A Living Hope

1 Peter 1:3-9

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us 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. This inheritance is kept in heaven for you,  who through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time.  In all this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.  Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy,  for you are receiving the end result of your faith, the salvation of your souls.

“He has given us new birth into a living hope.” I really like the term “living hope.” Hope is something that lives in us and does stuff.  It works. It builds. It makes other things possible.  Hope is more useful when it is put to use.  That brings me to the next hopeful habit – work.

We talked about prayer and active learning as hope producing, but hope expands even more as we work.  I was sharing with my Dad a while back that work I did over 30 years ago has come full circle.  When I was 15, I got a job mowing church lawns.  It was something my Dad had helped me do and he did it with me for a while until I was ready to take it over.  Fast forward 30+ years and I was able to do the same thing with my son Paul a couple of years ago.  I couldn’t have known that would happen when I was 15, but whenever you work at something, it prepares you for something else in the future -  especially if you try to do it well.  Starting my own business at 15 installed a hope in me that I could do other things as well.  That is hope at work.

The work we do now, especially if we try to do it well, will prepare us for what’s next.  I really do believe that. I hope you will too.

 

Prayer:  God give us love and care for the work we have in front of us. May it become a “living hope” at work in our life. Amen.

 

Prayer Focus: Ask God to show you what hope-producing work you could be doing during this season of life.

 

Song:  You Make Beautiful Things - Gungor

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1spkhp41ig4

Blessings Where We See Curses

 

Blessings Where We See Curses

 

Matthew 24:45-51, CEB - “Who then are the faithful and wise servants whom their master puts in charge of giving food at the right time to those who live in his house?  Happy are those servants whom the master finds fulfilling their responsibilities when he comes.  I assure you that he will put them in charge of all his possessions.  But suppose those bad servants should say to themselves, My master won’t come until later.  And suppose they began to beat their fellow servants and to eat and drink with the drunks?  The master of those servants will come on a day when they are not expecting him, at a time they couldn’t predict.  He will cut them in pieces and put them in a place with the hypocrites. People there will be weeping and grinding their teeth.

 

                We all have work to do. When we’re young, it’s schoolwork and for many, chores.  We graduate.  Maybe we go to college where our work is more schoolwork and possibly a side job.  At some point though, our formal schooling is over and we begin a different kind of work.  Even those who start a family and make the choice quit their job to raise children have work, perhaps more work than most jobs outside the home.  After the children are gone and all the others retire, most find other work.  They volunteer.  They help their adult children and dote on grandchildren. They take up a hobby that they’ve been thinking about but never had time while they held a formal “job.”  Many elderly people who can no longer do the physically and mentally demanding work they did earlier in their lives seem to find ways to keep working at something.  They find ways to keep working. Our work may change over the course of our lifetimes, but we always have work to do.

                Quite often, I have observed what happens when people choose not to do the work they have been given.  I’m not talking vacations or sabbaticals or transition times.  Those are all healthy ways of making sure we can keep working.  I’m talking about people who choose to stop doing their work permanently.   It can happen at any stage.  Children who give up on their school work often flounder for the rest of their lives.  People who quit or lose their jobs and choose to stop working altogether lose their sense of purpose and connection to the world.  Even many people who retire and don’t discover their post-career work struggle with the same issues of purpose and connection. 

It seems that having work to do is generally good for us even though we don’t often feel that way. I often find myself fantasizing about a “someday” when I will no longer have work to do.  I even occasionally have days now when I rebel and refuse to do my work.  I also thoroughly enjoy short periods of time of “days off” or vacation and my “work” is to intentionally do nothing.  But I’m realizing more and more that the work I’ve been given to do is a gift.  Even the work that I do for others often does more for me than it does for them.  I’m not always aware of this in the moment, but I’m aware of this truth right now.  Faithfulness in our work in the world is good for us.

Maybe the “weeping and gnashing of teeth” Jesus spoke about in the passage above is more of a “self-inflicted wound” than a punishment for those who chose to interrupt their faithfulness.  I don’t know for sure.  What I do know is having faithfulness to perform does more for us than simply pleasing God, although Jesus assures us God is pleased.  The ways that Jesus teaches us to live are really the best way to live – for us, for our families, for our communities, and for the world.  Go figure.

 

Question:  How have you been blessed by your faithfulness to God and other relationships that you are in?

 

Prayer:  O God, sometimes we begin to think that the work we do is a curse.  Forgive us.  Give us eyes to see it the way you do.  You are pleased in your faithfulness to us.  May we be pleased in our faithfulness to You and each other.  Amen.

 

Prayer Focus:  Spend a little extra time praying for the members of your household today.  If you live alone, pray for the people in your extended family.

 

Song:  The Weight | Featuring Ringo Starr and Robbie Robertson | Playing For Change | Song Around The World

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ph1GU1qQ1zQ