Hi, my name is George Sinclair. I'm the lead pastor of Church of the Messiah. It is wonderful
that you would like to check out some of the sermons done by Church of the Messiah, either
by myself or some of the others. Listen, just a couple of things. First of all, would you pray
for us that we will open God's Word well to His glory and for the good of people like yourself?
The second thing is, if you aren't connected to a church and if you are a Christian, we really,
I would really like to encourage you to find a good local church where they believe the Bible,
they preach the gospel, and if you have some trouble finding that, send us an email. We will
do what we can to help connect you with a good local church wherever you are. And if you're a
non-Christian checking us out, we're really, really, really glad you're doing that. Don't
hesitate to send us questions. It helps me, actually, to know, as I'm preaching, how to
deal with the types of things that you're really struggling with. So God bless.
Let's just bow our heads in prayer. Father, you know how starved human beings are for meaning
and how starved human beings are for hope. And you know, Father, the sorrows of our hearts as well as
the joys. And you know our fears of death and you know, Father, just our struggles to navigate things
like hope and meaning in our world and in our lives. We thank you so much, Father, for your Word that you
have spoken to us and the Holy Spirit that brings your Word home to us. We ask that your Holy Spirit would
help us to know Jesus better in who he is and what he's accomplished and what he's doing in our lives,
that we might have a living hope, that we might know there is a meaning to our lives. And we ask
these things in Jesus' name, your Son and our Savior. Amen. Please be seated.
I think, hopefully, Claire, I think, has been able to find this. You can put up that picture now of the
book. Yeah, there we go. I was listening to an hour-long interview, a 67-minute-long interview just
the other day. And it was an interview with this fellow here by the name of Ming Wang. And the interview
was about partly because there's a movie based on his life, which is coming out sometime in May.
But it was a very fascinating story. I was quite mesmerized by listening to the interviewer.
He grew up in China, and when he was just about to enter into school, the cultural revolution happened
in China. And that's something which has been largely forgotten by most people in North America.
But basically, from 66 to 76, an absolutely terrible experiment was played upon the population
of China, where the children of the educated people were taken from them and basically condemned
to 10 years of no education, thrown out into the rural areas. And many people died of a very
terrible thing. And he was just coming into school when this was happening. I think it happened
when he was maybe just... Anyway, it's a story of his life, how he made it through all of that,
the poverty, even though his parents were doctors, the great poverty that he grew up in.
Very interesting thing about just the love of his parents for him. And through a series of
circumstances, he comes to the United States with $50 in his pocket, but he's received a scholarship.
He's a very, very bright student. And he ends up doing a PhD in physics at MIT,
at the same time as doing his becoming a surgeon through Harvard. So he's a double doctorate,
a PhD in physics, and a surgeon. And he graduates magna cum laude in both places. Very hardworking,
studious person. And the reason I'm telling you all of this is that he, of course, grows up in a
completely atheistic educational system. He has atheist parents and family. He doesn't know anybody who's
Christian. And the only thing that he heard other than atheism was he would hear a little bit, of
course, of Confucian type of wisdom and a little bit of awareness of the outside world, but a
completely atheist system of thought. And as we all know, Harvard and MIT are hotbeds of Christian
fundamentalism. And so he goes to Harvard and MIT to study. And he becomes fascinated with the eye.
And one of the things he says, I didn't know this, half of the neurons in your brain are connected to
you being able to see. And the more he studies the eye, everything about it, the intricacy of it,
all of the different biological systems and the feedback loops and how it's connected to the brain,
the more and more he looked at it, he just couldn't believe that anything so complicated could
actually work all the time and how it could actually develop and come to be. And at first he had these
just like massive questions. The more he studied the eye, the more just not unbelievable it is,
because obviously it exists, but just like mind-blowing it was in terms of its complexity
and all of the systems. And he starts to ask his professors, how on earth could this be? It's just
so unbelievably complex. It's just mind-blowing. And finally, one of the professors overheard that
he'd been asking these other professors all about that. And he said to him one day, you and I should
go for lunch. So they go for lunch. They sit down at a restaurant by the window. And after they've had
their pleasantries, the doctor who invites Ming out for lunch says to him, you see that car over there?
And Ming says, yeah. He said, the doctor says to Ming, what's the difference between the eye and that
car? And Ming mentions a couple of things, but at the end he says, actually the most important
difference between the eye and the car is the eye is vastly, incomparably more complex than a car.
Car's very, very simple. The eye isn't simple. And then the doctor says to him, what would you say
if I told you that that car developed just by chance, just by explosions and the blowing of the
wind and earthquakes? And as soon as he said that, there was a break in the dam in his mind.
He realized that atheism was wrong.
And that what he'd been taught in terms of the overall view just couldn't possibly be true.
It just could not possibly be true that something like the eye, if he couldn't believe that something
like the car could happen by chance, it was completely implausible and impossible that the eye
happened by chance. And that led him on a search that culminated. And actually it's very interesting.
One of the things that led him to Christianity was its openness to evidence because he was a scientist,
scientist, science-driven, experimental and evidence-driven. And Christianity is open to evidence,
especially around things like the resurrection, to which he ended up coming to the conclusion had to
actually happen. He becomes a Christian. And the rest of it is about his work helping people be able to see.
Now, I mention all of this because the Bible text today talks about two things which nobody in Canada
are interested in are basically hope and meaning, being facetious. We don't live in a time that hope
is characterized as I think most Canadians. And we don't live in a time when meaning is something
which really, I mean, people obviously are always seeking hope and meaning. But we live in a bit of a
time where there's a meaning crisis, and in many ways, a hope crisis as well. In fact, surveys regularly show
that Canadians have less hope for the future than previous generations. And that gets even worse
as you become younger. The text we're going to look at today speaks directly to these two questions.
So let's look at it. It's 1 Peter chapter 1, verses 3 to 12. 1 Peter chapter 1, verses 3 to 12.
Okay, a little time out. All you grammar geeks, there's a really interesting grammar geek thing
right here. Verses 3 to 12 in the original language is one sentence. That's pretty cool.
No editor will allow something like that now. I know some of you have to do writing. I think some of you
have to do legal opinions. I don't think even lawyers would allow you to write a sentence which
is so long with so many clauses. And here's the other grammar geek moment. Sorry. Then we'll go
back to the thing for the rest of you non-grammar geeks that you're going to find interesting.
The other really interesting grammar geek thing is the very first phrase which we're going to read
is the governing phrase of the whole sentence. So all of the other clauses are actually just
adorning this fundamental first phrase. There you go. We'll get out of grammar geek moment into the
text. And here's how it begins. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
That's a wonderful way to begin a sentence. And everything else in the entire sentence is going
to just try to unpack that, help us to understand its implied verb. It's calling us to bless God,
the Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ. And blessing is like a type of, an even type of higher praise.
It implies that we're willing to humble ourselves, to get on our knees, to bow to him, to acknowledge
his greatness, his glory, his beauty, his love, his justice, the things he has done, all of the
excellencies in and of himself. And it's a call for us to do that. And it's a very, very powerful thing.
Now, the next thing that it goes into is something that I talk about a fair lot. And I know that when
I talk sometimes to non-Christians about it, their eyes sort of glaze over. It sounds a little bit
like trying to get into a bit of an argument about, you know, something in history or something like
that. It seems a little bit abstract. But for Paul, when he's writing this, this is not abstract.
This is life and death. This letter that we're reading, you know, it looks all fancy in a book like
this. And at one time, this, you know, this, who has, other than Bibles, who has pages like this,
right? And there was some gold type stuff on the edge. It looks very fancy. But this was just
originally written probably around the year 62. It was, it would have been on some type of parchment
or scroll. And Paul, Peter would have wrote it or had somebody else read it. I mean, if I was going
to write something that had to go circulate to a lot of people, I'd want somebody with neater
handwriting than mine, actually doing the writing so that people could actually read it. And it was
a circular letter sent to a variety of churches. And it's written in 62. And so listen how he begins.
So verse three begins, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. And here's the thing
where that which a lot of us, a lot of Canadians just think is like sort of nitpicking and abstract,
doesn't matter. Peter tries it directly to meaning and hope. Look what he does. According
to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection
of Jesus Christ from the dead. We're going to pause there. Look at that. According to his great mercy,
he has caused us, God has caused us who are Christians to be born again. God caused that.
And when he causes us to be born again, he's also giving us a living hope through the resurrection
of Jesus Christ from the dead. Now, you know, as I said, a lot of Canadians think that's a bit
like nitpicky or like it's just history or this is for Peter within a couple of years of writing this,
Peter will die a torturous death in Rome under the emperor Nero. And he's going to die this
torturous death within a couple of years of writing this. And he could have spared that entire death
if he had just said to Nero and to others, actually, we made it up.
He didn't rise from the dead. And if Peter had just said that, we just made it up.
He didn't rise from the dead. He would have been spared a torturous death in public.
But he didn't recant. You know, when we watch the unfolding, ongoing tragedy in, and I'm just
partly using this, the thing of Hamas and Gaza, because it's so much in the news. And one of the
things I feel when I say things like this, I know there's lots of other very, very terrible conflicts
going on in the world that don't get the same coverage. Part of the reason that the coverage
in Hamas gets so much coverage is that one, first of all, there's a lot of anti-Semitism in our
country. And the other thing is, I've been to Tel Aviv. And I've been to lots of parts of the only
parts of the third world that I've been to are Africa. If you want to cover a news thing, you'd way
rather be in Tel Aviv than a lot of other places. Reporters don't mind going to Tel Aviv. Tel Aviv
is a spectacular, wonderful, vibrant city right on the Mediterranean with wonderful beaches,
great food, and culture. It's one of the reasons it gets covered so much compared to the ongoing
problems in Iraq and Syria and Sudan and Ethiopia and a whole lot of other places. But here's the point.
I mean, obviously, one of the problems with Hamas is they'd much rather have innocent civilians die
rather than themselves. But they are willing to die for their cause. But what Peter does is not at all
the same of what Hamas is doing. Peter dies for a fact. I mean, on one level, of course, he's dying
for a cause, but he dies for a fact. If he merely was to say, no, the resurrection didn't happen,
he would have been spared. But he doesn't deny it. He'll go to his death affirming that the grave was
empty. And they saw Jesus alive. And he really did rise from the dead. And Peter will go to the
grave maintaining that. This would have been one of the many pieces of evidence that a doctor like Ming
Wang would have taken as being so remarkable about the Christian faith that it would hang on something
which is open to evidence like this. It's really quite remarkable and absolutely unique amongst the
religions of the world and the spiritualities of the world, this openness to evidence and this concern
for the truth. And if we were to say, well, you know, surely if Jesus rose from the dead, there'd be
some type of evidence like maybe letters. Duh. And on and on and on and on. All written by people who said,
we saw him. The grave is empty. We saw him. Now, if you could put up the first point, Claire, that would be
very helpful because it's, I mean, the resurrection is going to be important in everything that follows. But here's my
first point. Only in Jesus can you have true living hope. Only in Jesus can you have true living hope.
You have, another way to put it would be, you have true living hope in the person of Jesus. Now, hope and
meaning are very, very puzzling things. Canadians don't think about it enough, the average Canadian,
because on one hand, we desperately need hope. We desperately need hope. And when people lose hope,
they want to die. It's connected to depression. It's connected to suicide. It's connected to
alcoholism. It's connected to affairs, to gambling, to going into debt, to risky behavior, to cutting
yourself. On and on and on. When people lose hope, all sorts of bad things happen. But, you know, from a
secular Canadian point of view, hope makes no sense. It is not something that helps you in terms of
evolution. And anybody who studies it knows that's the case. Human beings have only been around for
a very short period of time. What's the most successful creature on the planet that's been
around the longest? The jellyfish, according to evolutionists, have been around 700 million years.
Does a jellyfish concern itself with hope? No. They are vastly more able to survive. And you just go on
and on and on and on. How long have crocodiles been around? 95 million years. Do crocodiles struggle
with issues of hope? No. Do they need hope to survive? No. Hope would add nothing.
Well, jellyfish and crocs aren't particularly very social. Ants, little tiny ants. Well, they first
appeared, according to evolutionists, 90 million years ago. Around 50 million years ago, they really
multiplied and spread. So they've been around 50 million years. And ants are social or communal
types of insects. And no ant thinks about hope. Why does hope even exist as a category? See, that's
part of the whole thing about why this, you see, part of what's so beautiful about the Christian faith
is that there's a deep coherence and beauty to it. A deep coherence and beauty to it.
That, and part of what's connected to hope is not just a deep coherence and beauty, but an overarching
story that makes sense of human life and human history and human desires and human yearnings.
And we can understand that we're not just a result of blind chance in evolution, but there is a God,
the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Three persons, one God. And that God created all things
that exist. And he created human beings in his own image. And part of how he created human beings,
God himself is outside of time, but he created us to be in time. And one of the aspects of us as human
beings is that he built us to hope.
To think of the future and to think of the end and to hope.
I mean, you know, in a sense, because when he created all things, there was no sin and was no death.
You plant seeds in the garden, you hope.
You know, you're raising chickens, you hope.
It's built into us, it's hardwired into us.
Like, to my secular Canadian friends, it's explained to me hope.
Why it is so desperately needed, and how it makes absolutely no sense whatsoever from the governing myth
of Canadian society and culture.
We need hope.
And the other thing about it is that not only do we need hope, but we, if we only have hope in this world,
it's not enough.
Now, I have a counseling degree.
I know, and every time I say this, people wonder, why am I not nicer?
But that's a whole other separate topic of conversation.
But I actually have a master's degree in counseling.
And I don't know what they, you know, it was just after fire was invented and the wheel was invented
that I took my training to be a counselor.
So I don't know what they do nowadays where people are more hip and, you know, all that.
You know, they're way smarter because TikTok's been invented and Instagram and Facebook.
So I don't know what they teach now.
But one of the things that was drummed into us all the time when you're in a counseling situation is there's three,
there are four words you never say in a counseling situation.
Things will get better.
Never say it.
Because things will get better.
They get diagnosed with Lou Gehrig's disease a week later.
Their wife leaves them later.
They get fired.
They discover they have cancer.
You don't know what's going to happen to them in three.
You don't know what's going to happen to them.
You can't say things will get better.
You're going to feel that because people go into counseling.
Well, a lot of people go into counseling because they're massively screwed up.
You can figure out whether how much of that was why I got a degree in it.
Once again, that's something for you guys to discuss when I'm not around over coffee.
But I know some of the things you'll say, I probably have to say I resemble that comment.
Not resent, but I resemble it.
But mostly people go into it because, of course, they're compassionate people.
They want to help.
They want to make a difference.
And so it's very human desire to give that type of comfort because people need hope.
But we can't say it.
Now, I won't go into what you do try to say in counseling, and I've forgotten a lot of it.
But, you see, the point is that that comment shows that what we desperately need is a hope that's both relevant to our day-to-day life,
but is greater than life, that in a sense is outside of this order.
And only the gospel provides that.
Listen again to the scripture sentence.
Verse 3.
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.
Why is the resurrection so important?
Christianity hangs on it.
If the resurrection is true, Christianity is true.
And why is the resurrection so important?
It means that it's something connected to our day-to-day life.
Jesus lived a normal human life.
He had to work.
He had to eat.
He had to clip his toenails.
He had to cut his hair.
He had to learn how to deal with business customers before he went into his three years of ministry.
He had to suffer with trials and temptations.
And he lives a life that you and I should have lived but aren't able to live.
He lives a sinless life.
He dies the death you and I deserve.
He conquers that which causes death, which is sin.
He conquers death.
I mean, he pays for the sin.
He conquers death.
He's resurrected.
He cannot die again.
He's on the far side of it.
And when we put our faith and trust in him, we are entering into Christ who is on the far side of death.
And so we are embracing and receiving a hope that is both understanding of life, relevant to life, but is beyond death.
I didn't do very much racing.
But when I was younger, I did a few races.
And one of the things you learn in a race is you don't shoot for the finish line.
You shoot for 10 yards past the finish line.
Because if you shoot for the finish line, unconsciously you'll start to slow down at the end and then somebody will pass you.
You shoot for whatever.
There's 10 yards, 15 yards, whatever.
You shoot from beyond it as if that's the real finish line.
And you keep going so you finish well.
And that's exactly what Christ offers us in the Christian faith.
Now, there's another thing which goes on here, which is just as a bit of an aside.
You know, and this is, we every week we set this up to be able to help people who aren't able to come to church to be able to worship with us.
And we're going to continue doing this into the future.
And there are shut-ins and all, and there are people who are distant.
And you're not able to come to church.
And we understand.
We also understand that there are people who watch this because they're trying to figure out the Christian faith a little bit.
And they're trying to figure out what's going on.
I just want to say to some of you who maybe don't fit into those two categories, you really need to do worship face-to-face.
Like, it's not just about Jesus giving you hope in the future.
It is that.
But one of the means that he gives you for grace, because, you see, one of the things we need to do is we need to be reminded about this because we forget about it.
We need to pledge our allegiance to Christ together.
And it's not just that when we're dealing with these things of suffering and all, which I'm going to talk about again in a moment,
that one of the things which is so precious about the Christian faith is that his presence is with you when you're dealing with trials and suffering,
and his power is with you.
But it's not just his presence and his power.
It's also his people.
He's given you his people.
And you need to be face-to-face.
I just want to encourage you.
Yes, it's inconvenient.
It's way easier to watch a service in your pajamas and at your convenience.
And I'm not, we're not going to stop doing this.
I just really want to encourage you.
Face-to-face worship is so important to hope and meaning and living the Christian life.
I just want to encourage you.
That's all.
Anyway, let's get back to the text.
I have to watch my time.
There's a few more things.
We'll be a bit quicker going through the rest of the text.
One of the things which is so neat about the Christian faith, well, here, let's see where this next bit goes.
Just as I said, you need to be part of a face-to-faceness, and not just face-to-face on Sunday morning,
but the women's ministry led by Lisa and others, and we're hoping that as early as July,
but if not, it looks like we have a person to lead a men's ministry as of September,
and there's a youth group which is going on, and there's small groups, and there's friendships,
and there's all of those types of community things which are all very, very desperately needed,
but the Lord knows that we get discouraged.
And so listen to what he says next to help us in our discouragement.
Verse 4 and 5, right?
So he's talking, he's giving a resurrection from the dead, verse 4,
to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you,
who by God's power are being guarded through faith for his salvation,
ready to be revealed in the last time.
If you could put up the next point, that would be great, Claire.
Only in Jesus does God pledge to keep you and your inheritance until the end and beyond.
That's the powerful thing here.
You see, this is one of the things that's wonderful about the Christian faith.
It's not just, in a sense, putting my faith in Christ,
and then I'm born again, and I'm going to live forever in heaven.
What you're really entering into, the Bible constantly says
that what you're entering into is a covenant, a new covenant.
You're entering into God's kingdom,
and that kingdom begins in tiny little seed form,
and with all sorts of imperfections on this side of the grave,
and will be consummated in the new heaven and the new earth.
And so, in a sense, if you were to go into a covenant,
it's a little bit like marriage.
The whole Christian understanding of marriage is that marriage is a type of covenant.
And so, if you go to a marriage ceremony, a Christian marriage ceremony,
the husband and the wife, they make pledges to each other.
They make promises to each other.
And then they seal that with the joining of hands, with a ring, etc., etc.
And it's the same type of model in terms of when you come to put your faith and trust in Christ.
You come to Jesus and say,
Jesus, I need hope in my life.
I need meaning in my life.
There's an emptiness in my life.
I've done wrong, and I can't fix myself.
And I've come to believe that you really did.
You really are the Savior.
You really have risen from the dead.
And you hear me when I speak to you.
And I'm coming to you.
I give myself to you.
That's the pledge.
I give myself to you.
And I'm so thankful that you will take me.
And when it's not just that Jesus takes you,
it's also God the Father and the Holy Spirit.
And when God takes you,
he makes a pledge to you.
He pledges to you.
I have an inheritance for you.
And I pledge that I will keep that inheritance for you.
And I pledge to you,
weak Christian,
I pledge to you
that I will keep you
until you receive that inheritance.
That's what's being said here in the text.
I pledge to you, God the Father says.
Your grip is weak.
Your grip will let go.
Your eyes will be distracted.
You will have limp knees.
You will have times of great selfishness.
And you will have times of great pain
where it's hard for you to believe that I even exist.
But my eyes will never leave you.
My hand will never let go of you.
I will always hold you in the hollow of my hand.
I, the one who have brought you to faith in Christ,
I will keep you.
And I will keep you for a future or an end
that will not ever perish,
not ever fade,
not ever,
what's the other word that he uses here,
that will not ever be defiled.
That's his pledge to us
when we put our faith and trust in him.
Now, you can't have,
if there's no hope in life,
there is no meaning.
And if there is no meaning in life,
there can be no hope.
And in Canada,
and for many people,
it's very hard to believe
there can be meaning or hope
when death is the final word about us.
Or where there is suffering
or there is pain.
And the Bible directly tackles that.
In fact, one of the things,
this is just opening it up,
I'm not going to say very much about it right now,
because a good part of chapter 3 and chapter 4
are all going to be about the topic of suffering.
It's going to be one of the main things
that we're going to talk about
in the book of 1 Peter over the coming weeks.
But look at how the Bible anticipates
this human concern with discouragement,
which he's already starting to address
about his pledge to you,
that he will keep you
and he will keep your inheritance.
But look at this, verse 6.
So in this you rejoice,
right,
the fact that you have an inheritance and all,
that God is keeping you.
But listen,
though,
in this you rejoice,
though,
though now for a little while,
if necessary,
you have been grieved
by various trials.
Trials means hard times.
Hard times.
Maybe it's a hard time of depression
that leads you to cutting yourself.
Maybe it's a hard time
that leads you to drinking.
Maybe it's a hard time
that just leads you to despair.
Hard time that means
you just want to spend all your time in bed.
But hard times.
Just read that again.
If necessary,
you have been grieved
by various trials.
But listen to that word,
so.
So that the tested genuineness
of your faith,
more precious than gold
that perishes
though it is tested by fire,
may be found to result
in praise and glory and honor
at the revelation of Jesus Christ.
That's the second coming
or when you see him face to face
at your moment of death.
Though you have not seen him,
you love him.
Though you do not now see him,
you believe in him
and rejoice with joy
that is inexpressible
and filled with glory,
obtaining the outcome
of your faith,
the salvation of your soul.
Now there's
that word rejoice
and all that.
It's one of those
double meaning words
in the original language
which English can't happen
so you have to choose
one or the other.
But it's in a sense
speaking to two groups
in the room right now.
Back when I was in Eganville,
there were two elderly ladies
that I had to go and visit.
One elderly lady
had been brought up
very well off.
I mean, I don't know,
if she was still alive now,
she'd be in her early hundreds,
maybe 110.
She went to university
when that was very rare for women,
grew up with money,
was very, very well trained,
had two daughters
who loved her
and paid lots of attention to her,
had grandkids,
lived in a really beautiful house,
had house help
and housekeeper
and all of her needs
were being met
and every time I visited her,
all she did was complain.
It was the most depressing visit.
She'd complain
because she couldn't play the piano
the way she used to.
She'd complain about the fact
that the person
who her daughters were paying
to look after her
didn't clean the counter
the right way.
She would just complain
and complain and complain.
At the same time,
I was visiting another woman
who was at the end of her life
who grew up
and continued to be dirt poor.
She had a physical handicap.
She had never been married.
She had no children
or grandchildren.
She was on welfare.
And her smile lit up the room.
Her smile lit up the room.
Now, this thing of rejoice
is speaking to two groups
of people who can be in this room.
And I can think of many people
that I've known over the years
who've suffered very, very trying things
but somehow have a joy
in the midst of it.
And this sense of rejoice
in the Greek,
it's one of the things,
one of the reasons I think
God chose to reveal
the New Testament in Greek
is that it often has
this double meaning
so he can speak to two audiences
at the same time.
And for those of us
who are living that right now,
you're going through
a very hard time
but somehow there's a sense of joy.
The Bible's speaking to you.
And for those of us
who are going through
a very hard time
but we don't,
it's speaking to you
to turn to him.
Choose joy.
Choose to be like that poor woman,
not like the complaining woman
because often joy is a choice.
At least a part,
it begins with a choice.
But here's the thing
about the whole sentence.
If you could put up the point,
Claire, that would be helpful.
Only in Jesus
does your suffering
have meaning and purpose.
That's the whole thing.
You go back
and you look at the verse again.
There's a sense that,
there's an acknowledgement
that on this side of the grave,
and I'm going to talk a little bit
in the next coming weeks,
I wasn't going to do it now,
I saw that I'm going to have
about two or three sermons
later on about it
so I'm just planning an idea here.
One of these fundamental ideas
is that contrary
to what Canadians expect,
just as we understand
at an intuitive level
if there's no meaning,
there can't be any hope.
And if there's no hope,
there can't be meaning.
But if there is hope,
there must be meaning.
And if there is meaning,
there must be hope.
And the Bible says
there's both
and it comes to you.
It's created into you
by God
that you desire these things
as human beings.
And as a result
of your fall
and rebellion against God,
it's something now
which is fractured within you,
which is lost
within your power,
but you still have a sense
that drives you
that you need it.
And the gospel
is the answer
to the longings
and the yearnings
and the brokenness
of your heart
to say that God
has come
in the person of his son
to restore to you
hope and meaning,
a hope and a meaning
even in the presence
and the face
of very, very,
very hard times.
One of the things
that's going to be
so powerful about this,
he's going to be talking
later on
to women
who become Christians
and women in that status
have next to no society
and those of them
who have pagan husbands
and how do they have meaning
and have hope?
He's talking to a society,
you know,
in the time of Roman society,
one third of the entire empire
were slaves
and many of the people
that he's writing to
are slaves.
How do you have hope
and see meaning
when you're a slave?
And he's going to say
there is meaning
and there is hope.
And you can go looking for it
and pray
and pour out your heart to God
to know that you're looking
for something which is there.
And this comes up
to the very final point
as I close up.
You know,
it's really interesting
that he acknowledges
the fact
that many of the people
he's writing the letter to
have never seen Jesus
yet they believe in him
and trust in him.
Why on earth is that?
Why can that be?
Well,
that's because God's
not just purely
in the business
of revealing facts to us.
He wants to save us.
And look at this
very, very powerful thing.
I'll then explain
what it means.
Verses 10 through 12.
Concerning this salvation,
the prophets who prophesied
about the grace
that was to be yours
searched and inquired carefully,
inquiring what person or time,
now listen to this,
what person or time
the Spirit of Christ
in them was indicating
when he,
that is the Spirit of Christ,
predicted the sufferings of Christ
and the subsequent glories.
One of the things
which is going to be
so important and precious
in dealing with suffering
is to understand
that Christ suffered.
Just as one of the things
which is so important
to understanding
the meaning of suffering
is to understand
that Jesus defeated death
and sin on the cross
and in his resurrection.
But notice it's the Spirit.
When we read the Old Testament,
it was the Spirit
who caused the Old Testament
to be written.
And then look at verse 12.
It was revealed to them,
that's the Old Testament writers,
that they were serving
not themselves,
but you.
And this you is speaking
to you guys too,
to me,
in the things
that have now been announced
to you through those
who preach the good news
to you by the Holy Spirit
sent from heaven,
things into which,
beautiful phrase,
things into which
angels long to look.
If you could put up
the final point,
Claire,
that would be wonderful.
The same Holy Spirit
that inspired the Old Testament
is the same Holy Spirit
that inspired the New Testament
is the same Holy Spirit
that brought you
to saving faith
in the Lord Jesus Christ
when you heard
the one and only
biblical gospel.
One Holy Spirit,
seamless.
One of my favorite hymns
is Great is Thy Faithfulness.
And I,
earlier on in the service,
I urged people
to consider
how important it is
to have face-to-face worship.
One of the lines
I love in that hymn
is,
Thine own dear presence
to cheer and to guide.
I was talking
to a sports psychologist
a couple of months ago,
and one of the things
which are interesting
about sports psychologists
is unlike all other psychology
that basically deals
with problems,
sports psychologists
deal with how to get better,
how to succeed.
And anyway,
one of the things
I was talking to her about
is I said,
you know,
I said,
you know,
what you're doing
is really,
really important,
and there's lots of things
that, you know,
I can learn
and others can learn from it.
I said,
but you know,
one of the things
is that having
a really,
really good attitude
and believing
all of these positive things
doesn't stop bad things
from happening to you.
So we can understand
that there's meaning
and there's hope,
and it doesn't mean
that those bad things
aren't going to happen to you,
but here's the thing.
Think about those two women
that I was describing
that I was visiting with
back when I was
in my previous parish.
It's way easier
to deal with hard things
if you have a sense
that there's meaning
and hope
than dealing with hard things
if all you are
is grumpy and selfish
and you think
there's no hope.
And it's not only
that it's easier
to deal with hard things,
the Bible says
you're not dealing
with these hard things
by yourself.
The Holy Spirit
is present with you.
You do not walk
that walk alone.
The presence of Jesus,
the presence of the Holy Spirit,
the power of the Holy Spirit,
is with you
as you deal with those
very, very, very hard things.
And hopefully,
by God's grace,
and obviously,
this cannot always happen,
also His people,
the three Ps,
His presence,
His power,
and His people
as you deal
with those hard things.
And not only that,
as you celebrate
the good things.
So many people now,
they're so alone,
they need to hear
way to go.
And actually,
you can get through
a small group
in a church,
way to go.
Great that you got
that promotion.
You can come
and be thankful
for others,
and you can get
the back slapping,
the hugs,
the singing of the praises,
it's all one.
It's the beauty
of the gospel.
Let's stand.
bow our heads in prayer.
Father, we give you
thanks and praise
that when we put our
faith and trust in Jesus,
that we are entering
into a covenant
with you,
Father, Son,
and Holy Spirit,
that not only do we,
in a sense,
pledge ourselves to you
and give ourselves to you,
but that you make
a pledge to us.
You pledge to us
that we will be born again.
You pledge to us
that you will receive us
and that we are yours.
You pledge to us
that our sins are forgiven,
that that slate
has been wiped clean.
You pledge to us
that the righteousness
of Christ will be ours.
You pledge to us
that we have
an inheritance in heaven.
You pledge to us
that you will keep us,
that we might persevere,
and you pledge to us
that there is, in fact,
the possibility
to understand a purpose
and a meaning
in even the hardest times
in our lives.
And, Father,
we are so grateful
for your mercy
and kindness to us
in doing this.
We thank you
that you do not weigh
our merits
or our social capital
or our social worth
when you make this offer to us.
You make this offer
to rich and poor alike.
You make this offer
to people
in every ethnic group
and racial group
and language group
and cultural group
that you do not weigh
any of these accomplishments
that you know
that we all stand
equal before you
in terms of our need.
And you make this offer
and this pledge to us
and we thank and praise you
for those of us
who are in Christ
that your Holy Spirit
moved us
to make such a pledge
that we would be yours.
And we thank you, Father,
that when we gather
on a Sunday morning
like today
that as Steve leads us
in the Lord's Supper
that we can remember
once again
how we've fallen,
how you forgive us,
and the new covenant
that Jesus inaugurated
and remind us
of what he accomplished
for us on the cross
and that we can do that
until he comes to gain
or until we see you
face to face.
And Father,
we thank you for this.
We ask, Father,
that you help us
to grow
in our gripping
of the gospel
and grow in our ability
to celebrate with others,
commiserate with others,
and lift each other up
in prayer.
And we ask all these things
in Jesus' name,
saying,
Amen.