In our previous message we saw ourselves as born again to a living hope of an imperishable inheritance. Now in the text before us we see that inheritance summed up as "a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time." Future salvation is a keynote struck in this passage of Scripture.

With (tongue in cheek) apologies to those who would allow only one keynote per passage, I add another. Faith is another keynote struck in this passage.

These two themes join hands in these verses. So we'll take them hand-in-hand as FAITH AND OUR FUTURE SALVATION.

Our faith projects us into the future. It's full of hope. The so-called faith chapter, Hebrews 11, starts with: "Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen" (vs 1). And the believing examples in the chapter exercised faith that projected them into the future.

At the beginning of our text we find "who," which connects with the identification of the addressees in vs 3: those God "has caused us to be born again to a living hope." It ends with the identification: "you who believe in him."

"Him" refers to Jesus Christ in previous verse. We who believe in the Jesus Christ have a living hope. Our faith attaches itself to that hope. We are believers who have a future salvation and by faith we view it in advance.

Our "faith is the assurance of things hoped for." And so our text begins by assuring us of that:

In our previous message we saw that our inheritance is being kept in heaven for us. Now we see that we as the heirs are being guarded by God's power for the future salvation that will deliver us into our inheritance in the eternal realm.

It is important to notice cause and effect here. We must not attribute our eternal security to our faith, but rather to God's power. We are being guarded by God's power as the cause and through faith as the effect. Not the other way around!

There's the idea around among Christians today that faith is something inherent in every human being and that each one can either choose or refuse to exercise their faith.

The idea is just plain foolish. Faith is trust or believing. If we have it we trust. We believe. We can't have faith and not exercise it. Either we trust or we don't; either we believe or we don't; either we have faith that trusts or we have no faith. Either we have faith that believes or we don't have faith.

If we don't believe we are unbelievers. Unbelievers don't trust. They don't have faith. So how did we switch from unbelief to faith? How is it that we can now say that we believe in Jesus Christ as our Savior?

God's power. That's what happened to us. By grace God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ are the source of our faith just as surely as they are the source of our love (Acts 18:27; Eph 6:23).

It is our faith. The text not only speaks of "you who believe in him," but also speaks of "your faith" two times. God doesn't believe for us; we believe for ourselves. But the power of God is the source of our faith.

We are in Christ Jesus and so are God's gifts of love and faith and nothing can separate us from them. They are gifts He gave us through His grace before the ages began (1 Tim 1:14; Rom 8:1, 38-39; 2 Tim 1:8-9).

God gave us saving faith and we will never lose it. And through faith He will guard us until we receive our ultimate salvation. No doubt about it!

And now our salvation is nearer than when we first believed (Rom 13:11). So Peter tells us it's "a salvation ready to be revealed." This brings us to an important prospect of our faith, the rapture of the church.

The Bible presents the rapture as an imminent event. Imminence means nearness. The question is, when we think of the rapture how near is nearness?

The imminence of the rapture started out as one kind of possibility but later took on the meaning of another possibility, the one that applies to us today. Let me explain.

Jesus had risen from the dead and was meeting with His disciples on the shore of the Sea of Tiberias, focusing His attention on Peter. "When you are old," Jesus told him, "you will stretch out your hands, and another will dress you and carry you where you do not want to go."

John, who recorded this occasion in his Gospel, explained what Jesus meant: "This he said to showby what kind of death he was going to glorify God." Someday an elderly Peter would be carried away to a martyr's death (Jn 21:18-19). And the early church adopted the meaning of imminence as we know it today after the death of Peter in old age.

The interpretive words are "when you are old." Obviously, this meant that the rapture wouldn't take place before Peter grew old and died. He was one of the charter members of the church and if the rapture had taken place before he died he would have been raptured.

During many of those years, due to aging, at given times some people expected to die themselves before Peter's death. Others expected the rapture in their lifetime, but not immediately. And as some saw Peter starting to grow old the time factor began to shrink in their view of imminence. In fact, in his first inspired letter Peter, no doubt reading his own wrinkles, urged his readers: "Set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ" (1 Pet 1:13). And surely his words ring with the sound of immediacy when he writes: "The end of all things is at hand; therefore be self-controled and sober-minded for the sake of your prayers" (1 Pet 4:7).

Soon after that Peter made a startling announcement in his second inspired letter. "I think it right, as long as I am in this body, to stir you up by way of reminder, since I know that the putting off of my body will be soon, as our Lord Jesus Christ made clear to me" (2 Pet 1:13-14). In approximation to that event the imminence of the rapture took on new meaning.

I say, "in approximation" deliberately. There was a couple of things Peter said would happen to those early church believers that we must allow for in relation to the imminent event of Christ's return. In his first letter he told the saints who were suffering under persecution that God would "restore, confirm, strengthen and establish" them (1 Pet 5:10). In his second letter he told his same readers that "false teachers" and "false prophets" would be infiltrating among them, "secretly" bringing in "destructive herisies" and exploiting them "with false words" (2 Pet 2:1-3;. So I say, "in approximation" to allow time for those events to happen before the rapture could be considered as an any-day-now event.

So considering Jesus' prophecy of the death of Peter and those other prophecies of Peter coming to pass, we can say for sure that when all that happened imminence took on the meaning that it still has for us today. From that time until now, for generation after generation it has meant: Always be ready.

We should always be ready for our "salvation ready to be revealed in the last time." Each generation of believers, probably since the postmortem fulfillment of Peter's predictions I've cited, could consider themselves as living in the last time. And so should we.

Peter's direct addressees had been "grieved by various trials." Their trials were "for a little while," and "necessary." "If" shouldn't be taken as something that could or might happen to them, but as the realistic fact that they were suffering for righteousness sake and according to the will of God (1 Pet 3:14; 4:19).

Yet Peter wrote: "In this you rejoice," referring back to "a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time." They grieved yet they rejoiced. The Apostle Paul spoke of it in his own case. Read the various trials he experienced that could have frazzled him to complete physical, emotional and spiritual exhaustion. Yet in his own words he was "as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing. (2 Cor 6:4-10).

This is an inexplicable but very experiential fact that many of us as Christians have known when severe trials haven't spared us. The grief is real. No doubt about it. But the joy of the Lord is real too.

When my mother committed suicide her clothes were found at the edge of a lake but her body wasn't found until seven weeks later. Believe me; my grief of that waiting period was very real. But, praise God, His compensating joy was also very real.

During that time I was making deliveries at regular stops. At one of them someone who knew what our family was going through perceived my victory and commented: "You are a wonder, you are." Of course, I replied that it wasn't me but the Lord.

I vividly recall how the imminent return of Jesus became a precious sustaining part of my life during that grievous time. "In this" I rejoiced, namely, the "salvation ready to be revealed in the last time."

When our daughter was sixteen she was involved in a near fatal car crash in which she sustained multiple injuries. During her recovery once again the paradox became a part of my life. Grief, real grief; joy, real joy.

Are you facing some heart-breaking trial right now? There's a verse I gave you in my previous message that's no empty platitude. "May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope" (Rom 15:16). Reflect again on this verse until your tears of grief are joined by God's tears of joy.

"Salvation ready to be revealed in the last time will be revealed at the revelation of Jesus Christ." There is no salvation without the Savior. How precious to anticipate seeing Jesus Himself and being like Him and with Him forever!

I've always loved that precious fact of Scripture that "the Lord himself will descend from heaven" (1 Thess 4:17). The context deals with the resurrection of the dead in Christ and the rapture of the saints alive on earth when He comes. And the thought of that event is thrilling. But that reflective expression: "the Lord himself," always pulsates for me on the page of that verse especially, making Jesus Himself my preeminent thrill.

At the relation of Jesus Christ special attention will be given to genuine faith. Peter tells his contemporary readers that the reason for their various trials is "so that the tested genuineness of [their] faith…may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ."

He contrasts their genuine faith with gold that perishes, suggesting that the kind of faith they had was imperishable. No wonder. It was given by the power of God and guaranteed to bring them to their future salvation.

We might also contrast their faith with the works of believers that will be accounted for at the Judgment Seat of Christ. Some will be acceptable and by analogy like gold, silver and precious stones will not be burned up by the test of fire. Others will be unacceptable and by analogy like wood, hay and straw will be burned up by the test of fire. Those whose works get burned up will suffer loss but they themselves will be saved (1 Cor 3:12-15).

They will be saved because of the imperishable God-given faith that God has granted them by His grace. At the revelation of Jesus Christ that faith will be found to result in praise, glory and honor. "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ," (1 Pet 1:3) for He "according to his mercy has caused us to be born again." His power guards us through faith to bring us to our eternal inheritance. So at Christ's return the genuineness of our faith will result in praise to God Himself Who produced it.

Now back to the words "so that." Peter told his suffering readers that their various trials were "so that" the testing of the genuineness of their faith would result in that future accolade to God. I think the proper take on this is to assume that the testing was present during their suffering, not at the future result of the test.

It wasn't a test to see if their faith was genuine, but a test of the genuineness of their faith exactly that. That they passed the test is evidenced by their living hope of future salvation and great rejoicing in spite of their grievous trials.

See their attitude enhanced in the final two verses of our test under the point:

They believed in Jesus Christ. See how their faith in Him made them rejoice. They rejoiced "with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory."

Their attitude was like Paul's who considered "that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us." He called that glory "the revealing of the sons of God" and "the freedom of the glory of the children of God" and "the redemption of our bodies." It will be our glorification when we will be glorified and "conformed to the image of his Son" (Rom 8:18-23; 29-30).

Though those early readers of Peter had not seen Jesus Christ they loved Him. And, I have no doubt, they were focusing on the Savior whose image they'd bear when they would be like Him and see Him as He is (Col 3:4; 1 Jn 3:2).

Anticipating that glory of then filled them with glory now. They were "obtaining the outcome of their faith," that future salvation of their souls. They knew that and rejoiced "with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory."

The goal, or as the ESV puts it, the outcome, of our faith is here called the saving of our souls. Peter tells us that we "were straying like sheep, but have now returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls," and that we have purified [our] souls by [our] obedience to the truth" (1 Pet 1:25; 2:22).

Blessed God Who caused us to be born again to a living hope. Bless Him for His power that guards us through His gift of faith for our future salvation.

Genuine faith. It came to us initially when we received Christ as our Savior. That's when we had our initial saving encounter with the Gospel. That's when the death, burial and resurrection of Christ became to the power of God for our salvation (1 Cor 15:1-4); Rom 1:16).

In that Gospel "the righteousness of God is revealed." As believers we look back to the cross where Christ became sin for us so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God, and we praise God for the appropriation of His righteousness that we've made that gives us right standing before Him now and forever (vs 17; 2 Cor 5:21).

But I've short quoted. Here's an extension: "The righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith." And that means that from our initial faith we move on to "walk in the footsteps of faith" exemplified by Abraham (Rom 4:12). As another extension to the quote defines, "The righteous shall live by faith."

Thus we combine our backward look with our inward look. Paul gives us his own testimony about this combination: "I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me" (Gal 2:20).

Paul writes about Christ as his dying Substitute on the cross: "who loved me and gave himself for me." He also writes about Christ as his living Substitute: "It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me."

There is the sinful Paul (Rom 7:18) who was nailed to the cross in his Substitute. That sinful Paul no longer lives. But a new Paul has come out of death with Christ who lives by faith in the Son of God. Looking upward we see Paul and ourselves seated with Christ, where we see Christ as our life (Col 3:1-4).

By faith we transfer Christ as our life in Whom we are seated above into practical Christian living here below. We started by faith in the Son of God and we continue by faith in the Son of God.

And in our forward look we realize "that salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed." While we sense the imminence of our ultimate salvation, by genuine faith we "put on the armor of light" that is, we "put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires" (Rom 13:11-14).