Set Your Hope Fully On Grace

Having reached the turning point in Luke's gospel we now take a break from that series. This week we will consider our lives, the joys and struggles we face personally and in our families, in the context of our belonging to the family of God and the living hope we have been born to in Christ Jesus (1 Peter 1:3-19; Colossians 3:12-17).

As children of God we often find ourselves disappointed with our performance, or with that of another person, and our 'natural' response to this is to try harder, to be more determined to do better or make sure the other person lifts their game. We have seen our Olympic athletes struggling with this very matter over the past week, albeit in a different context.

We know we have been saved by grace, through faith, on account of Christ. And we know that our final salvation is secure in him, but we battle, daily, with how to best live today as children of God. We are, after all, called to be holy in all we do, yet we seem to fall far short of this. Complacency is not the answer, but neither is any form of 'boot-strap' theology where we lift ourselves to greater heights of faith or holiness.

As Peter explains in his first letter, the great assurance we have in the gospel of Christ is that we are guarded daily by God's power through faith for salvation and that our faith, when tested, will not result in disappointment but in praise and glory and honour - this is the living hope we have been born into through the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus, and need to be reminded of and encouraged in day by day.