◄ What Does 1 Peter 1:3 Mean? ►

The God and Father of Jesus Christ is deserving of our thankful praise and eternal worship for His overflowing grace and His abundant mercy. He is FATHER with respect to Christ's divinity and He is GOD regarding the humanity of our Lord Jesus and how we bless His wonderful name. This is my Father - and this is your Father. This is my God - and your God.

Our praises stream back to the cruel cross and the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world, and our hallelujahs fly forwards to the glories set before us and our eternal home, for we are redeemed by His blood, born anew by grace through faith, and resurrected with new life in Him.

It is a great and a glorious hope. It is a certain hope and positive hope. It is a hope anchored on God's unchangeable promises and steadfast name, written by the Lord's dear disciple, Peter. Though we delight in John as the apostle of love and Paul as our chief apostle of faith, we identify Peter as our great apostle of hope.

In this chapter, Peter reminds us about our great inheritance that is being kept for us in heaven, and that this life is our one opportunity to prove our faith, as we walk by the Spirit to the praise and glory of the Father, eventually resulting in "praise, glory, and honour when Jesus Christ is revealed." And the reason we can so confidently walk by faith today is all because of Christ, our living hope: "Though you have 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, for you are receiving the end result of your faith, the salvation of your souls."

Today we are strangers in a hostile world and sojourners in a place that is passing away, but our hope is securely grounded on Christ, Who is our Chief Apostle and our Great High Priest.

Let us live upright and godly lives in this present age as we wait for that blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ, in Whom we trust.

Dear Heavenly Father, how I worship You for Your overflowing grace and abundant mercy. Thank You that through faith in the death and Resurrection of Jesus, You have brought me into Your family and set before me the living hope of heaven. In Jesus' name, AMEN.