“Through him you believe in God, who raised him from the dead and glorified him, and so your faith and hope are in God.”           

When I returned to an anniversary celebration of my former church, it was a blessing to me as the pastors continue the tradition of preaching the Bible. That may come across odd to you, but many churches, instead of putting the Word primary, church growth and people pleasing become paramount.  To come together to see what God has done and is doing for over 150 years is worth celebrating.             

What was also encouraging to me was the breath of fresh air given by the Holy Spirit to revive and renew the church. The people were unified. They were optimistic about the future. They love their present pastor and he loves them. He knew God had sent him there and they knew it too. They saw people come to Christ, clean up their lives, change, and worship. The theme around which many of us spoke was the enduring work of God that is founded on continual teaching, training and preaching from the Word of God. As we remain faithful the Word of God and seek to put it into practice and obey it, we can believe it will not return void. God is doing something by His Spirit through the Word which is to produce love.           

As we continue to look at Peter’s encouragement to the suffering church, they knew Pastor Peter experienced the hard times of life. They knew he did not always get it right. He wanted them to keep looking at the Lord. He knew the only practical way to do that was to keep diligent in the word of God. It is not just for the purpose of studying and learning the truth, it is for the purpose of living out that truth to change our hearts and our relationships.           

The truth of the word points to the person of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is not only the author of truth, but of life and love. Hope comes when we focus on the works of Jesus who died for our sin and is coming again. Inviting Christ into our lives and seeking to follow up is the key for our eternal hope and life everlasting.

The Bible is to be a living book. That is a present tense verb. It talks about continuingly living out the truths that affect us in life and in suffering. Likewise, it is an enduring book. It will last forever. In a world where everything is dying around us, there is one thing that endures. It is the word of God.

When we start to replace the teachings of the Bible with thoughts of mankind, we will endanger the church. When we speak the truth without love, we have hardened the church. When we speak love without truth, we move to a man-made religion. The anchor holds. It is the basis of not only our faith, but our life. If it doesn’t affect how we live, then we haven’t understood it well enough yet.

Application:  Can you think of a practical way to carry out one of its principles today? How has it encouraged you? How has it affected you? How has it affected others through you? It is the change agent through which God works.

Prayer:  Gracious Father, Your Word is always an encouragement to me.   Your Living Word is always at work within me through Your Holy Spirit.  This is more than I can comprehend, so I praise YOU!