Hope for Now

Therefore, prepare your minds for action, keep sober in spirit, fix your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. - 1 Peter 1:13

Hope.

We all need hope.  It motivates and sustains us.  Often it's the difference between waking up ready to go and never wanting to get out of bed. Half empty or half full?  Hope is important.

That's why when I read this verse, my mind said "Stop!"  Actually, it was when I hit the word "completely".  Not just "be hopeful" or "find hope", but "fix your hope completely".  Sounds like this is the summation of where all our hope should come from.  

Continuing on with the verse...

"On the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ"

And this is where my spirit said "Stop!".  Seriously.  Can't I just read my verse and move on.  

But something bugged me.  Let's set our hope on the grace coming when Christ is revealed.  Well, having heard a bunch of scriptures in my days, this says "Second Coming" to me.  So when Christ returns or I meet Him in Heaven, the grace which is revealed then is what I set my hope upon.  Seems a long time away.  Actually reminds me of that old hymn of going to heaven.

When we all get to Heaven, what a day of rejoicing that will be.
When we all see Jesus, we'll sing and shout the victory.

Honestly, I don't like that song.  "Blasphemy" you say.  Perhaps.  But it has a morbid tone to it.  It says to me that when I manage to suffer through this life, staying firm, I'll find a reason to shout at the end.  

It's just that this isn't the gospel I know.  This isn't the eternal life I've received.  ( Go see here for eternal life in my view )

So that verse bugged me, so what do I do, off to biblehub.com.  

I don't know greek, but I can click links.  Obviously word order moved around, but it just seemed odd, so I went farther.

For example, click on the number for "at" above and you get:

Perhaps it's just me, but the word "at" denotes a time in the future typically, but "in" for example is more present tense.  Odd, jump a little farther back and you see "being brought".  Hmm, the verse said "to be brought".  That seems like a different tense.  Click on that horrible "V-PPM/P-AFS" link and you find it's present tense.  But wait, the verse sure sounded future.  Strange, but then again... [shrugs] greek.

If you go switch back to the parallel view you'll find almost all the translations were similar, except for one of my new favorite translations.  Way to go Jubilee Bible.

Therefore, having the loins of your understanding girded with temperance, wait perfectly in the grace that is presented unto you when Jesus, the Christ, is manifested unto you,

Here's the point I've been way too slowly working up to.  This shouldn't be future tense.  We shouldn't set our hope upon grace we'll find in Jesus some day in the future.

Nope.

Our hope is on Jesus now.  As Jesus is revealed to us now, we find the grace He has brought for us.  So we set our hope on Him, just as Hebrews says "fixing our eyes upon Jesus".  

Hope then, is found upon our knees.  As we seek this Jesus who has saved us, waiting in His presence to know Him better, the revelations of His goodness which are given to us overflow in grace over us.  Grace then allows us to live our lives fully.