A Living Hope

"To be born is to enter existence in a new world. Physical birth brings us into a world that will eventually perish. Spiritual birth is into a world where there is hope for the future...

"The picture of the Christian life presented by Peter in these opening verses is characterized by hope in what God will do in the future. Christians, he says, look forward to salvation in the world to come. Their lives ought to have a forward-looking and other-worldly dimension that is often lacking among contemporary [Western] Christians." —I. Howard Marshall, 1 Peter, 36, 43.