Hope
Peter’s first letter was written to Gentile Christians who were undergoing persecution. He wrote this epistle to give them hope during their times of trials. When you are being persecuted for living the faith that our Lord asks of you, you need to know there is a reason for continuing to keep on going. Of course, in the day that Peter wrote this, the church was being heavily persecuted. Christians were dying for the simple reason that they were followers of Christ. We don’t quite yet have that problem, but it does seem like it is getting closer.
To those who believe the Bible is the infallible Word of God, we must take His words and apply them to our lives. When sin is pointed out in the Scriptures, it is so that we may repent, begin again and be the example He desires us to be. Suffering is never fun as we see in the example of Jesus in 1 Peter 2:21-24, “For you have been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in His steps, 22 who committed no sin, nor was any deceit found in His mouth; 23 and while being reviled, He did not revile in return; while suffering, He uttered no threats, but kept entrusting Himself to Him who judges righteously; 24 and He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, so that we might die to sin and live to righteousness; for by His wounds you were healed.” (NASB)
Jesus made the ultimate sacrifice, and we must follow His example. Sadly, there are many people who would rather retaliate, fight, belittle, etc., than go through the things our Lord did for us. Peter was an eyewitness of the things which he was writing about. He saw the suffering Messiah, Jesus, going through all of these things. Therefore, he offers hope to all of those who will obey Jesus. Even in midst of supreme trials in our lives, He will prevail if we just follow Him.
And of course the important part of this is that we have to be in Him. There are two passages in the New Testament that tell us how we get into Christ. Note these: Galatians 3:27, “For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ.” and Romans 6:3-4, “Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death? 4 Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.” If you will note, the passages say we are baptized into Christ. If we are not in Christ, we do not have any of the promises that the Bible speaks of.
It is important to obey the teachings of the Bible always. Are you doing so? Do you have this hope? Anyone who obeys the teachings of Jesus has the hope of eternal life.