Well, hello and welcome to Walking with Christ. I'm Jeremy, and I'm so glad you're here today. Thank you for taking just a few moments to listen to this devotional. As a reminder, these devotionals are just a short time we set aside to reflect on a portion of Scripture contextually, thoughtfully, and prayerfully. And as we go verse by verse through these chapters of the Bible, we seek not only to understand God's Word a little bit more, but also to apply it, and to let it shape how we live, think, and walk with Jesus each and every day. Today we look at a very encouraging passage in our study of Colossians, looking specifically at chapter 1, verses 3-5, and we'll be reading from the ESV. Paul writes there, We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. Last time, we looked pretty closely at the relationship of God the Father and Christ the Son, noting their distinct and unique roles and personalities in the Godhead. But this was simply the beginning of a beautiful and encouraging passage of Scripture as Paul opened up his letter to the church in Colossae. He continues this into verse 4 with, "...since we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints because of the hope laid up for you in heaven." It doesn't take much to see Paul's amazing heart here. The joy he found in this church, and this is one that he likely never visited in person, was very clear and very authentic. Paul says that he and the others who were with him thanked God when they prayed because of the church's faith in Christ and their love for the saints, and that's believers. This is something we may have experienced before, especially if we have discipled those new in the faith. Seeing someone's commitment and trust in the Lord grow is a source of great joy to a Christian, and witnessing their brotherly love for other believers deepen and mature, further proving their faith is genuine, brings joy upon joy in a spiritual sense. And it is here that we can see how the Holy Spirit refines believers to be more and more like their Savior Jesus. As professing Christians, it's important for each of us to be mindful of how we portray our love and faith to others. People are watching and they're paying attention, both fellow Christians as well as the unsaved. And this is why Paul says in four of his epistles that we need to live in a manner worthy of our calling as Christ followers. For scripture references, you can look up Ephesians 4 verse 1, Philippians 1 verse 27, Colossians 1 verse 10, which we'll get to soon, and 1 Thessalonians 2 verse 12. So if we behave as unbelievers or we walk in a weak, unproductive faith, lacking love for other believers and for the lost, we rob joy from other Christians and we mock our Lord. Like the Colossians, we should be walking examples of our faith in Christ and reflecting the love that He has for us in everything that we do. As a friend recently told me, no matter what we do, in work or play, it should be as though we were putting it on a serving plate and offering it up to God. With this kind of attitude, we are bound to honor God, to bring joy to our brothers and sisters in Christ, and to shine a light into the dark world around us. Paul then goes on to say that the Colossians' faith and love is because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. The word rendered because is from the Greek dia, and it might be better understood here as through or by means of. The Colossians' faith in Christ and the love they had for the other saints came through the hope they had laid up for them in heaven. Worth noting here is that the text does not suggest that these believers had built up this hope on their own. It was a hope laid up for them. The Greek word used here means to be laid away, or reserved, or awaiting. This hope was not of their own accord, and it's not of ours either. It is a hope provided to us by God in Jesus Christ as part of our salvation. We have the hope of heaven through the gift of salvation, and this hope subsequently increases our faith in Christ and our love for other saints. The Apostle Peter spoke of the source and magnitude of our hope in the opening of his first epistle. In 1 Peter 1 verses 3 to 5, he wrote, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. According to His great mercy, He has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God's power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. God keeps, or perhaps more precisely, guards our inheritance in heaven, protected through a faith in Christ which He mercifully grants us for a salvation to be revealed at the proper time. Now this is truly an amazing promise, and one that can certainly be relied upon more than the fact that the sun will rise in the east and set in the west. Our hope is secure. And with this hope, we are free to exercise boundless faith in Christ and to show great love to all the saints, just as our brothers and sisters did in Colossae 2,000 years ago. Well, thank you so much for spending these few minutes in God's Word with me today. And as you go about the rest of your day, remember the words of Colossians 2, verse 6. Therefore, as you have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him. May the Lord strengthen you to walk faithfully with Him step-by-step, verse-by-verse, and day-by-day. And until we meet again, keep walking with Christ.