Living Hope in Everyday Life

I can invite you to grab your message notes as we continue with our series, Living Hope. Today, How to Live with Hope in Everyday Life. You want to live knowing that every single day matters, making the most out of every opportunity, every single day. That's going to be our focus this morning. But before we get to the everyday stuff of life, this is a little bit more extraordinary. Did you catch the story of the guy who crossed over Niagara Falls on the tightrope? Did you see this? This was amazing. Check this out on screen here. This is 33-year-old Nick Wilenda a week ago Friday making his historic crossing. Took Wilenda 30 minutes to walk 1,800 feet over the main horseshoe section of the falls, which had never been done before. And from these photos, I mean, you can see just how insignificant he is in comparison to the thundering falls. I mean, check out this white shot here. He looks like a little spider. See him down there at the bottom? Unlike like a little thin strand of web. It's just completely amazing.

But as it turns out, while Wilenda was totally on board to just put his full faith and trust in his own skill and abilities and balance, ABC, who sponsored this event, had kind of a different view. They insisted that he wear a safety tether. See that little pulley he's got behind him there? That's what the suits in legal made him do. Yeah, I mean, like, guy can't go out and risk life and limb anymore. That's just the world we live in. And it takes some of the suspense out of it. You know what I mean? I mean, don't get me wrong. It's incredible accomplishment. I mean, he showed you have the chops to do it, but his life was never really in danger. You know, his pride, his reputation might have been, but his life was totally secure, held fast by something much stronger and more reliable than Nick Wilenda, which, you know, in the final analysis is probably not the worst idea in the world.

Now, let me ask you, what's your lifeline? What's going to hold you up if the bottom falls out in your life? What's the thing or who is the person who's still there when your strength, your skill, your smarts give out because someday one or all those things are going to? Put another way, what or who are you betting the farm on? What are you betting it all on? Even if you say nothing, well, then I guess you're betting it on nothing. But of course, there's a much better option. It comes up over and over again in this little book called First Peter. And if you remember from René's message last week, Peter wrote this letter to Christians who were having really tough times. I mean, they're being persecuted, abused, they're suffering. In some cases, they are brutally killed just for being Christians. You know, what keeps them from plunging into fear and despair? Well, it's right here in First Peter, chapter 1, starting in verses 8 and 9. That's where we're going to begin today. So, crack open your Bible or grab one of those TLC Bibles and find First Peter, chapter 1. Don't be afraid to use the table of contents. It only covers a couple pages, so it's easy to miss and you're going to find it near the very end of the New Testament.

First Peter, chapter 1, starting at verse 8 this morning. And by the way, these are some of my favorite verses in the entire Bible. Please follow along as I read. You'll also see these verses in your notes and on screen as well. "Though you have not seen him," that's Jesus, "you love him. And even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls." And I love this because Peter understands that his recipients of this letter and all of us, you know, we didn't have the opportunity to walk around with Jesus when He was on earth during His ministry, okay? We didn't get to see the big miracles that He did. We didn't get to see Him after He rose from the dead and touch Him. And the overwhelming majority of Jesus' followers didn't have irrefutable eyewitness experience like Peter did. And we walk by faith, not by sight.

And that doesn't mean that we don't have very credible reasons to believe, but you might say that ours is a more everyday faith, a faith less reliant on the spectacular things that Peter saw, you know, in spades. But don't get me wrong, Jesus is just as real, just as active and alive as He was 2,000 years ago. So He says, "Though you've not seen him, you love him. And even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, and many of you can attest to this in your lives right now." And why is that? How does that happen? It happens because you're receiving the goal of your faith even now, the salvation of your souls. Do you believe that? Is that something that you can take to the bank? You know, more than your job, your retirement, more than anything else, you know in your heart that Jesus is never going to leave you nor forsake you. And even when you die, you will live with Him forever. Do you believe that, church?

Great, because Peter says over and over again, man, if you believe that, carry that hope with you every single day. Man, keep it at the fore of your mind. Allow it to inform your decisions, your priorities, your attitudes and actions. In other words, here's the big idea of this message and what I believe the kind of the big idea of this entire letter, it's this, "Live today with eternity in view." I'm going to ask you to jot that down and sear it into your brain. You want to live with a keen sense of hope every single day? Live with eternity in view. It's interesting. Yeah, Peter, you know, writes these suffering Christians and he could have said, "Wow, man, I don't know guys, I guess you're just getting a raw deal here. I mean, bummer for you. I don't know what else to tell you. Sorry, life's just so tough." But instead, instead he reminds them just how incredibly privileged and blessed they are.

You know how incredibly fortunate you are, he says? Check this out. He says in verses 10 through 12, "Concerning this salvation that you're receiving, the prophets who spoke of the grace that was to come to you searched intently and with greatest care, trying to find out the time and circumstances to which the Spirit of Christ in them was pointing when He predicted the sufferings of Christ and the glories that would follow. It was revealed to them that they were not serving themselves but you. When they spoke of the things that have now been told you by those who have preached the gospel to you by the power of, or by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven." Even angels long to look into these things. I mean, it's an incredible passage here, but it's so easy in the mundane realities of life or even during our weekly gatherings together as a church to forget just how incredibly blessed we are to know all that Jesus has done for us.

I mean, the Old Testament prophets through the inspiration of the Spirit, they were able to, you know, anticipate by faith the coming of the Messiah, but we know He's already come. We can look back at His crucifixion and His resurrection and it's even the angels. They're so interested in this. They long to look into these things to see how we have been the recipients of God's grace. And by the way, where it says that the angels long to look into these things, in the original language this was written in, that phrase has the idea of stooping down low and peering into with just intense fascination. I mean, they're just like, "Wow, this is incredible what God is doing." I mean, think about it, these angelic beings, you know, they can stare into the universe and see galaxies and nebulas, but they're like, "Check this out! Can you believe God is going to become one of those humans?" I mean, it just enthralls them what God is doing for us here on earth.

Reminds me of when I was a little boy growing up, I was just fascinated by nature. I mean, I still am, but I had a lot more time back then. So, you know, every once in a while, you know, I could be caught, I'd find like an anthill or something like that, and I would just kind of get down like this on my hunches, and I could stare at it for like hours, you know, watching. Some of you are with me on this, and you know, the ants, you know, they're going in and out of the little hole, and they're doing their little daily routines, and they all kind of pat each other down when they pass each other on their little ant trails, and it's really cool stuff, you know, you know, check it out sometime. You know, my brother and my sisters, they just thought I was weird. I mean, it's like whenever someone couldn't find me, they're like, "Where's Mark?" You know, one of them would pipe up, "He's probably out looking at some ant hill right now." You know, they remind me that to this day, and I guess it is a little bit weird.

But my point is, is that when the Son of God is born into our world, this tiny little speck in the universe, the angels peer down into this ant hill, and they sing out glory to God in the highest and on earth peace among men with whom his favor rests. It's incredible, because this living hope that we have and the salvation we're receiving right now, this is no small thing. This is like the greatest event, the greatest gift in the entire universe, because God has given himself to us in Jesus Christ. And man, we don't just enjoy Him on the weekend or during special holidays. We enjoy Him every second of every day, which means there's no real just ordinary moments, is there, when God's in it.

Now, I'm not suggesting that if you live with eternity in view, you're going to be immune to grief and sorrow and disappointment. We know far better than that. But what I am suggesting, along with Peter, is that you'll see your hardships and griefs in a completely different perspective. I can tell you from personal experience that you can be totally struck down, and at the same time supremely confident that you cannot be destroyed. Because as Christians, we're tethered to Jesus. He's our lifeline. He's our strength, our sustainer, our Savior. Do you believe that? Well then, in view of the incredible grace, blessings, and future that we have in Jesus Christ, the first thing Peter says is, "Live accordingly." Live accordingly. Salvation is so much more than just a ticket to heaven. Salvation is transformational, and that transformation includes how we view our time here on earth, our relatively brief time, I might add.

But picking up at verse 13, Peter says, "Therefore, prepare your minds for action. Be self-controlled. Set your hope fully on the grace to be given you when Jesus Christ is revealed." Peter's talking, of course, about where we choose to set our focus, and yes, we do have a choice. Now, so often I allow that choice to be made for me by someone or something. That kind of dictates my agenda, and pretty soon, you know, I'm in just full reaction mode, and then I wonder how I got so stressed out. Can you relate to that? But when we take time to prepare our minds, like you can every morning with the meditations that we put the devotionals in your notes, or when we take time to pray and read our Bible or listen to worship music, it helps us refocus, set our hope, as Peter says, on the truths that literally transform us.

And notice what Peter tells us to set our hope on. He says, "On the grace to be given you when Jesus Christ is revealed." And that's what Peter just keeps coming back to in so many words over and over, "Live today with eternity in view." Now, to be clear, living out our faith, living according to what we believe, you hear me on this, it can only be done in the power of the Holy Spirit. Because God's grace isn't just saving grace as we often think of it, it includes empowering grace. God gives us the power to live according to what we believe, but God also invites us, commands us even, to participate in what He's doing in our lives. And He's not gonna force us on you, He's gonna be persistent, but He's not gonna force you, you get to choose.

Years ago, I was talking to a friend, fellow Christian, and he was in kind of an emotional funk, not kinda, he really was. And unfortunately, he was treating, may I help you somehow? He was treating his depression and his disappointment with God and with life by smoking copious amounts of pot, which wasn't having a therapeutic effect, I might add. It was simply making him more disengaged, less motivated to really do anything. He seemed to lack any sense of personal responsibility. And I remember at one point in the conversation, he just looks at me, he says, "Hey, you know what, Mark, He's the Savior, you know, let Jesus come and save me, you know, I'm just gonna kind of sit here and wait for Him." Now on one hand, Jesus isn't thwarted by our belligerent or less than helpful attitudes, but on the other hand, I don't think that Jesus was gonna zap his stash of pot just to prove a point, you know. He had a role in the whole equation and we all have the ability to choose where we're going to set our focus.

I'll give you another illustration. I mentioned Nick Wilenda at the beginning, says in an article about him this week that he called the journey over Niagara Falls peaceful and relaxing. I don't think it would have had the same effect on me, I don't know about you. But he says that carrying the 40-pound balancing pole was far more taxing than he expected and his arms cramped up worse than ever before. But of all the obstacles that were before him, he says the steps that he took directly over the brink of the falls were the most nerve-wracking at test of true mental fortitude. He says, "Mentally, your mind goes, 'What are you doing?'" Surprising that your mind would do that when you're about to step out over the falls. Shocking. But listen to this, he says, "This is where I tell myself, 'You're on a wire.' The wire is the same whether you're over land or over water or over the moon. It's still the same, so focus on the wire and focus on the other side." And to keep that laser focus, Wilenda turned to prayer and says, "I prayed nonstop." The Bible says, "Pray without ceasing? Without ceasing? I'm always praying." I bet his wife's always praying too.

But would you agree that everyday life can be a lot like a high-wire act? You know, sometimes you feel like you are just way out over the falls and it's just kind of an abyss below you. Sometimes, often perhaps, you may as well be one inch off the ground, you know, it's just like another day. But where we set our focus and who we realize is actually keeping us on that wire, man, that makes all the difference in how we actually live our lives. Verses 14 through 16. "As obedient children, do not conform to the evil desires you had when you lived in ignorance." In other words, don't let who you were, you know, before you came to Christ dictate who you are and who you are becoming. You know, those days are past. "But just as He who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do. For it is written, 'Be holy because I am holy.'" And I hope you don't read this and think, "Well, man, I've never been holy and I never will." So, you know, why even think down that road? Well, the reality is that in Jesus Christ, in the eyes of God, you are holy right now. Spotless, blameless, pure because of Jesus.

But on a practical level, God is also in the process of making us holy because holiness is our destiny. That's the finish line. So, what Peter is getting at here in this verse and in the verses to follow is, guys, be on board with where God is going to take you. You know, kind of set your nose in that direction. Lean into it. Embrace it. Picking up at verse 17, "Since you call on a father who judges each man's work impartially, live your lives as strangers here in reverent fear. For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your forefathers." And if you get handed an empty way of life from parents or grandparents, a lot of us, a lot of people. But that's your old life. You've been redeemed out of that. A life that was purchased with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect. "He was chosen before the creation of the world but was revealed in these last days for your sake. Through him you believe in God who raised him from the dead and glorified him and so your faith and hope are in God."

Now, we don't have time to do justice to everything Peter is saying here, but I just want to point out one detail. You notice there in your notes where there's the bold type where those phrases appear in all you do, live your lives and way of life. All of those phrases come from the same word in the original Greek, the very same word. And you can obviously translate it a number of ways. It has to do with your lifestyle, your pattern of living, you know, kind of what defines the way you live. And it's a word that only appears 15 times in the entire New Testament. But Peter uses it six times in his first letter and twice in his second. So obviously this is like a big word for Peter. I mean his letters are really short, but he uses this word a lot. And why is that? Well, I'm just speculating, but maybe, maybe Peter never forgot the night that he denied Jesus three times. I mean, Jesus eagerly forgave him and Peter knew that, but maybe he would think back to that time when there was this huge disconnect between what he believed and how he lived.

And so perhaps it became a real priority, a real prayer for Peter to close the gap between his faith and his practical living. Because the more you believe in the grace and the blessings and the future that you have in Jesus Christ, the more brightly that fire burns to live your life accordingly. You know what I mean? And if that's where you are today and you're saying, "Man, Mark, that's what I want. I want to be all that God wants for me to be, all that he intends." You know, where do I begin? Well, next thing Peter says is love deeply. If you're gonna live accordingly, you gotta love deeply. And sometimes people, you know, they think that becoming more godly means you become kind of a, I don't know, religious prude or kind of uptight or something like that. But that's not what holiness is about. Holiness is about being set apart for God's purposes. And God's purposes are loving. God is not just holy. God is love.

So in verse 22 it says, "Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for each other, love one another deeply from the heart." It just kind of overflows from your heart into your life. And godly people are loving people, period. Godly people are loving people, period. John says, "Hey, don't say you love God and then you hate people." It doesn't work that way because God is love. And Peter's focus here is really on brotherly and sisterly love, love between fellow believers. And not that we're not obligated to love people outside the church, but our first obligation is to love the people who are with us in church every weekend, our fellow believers. That's our first obligation. That's what got these first Christians through the hardships that they suffered. They were being, you know, they're loving on each other. They're sacrificing for each other. They're supporting each other. And you would be amazed at the people in this church that do the very same thing.

I'm thinking of a remarkable couple. Dave and Ruth Kamber, they volunteer in our nursery every single weekend. Every weekend out of love. In fact, Adrian this week, he reminded me of this because he was talking about how Dave and Ruth have been there for their little girl Ella every weekend. It's just such a huge gift for Adrian and for his wife Jamie. And that reminded me of how they did the same thing for Laura and I. In fact, all three of our kids, they just loved on them. And a lot of times we bring them to them and they're just screaming their heads off. And Dave and Ruth are like, "Give them to us. You guys go. Get a break, man." Like it was a challenge, like win them over, you know. And they have a little, you know, strategy. They just put them in a baby carriage and they whisk them around the campus during the services. Maybe you've seen this before. That's kind of like their strategy for crying babies.

And you know, when you're a first-time parent, it's kind of nerve-wracking to hand your little one off to them. But by the time you get to the third, it's like, "Here you go. They'll never remember this, you know. Bye-bye. We're going to church." I mean, I look out these exits when the doors are open and I see one of my screaming kids going by outside the windows. So Dave and Ruth are motoring them down and they're just like, "I like the little hands sticking up." And is it wrong that in those moments I was happy that it was them and not me? That's kind of sick, huh? Oh well. You can pray for me. But you know the Canburns, they've been doing this for like 20 or more years. I don't know how long they've been doing it. A lot of you parents, you know exactly what I'm talking about. They are like major leaguers when it comes to loving others deeply. I mean, they're just heavy hitters. You know me? You know, I'm still in T-ball compared to them, okay? But it's not about comparing. It's about doing what you can to love others.

And you might hear about people like Dave and Ruth and go, "Well, I could never do what they do." And honestly, most of us aren't cut out to do what they do, but we're cut out to do something. In fact, let me suggest you one thing that all of us can do that is deeply loving. It's this. We can pray for each other. We can pray for it. Maybe you just start praying for the people that you see in your section of the auditorium every week, you know, in your pew. And we all got our pew, right? Everyone's got their spot. And so you just start praying for those people you see all the time. Or I think this would be really cool. You know, my brother came back from Africa this week with Robin and the girls, and Paul reminded the rest of his pastors just how huge it is for the missionaries to know that we are praying for them. It just lights them up because not only are we bringing their needs before the Lord, we're remembering them in the process. And these are people who have reason to feel forgotten a lot of the time.

So here's my idea. I think this would be really cool if maybe after this service, we copied off. This was this booklet was from our World Outreach Week earlier this year, and it's got all of the missionaries, kind of little bios, all the missionaries we support, what they do. It's super inspiring, and it has their prayer requests in it. Now we don't know where the rest of these are, so we've made photocopies, and you can get one at the info desk, or you can even better go to our World Outreach display right out there in the lobby and get current information, and it's got their email address on there. Wouldn't it be cool if during this coming week or two, these missionaries just got bombarded with little short emails from all of us that just said, "Hey, you know what? We love you. We appreciate what you're doing, and we're praying for it. I just want you to know that I think it would just incredibly stoke these people and could make an eternal difference in their lives. Are you on board with me on that? All right, okay, we'll see. Well, you just pick up the info afterwards and run with it.

All right, with a big idea of living today with an eternal view, and when we do that, we can't help but be overwhelmed by the love, blessings, grace, and future we have in Jesus. Peter says in response, you know, live accordingly in the power of God's Spirit, and love deeply, and finally, cling tightly. What do I mean by cling tightly? I mean it the way David does when he says in Psalm 119, "I cling to your testimonies, O Lord. Do not put me to shame." In other words, "Lord, I bet the farm on you. I don't have a plan B, God. If you're not my hope, I got no hope at all." And rather than being a statement of desperation, it's really an affirmation that there really is no true hope outside of the Lord. There's no true hope because hope that doesn't last isn't really hope after all.

So Peter writes in verses 23 through 25 about an enduring hope that we have. He says, "For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable through the living and enduring word of God. For all people are like grass." You know, we just don't have endless tomorrows. We just don't. Our lives are relatively short. "In all their glory is like the flowers of the field. The grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of the Lord endures forever." And this is the word that was preached to you. What a blessing to have that word preached to you. And I started asking you, you know, what's your lifeline? What are you clinging to? You might ask yourself, is it something that's imperishable? Something that will endure forever? Because the word of the Lord does. And central to God's word is that God became flesh in Jesus Christ and He is our living hope and Savior. And you can take that to the bank. That will endure forever because, hey, let's face it, we are all going to cling to something. We're all going to cling to something. Why not cling tightly to Jesus, the one thing you can count on?

Because let's face it, times are going to come when each one of us is going to be tested. It's going to start out just an ordinary day. And then you're going to be thrown a curve, if you haven't already, that you never saw coming. And in that moment, the thing you're clinging to is not only going to be revealed, it's going to be put to the test. In fact, it happened just like that about a week ago to a guy named Steve Saint. Many of you know who Steve Saint is. He spoke here, right here on this platform a couple years ago, incredible story. Steve Saint's dad, Nate Saint, was a missionary pilot who was killed by the people he was trying to share Christ with, the Waddani Indians in Ecuador killed him for trying to share his faith. Well, Steve was a boy at the time that he clung tightly to Jesus and so much so that he ended up adopting as his new father, the same guy who killed his dad, Nate. I mean, it's crazy. It's an amazing story of the power of Jesus to bring healing and transformation where there was enmity and violence.

Well, Steve has spent most of his adult life trying to figure out ways to bring dental and medical care and all sorts of practical assistance to people who live in the remotest parts of the earth. In fact, he even invented a couple years ago a flying car so that, you know, the outreach efforts could continue when the road stopped. In this past week, he was working on, like, his latest gadget and they have a R&D center in Texas and there was an accident and Steve was severely injured, but not one to be stopped. He and his team put together a video on how he's doing and I want you to watch this and see if you can't discern what this man is clinging to even now. Watch the screen.

My accident was a week ago. It was just a safety strap that broke and the next thing I knew people were talking around me and I saw the puppies clouds in this little window and then I saw helicopter blades going through the window and I realized I was in a medevac helicopter on my way to Shands Hospital in Gainesville near where our I-Tech R&D Center is. I can tell you I've never felt this helpless before in the pain and the fear. Here's the update. I'm scheduled for surgery tomorrow to try to relieve the pressure on my spinal cord that is keeping me from moving. I mean, actually, this is a week's worth of work and people tell me that's pretty good. I know that God has compassion on his people, whether they know they're his or not, and he wants to have relationship with them and I think that if we're going to tell the world about Jesus that we're going to have to do it in new and creative ways, that's what I've gotten to do over the last years. If God is prompting you to get out there and get involved in the fray, then please do it. If you feel like you're all thumbs, come on, join the crowd. Let's give everything. Nothing held back. You know, he only expects us to give him what we have. For some of us, that's not very much. Certain points in our life, that's enough. Thanks.

Amazing man of God's. I hope you can go to his website on screen, iTechUSA, to get updates about him. You can also get information on Facebook. I hope that you will be praying for Steve. I imagine he's already had his surgery. He's scheduled to be here this next year, beginning next year. I have no idea where this is all going to go, but I know he would appreciate our prayers. But I say this not just to inform you, but also to inspire you, because here's a guy who when he struck down is still clinging to the hope and the promise and the life that is in Jesus Christ. A life that the time, misfortune, injury, sickness, even death can never destroy. Because when you are tethered to Jesus Christ, every day matters. Every moment matters. Every day we can live and love in ways that have an eternal impact. Do you believe that Twin Lakes Church?

All right, then with that said, I want to close with this. Because when I watched that video of Steve, it reminded me of a hymn, an old hymn by Charles Wesley. And the first time I heard the words of this hymn, they just planted themselves on my heart. Now, I hope that they'll have the same impact on you this morning. It's called, "O Thou Who Camest From Above." "O Thou Who Camest From Above, the pure celestial fire to impart, Kindle a flame of sacred love upon the mean altar of my heart. There let it for Thy glory burn with inextinctual bold blaze and trembling to its source return in humble prayer and fervent praise. Jesus confirmed my heart's desire to work and speak and think for Thee, still let me guard the holy fire and stir up Thy gift in me. Ready for all Thy perfect will, my acts of faith and love repeat till death Thy endless mercy seal and make my sacrifice complete." Would you bow your heads as we pray.

Precious Heavenly Father, we thank You for Your love for us, Lord, that just burns so brightly. We just begin over the years to get a sense, Lord, of how passionate You are for each one of us, that You would give Your Son so that we could be called Your sons and daughters. And Lord, I pray for all of us here today, those, first of all, who are part of the household of faith, who call You Lord and Savior, that, Lord, You would just continue to kindle that flame of love for You and that our lives would become more and more consumed with Your purposes, with Your desires, with Your plan for each one of us. And Father, for those who are just checking out Christianity and getting a sense of what You might mean to their lives, Lord, I pray that You continue to draw them to Yourself, keep their hearts and minds interested and intrigued as You draw them closer to You, Lord. Father, we thank You for Your goodness, for Your grace, and we ask that You would confirm Your word in our hearts today. In Jesus' name, amen.