“Therefore, preparing your minds for action, and being sober-minded, set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ” (1Pe.1:13). The future is uncertain, so what have we to hope in? Hoping in things that aren’t eternal is really no hope at all, for such things are merely temporary. But the return–”or revelation”–of Christ is sure. When he returns, he’ll show grace to his children for all eternity. Peter says to fix our hope upon this. When we do, it will prepare our minds for action here and sober up our foggy thinking for “the thoughts of eternity are mighty prevailing thoughts, they are over-awing thoughts, soul-humbling thoughts that would ballast our hearts” (Jeremiah Burroughs). The best way to be effective in this life is to “set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.”

“‘Were you there when they crucified my Lord?’…we must answer, ‘Yes, we were there.’ Not as spectators only but as participants, guilty participants…Before we can begin to see the cross as something done for us, we have to see it as something done by us.” John Stott, The Cross of Christ