Salvation: Future, Past and Present

Introduction Last year, on our way home after Christmas, we reached New Liskeard just as the highway closed. We had been driving all day and were only an hour from home. Thankfully, I have Google Maps. It found us a new route on backroads I didn't even know about. When you know you're being guided to your destination, travelling down dark, unfamiliar roads is much less stressful. But when you're unsure of your destination, the journey feels different. You lose sight of your goal and start worrying about what's happening in the moment. Did I take a wrong turn? Where does this road lead? Many of us feel this way in life. We get so focused on the present that we forget where we're going. Life turns into paying bills, buying things, planning vacations, and worrying about our health. We forget we're on a journey and focus on where we are instead of where we're going. Peter wrote to people who were struggling. They were hurting and discouraged, so he urged them to focus on where their journey would end. He wanted them to understand that salvation is more than just saying a prayer once. Salvation covers our past, present, and future. God saved us through Jesus' death and resurrection, is saving us now by changing us, and will save us completely when Christ returns. If we forget about that destination, we start living as if we have no direction. Today, I want to talk about salvation in three ways: our hopes for the future, the past events that make those hopes possible, and how the past and future come together to shape how we live right now. I. You Will Be Saved A. The Future Dimension of Salvation Last week, we looked at the start of chapter 1, where Peter talked about the inheritance God has for believers. This points to our future salvation. Sometimes, talking about being saved in the future feels strange, because as believers, we usually say we have already been saved. We often see salvation as a one-time event where our status changes before God-we were sinners, but now we're saints. But Peter means something bigger when he talks about being 'saved' or about 'salvation.' For him, salvation is about God making everything right. About giving us a hope for a better future, about freeing us from the mistakes of the past, and about giving us a hope for a new life in the present. But first, let's focus on that future hope. We look forward to a future salvation, to get something we haven't experienced yet. We want to be free from pain, to be rewarded for following God, and to be known as his people. This hope for the future helps us choose a holy life, even when it means making sacrifices. It's similar to saving for retirement. Small sacrifices now can lead to big rewards later. For example, if you bought a large coffee and a donut at Tim's every day, that's about $28 a week. If, instead, you invested that money you would have spent each day in an average-performing mutual fund by the time you were 65, it would be worth $600,000. Giving up a little now can mean much more later. When you remember your goal, it puts the sacrifices you need to make now in a different perspective. Peter wants us to get excited about the future God has planned for us. When we focus on that future, it helps us make sacrifices today. But if we only think about the present, we can get stuck on things that don't really matter or might even hurt us. That's why Peter writes: So fasten your belts-the belts of your minds! Keep yourselves under control. Set your hope completely on the grace that will be given you when Jesus the Messiah is revealed. As children of obedience, don't be squashed into the shape of the passions you used to indulge when you were still in ignorance (1 Peter 1:13-14, BFE). Peter wants his readers to look forward to what God will do. He wants them to long to share in Jesus' glory when everything is finally revealed at his return. That hope for the future gives them strength in their tough times. The same is true for us. B. Hoping for Something Better We often don't imagine God's promised future very well. For many of us, life here is already pretty good, so we picture the next life as just a better version of this one. Maybe we think we'll have young bodies, not subject to aging or disease. We'd like to live somewhere where winter is shorter, and we'd like to finally be able to get all the stuff we wanted but couldn't afford. That kind of upgrade might seem good enough to us. Or maybe we picture the next life as sitting on clouds, listening to angels play harps in a never-ending worship service. That might be fun for a while, but after the 39th repeat of the chorus for "Lord I Lift Your Name on High," we might wonder to ourselves, "Wait. How long is this supposed to last?" Because we're so attached to our current lives and don't really understand what God promises for our future, we don't put much hope in it. Sometimes I worry that if my life is comfortable enough, I will lose that fire in the belly to see God's kingdom come. Maybe that's why Jesus said, "Blessed are the poor." When things aren't working that well for us here, we're more open to what God's disruption. Sometimes, the hard times God allows us to go through help us focus on his promise of salvation. Hard times can change our priorities. For Peter's readers, it was persecution. For the Israelites, it was slavery in Egypt or exile in Babylon. For us, it could be a financial crisis or another pandemic. It might not always be the challenges we face together, but personal difficulties that change our perspective. We could get sick, lose a job, or watch what we've worked for fall apart. Putting our hope in God's promised future spares us the inevitable pain that comes with putting our ultimate hope in things that don't last. That's why Peter continues, Rather, just as the one who called you is holy, so be holy yourselves, in every aspect of behaviour. It is written, you see, 'Be holy, for I am holy.' If you call on God as 'father'-the God, that is, who judges everyone impartially according to their work-behave with holy fear throughout the time in which you are resident here (1 Peter 1:15-17, BFE). Holy means being set aside for God's purposes. If we keep our eyes on God's promised future, we'll spend our lives pursuing things God's purposes-things that last. But if we don't, we will end up disappointed when the things we hoped for don't last. Even being God's children won't protect us from that kind of disappointment. So let's learn to value God's purposes, what he says is important, so our hope for the future will be even stronger. II. We Have Been Saved A. Jesus' Past Victory Our hope for the future isn't just wishful thinking. It's a certainty because of what God has already done through Jesus. Many people try to sell us their vision of the future, but often it's just a fantasy. For example, someone might say to invest in electric car companies because 'soon everyone will drive EVs'. I wonder if it's realistic. Right now, we don't have the minerals to make enough batteries for that many cars, so those predictions might be more aspirational than practical. But our hope in God's promised future isn't such wishful thinking. The key event that makes it possible has already happened. Peter explains it like this: You know, after all, that you were ransomed from the futile practices inherited from your ancestors, and that this ransom came not through perishable things like gold or silver, but through the precious blood of the Messiah, like a lamb without spot or blemish. He was destined for this from before the foundation of the world, and appeared at the end of the times for your sake, for you (that is) who through him believe in the God who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God (1 Peter 1:18-21, BFE). It's what Jesus did on the cross that guarantees the future God has promised. B. God Forgives Our Past What God has done also means our past doesn't have to define our future. Most of us have things we wish we could do differently. I wish I had exercised more and eaten healthier when I was younger. Maybe we wish we had been more attentive to our spouses or kids, or learned better ways to resist temptation. But what's done is done. There's no undo button in life. Still, God's grace can undo the past in some ways. It doesn't erase the consequences of our actions. Asking God for a new heart doesn't free someone from jail or fix a marriage that has ended in divorce, but it does set us free from our past failures before God. Our past sins are serious, but when we repent, God's grace is enough to wipe us clean. As far as God is concerned, it's as if we never sinned. The Psalms put it this way, as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us (Psalm 103:12, NIV). Now my modern brain thinks about east and west being pretty close at the international date line, but this is the psalmist's poetic way of explaining that God completely erases the stain of our past sins when we have repented of our sin. Peter wants his readers to know that even though they have done things in the past they regret, those failures don't have to define their present or future. Because of what Jesus has done, our past can stay behind us, and we can start a new life. But to be free from those failures and experience future salvation, we need to accept the new life God offers us now. III. Be Saved We hope in God's promised future that he will set things right that are currently not right. The basis of this hope lies in the past: both that Jesus has won the decisive victory on the cross and that the stain of our past sins has been dealt with. Because we have been saved and we will be saved, we are called to live in our present as saved people. A. Grace and Works Sometimes, Christian faith overlooks our present reality. We talk about Jesus' finished work on the cross and our future hope, but treat the present as if we're just waiting for heaven. We might try to behave, but there's not much urgency. Peter, however, says we need to get busy loving others: Once your lives have been purified by obeying the truth, resulting in a sincere love for all your fellow believers, love one another eagerly, from a pure heart. You have been born again, not from seed which decays but from seed which does not-through the living and abiding word of God. Because, you see- All flesh is like grass and all its glory is like the flower of the field. The grass withers, and the flower falls but the word of the Lord lasts for ever. That is the word that was announced to you. So put away all evil, all deceitful, hateful malice, and all ill-speaking. As newborn babies, long for the spiritual milk, the real stuff, not watered down. That is what will make you grow up to salvation-if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is gracious (1 Peter 1:22-2:3, BFE). Peter connects salvation and transformation in our lives right now. The purification we receive leads to sincere love. God has planted his seed in us, and that seed should produce a certain kind of life. not just praiseworthy action, but a changed heart. If what grows in us doesn't correspond to the seed he planted, then it might make me question whether or not I have ever tasted God's grace. Imagine you go to the garden centre and buy a package of tomato seeds. You plant the seeds and tend to the garden. But when the plant starts to emerge, it doesn't look quite right. And come harvest time, you don't have tomatoes in your garden, but zucchini. You might go to the garden centre and say, I bought a package of zucchini seeds mislabeled as tomato seeds. You didn't see them make that mistake, but you know that's what happened, because what grows is proof of the kind of seed that was planted. If God's grace has been planted in our hearts, it will grow into love. It may not be perfect love, since we're all learning, but we should at least grow in compassion for others. Our works show the evidence of salvation. This brings us into a big theological debate. You might say, we are saved by grace, not by works. Yes, we are saved by grace. Our works don't earn salvation; But, salvation produces to good works. The order matters. If works come first, then we're trying to gain salvation by putting God in our debt This denies God's gift he gave us in Jesus. It also cheapens the gift because it fails to recognize that I could never do enough good to earn what Jesus has done for me. At the same time, Jesus sets and example of what pleases God, Because God has been so generous, it's right to be loyal to him, and we show this loyalty through doing the kinds of good works Jesus did. We don't do good in order to be saved, but because we are saved. Paul expresses the same idea in Ephesians 2, the passage often quoted to say works don't matter: You have been saved by grace, through faith! This doesn't happen on your own initiative; it's God's gift. 9 It isn't on the basis of works, so no one is able to boast. 10 This is the explanation: God has made us what we are. God has created us in King Jesus for the good works that he prepared, ahead of time, as the road we must travel (Ephesians 2:8-10, BFE). God's grace saves us not because of our good works, but for good works. So Living a faithful life isn't extra; it's how we show the new life we've received by faith. B. A Transformed Will The gospel is like a seed planted in our hearts that leads to a changed life. We have a responsibility to care for that garden, just as Adam was charged with caring for the garden God gave him. Anyone who gardens knows you can't make a seed grow, but you can create the best conditions for it. You water it, add compost or fertilizer, pull weeds, and keep pests away. If you do your part, God will make the seed grow into a mature plant. What does it mean to care for the garden of our hearts? We need to practice both weeding and watering. i. Weeding Weeding means keeping harmful things out of our hearts. These are the desires that pull us away from the truth and lead us toward harm. They are things like pride, envy, resentment, selfishness, lust, and greed need to be removed. They're not actions. They're desires. They're the things that we want that are contrary to what God wants. For example, I might want to feel important, but God wants me to learn humility. I might think the good life is about what money can buy, but God cares more about the kind of person I become. I might want to be in control, but God wants me to find peace by trusting him. God isn't interested in just policing our actions. He wants to change our hearts, because what we want shapes what we do. If our desires are right, our actions will follow. It's hard to change our desires. It's much easier to change our actions. This is like cutting weeds at the surface, rather than pulling them up by the roots But if we don't deal with the root of the problem-our heart's desires-the weeds will keep coming back. They can stop the life God wants to grow in us, which won't mature if it's crowded by weeds. If I'm serious about weeding my heart it means regularly taking time for honest self-examination. I say 'honest,' because if I am looking simply to justify myself, I'm guaranteed to not find much that needs to change. I need to humble my before God and ask him to show me what needs to change. Remember, God already knows, so he won't reject me, even if he exposes something really. This is the sort of examination David is inviting God into in Psalm 139:23-24 Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. Point out anything in me that offends you, and lead me along the path of everlasting life (Psalm 103:23-24, NLT). If we honestly ask God to show us the weeds, He will do it. It may not make us feel good in the short term, but just as David says, it's the way path to everlasting life. ii. Watering Allowing the new life to grow in us isn't just about keeping bad stuff away, but also letting the good stuff in. To continue the analogy, we need to Water our hearts to help the seed grow. This isn't about creating new life, but about giving it the best environment to grow. Watering means practicing spiritual disciplines that focus us on God and his kingdom. These include prayer, reading and studying scripture, fasting, meditation, confession, and serving others. Like physical exercise, these habits work best when we make them part of our routine. Maybe you read a short passage of scripture and reflect on it each morning. Maybe you say the Lord's Prayer after breakfast. You might have a trusted friend to confess your sins to each week and receive assurance of God's forgiveness. Or maybe you volunteer regularly to help those in need. None of these practices guarantees a dramatic change in your life, but they open you up to God making the soil of your heart a welcoming place for the seed of new life God has planted in you. Only with a changed heart can we truly learn to love each other. Otherwise, our religion is just behaviour modification, which is only surface-level. And what is planted will eventually come up, so all our attempts at keeping the bad stuff confined beneath the surface will eventually fail. But by caring for the garden of our hearts, we grow into the people God wants us to be. Conclusion The Christian life here and now isn't about waiting around for heaven. It's a journey toward a real future that Jesus has already secured for us. Peter wants us to let all three parts of salvation shape our lives at the same time. We look back and remember that Jesus has already paid for our sins. Nothing can undo what he has done. Also, while our past failures are real, because of Jesus, they aren't final. His sacrifice sets us free, so our past no longer controls us. We look ahead and remember that God will finish what he started. One day, suffering, shame, death, grief, temptation, and injustice will all be gone. God will fix everything wrong in our world, even the stains in our hearts. This future isn't a fantasy-it's guaranteed by Jesus' resurrection. Because of that, we live differently now. In the present, we need to tend to the garden of our heart, nourishing what God has planted. We pursue holiness, not to earn God's approval, but because his life is already growing in us. The life that will be mature in the age to come is already blooming in our hearts. So the question I have to ask myself is, "What do I want to grow in me?" Is the certainty of salvation guaranteed by what Jesus did, and nourished by the hope of what God will do, making the soil of my heart receptive to the work God wants to do in me right now? Am I willing to surrender my desires to God, to come under his discipline and become something new? I have been saved. I will be saved. In light of that, I must learn, today, to lay claim to that salvation and let it grow in my heart. Salvation: Future, Past & Present | Salvation: Future, Past and Present By Peter Law | Crossings Community Church (Kirkland Lake) | May 17, 2026 | 1 Peter 1:13-2:3