentiles, Peter looms as a powerful figure for truth – all of that happened after his hopeless moment. There is nothing like someone who has been where you are to put their arms around you and say, "I know what you are feeling, I’ve been there." And if anyone can speak to feeling hopeless it’s Peter.

The second reason, why he is called the apostle of hope, is because he was writing this letter to encourage believers who were facing some hard times.

This whole book of I Peter is about hope. It’s about finding encouragement when things go bad. Most likely he wrote this book around 64 AD. That was the same year that the Roman Emperor Nero set fire to Rome and blamed the Christians. That set off an intense persecution of all Christians in Rome. And Peter writes to these churches to let the know how to stand firm.

No matter what problems you are facing. "I’m facing so much pressure at home" or "Job situation is insecure and I don’t know what’s going to happen" No matter what, whenever you hear the whispers of hopelessness choking you out, Peter can speak new hope into your life.

DO I MATTER?

Let’s read: I Peter 1.1

"Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, To God's elect, strangers in the world, scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia who have been chosen..."

Peter is addressing Christians that were scattered all over these regions. All of these provinces are in Asia Minor, modern day turkey – lie along the Mediterranean and Black Seas. Christian churches were growing in the area, and they were sure to hear about the trouble in Rome – later we know that these churches faced all kinds of terrible persecution themselves. And I’m sure they were wondering, "Why is God letting this happen to me? How can God say he loves me and let these problems come into my life?"

The first thing that happens to us when we face difficult times, uncertain times, is that we begin to question whether God really cares about us. So Peter hits it head on.

I want you to circle a few keys words:

Circle the phrase "strangers in the word" – They were strangers, foreigners, not from around here - their home wasn’t really in this world. (I Peter 1.17) When you come to Christ, you are a citizen of heaven, this world isn’t your home, you’re just traveling through –this isn’t your final destination. People won’t always accept you, embrace you, or understand you – why? Because you don’t fit in here! "Why don’t I get accepted, why am I not included, why am I not invited?" Hey – this isn’t your place. It’s easy to feel unwanted, misunderstood, pushed out. That is how you are seen from this world’s perspective.

Circle the word "chosen" – valued, selected, picked out, wanted, prized. That is how God sees you. When someone is chosen, they are wanted – they are picked out over anyone else. This is a reoccurring theme in the Bible.

Ex 19.4-6
1 Peter 2.9-11
2 Samuel 9 – all his life he had been told he was worthless, crippled, no good, waste of time, nothing to offer – he had started to believe it –telling himself – but that is not how David saw him!

You are chosen, wanted, special, selected

You are the apple of my eye

My affection is toward you

I love you with an undying love –as high as the heavens are above the earth

Nothing can separate me from the love of God in Christ Jesus

HOW CAN I KNOW THAT GOD CARES FOR ME?

I Peter 1.2 – gives us three proofs that you matter to God

Look at the Father choice of you – "…according to the foreknowledge of God the Father…"

Look at the Spirit’s work in you– conviction, opening your eyes, speaking truth, drawing you "…through the sanctifying work of the Spirit…"

Look at Jesus’ sacrifice for you – "… for obedience to Jesus Christ and sprinkling by his blood…" this is Palm Sunday, think about how much you matter to God!

GOD’S GIFTS TO THOSE HE LOVES

"Grace and peace be yours in abundance."