Advent: A Season of Joy and Hope

When thinking about advent this year, it’s hard to escape the hope and joy that the season brings. We sing about “Joy to the world” while remembering the words of the angels to the shepherds: good news of great joy. Even pop radio Christmas songs joyfully declare “It’s the most wonderful time of the year.” But, this joy exists all season long. It’s the joy of putting up the tree. It’s the joy of singing Christmas songs. It’s the joy family and friends. It’s the joy of that Christmas dinner. It’s the joy of buying a present and wrapping it and waiting to surprise someone with that gift they’ve been wanting but didn’t think they could get (that’s a four-wheel drive truck if anyone is looking for a last-minute gift for me). And all of this joy is built on the back of hope. You look forward to the celebration of the birth of Christ and all that comes along with it. But, all of this is built on the world’s idea of hope, this feeling that what is wanted will happen. For us, it’s more. Hope: trustful expectation, particularly with reference to the fulfillment of God’s promises. Biblical hope is the anticipation of a favorable outcome under God’s guidance. More specifically, hope is the confidence that what God has done for us in the past guarantees our participation in what God will do in the future. This morning’s passage deals with the hope we have as believers…a hope that was birthed out of the fulfillment of hope when Christ was born, which led to a life that secured eternal hope for all who would believe. Turn with me this morning to Romans 5 as we think about joy and hope this season.

This passage begins as it reflects back on what Paul has claimed so far. Remember that Romans is written as a gospel treatise -- all who call upon God’s name will be saved, and the gospel is the power of God for salvation to all who believe (Rom.1:16). All of mankind stands guilty and condemned before God because of their rebellion, but God responds to man’s guilt by sending Jesus to become the sacrifice that removes and bears the wrath of God. The response to God’s gift is faith, to believe and respond according to said belief, just as Abraham believed God and trusted and acted on God’s promises. If Paul had ended his letter at chapter four, the Romans would have had sufficient information to assure them of the gospel. However, Paul continues now to the practical implications of the gospel and the believer’s justification. There is a transition that occurs here as Paul begins to discuss implications, before arriving at chapter 12 and the discussion of practical applications.

This therefore roots what Paul says in the death and redirection of Jesus. Jesus was raised for our justification, and those who believe are counted as righteous.

Remember Peace (v.1).

This is a bold legal declaration -- NOT GUILTY! This is what it means to be justified. No longer must we fear the wrath of God. Justification doesn’t only end our hostility with God, but it also alleviates our anxiety that spawned from our hostility. There is no longer any need to fear retribution from God.

Justification by faith is a summary of Rom.3:21-4:25. Justification tends to refer to God’s decision not to condemn someone. This decision coincides with a person’s faith, not obedience to the law...not even circumcision. A person of faith (the object of faith is usually Jesus, but sometimes it’s God) trusts that God justifies the ungodly through the atoning work of Jesus’s death and resurrection from the dead.

Faith has been described as “taking seriously what God has obligated Himself to do.” In a sense, faith is holding God to His promise, not that He has to be held accountable, but is the expression of the belief that God will do as He says.

Because God’s wrath has been absorbed by Jesus (the idea of propitiation in Rom.3:25), Christians no longer fear judgment and the wrath of God. Instead, they have peace, “harmonious relations” free from disputes. This is not only a subjective feeling (though we may need more convincing of this) but an objective reality. However, Scripture has a deeper meaning/understanding of peace. It includes general well-being, prosperity, and/or salvation. Isaiah proclaimed an era of peace established by God, and Paul picks up this prophecy later in Romans 10:15. Still, it’s not out of line to see peace as THE accomplishment of the gospel (see Eph.2:11-17).

Calvin said peace refers to the “serenity of conscience, which originates from the awareness of having God reconciled to oneself.”

In layman’s terms, peace means that the hostile wall that divided us from God, blocking a true and right relationship with Him, has been torn down. Jesus was able to say confidently to His disciples the words of John 14:27 because “upon Him was the chastisement that brought us peace” (Isa.53:5) and because He Himself is the “Prince of Peace” (Isa.9:6).

When reflecting on the peace the believer now has, think about Augustine's words in Confessions. Our hearts are restless until they find rest in God. Until he found rest (peace) with God, Augustine wandered from purposeless pursuit to vain experience and back again.

There is peace because the hostility is gone, and there is peace that is serene and allows the wandering heart to stop its searching.

Rely On Grace (v.2).

Access to grace has been made available. It is our new lot in life. We need not worry over whether or not grace will be available to us. We can tap into it at any time. While it might seem like a generality that may or may not have bearing on life, remember Paul’s words in 2 Cor.12...whatever Paul faced, even the thorn that tormented him, grace was the answer. Paul’s word choice for access is a word that refers to gaining access and being led into the court of royalty. The Roman populace Paul writes to would’ve been familiar with the strict protocol for limiting access to the emperor to only certain high-ranking individuals. Through Christ, every believer is a member of this high society!

Think of stand in terms of standing or position. The word stand (along with “have” earlier in the vs.) is perfect-tense which emphasizes the continuation of a new and gracious situation. Grace is our current and forever lot in life.

Now for the believer this isn't some cheesy, turn-your-frown upside-down advice. Rather, it is a decision informed by truth to not let the weight of the world have bearing on life. It is a settled contentment that says, "come what may" and rejoices in what is surely secured and coming. This is certainly what hope is attached to -- our state of being has changed from alienation and death to peace and literally being defined by grace. That status has forever changed, and hope is the beautiful outcome.

Hope of the glory reflects on the promise that one day God will glorify Himself by glorifying His people. Glory is a state of honor. Remember that believers will one day inherit the kingdom and receive crowns to give back to Christ the King. Glory has been described as putting holiness on display, and one day God will indeed put the believer’s separation from the world on display by glorifying him. The believer should fix their hope firmly on God’s ultimate deliverance.

We should likely read the hope here in light of the fact that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. The grace in which we now stand, the peace which we now enjoy, the justification that brings us peace with God, it all brings a restoration of that glory that was once not ours. It has been restored through the work of Christ and our faithful response!

There is an interesting chain of events that begins here with the hope of glory, a hope that allows the believer to rejoice. However, the rejoicing isn’t limited to hope, but extends also to sufferings. The chain that then begins in vs. 3 ends again with hope in verse 5!

Consider Paul’s treatment of joy and anticipation and the hope of glory fleshed out in chapter 8. He speaks of God’s Spirit at work in us by which we cry out to God as our Father. As children of God, we are in line for a glorious and unbelievable inheritance. Peterson then translates, “That’s why I don’t think there’s any comparison between the present hard times and the coming good times. The created world itself can hardly wait for what’s coming next. Everything in creation is being more or less held back. God reins it in until both creation and all the creatures are ready and can be released at the same moment into the glorious times ahead. Meanwhile, the joyful anticipation deepens.” (ROM.8:18-21 -- THE MESSAGE). Paul goes on to compare joyful anticipation to the excited and joyful longings of an expectant mother. This is the hope of glory.

There's a great difference between claiming to be a Christian and actually enjoying it!

Rejoice In Hope (v.3-5).

Martin Luther said, “Since God now has justified us by faith, and not by works, we have peace with Him both in heart and conscience, though not with man and with the flesh, nor with the world and the devil. Believers have all the more trials.”

Our standing with God produces hope, but so does our experience. Oddly, it’s the trials...the sufferings...the Grk. word thlipsis, which equals distress, that’s the experience that ultimately produces hope. There’s a whole chain of growth that happens (fleshed out over the next couple of verses):

suffering leads to endurances

endurance produces character

character produces hope

hope does not put us to shame because God’s love has changed our core person and desires

Much like an athlete that stresses the body for the sake of being prepared on the athletic field, or a special forces operator who pushes himself physically and mentally beyond what most could endure in order to be unwaveringly convinced that they will win the battle, the believer rejoices in sufferings because ultimately it leads to hope, a hope that is not shaken. The believer shaken by difficulty will joyfully quip in the face of hardship, “Bring it on, for I am His and Christ is mine.”

The joy in sufferings is not some twisted form of Christian pleasure-seeking-from-pain. Instead, it’s the outcome that brings the believer joy. Similar statements are made by James (James 1:2–4 “Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”) and Peter (1 Peter 1:6–7 “In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.”), and this could be a widespread tradition/proverb that had begun to circulate during the early church.

The key to rejoicing in hardships is knowing that it produces endurance, the ability to keep moving forward without giving in. Suffering isn’t evidence of the absence of God’s love, but rather an opportunity to know and experience and affirm and apply God’s love when everything else is lacking. When all you have is Christ because everything else is being stripped away, and you walk out the back side of those difficulties...or rather, Christ carries you out the backside because of grace...all the more you have reason and confidence that He who began a good work in you will be faithful to complete it (Phil.1:6).

It’s interesting that here, character is defined in terms of steadfast commitment to God, unwavering faith in the face of difficulty. If you were to take a poll of the average person, unwavering faith probably isn’t popping up on their list of mature and desirable character traits, but that’s exactly the type of character trait that should produce joy in the believer. Job sensed the worth of perseverance, saying that ‘When He has tried me, I shall come forth as gold’ (Job 23:10).

Just as our present access to God gives hope of sharing the divine glory (Rom. 5:1-2), so with our sufferings. They help to produce character, and approved Christian character finds its ultimate resting place in the presence of God, not in a grave. By the tutelage of suffering the Lord is fitting us for His eternal fellowship.

P. Tripp: “Hope for the believer is not a dream of what could be, but a confident expectation of a guaranteed result that shapes his life.” The reason hope does not put us to shame is that God’s purposes and promises will never go unmet or unfulfilled. We never need to worry if God will come through or not. Now, sometimes the satisfaction of our hope…of these promises…are not necessarily what we desire, but we never need to doubt whether or not they are good. We never need to doubt whether or not even our trials have purpose…even if we’re not delivered…even if we live on with whatever difficulty. Again, think back to Paul’s thorn in the flesh. Did he get the outcome he wanted? No. Did God make good on his promise? Yes. So, Paul can here confidently say, “Hope does not put us to shame.”

This idea will be significant, particularly in chapter 8 where Paul says that it is the “law of the Spirit of life” that “has set you free in Christ Jesus.” He goes on to say that “those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit.” Combining these two, there becomes a sort of litmus test in our faith -- if I want to know that the Holy Spirit has been poured into my heart, then ask, “Is my mind set on the flesh or the Spirit?” If it is set on the flesh, the answer, whether you’re a believer or not, is to repent. If your mind is set on the things of the Spirit, how much more do you have confidence to find joy in hope today? The God who loves us, justifies us, makes peace with us, and secures eternity for us, he gives us hope that a better day is coming. Life then attaches to this hope, that all things will be made right, and we rejoice and exult in God. Hebrews 6:19 (“We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain,”). A ship firmly anchored is safe from idle drifting. Its position and safety are sure. So hope is a stabilizing force for the Christian. Those with a living hope have a steadying anchor in all they do, giving them a solid footing and security.

For the most joyful person caught up in the season, remember to place your hope in Christ.

For the one hurting, facing a difficult season, Christ is your hope, and the certainty of eternity gives you joy that goes beyond our momentary experience.