The One Part 3 - Hope!

“As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.” – Ephesians 4:1-6 NIV

According to ‘Google,’ the definition of ‘hope’ is “want something to happen or be the case.” We often recognise ‘hope’ as a wishful thinking. This word has uncertain possibility about what we want something to happen. For example, I hope that I can get a Christian girlfriend someday. However, Christian hope has a different meaning. According to ‘The Westminster Dictionary of Theological Terms,’ it means to anticipate “the future as the fulfilment of God’s purposes based on God’s covenant faithfulness and the resurrection of Jesus Christ as known by the work of the Holy Spirit.” A Christian is a believer in Jesus Christ. If we put faith and hope together, it becomes the “evidence of things we cannot see.” (Hebrew 11:1). Since I am a Christian, I could say “I will be resurrected at the end of my physical life by the power of Jesus” with confidence. One of God’s promises is that believers in Jesus are going to be resurrected at the end of their physical lives—just as Jesus was raised from the dead (Romans 8:9-11).

I do not know how to show the real evidence that Jesus Christ was crucified for us to give us eternal life in Him and the Spirit of God apart from the Bible, but when we imagine these things and God’s love for us, it does not really make sense. How God can send His beloved and only Son, Jesus Christ, into the world to crucify for us, especially when we have ignored Him? In addition, Jesus considers us as His friend (John 15:13-16). How amazing is that? Furthermore, 1 Corinthians 15 is probably the strongest argument of Apostle Paul on what Christian faith would be looking like if there is no resurrection of the dead. “For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied.” (v. 16-19) Actually, he was the persecutor of the church before he had the encounter of Jesus (Acts 9:1-19). Nonetheless, after he became a believer in Jesus, he was confident in proclaiming that he was saved by the grace of God (1 Corinthians 15:3-10).

I had an encounter with God like Paul before I became a believer in Jesus. I was probably worse than him. I was not a persecutor of the church and had not been blinded for several days but I became a liar to the church and Christians. According to the Bible, I lied to God (Acts 5:3-4). I was pretending to worship Him while I was in the church. My mind was on people all the time. Technically, I was a follower of the people. As I want to be “cool” person in Long Bay College, I considered pink as my favourite colour and I purposely got into trouble. Now, after I became a Christian, I found my identity in Jesus and can fearlessly say what Paul declared: “by the grace of God I am what I am and his grace to me was not without effect.” (1 Corinthians 15:10).