When Jesus died on the Cross, that left the Apostle Peter as a man without hope. Emotionally, he was a man full of bitter sorrow. The memory of his denials of Jesus Christ, by even calling down curses on himself was like dark cloud of hopelessness hovering over his life.
Then the first reports came in from the women, to the effect that Jesus was alive. Peter raced to the tomb and it was empty. His hope sprang into life again. He now had a LIVING HOPE, grounded in the resurrection of Jesus Christ
All genuine hope is derived from God and his promises, and the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.
The Christian hope is based on Jesus’ resurrection from the dead. It is the proof that the sacrifice made by Jesus in payment for our sins was acceptable to God, and that payment for our sins has been made in full.
The resurrection is everything to Christianity. The crucifixion loses its meaning without the resurrection. The life of Christ is a waste without that resurrection. Without the resurrection, the death of Christ becomes the heroic death of a noble martyr, and nothing more!
It wasn’t His teaching, and it wasn’t His miracles, and it wasn’t His dying that accounted for the Church, and accounted for Christianity. It was His resurrection. There would be no Christian Church today, if Jesus Christ had not risen from the dead.
The foundation of our faith, The foundation of the Church, The foundation of our eternal hope is the resurrection of Jesus Christ. He is the ground of all our hope. You can bank your hope on him. Not yourself, Not your intelligence, Not your health, Not your money, Not your job, Not your reputation. None of these things can sustain your hope. They can collapse in a moment.
When we are faced with pain or illness, disappointment or tragedy, we need the hope that God is aware of what is going on in our lives, and that He cares.
When it seems like “ALL-HELL” is breaking loose in the world around us, we need the hope of knowing that God is still in control and that He is the ultimate victor.
When we are filled with fear, we need the hope of a living Savior saying to us, “FEAR NOT, I WILL NEVER LEAVEYOU, NOR FORSAKE YOU.”
God wants your hope to be firm and unshakable, and so he built it upon it his own Son, Jesus Christ, the foundation of our hope.
by Corville Peters
