Get ready to start a journey…a journey through the pages of the Bible and the pages of your life.
The life of the believer is a life of living hope. God’s great mercy saves, and through the death, burial, and resurrection of his Son, the road home has been paved. The heavenly inheritance that awaits us is “kept in heaven” for us. Unlike the shiny objects that distract us, it is “imperishable, undefiled, and unfading.”
Grace is the entire package. It initiates our relationship with God and takes us all the way home.
Let’s face it. We really are what we think about and desire. Our minds are the GPS that leads us to our “treasure,” and our hearts are the engine that carries us to our “prize.” Our minds determine the direction; our hearts provide the drive. That’s why the passage today is so important.
Aliens. That’s what we were before Jesus. We were “excluded from citizenship…foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God…” (Eph. 2:12 NIV). But Jesus changed that…forever. We “who once were far away have been brought near by the blood of Christ” (Eph. 2:13 NIV).
My passport says that I am a citizen of the United States. I am very thankful for that. I am even more thankful for my heavenly passport. And that is all because of Jesus. Here’s what Paul says in Philippians 3:20.
Today we start a new series of devotionals called Living Hope. Our hope is secured in the living God, who always keeps his promises. While we will use many passages in Scripture, 1 Peter will be our base. So, let’s start with the first two verses of this letter.