Through him you believe in God, who raised him from the dead and glorified him, and so your faith and hope are in God.
1 Peter 1:21 NIV
Believe
An Ipsos survey released last March finds that, on average across 30 countries, only 30% of adults say most people can be trusted against 70% who believe that you can’t be too careful dealing with people. Among these countries, interpersonal trust is highest in China and India, where 56% say most people can be trusted, and lowest in Brazil, Malaysia, and Turkey, where fewer than 15% say so. In Canada, only 33% of citizens believe that most people can be trusted, against 67% who believe that you can’t be too careful dealing with people.
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There is a common misunderstanding about Christianity that anybody who claims to believe in God is a good Christian. There is far more to it than this. The Bible tells us in James 2:19 that even the demons believe in God, and they tremble. But they are hardly Christians. So, what is the mark of a Christian? The answer to that is found in 1 Peter 1:21: “Through him you believe in God, who raised him from the dead and glorified him, and so your faith and hope are in God.” Peter here is speaking about Jesus. The apostle has just been speaking about our redemption through His blood and then he adds the rest of the story. It was God the Father who raised Jesus from the dead and who then raised Him to Glory. Because of our relationship with Jesus, Peter says, we put our faith in God. The heart of the Christian faith is Jesus. Through Him we meet God the Father. A Christian is not someone who simply believes in God. It is a person who has come to know God through faith in Jesus.
These have been words from the heart.
Bob Beasley