Romans
15:13
Is there hope? That’s
a question that many people are asking. Is life worth living? Can
I count on anything in life? Is
There Hope? This question is asked everyday by thousands of people in a thousand
different ways.
You can go forty days without food and three days without
water and you can go eight minutes without air. But you can’t go a single second without hope.
Hope is one of the essentials of life.
When hope is gone, life is over. You
need hope to cope.
I remember reading about a young man in another country
that was trapped under the debris of a school that had collapsed when an
earthquake hit the area where he lived. The
rescue workers were digging through the rubble to find survivors.
After a few hours of pulling body after body from the rubble they gave up
hope of finding anyone alive. They
were calling off the search. This young boys father ran past the barricade and
started searching through the rubble for his son. Everyone tried to convince him
that his son was dead and that it was no use to keep searching.
The father ignored all those around him and kept digging and searching.
Hours went by, and then night fell but he kept searching.
The police tried to get him to go home but the father refused. One day
went by then two days went by on the third day as he was digging he heard
something. He could here a voice saying hold on my dad is coming.
Hold on my dad will find us. As
the man broke through the rubble he heard his son say dad is that you?
The father replied yes son it's me!
Dad, I told them that you would come for us and that you would find us.
What kept those children a live? Someone was giving them Hope!
What gave that young man hope? He
remembered hid father’s words to him. Son I will always be there for you- I
will never leave you. The words of the father gave his son hope to survive.
I want to tell you now there is still hope. There is hope for your
loved ones. There is hope for your family. There is hope at the end of the
valley that you are going through. Remember the words of your Heavenly Father
through the Lord Jesus Christ.
I will never leave you or forsake you.
Let's begin by looking at, where do you go
to find the help and the hope that you need.
Because if you don’t have hope none of the other things in life really
matter. You have to have hope to
believe that God will work in your life. You
have to have hope to believe that God can change your situation, that God can
meet your needs.
The Bible tells us that you find it in God.
God is the source – the source
of hope.
Romans 15:13 “May
God, the source of hope, fill you with joy and peace through your faith in
Him.” In other words as you
put your faith in God, He gives you peace, joy and hope.
And He says, “.. Then you will
overflow with hope…” Specifically, God says if you want to put your hope
in Me, you need to put it in My name. “In
Your name I will hope, for Your name is good.”
What does that mean? How do
you put hope in a name?
You need to understand that names meant a lot more back in
the past than they do today. Today,
we choose names for the way that they sound.
You just like the way it falls off your tongue.
But in ancient cultures, they would choose a name because
of what it meant, because of what it described.
In fact, your name was usually the definition of your character.
You were given a name that matched who you were.
When
God chose to reveal Himself to us through the names He gave Himself. Did you
know that God has a lot of different names?
Jesus Said, “ This is Life eternal, that they might know you the only
true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent. ” Each name of God is a description of His character and, each
one of those names is a promise to you. Each
one of those names is a benefit that God says, I provide to man.
For instance, one name that is used to describe God is
Jehovah Shalom. That means, “I am
the God who gives you peace. And if
you want real peace of mind you come to Me for it.” In another place Abraham called God Jehovah Jirah.
That means, “ the God who provides for all your needs.
You can count on Him. You
can come to Him and know that He will meet your needs.”
Ezekiel 48:35 35 “The city will measure
about six miles around. From then on the name of the city will be The Lord
Is There.” (NCV)
The Hebrew word for the Lord is there is “Jehovah Shammah.”
That means, “I am the God who is always there.”
There is no place that God is not. There
is no place you will go that God isn’t. God
has been in your past. He’s in
your present. He’s going to be in
your future. He’s in the good
times and the bad times. He’s in
the good places. He’s in the evil
places. He is everywhere.
Psalm 139:7-12 7 Where could I go to escape from your Spirit or from
your sight? 8 If I were to climb up to the highest heavens, you would
be there. If I were to dig down to the world of the dead you would also be
there. 9 Suppose I had wings like the dawning day and flew across the
ocean. 10 Even then your powerful arm would guide and protect me. 11
Or suppose I said, “I’ll hide in the dark until night comes to cover
me over.” 12 But you see in the dark because daylight and dark are
all the same to you.
God is with me all the time, whether I feel it or not.
There are a lot of things in life that I can’t count on, a lot of
things in life that are uncertain. These
are three anchors of the soul as the Bible calls them – hope is the anchor of
the soul – things that I can count on so that no matter what happens, there
are three sources of hope that I can count on to
give me hope.
I.
GOD’S PRESENCE IS WITH ME TO WATCH OVER ME.
Isaiah
41:10 10 So don’t
worry, because I am with you. Don’t be afraid, because I am your God. I will
make you strong and will help you; I will support you with my right hand that
saves you. (NCV)
Regardless of what happens, you and
I don’t have to go through it alone. There
is a God who will be with us. He
will be there with you. That is one
of the certainties of life that I can hold on to.
When I hold onto that certainty, I have hope.
There are a lot of uncertainties in life.
One of the sad uncertainties of life is that people will leave you.
Friends and family might move away.
There will be people that you love that will die.
There will be people that you love that will become ill and won’t be
themselves any more. There may even
be those that you argue with and there’s a separation that’s painful.
The sad truth of life is people leave us.
The truth is, God will never leave you.
Psalm 32:8”I
will guide you along the best pathway for your life. I will advise you and will watch over you.”
Circle “guide” and “advise”. You
and I, we don’t know the future nor can we can control the future.
God does know the future and God is in control the future.
Since God knows and controls the future He is able to guide and advise
us. He’s willing to show us the
way. It is up to you and me to
follow His lead and listen to His counsel.
I don’t know what tomorrow holds but, I know who
holds tomorrow.
Lamentations
3:19-24 “19 Lord,
remember my suffering and my misery, my sorrow and trouble. 20
Please remember me and think about me.
21 But I have hope when I think of this. 22 The Lord’s
love never ends; his mercies never stop. 23 They are new every morning; Lord, your loyalty is great. 24 I say to myself, “The Lord
is mine, so I hope in him.” (NCV)
Jeremiah’s outward affliction and inward turmoil pushed
him toward despair (Jeremiah said, “my soul is downcast, my hope had been
shattered”). However, there is one thing that gives me hope and crowds out the
hopelessness that threatened to overwhelm me: Because of the Lord‘s
great love we are not consumed, for His compassions never fail. Judah was down,
but not out. God was punishing Judah for her sin, but did not reject her as His
covenant people. The word for ”great love“ is h\esed_,
which has the idea of loyal love. God was sticking by His chosen people. Could
Judah push God so far that He would finally abandon her forever? Was God’s
supply of loyal love and compassion limited? Jeremiah’s answer was no. God’s
”loving-kindnesses“ (nasb) are
new every morning. God offered a fresh supply of loyal love every day to His
covenant people. Much like the manna in the wilderness, the supply could not be
exhausted. This truth caused Jeremiah to call out in praise, Great is Your
faithfulness. The fact that God had an unlimited supply love and mercy gave
Jeremiah hope. (modified from The Bible Knowledge Commentary)
That one verse has enough hope to get me at least through
to the next year. It’s all about
hope. Nothing can ever make God
stop loving me once I put my hand in His hand. Once I put my hand in His hand He
will never let go. Circle the last
phrase “God’s mercies are new every
morning.” Many of us look
back on our lives and say “I really blew it there.
I wish I hadn’t done that.” We
feel hopeless because we feel like we’ve already messed the thing up anyway.
The Bible says that God gives us a new fresh start every morning.
I need that. I need the hope
of that. That God gives me a new
start and a new day to live and serve Him.
II.
GOD IS WORKING IN ME TO ACCOMPLISH
HIS PURPOSE IN MY LIFE
No matter what’s happening in my life – good, bad, or ugly – God is
working in me to accomplish His purpose is in me.
The most difficult kinds of questions of life are, “Why is this
happening to me. When you don’t understand what is happening it makes life
difficult.
But, when you see a purpose behind your problem it gives
you enormous hope. It also gives
you enormous power to endure it. And
God says, I am working in your life and I have a purpose no matter what’s
happening.
God is doing good things in my life even when the situation
is bad, even when I don’t understand it, when it doesn’t make sense.
When the situation is bad, He is still doing good things in my life.
Romans 8:28 ”We
know that God causes all things to work together for good for those who love God
and are called according to His purpose.”
Notice first what it does not say. It doesn’t say, “All things work out the way I want them
to.” We would like that and
we’d like to interpret it that way but that’s not what it says. It doesn’t say, “All things work out the way I want them
to.”
It does not say, “All things have a happy ending on
earth.” Because that is not always true.
All things do not have a happy ending on earth.
Reality teaches us that not every patient gets well, not every couple
that gets married lives happily ever after.
All children don’t get straight A’s and become captain of the
football team. What does it say?
Notice: It
doesn’t say, “All things are good.” And
it does not say God causes all things. God
does not. God does not cause rape.
God does not cause war. God
does not cause famine and poverty. God
does not cause leukemia and cancer. To
attribute those things to God is to turn God into a monster.
God is not a monster. God is
incapable of sin. It doesn’t say
God causes all things. We
bring a lot on ourselves.
But it does say, “God causes all things to work together for good.” Circle “work together”. It’s not by accident and it’s not separate. When you’re baking a cake you’ve got to have some flour and some raw eggs and some Crisco and some sugar and some salt and some vanilla. These may be all the ingredients to bake a cake. However, all of these ingredients by themselves separately aren’t a cake. You have to mix them together, pour the mixture in a pan and then put it in the oven so the heat can bake it.
The problem we sometimes have is we sample the ingredients
of life separately and we don’t like what we taste and we definitely don’t
like the heat. However, if we will
allow God to work these things together and apply the heat He will make
something wonderful of our lives.
·
“… Those who love
God…” Notice the qualifier of this great promise.
It is not for everybody. It
does not say that all things work together for good for everybody.
Those that thumb their nose at God, and walk out the back door and say,
“Forget You, God!” all things are not working for good in their lives.
In fact, all things are working for bad in your life.
This is not a promise to everybody.
It’s a promise for those who love God and want to have a relationship
with Him and who are trying to live according to His purpose.
Jeremiah 29:11 God says, “I have good plans for you,
not plans to hurt you. I will give
you hope and a good future.”
You may think that what God is doing in your life right now
is painful and is to no avail but God says, “My plan is good.
You just don’t see it. You
need to trust Me. You need to have
hope because it’s a plan to give you a hope and a future.”
You may be here and think that God has stopped working in
your life. This verse is for you.
Philippians 1:6 “God began doing a good work in you and I am sure He will
continue it until it is finished when Jesus Christ comes again.”
God starts something in your life and what He starts He finishes.
You may say you’re too far beyond hope.
You’re not. You’ve
walked away from it but when you come back and say, “God, I’m going to give
You the mess, give You the pieces. Give me Your peace.” Then
that which He started, He finishes in your life. And He keeps on keeping on.
III.
GOD HAS A PLACE PREPARED THAT IS WAITING FOR ME.
When things get unbearable in your life you remember that our ultimate hope
is heaven. Paul says it like this,
If all our hope is just on this earth, we should be pitied.
But there’s more to life than just here and now.
We do have an ultimate destination.
This is just the warm-up act. And
God is preparing a place in heaven.
John 14 “Don’t be troubled. You trust in God, now trust in Me. I am going to prepare a place for you.”
Circle “place”. Jesus
Christ says that heaven is a place, not a state of mind.
It’s not some kind of nirvana, nothingness, where you just float
around, bodiless, spiritless, whatever. It
is a real place and God says “I am
going to prepare a place for you.”
Heaven is a place of relief and release.
No fear. No pain.
No sorrow. No conflict. No more problems. The
Bible says this “He will wipe away
all tears from their eyes and there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor
crying, nor pain. All of that has
gone forever.”
If you are feeling hopeless about something in
your life, you have forgotten how much God cares about you.
The Bible says in Isaiah 46:3-5 “Listen.
I have upheld you since you were conceived and I have taken care of you
from your birth. Even when you are
old, I will be the same. Even when
your hair has turned gray, I will take care of you.
I made you and I will take care of you.
I will carry you and save you. Can
you compare Me to anyone? No one is
equal to Me or like Me.”
Maybe you feel trapped in your situation!
What do you do? You
give it to Jesus Christ. When you
do, you will have a rebirth of living hope in your heart. “In God’s great
mercy He has caused us to be born again into a living hope because Jesus Christ
rose from the dead.” You will
have a rebirth of hope in your life. You
will go from no hope to new hope.
If you’ve just been barely hanging on you need to do
these three things.
One you need to remember the presence of God.
That He has always with you. That
you will never be without Him. You
may not feel His presence but He is there.
He is aware. He cares.
He can help. Jehovah Shammah
– “I am the God who is always there.” You remember God’s presence.
You will never go through anything alone.
Two remember that God is working in you to accomplish His
purpose in your life. What ever is happening in your life God is at work for
your good.
Three remember there is a home waiting for you at the end of the journey. A home where there will be no heartache, pain or tears for God will wipe them all away.
When I have hope what happens?
“Those who hope in
the Lord will renew their strength. They
will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk
and not be faint.” No
situation is hopeless.
Begin to Pray now!