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1 Peter 3:15 – Why Are We Losing Our People?
Why are we Losing both Children and Adults?
Which of the following fits someone you know: 1) They still believe in Jesus but they are not active in their faith; 2) They adopted the world’s beliefs and moral systems; 3) Their peers are their guide; 4) They are too busy to be bothered with everything; 5) They became a believer in another religion.
Again, I ask, “Why are we losing both our young people and even adults?” A true but more shallow answer is these people never became fully armed with the right arguments against false beliefs; nor did they get invested deeply into the right reasons for their own beliefs.
Peter didn’t make those arguments in giving hope to his readers. There is a deeper reason people are walking away. They’ve lost something. Peter writes, “Always be ready to give a defense for the hope that is within you” (1 Peter 3:15). This verse isn’t primarily about being able to recite why (pick a church topic). This verse is about “our hope” which is the resurrection. This is why we don’t fear what others fear – death (1 Peter 3:14). What is the reason for this seemingly irrational hope? It is the historical reality of Jesus’s resurrection.
This makes everything rational. This means that I can endure persecution, even death, because of the resurrection.
But there is more. Peter also writes, “by His wounds you were healed” (1 Peter 2:24). Jesus’s crucifixion heals us of spiritual wounds, but His resurrection heals of us physical wounds – the consequence of living in a cursed world – sickness, pains, deformities, and death.
When petitioning with people who have fallen away in various forms, we need to remind them of Jesus’ resurrection, that is our hope. So, ask them, “Do you want to be rid of all the pains of living in this world? Do you want to be resurrected?” The resurrection is coming, where all the tombs will open, raising both the righteous and unrighteous (John 5). So ask, “Do you want to be resurrected with an imperishable body, raised in honor, glory, and power, as a spiritual body” forever (1 Cor.15)? That is our hope!
Why are we losing people? We – and they – have forgotten what our hope is.
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