We hope this week's devotional will encourage you in your spiritual walk.
You are welcome to share this and include it in your church newsletters if you wish; we just ask that you please give credit to NTC and the author. Thank you!
1 Peter 1:3-9
3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! By his great mercy he has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, 4 and into an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, 5 who are being protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. 6 In this you rejoice, even if now for a little while you have had to suffer various trials, 7 so that the genuineness of your faith—being more precious than gold that, though perishable, is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honour when Jesus Christ is revealed. 8 Although you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and rejoice with an indescribable and glorious joy, 9 for you are receiving the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls.
Devotional – Living in the Light of Easter:
The reality of 1 Peter 1:8 can be quite confronting. Having just celebrated Jesus’ victory over Sin and Death in Easter, it can be disheartening to turn on the TV or scroll through a news feed and see the continued effects of sin all around us. Not only have we not seen Jesus with our own eyes, but sometimes it seems like the darkness of this world threatens to smother the light of the hope of Easter.
The people who received Peter’s letter were facing intense struggles and persecution. Peter wrote to encourage them to remain steadfast in their faith. Often, we think about faith in intellectual terms – lists of doctrines to which we agree. But another word for faith is trust. When faith is expressed as trust in the goodness of God, it can transform our worldview and help us see life's circumstances through a different lens. Peter reminds his readers that they are “being protected by the power of God” – I do not think that he means that they (nor indeed we) are bulletproof. He reframes their persecution in a bigger context – we do not only live for this present moment, but with an eye on the day when “Jesus Christ is revealed.”
Easter is not simply a historical moment that we celebrate, nor is it an escapist dream of some unrealistic future. The faith that we have in the resurrection of Jesus Christ produces in us a living hope that transforms our present reality from dark despair to persevering light. Because the power of God is at work in us we are not overcome by the circumstances of life, even if they crush us. The Gospel of Jesus is an affirmation that not even death can stop what God is doing in and through us. So we freely and ambitiously embrace life with all its thorns and live boldly the life of Christ in our place, to become the light of easter for our family, friends and neighbours.
Let us press on with unfading hope.
Prayer:
Almighty God, as we move on from the celebration of Easter, confronted by the realities of the rub of life, may we boldly give ourselves for your Kingdom, trusting that you are at work in and through us in Jesus’ name. Transform us by your power as we live out the hope of Easter in our everyday ordinary lives. Amen.
Richard Giesken
Associate lecturer (Biblical Studies and Missiology)