In 1:1 and 2, we have the operation of the Triune God: the selection of God the Father, the sanctification of the Spirit, and the sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ. Then in the remainder of the first chapter we have the full salvation of the Triune God. This full salvation is composed of the Father’s regeneration, the Spirit’s application, and the Son’s redemption. The Father’s regeneration has brought His eternal life into us and has also brought us into the enjoyment of this eternal life. Now this enjoyment is a living hope for us today.
When some hear that we may enjoy the living hope today, they may argue and say, “How can you claim that the living hope is a present matter? Something present can never be a hope. Romans 8 gives us a description of hope. That chapter tells us that hope refers to things that we have not seen.” Those who would try to argue in this way need to realize that the living hope, the inheritance, is ours today, tomorrow, and for eternity. With our present enjoyment we have a hope. This means that our enjoyment of the divine life is a hope. For example, perhaps early in the day you may have a failure in your Christian life. Nevertheless, even though you have failed, you still have a hope. You may say to yourself, “I’m very weak, yet I still have hope. My experience may be poor, but I have hope. Perhaps even later today my experience will be uplifted.” Do you not have such a hope within you? We all have this living hope. Day by day we live a life of living hope.
The reason we have a life of hope is that we have a heavenly inheritance. This hope, this inheritance, is the result of the Father’s regeneration. In verses 3 through 9 we see various aspects of the inheritance of eternal life. Our enjoyment and experience of eternal life are due to the Father’s regeneration.
A recent experience I had with a stomach ulcer may be used to illustrate what Peter means by living hope. When I discovered that I had a problem, I was hospitalized briefly for examination and tests. After the examination and the tests were completed, I began to have a living hope every day. I realized that within my body there is a life that could solve the problem of my ulcer. This life caused me to have a living hope. Eventually, I was fully healed and recovered. I was recovered according to the living hope I had.
A living hope depends on life. If there were no life in our body, we would not have the hope to be healed of any illness or injury. But because we have life in our body, we have the hope for it to be healed of injury or illness. We would not have such a hope for something that is not living. For example, suppose a wooden chair is broken. The chair does not have any hope of repairing itself. If no one comes to work on the chair to repair it, it will remain indefinitely broken without any hope of being fixed. But when I was in the hospital, I could have a living hope because of the life in my body. I had the confidence that my physical life would heal the problem in my body. Therefore, I had a living hope.
What is a living hope? A living hope is a hope that comes from life. This hope results from the living, organic element within us.
In addition to physical life, we also have the divine life in us through the Father’s regeneration. This life is the strongest, richest, and highest life. To be sure, this life will take care of us. We may have problems and troubles, but we have a living hope because of the divine life within us. We are not dead—we are living. Thus, we have a living hope, the hope that our situation will be better in the future. We have eternal life, and this life gives us a living hope. This hope is the inheritance of all the blessings of eternal life.