Shall we pray? Loving God, we just thank you
that we get to gather together to worship you
and to just sit under your word and to hear what
you have to say to us today. Speak to us and
set our hearts aflame again with love for you.
In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. We're going to
be thinking a little bit about hope you'll see
on the screen. Our city needs hope. I wonder
what you are personally hoping for today. Perhaps
a breakthrough, a change in a medical issue.
Maybe you're praying for peace. Maybe you're
hoping for sleep, to feel less anxious, to get
that essay done, to have some certainty about
the future. Hope and uncertainty nearly always
go hand in hand, don't they? And yet the hope
that we have as Christians is different. Because
it's based on the truth of scripture, the promises
of God, the certainty of following God who was
before the earth existed, as we read in 2 Peter,
and the guarantee of the resurrection, that the
resurrection of Jesus springs. And so our hope
as followers of Jesus is twofold. It's eschatological.
It's about the now and the not yet. We have a
hope. of the glorious future, that promise of
heaven, eternal life. At some point, God's redemptive
plan for you and me and the whole of creation
will come to completion. Jesus will return like
a thief in the night. The heavens will disappear
with a roar, we read in verse 10. The elements
will be destroyed by fire and the earth and everything
in it will be laid bare. And all that's wrong
and evil in the world will be exposed. There'll
be a new heaven and a new earth. Verse 13, and
when that happens, scripture tells us that all
who love the Lord Jesus will be renewed and restored
and invited to this eternal banquet with the
King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. Isn't that
brilliant news? What a great expectation and
promise we have. But as Christians, our hope
is also a present reality. The hope we have as
Christians is now. Yes, we get to live with the
hope of eternity with God when we die. But as
whole life disciples of Jesus, we also get to
live in the now. We get to live out the reality
and the promises of God now. We have a hope now
of the now and the not yet. And that's what we're
going to explore further as we dig a little deeper
into this passage. So firstly, we have hope for
the future, the not yet. I wonder whether sometimes
it's Christmas, Christmas, it's on my mind already,
Vicarland. I wonder whether as Christians, we
sometimes focus a little bit too much on this.
Controversial, maybe. When our oldest son, Zach,
was a baby, I, like many of you who might have
children, went through days and months where
I just couldn't wait for him to push on to the
next stage, whether it was sleeping through the
night or... being potty trained or feeding himself
or learning to read or not screaming when we
dropped him off at school. And then suddenly
in the space of about two minutes, he's 21 and
he has a beard and he's a beast of a man. And
I go, wow, where did that time go? I'm guilty,
like maybe some of you are, of rushing through
things, powering on to the next stage, always
looking forward to the what next. And sometimes,
therefore, I miss out on the present. And I enjoy
what's happening now. In his second letter to
the Christians in Asia Minor, Peter speaks into
this. Before Jesus ascended to heaven, he'd said,
hadn't he, that he would return to judge the
living and the dead. And so people were looking
forward, waiting for that promise to be fulfilled.
Many expected Jesus to return imminently and
unexpectedly. And yet there were at least 40
years from that moment and still no Jesus. And
this had become great fodder for the sceptics.
Look at verses three and four. Where is this
coming that he promised, they're asking? Jesus
said he was going to return and he hasn't turned
up yet. And how does Peter respond to this? By
reminding them not to second guess God, to not
rush through the present, verse 8. Do not forget
this one thing, dear friends, with the Lord,
a day is like a thousand years and a thousand
years is like a day. Who knows the timing of
the Lord, Peter is saying. We don't need to stress
over when Jesus will return, but let us keep
hold of that big picture that God does keep his
promises. We can put our hope in him and he will
do what he will do in his timing. And isn't that
something that many of us need to be reminded
of time and again as we journey through life
as Jesus' disciples? As we sit hoping. waiting
for God to answer the prayer, for our friend
or our family member to be healed or to come
to faith. As we pound in frustration on God's
door saying, come on, why are you not changing
this situation I'm in? Where is the breakthrough?
We need to remember this truth that God isn't
slowing keeping his promises, but he will do
what he will do in his timing and for his bigger
purposes. And what are these bigger purposes?
Look at verse 9. Instead, Peter writes, he is
patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish
but everyone to come to repentance. God is patient.
Why? Because he loves us. He loves his creation.
He doesn't want anybody to perish. He wants everyone
to have the chance to respond to Jesus's invitation,
follow me. And that's where we get to join in,
isn't it? Matthew 28 is explicitly clear that
if we are disciples of Jesus, our job is to go.
To so overflow with the love of Jesus to those
around us that everyone gets the chance to hear
and to respond. Some of us will do that by preaching
or being evangelists or being youth workers.
But we don't have to stand and preach everywhere
we are. We just have to be God's people to take
opportunities when they appear to share the love
of God, sometimes in very practical ways or by
sharing our story. of how jesus has changed our
lives back to the passage we're at verse 10 and
this is where it gets a little apocalyptic Now,
I was a teenager in the 80s and 90s. And for
those who missed out on this spectacular era,
which is most of you, you will have sadly missed
out on a whole genre of Christian films about
the end times. You can probably find them on
YouTube or somewhere. If you imagine, think fire.
coming down to burn up the earth, teenagers hanging
around together and suddenly the Christians are
taken and everybody else is left behind. Think
Marvel Endgame, if that's your bag. I think these
films were basically designed to petrify us as
teenagers into following Jesus. Funnily enough,
I'm not quite sure they achieve their aim. But
here in verse 10, Peter brings clarity. The day
of the Lord will happen when we least expect
it. Like a thief, he uses Jesus's words, who
comes unannounced. But rather than a complete
annihilation of the earth, Peter chooses his
words very carefully. Everything will be found
out, or as the NIV translates it, will be laid
bare before God. And this... Phrase translated
as laid bare implies that God will peel back
the curtain and will reveal everything for what
it really is. Everything will be laid bare. I
really love N .T. Wright or Tom Wright. I'm a
bit of a creepy. I once sat at a seminar with
him and. I was just hanging on his every word.
So I do know his books pretty well. And in his
book on heaven, Surprised by Hope, Tom Wright
says this. The point of redemption is that it
doesn't mean scrapping what's there and starting
again from a clean slate, but rather liberating
what has been enslaved. When everything is laid
bare, evil and injustice will be exposed and
removed. And as we see in verse 13, a new heaven
and a new earth will emerge. It will be filled
with justice where those who are right with God
will dwell. So hope is not an ethereal concept.
Hope has a name and his name is Jesus. Those
of us who have salvation in Jesus do not need
to fear, do we? We can look forward, we can hope
for this day of the Lord when goodness and beauty
and redemption and joy will be made complete,
when righteousness will flow like a never -ending
stream. But what does that mean for us now? I
wonder whether one of the most prolific distortions
of Christianity over the ages is that it's all
about being saved so that we can go to heaven
when we die. I'm sure I'm not the only person
here who has thought at some point in their life,
well, I've given my life to Jesus, I've repented,
I've been baptised, so now I get to live how
I want because I know Jesus will forgive me and
my place in heaven is guaranteed. In his first
letter, Peter encourages us that God has given
us, and it says this in 1 Peter 1, 3 to 4, God
has given us a new birth into a living hope through
the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead
and into an inheritance that can never perish,
spoil or fade. We have living hope now and for
eternity, the now and the not yet. It's also
certainly and wonderfully true, says John Ortberg
in his book Eternity Now. He says it's also certainly
and wonderfully true that the message of Jesus
and his early followers is not just, even though
it is, about forgiveness of sins that allows
us to escape that bad place and go to a good
place. It's a newness of life. To be sure, this
new life includes forgiveness, but it includes
so much more. Let's not miss out on the so much
more of the gospel. Jesus is good news for you
and for me and for this world we live in. The
work of the cross is good news now. But do you
know that Jesus spent most of his time on earth
not teaching people how to get a pass to heaven
for the future, but how to be disciples now,
to build the kingdom of God and bring in the
kingdom of heaven now. He demonstrated and taught
what it looks like to love God and to love the
other, how to actually live in the fullness of
life that the cross has bought for us now. Yes,
we have a future safe with God for eternity.
But as Christians, we get to live in hope and
get to be hope now. And doesn't this world need
it? And so there's hope for the present. Eternity,
if you like, is now. So this life is not a heavenly
waiting room, as we know, which we have to patiently
endure until we're called to step into what we've
been waiting for, heaven. In the words of Dallas
Willard, eternity is now in session. Are we living
like it is? We get to live in. And we get to
live out eternity, the hope and joy and peace
of the gospel of Jesus now. And how do we do
that? Verse 11 tells us, by living holy and godly
lives. And that is the call on our lives as disciples
of Jesus, to be holy and godly. That means living
lives that are orientated towards God, with Jesus
at the centre. Lives where God is our hope. God
is our rock and our fortress and salvation. Lives
that point every day in every part of who we
are to Jesus. Lives where the Holy Spirit is
daily renewing and restoring us because we cannot
do holy and godly living on our own. Lives which
bring in God's kingly rule now of love and joy
and peace and justice and hope to the communities
God sends us to be in. Lives which are distinctly
different and counter -cultural. Lives where
we take risks for God. So eternity is now. The
call on our lives is to live for Jesus now and
proclaim forgiveness, freedom and fullness of
life now. And all of us, whatever our age, whatever
our gender, whether we're struggling in some
way, none of us are too inexperienced or too
broken. to live out this hope in Jesus in good
times and in the waiting times and in the suffering
times. A few months ago, I was away at a conference
with a church leader, a mate of mine, Tim, and
he came to that conference completely exhausted.
He'd come from the bedside of his severely disabled
son who had been in hospital for weeks and weeks.
And during that particular period of time, it
was about four months, from one day to the other,
they hadn't known if their son was going to live
or die. And as we stood next to each other during
the time of worship, I was bowled over by the
hope and the faith that Tim had in Jesus. as
in the midst of this waiting, the hopelessness,
the suffering. He was worshipping Jesus. He had
his hand raised and he had tears streaming down
his face as he sang with boldness and confidence
these words, Alleluia, praise the one who set
me free. Hallelujah, death has lost its grip
on me. You've broken every chain. There's salvation
in your name. Jesus Christ, my living hope. And
so in this short passage of scripture, Peter
has given us a snapshot, hasn't he, of the big
picture. That our hope is in a future spent with
God in eternity. but also a reminder that eternity
is now. And because of Jesus, together as the
people of God, we get to join in with what God's
doing in this world. We get to join in and bringing
in his kingly rule through our lives, through
our work, through his church today. Hope has
a name and his name is Jesus. And that is the
name that we take out into this world. Good news
for the present. Good news for the future. Let's
pray. God, we give you all the glory. We give
you all the praise and we give you all the honour
that you are the one who has set us free. that
you are the one who has redeemed the whole of
your creation through the cross and resurrection
of Jesus. And God, we are broken and vulnerable
people. And we need your Holy Spirit to fill
us every day, to be able to live a life of holiness,
to fulfill the calling that you have put on each
of our lives to be your disciples. to bring eternity
into the present. Give us the honour and privilege
of seeing your will done, your kingdom come on
earth as in heaven. In Jesus' name, amen.