Hope
Notes
Transcript
What do I believe God wants them to know? They have a living hope in Jesus
Why? It gives us hope, anchor, joy
What do I believe God wants them to do? Put their ultimate hope in Jesus
Why? It brings hope and stability
ME/WE
What do you do when it dawns on you that the thing you hoped for, dreamed in, believed for is DASHED, GONE, DEFEATED, DELAYED
ANYBODY BEEN THERE??
What do you do?
What do you do when that job or money you thought would line up?
This job was going to be the perfect job with the perfect income but the job ended up being horrible or the pay not great.
Or we were hoping for some financial blessing to come our way and it never came
Anybody been there????
Or you hoped that relationship would work out
Married
Reconciliation would happen…hasn’t happened yet
Governmental
- They would rule this way or that way
And the list goes on
- Health
that thing
What do we do???
There is usually four ways that we deal with hope lost.
1. We become defeated....not just sad....not just a little depressed…but DEFEATED…anybody been there....
It is perfectly normally to feel sad....do not be like me in my early years of life and stuff or buy into the mantra....that’s nothing to cry about....losing a JOB is a big deal, breaking up is a big deal
What happened later is I imploded and good thing God and the church came to pick me up.
But there is a difference from being SAD and DEFEATED
2. We become an angry person....taking it out on everybody…mad at the world…ANYBODY beent there? I have. We are hurt and upset that the thing we hoped in is not happening.... We have lashed out at someone because of what happened to us. Have you been around someone like that? Have you been someone like that?
3. (Fight) I am going to fight for the thing that I hope for to happen....sometimes this is good…but sometimes we are fighting for something that God doesn’t want you to have becasue he has something better for you…a better job, a better relationship, a better place to be
4. They find a new hope.
- Relationship to a job
- Good health to the government
HOPE TO HOPE UNTIL THAT HOPE IS NO LONGER HOPEFUL
It is a cycle of madness we go through
WHAT DO WE DO WHEN OUR HOPE IS LOST???
THAT TEMPORAL THINGS, TEMPORARY THAT ONLY GIVE US TEMPORAL HOPE (JOB, RELATIONSHIP, GOVERNEMENT)…BUT THEN IS LOST
WHAT ARE WE TO DO?
ON TOP OF THAT We are hope seekers....WE DON’T HAVE A STOP HOPE BUTTON
“Our hearts are restless....looking for hope” Augustine
Not only that some physcologist say to live with an absent of hope is like living in hell....Anybody???
TENSION
WHAT ARE WE DO IF TEMPORARY THINGS GIVE TEMPORARY AND I WILL SAY NOT AS SATISIFY HOPE
How long does a the new job joy last, or that you hoped for hope stay?
Not forever
....arrival fallacy.... Momentary....people who hope for big awards…Oscars, Superbowls…TOM BRADY said their has to be more to life than this
THE REALITY IS TEMPORAL THINGS WERE NEVER MEANT TO HOLD YOU YOU UP…TO HAVE YOUR ULTIMATE HOPE
TO HAVE EVERY LASTING HOPE WE NEED TO PUT OUR HOPE IN SOMETHING EVERLASTING AND DEPENDABLE AND GOOD...
WHAT IS THE ONLY THING WE CAN PUT OUR HOPE IN THAT PROVIDES HOPE?
JESUS IS our hope our ROCK
AS THE SONG GGOES
My hope is built on nothing less
Than Jesus’ blood and righteousness;
I dare not trust the sweetest frame,
But wholly lean on Jesus’ name.
Refrain:
On Christ, the solid Rock, I stand;
All other ground is sinking sand,
All other ground is sinking sand.
OUR HEARTS ARE WRESTLESS UNTIL THEY REST IN JESUS- AUGUSTINE
THIS IS WHAT THE WORD OF GOD, THROUGH THE APOSTLE PETER IS GOING TO SAYING TO US AND TO THE CHRISTIANS OF THE DISAPORA....the elect exiles
Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, To those who are elect exiles of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia,
according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in the sanctification of the Spirit, for obedience to Jesus Christ and for sprinkling with his blood: May grace and peace be multiplied to you.
THE JEWISH CHRISTIANS LOST ALMOST ALL THEIR TEMPORARAL HOPES
they lost their land…this is huge…it is a treasurer
Kicked out for believing in Jesus
They lost their jobs
They lost family members…either through seperation or persuction
They lost their hope in governemtn
Not only that where they are living now, the are foreigners, not 2nd class citizens....no class citizesns
ELECT EXILES....usually ELECTED MEANS TO SOMETHING OTHER THAN EXILES
What does Jesus say to these new Christians of the Disapora who were kicked out? WHO MIGHT HAVE BEEN THINKING I THOUGHT WHEN I BECOME A CHRISTIAN “that my life would always be up and to the right??””
ANYBODY THINK THAT WAY???
“If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you.
If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.
Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours.
WHAT DOES PETER SAY TO THIS GROUP OF ELECT EXILES??
does Peter write....sorry things have been delayed....we will be back in Israel, overthrow the Roman governement....everything will be back to normal and better....Is this what Peter says???
No, Peter knows things look bleak, things look hard, things are difficult so Peter goes to their core, the place that cannot be moved, GOES TO REMIND THEM OF THE ETERNAL, LIVING HOPE THEY have in JESUS
LISTEN TO WHAT PETER SAYS
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,
What does Peter say?
He starts off praising God....there’s an exclamation point …What is Peter doing here???Peter do you not know our situation??
This is not praising time
This complaining time!…This is going to the high king of heaven and saying....God you got this wrong time!!!
We see this in Acts 4 when they are facing persuction…we see this in the Lord’s prayer
Peter is saying, yes, I know you situation physcially and spiritually ....I know this you used to be dead in your SINS and NOW YOU ARE ALIVE IN CHRIST
You were lost in your sins hopeless
You were on the outside with God but now you are on the inside
You were a child of wrath, now you are child of God
YOUR SITUATION HAS CHANGED FROM THE WORST SITUATION TO THE BEST SITUATION
NOT ONLY DOES PETER say that your status has changed
THIS HOPE YOU HAVE IS LIVING, it’s alive and eternal not tempoarary
AND it cannot be taken away or defeated, of fade away.
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.
Do we seee what Peter said
To an inheritance that is IMPERISHABLE, UNDEFILED, AND UNFADIG
What does it mean to have a hope that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading?
WE HAVE A HOPE that
death cannot touch…our hope continues on forever and and ever and ever
undefiled by evil....evil cannot touch your hope....It tried, it tried to kill hope on the CROSS but hope rose agin
UNFADING....time cannot touch it last forever.
HE SAYING CHURCH....I know the situation is bad in the earthly realm but in the Spiritual realm....your situation went from WORST to FIRST…BEST
and not only that it last forever
Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth.
PRESENT AND FUTURE HOPE
And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.
For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.
And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.
He is the God of the turn around
He turns around yoour suation
I like what preached as an 18 year old Jonathan Edwards
As Jonathan Edwards says in his paraphrase of Romans 8:28:
1. Our bad things will turn out for good.
2. Our good things can never be taken away from us.
3. The best things are yet to come.
THIS IS SO POWER
WHY BECAUSE WHAT YOU BELIEVE THE FUTURE TO BE SHAPES HOW YOU LIVE NOW
THE END IS NEAR, LIFE IS HARD....IF YOU LIVE LIKE ERORYS
YOU ARE MORE MEANT TO LIVE LIKE TIGGERS....FULL EXCITEMENT BECAUSE
YOU KNOW YOUR PAST…WHAT YOU USED TO BE
PRESENT…GOD IS WORKING ALL THINGS FOR YOU GOOD
FUTURE....REIGN AND BE FULLY REUNITED WITH GOD
YOU KNOW HAS THIS TIGGER IN THE SPIRIT SPIRIT....SISTER TRISH...
ALL IS WELL
GOOD IS GOD
I WAS DEAD, NOW ALIVE
I KNOW WHERE MY FUTURE IS
HOPE IS A POWERFUL THING
LViktor Frankl, he was Jewish and was a psychotherapist, who was put into the death camps during World War II, and he survived, even though he was even in Auschwitz.
Viktor Frankl says this about a future hope and the death camps,
“Many prisoners just lost all hope. Usually this happened quite suddenly, the symptoms of which were familiar to us experienced death camp inmates. We all feared for this moment in our friends. Usually it began one morning when the prisoner simply refused to get dressed or wash or go out to the parade grounds for inspection. No entreaties, no blows, no threats had any effect. They just lay there. They had given up. Nothing bothered them anymore, because they had no hope.”
Frankl says here’s a dramatic example that he witnessed. “My senior block warden, a well-known composer and songwriter, once told me he had a dream the war was going to end March 30. He was convinced his dream was a revelation from god. As the day drew nearer it became clear from news reports the war was not going to end. On March 29, he suddenly began running a high temperature. On March 30, he lost consciousness. On March 31 he was dead. The loss of hope had lowered his body’s resistance to all of the diseases in the camp.”
MY FRIENDS WE HAVE A HOPE BECAUSE JESUS IS OUR HOPE, OUR ROCK
THIS IS THE HOPE WE HAVE…let us put our hope in Jesus
My hope is built on nothing less
Than Jesus’ blood and righteousness;
I dare not trust the sweetest frame,
But wholly lean on Jesus’ name.
Refrain:
On Christ, the solid Rock, I stand;
All other ground is sinking sand,
All other ground is sinking sand.
One of the reasons this is so important
What you believe the future to be completely shapes how you’re living now. It changes your life completely.
There is a reason why SISTER TRISH is joyful in the trail....she knows she has an eternal hope
I was lost but now found
Dead but alive