We will wrap up our series on the ordinary means of grace by considering the hope that is ours in these means.

First, when we speak of the hope that is ours as Christians, we mean a hope that is certain to be fulfilled. We aren’t using the word the way it is often used in English—to describe a wish that we would like to have fulfilled, and maybe it will and maybe it won’t. Christian hope is the eager anticipation of the fulfillment of all of God’s promises in the person and work of Jesus Christ. This is why Paul says of Jesus Christ in 2 Corinthians 1:20, “For all the promises of God find their Yes in him. That is why it is through him that we utter our Amen to God for his glory.”

Second, the way God ordinarily applies the fulfillment of those promises to his people is by his Spirit working through the ordinary means. In other words, we don’t need to chase a mystical experience or wait for a Christian retreat weekend in order to be in fellowship with God! This is the good news about the ordinary means! The means themselves may be ordinary, but the work God does in us and for us by the ordinary means is anything but ordinary! It is miraculous. It is extraordinary. He is shaping us more and more into the image of Christ. He is beautifying us as a bride in preparation for the wedding day. We were dead, but are now alive in Christ. We were rebels, but are now at war with the desire to sin that is in us. And this desire is being mortified—killed—by the Spirit working through the ordinary means.

Finally, we should be encouraged by the simple fact that these ordinary means by which God does miraculous work in us are easily accessible. They are close at hand. You don’t have to be a monk to benefit from them. You don’t have to have a seminary degree. You simply have to avail yourself of them! Be in God’s Word regularly—reading it, praying through it, meditating upon it, memorizing it, and studying it. And let this time in God’s Word begin each week in corporate worship, where the one ordained by God to preach his Word opens that Word up to you. Come to the Table in corporate worship and eat and drink by faith, knowing that God has saved, is saving, and will save you by the perfect righteousness and shed blood of Jesus Christ. Be constant in prayer. You don’t need the perfect place to pray. You may pray in any place and in any circumstance, and your Father in heaven, who loves you infinitely, hears.

This hope belongs to us, dear saints! The Father has given us these things for our good. He meets us in them and builds us up through them. He loves us. There is nothing he will not do out of love and for the good of his Son’s bride.

Pastor Matt