Pass It On-Hope

III. We have the hope of vindication just as Christ received it.

A. We must believe in final justice and live in light of that justice to maintain our hope.

Maybe you are worn down by the seeming lack of justice in our world.

Maybe you have begun to not care about justice, especially final justice.

Murderers who get off with no punishment.

Criminals getting away with crimes and laughing about it, non-repentant. That is not the same thing. We can begin to doubt and believe that ultimate justice is a far off dream.

How can we still have hope in this type of society? How can we still hope for justice?

We must move from trusting in government, laws and TV news anchors to trusting in God!

We can easily get discouraged when evil gets off because of some technicality.

Good people are fired because they were honest.

People whose children are ostracized because their family tries to be weird and live for God’s ideal.

People who won’t play with dirty ethics and lose business deals.

There is persecution for Christians in all walks of life. Those folks find the message of hope Peter speaks of as applicable to their own lives and find solace in the ultimate vindication of God. I pray it strengthens you today as well.

Imagine you are a teenager where the majority of the high schoolers you are around drink to the point of drunkenness, where many smoke pot or worse, where many casually sleep around, and where that same teen society knows who does and does not do these things. Then imagine that you will not be accepted by your peers if you don’t do these things. Peter’s message of hope speaks to you. He knows how difficult it is to fight off pressures for acceptance and conformity, he knows Christians are to seek to live according to God’s ideal and refrain from sinful behaviors and he especially knows you will need to have special faith and courage to endure.

Peter is calling us to focus on the ultimate hope we have in Christ. Only with this hope can we:

1. Not conform to the sinful habits we are being drawn to by our peers.

2. Live faithfully and obediently to Jesus’ teaching

3. Find friends in those who seek God’s ideal with me.

4. Look to the day when God ultimate vindication is fulfilled for his people.

CT: May we share the hope of Christ with all who come behind us.

Conclusion: As we continue series this I pray we as adults do all we can to encourage and help our young people in this church and in our community. They face a lot of tough challenges. The thing is the problems they face are problems we all face even as adults. Only with a hope in Christ of a positive outcome no matter what this world throws at us can we carry on. God is our hope. He gives us a future we don’t have to purchase. There is no lottery ticket you need to buy Your chances of winning are 100%. It is free if we only identify with his Son and submit to him through baptism and obedience. Won’t you take hold of this hope that will carry through any situation this world brings.