ANG KAPANGYARIHAN NG PAGASA

18 May 2003 NLBC 1 Peter 1:3-9

Ang Kapangyarihan ng Pag asa


Intro. It was good to go home! But the surrounding circumstances around was not so good. Some of my loved ones were sick , not a very hopeful sight. There were less tourists. Less tourists in my town means less jobs, less jobs means less money. Na tempt talaga ako mag-complain but I was reminde by this passage.

Naremind tuloy ako sa nakasulat magaan lang ang ating nararanasan ikumpara sa luwalhati na ating madadatnan. Paul also wrote about the lashes, the shipwrecksand the many sacrifices he had to endure. Sumulat din si Pedro ng isang reminder para sa sa mga Christians noon na naging encouragement para sa kanila Ito ay isang encouragment di lang para sa kanila noon. Ang encouragement na ito ay angkop rin para sa atin ngayon...
Sinulat ni Pedro ito 30 years or so pagkatapos namatay at muling pagkabuhay ng ating Panginoong Jesus.

Angkop sa atin ngayon sapagkat

Kagaya nila noon meron din tayong mga umaabuso na mga amo (2:18),
Ang iba sa atin ay may binabantaan ng ating mga mahal sa buhay (3:1, 6),
Ang iba sa atin ay linoloko ng ating mga kaibigan at mga kakilala 4:14).
Of course wala violent na persecution pero sa ibang bansa meron na (4:12-18).

Ours may not seem to be seem to be a very anti-Christian society but the encouragement from Peter is as relevant today than ever.

Kagaya noon ang tanong para sa atin ngayon ay

Paano ba tayo magkaroon ng kapangyarihan sa kapanahunan ng kahirapan di lang upang palampasin ang kasamaan ngunit upang tayo ay magkaroon din ng kasiyahan at pagibig sa panahon na ito?

How can we have the power of the soul in times of great stress and anxiety not just to endure the evil day, but to be joyful and to fill our lives with the fruits of righteousness (Phil. 1:11), with deeds of kindness, with projects of mercy, with labors of love?

Paano ba tayo magkaroon ng kasiyahan sa kabila ng mga kahirapan?

How, when your life is in jeopardy, or your job, or your marriage, or your health, or your respect in the community--how can you rise up with joy and bless those who abuse you and devote yourself to labors of love?

Ibang klaseng buhay ang hangad ng Panginoon para sa atin.

Tinawg Niya tayo di lang para umibig sa mga panahon na mabuti.
Tinawag Niya rin tayo na umibig sa mga panahong di mabuti.

We are called to love not only in the very best of circumstances but also to love others even when our own life is falling apart.

Ang paghangad na ito nangangailangan ng isang kapangyarihan na di sa atin nanggagaling.

Loving in the worst of times takes a power of soul which is utterly beyond us. If that is what we are called to do, then the power has to come from some source greater than the human soul.

Peter does not say "when things are tough, don't fret about others, take care of yourself."
In fact, Peter emphasizes that the tougher the times the greater the need to live a life of love for others.

Listen to what he writes:

Having purified your souls, by your obedience to the truth for a sincere love of the brothers, love one another earnestly from the heart (1:22).

Beloved, I beseech you as aliens and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh that wage war against your soul. Maintain good conduct among the gentiles so that in case they speak against you as wrongdoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation (2:11,12).

Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps. He committed no sin; no guile was found on his lips. When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten; but he trusted to him who judges justly (2:21-23).

Do not return evil for evil or reviling for reviling; but on the contrary, bless; for to this you have been called, that you may obtain a blessing. For "He that would love life and see good days, let him keep his tongue from evil and his lips from speaking guile; let him turn away from evil and do right; let him seek peace and pursue it." (3:9-11)

Above all hold unfailing your love for one another, since love covers a multitude of sins (4:8).

Dito sinasabi ni Pedro live like Jesus even when life is really tough. When life is really hard in Christ you will have the power to love. You will have that Living Hope.

He begins the main body of his letter: "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who according to his great mercy has begotten us anew to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead" (1:3).

Today, I want us to answer three questions about this "living hope":
1) What is it?
2) How does it arise in our heart?
3) How does it empower us to love?

1) What is "living hope?" Anong klaseng pagasa ang buhay na pagasa na ito?

Ibangiba ang New Testament idea ng pagasa sa ating normal na idea ng pagasa.
Hope, as we typically think about it, is a desire for some future thing which we are uncertain of attaining. Ang pagasa para sa atin ay isang desire na sana mangyari ngunit di tayo sure mangyari.

a. Ito ay confident hope.
Noong sinabi ni Pedro sa 1:13, "hope fully in the grace that is coming to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ," he does not mean we should desire it and be uncertain of it. We don’t have to be uncertain because we have complete confidence in the coming of Christ. "Hope fully," means be intensely desirous and fully confident that Jesus Christ is coming again with grace for his people.

b. Next ito life changing hope.
Peter calls it "living hope." What does that mean? The opposite of a "living hope" would be a "dead hope," and that calls to mind a similar phrase in James chapter 2, namely "dead faith." "Faith without works is dead" (2:26), James says. That is, faith is barren, fruitless, unproductive (2:20). So "living faith" and, by analogy, "living hope" would be fertile, fruitful, productive hope. Living hope is hope that has power and produces changes in life. This is what "living' means in Hebrews 4:12 where it says, "The word of God is living and effective" So Christian hope is a strong confidence in God which has power to produce changes in how we live.

2) The second question I want to answer is, How does this hope arise in our hearts? Paano ito magmumula sa ating puso?

One part of the answer is given here in 1.3, another part is given in verses 1.23-25.

In verse 3, Peter says, "we are born anew to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

In verses 23-25 Peter says, "You have been born anew not of perishable seed
but of imperishable through the living and abiding word of God; for all flesh
is like grass and all its glory like the flower of grass. The grass withers and
the flower falls, but the word of the Lord abides forever. That word is the
good news which was preached to you."

We have hope because of his resurrection, we have hope because of the truth of God’s Word

And because we have His hope we have new birth.
What is new birth? "By his great mercy we have been born anew unto a living hope."
Have you ever asked the question: What makes you you? Ano ang bagay na gumagawa sa iyo na ikaw mismo? What is the essence of your unique personhood?
If you probe deeply you will find that it is not your actions or thoughts or ideas.
It is your desires. We are most basically what we crave. Ideas and principles will be brought in afterwards to justify our appetites and passions.

The new birth therefore is the radical inward heartfelt change which happens when we change our hopelessness for the living hope in Jesus Christ.

If that is true, then a radical change in our desires and longings will mean a radical change in our personhood. Something new comes into being and that is what Jesus and John and Paul and Peter call the new birth or regeneration. In New Birth we cease to put our hopes (our desires and longings) on things that are in the world, and instead place our hopes and desires on God.

2) And how does this living hope empower a person with the power to love. Paano nga ba nagbibigay ang buhay na pag asa na ito ng kapangyarithan na umibig.
Notice 1 Peter 1:13-15
Gird up your minds, be sober, set your hope fully upon the grace that is coming to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. As obedient children do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, but as he who called you is holy, be holy yourselves in all your conduct.

How does this living hope help us to love.
First of all, When we hope we are actually pushing out greed and self-pity.
When we live without hope we live only for what we can see making us consider only what is good for us. If we live with hope we are reminded that we have Him who truly cares for us 1 Peter 5:7, "Cast all your anxieties on me because I care for you

Second, this living hope helps us imitate Jesus Christ .
You always tend to imitate the people you admire most and desire most strongly to be around. Kids tend to dress and walk and talk like their heroes. And so do we adults, though we are less blatant about it. A person who hopes intensely in Jesus Christ, who longs to see him and be with him, will inevitably start to think and feel and act like Jesus. "Everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure"(1 John 3:3). Strong hope to see Jesus is a strong power for holy love.

Finally, this living hope empowers holy love is by giving the assurance of God's blessing and care which we need in order to follow through on some of his specific hard commands. There is only one basic reason why we disobey the commands of Jesus: it's because we don't have confidence that obeying will bring more blessing than disobeying. We do not hope fully in God's promise. What did he promise? Peter passes on his teaching like this: "Do not return evil for evil or reviling for reviling; but on the contrary bless, for to this you have been called that you may obtain a blessing. He who would love life and see good days & let him turn away from evil and do good." You will always be better off to obey than to disobey, even if it costs you your life. "Truly I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands for my sake and the gospel's, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time & with persecutions and in the age to come eternal life." (Mark 10:29-30). The only way to have the power to follow Christ in the costly way of love is to be filled with hope, with strong confidence, that if we lose our life doing His will we will find it again and be richly rewarded.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ - who according to his great mercy has begotten us anew to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.-- a hope that everyone can have and maintain if you pray this prayer from the heart: "Lord Jesus, I believe in my heart that you were raised from the dead and that this guarantees that your death was sufficient to pay for all my sins and therefore God is for me and not against me and that you yourself are alive today and with me to help forever. And I pray that you will help me now to hope fully in your promises so that I am freed from the greed and self-pity that come from fear, and that I might be driven to imitate your love, and that I might always believe it is more blessed to give (to obey) than to disobey. And so Lord grant me in these times of stress and anxiety to have the power of soul to be joyful and to fill my life with labors of love. Amen.