What is your hope in?

Introduction

Goodmorning everybody I am excited to be here today and I am excited to bring the Word! My name is Cody Cauble and I am the student pastor at Crossroads Baptist Church right across the road! If you and your family don’t have a church that you call home we would love to have you here. Our student services are at 9am on Sunday mornings and 6:30pm on Wednesday nights. We have a really awesome worship night coming up called Fall Rally on November 4th from 5pm-8pm if you’d like to come! I’ve got invitations here if you would like to grab one after chapel.

So I know that you guys have been journeying through and expounding on this verse 1 Peter 3:15 this semester. You’ve already talked about honoring Christ, giving a defense, and today we are landing with the phrase “for the hope that is in you;”

Today we are going to address one thing: what do you place your hope in? (Pause) Like what do you really put your hope in? Like think about that for a second. Where does your hope come from? Does it depend on your performance in school, in a sport, or a relationship? Does it depend on your circumstances and emotions? I think the answer lies in where you run to when things don’t go well for you. Is it in the gym, in a girl or a guy, a hobby, etc. Where does your hope come from? What makes you excited about the future? What makes you excited about the present? What makes you look back in your life and think “if i didn’t have (blank) I don’t know where I would be” I want to get really practical with this because we can ask that question and not know how to even figure out the answer. But think about what makes you look forward to the future? what makes you excited for the present? When you look back what makes you think “if i didn’t have (blank) I don’t know where I would be.” I’m not trying to be “churchy”, but if the answer to that question isn’t Jesus then we can run into a lot of issues and here is why:

When Peter is writing this verse he is writing to Christians instructing them of the key to living out a vibrant faith in the midst of persecution. When you are walking through your daily life and your heart is full of hope in the promises of Christ then when we have the opportunity to share about what God is doing in our lives: we sense it as a duty to defend doctrine instead of a delight to tell somebody why we are so hopeful.

Here are two passages of scripture that I believe perfectly capture what the Gospel is and what we hope in: Isaiah 53:4-6 and 1 Peter 2:22-25.

When I was studying for today and I saw, like I had never seen before, that witnessing will always be a burdensome duty to defend a doctrine as long as Christianity means for us simply accepting certain doctrines as true and keeping a certain list of dos and don'ts. So many people in the church have simply inherited the motions of church life and outward morality and piety, but the heartfelt reality of Christ and joyful hope in his promises are foreign to their experience.

That means as a Christian, the best way for us to be ready to make a case for the hope in our own hearts is to keep our own hearts happy and joyful in God. Morning by morning we have to go to the Word, not to anxiously amass arguments for every possible rebuttal somebody might have—that's what Jesus was against in Luke 21. No, we go to the Word because we are so desperately needy, our own hope wanes. We have fears that need to be overcome by the promises of God. We have doubts that need to be answered. The fight of faith is waged on our knees with the sword of the Spirit, the Word of God, and prayer. And when we emerge from that encounter with God with a renewed and lively hope in his promises, we will be ready to make a case for our hope. For God only calls us to tell others the reasons which that very day are making us hopeful in Christ.

I will end with this (Picture of Aubree and the dogs). Share story about Abe and Willow and Abe being excited to go “with us.”

The reality is in a room this size there are some of you that have never truly experienced the love of God. You may go to church but your hope is wrapped up in doing all the right things for God and not resting IN God and the promises of God.