Sermon Tone Analysis

Well, good morning everyone!

I pray that this finds you blessed and full from the Thanksgiving Day that we just celebrated this past Thursday!

Hands up to everyone who believes that they may have overdone it a little in eating that meal!

Well, good morning everyone!

I pray that this finds you blessed and full from the Thanksgiving Day that we just celebrated this past Thursday!

Hands up to everyone who believes that they may have overdone it a little in eating that meal!

OK, hands up everyone who believes that they may have overdone it a LOT in their eating of the Thanksgiving meal!

Hands up for anyone who says that they ate very modestly and made every effort to not watch and control every calorie that they took in that day!

Now, after the service, we are going to have a special laying on of hands for those of you who just raised your hands to that last question!

Would you please turn with me in your Bibles, to the book of and read along with me.

This past Wednesday afternoon, the day before Thanksgiving Day, our dear friend and sister, JoAnne Sadler, went home to be with the Lord.

This coming after a long battle with cancer for years in her life.

Within the last couple of months, JoAnne and Carlos had called the church and requested a time of prayer from some of the leadership, on a specific day, before she went and had some diagnostic tests done.

While we were in the prayer room, over here off from the sanctuary, and right after prayer, JoAnne mentioned about this drawing of Jesus that was in the room and of His laughing .

She said that this is how she saw Jesus and that she could picture Him as He laughed and celebrated in joy, over us, His children!

We all agreed as she mentioned this.

I want to share with you right now, the testimony that comes from another dear brother in Christ of mine, who is also a Pastor and who has also served as a Pastor and shepherd of Carlos and JoAnne Sadler.

Brother Harold Cox.

I had never met Harold before, until the past couple of weeks, as I was going to the hospital to talk to and pray with JoAnne and Carlos and the family.

I shared with you a week ago, of how I felt impressed to sing to JoAnne the song, “There’s Something About That Name”, in here hospital room one afternoon and of how Carlos and I stood on either side of the bed and did so.

Then after we were finished, Carlos said, “Well, that confirms it.”

I asked what he meant and he told me that maybe 20 to 30 minutes earlier, Pastor Harold had come into the room and said that he felt impressed to sing that same song and I had no knowledge of that, prior to getting there that afternoon.

In fact, it was that same afternoon, that I actually met Harold for the first time!

Anyway, Harold was at Jo Anne's bedside this past Wednesday, when she went home.

He said that he felt impressed to begin to pray for her, because her breathing had become labored and so he and the family began to pray for her.

As they were praying, Harold said that he knew in his heart, right then and there, what the Lord was confirming and getting ready do.

The Lord was getting ready to bring his daughter home to be with him.

Harold said that Jo Anne’s eyes, up to that point, had been glassy looking and glazed over, with no response and no life appearing in them.

He said that he was looking at her, as they were all praying and all of a sudden, her eyes opened big and wide and she looked up at him and around him and then began to smile a big and beautiful smile and then she made a loud and deep final breathing sound and Harold said that right then and there, he knew that his sister in Jesus, had just crossed over into the arms of our Lord and Savior, Jesus the Christ!

HALLELUJAH!

To be absent in the body, is to be present with the Lord!

And JoAnne is not the first person that I personally know of who has went home this exact same way.

(Mention Chris Capps, my great grandmother)

I say all of this, right behind reading the passage from , for a couple of reasons.

1) Because, I want to stress to everyone who is listening to this message right now, that there is NO DEATH to those who know Jesus as their Lord and Savior!

Death, has been swallowed up in sweet victory.

The passage from I Thessalonians that we just read, doesn’t say, “those who have died”, but rather, it says, “those who have fallen asleep”.

And this isn’t some estranged term or phrase that Paul envisioned, or dreamt up, but rather, it actually comes from the mouth of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, Himself!

Listen to what Jesus said in , about Jairus’ daughter, when the official report given, was that she had died.

The report has just been brought to Jairus that his daughter has died and that Jesus doesn’t need to bother coming any longer and Jesus says to Jairus, ““Don’t be afraid.

Just have faith.”

The upon arriving at the house, they went in and people were wailing and crying and Jesus said this, ““Why all this commotion and weeping?

The child isn’t dead; she’s only asleep” and the Bible says that everyone in the crowd, laughed at Jesus, for they all knew that she had died.

Then Jesus went into her room and took her hand and held it and said, ““Talitha koum,” which means “Little girl, get up!”

And the girl, who was twelve years old, immediately stood up and walked around!

Or, look at and the account of Lazarus

Note what Jesus said about Lazarus and the direct contrast of death and being asleep.

Now look at what Paul says about Jesus, after His crucifixion and resurrection, in ,

So, my first point in mentioning Jo Anne and her going home this past Wednesday and the passage from , is that DEATH, true and lasting DEATH, does not exist for a child of God!

We, like JoAnne, simply fall asleep here and wake up there, in His glorious presence!

The second thing that I want to mention about JoAnne and her going home, is the main focus for today, and that is the HOPE that exists within a TRUE BELIEVER of Jesus the Christ!

Let me also mention to everyone real quick, that

In his writing to the church of Thessalonica, Paul mentions in the passage that we just read, “But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do, who have no hope.”

When everyone who is on this earth faces the same end result, physical death, as tells us, “And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment”.

Why would some have HOPE and others do not?

I mean, if everyone who has ever lived, has been appointed a time of death as the scripture says, in the natural, biological/physiological sense, then why do some of those have HOPE and others do not?

And what is the HOPE that some people have and others do not, as Paul mentions?

Is one man’s HOPE while in this world, equal to another’s?

And since Paul was writing to the believers of Jesus Christ in Thessalonica, he was speaking in this passage of what is referred to, as the BELIEVER’S HOPE.

Well, we most certainly know that non-believers in the world use the word HOPE and express having HOPE about things in this life.

So, is HOPE for one group, not the same as HOPE for another?

That is, is there a difference between the world’s use of the word HOPE and that of the believer’s use of HOPE?

And let’s get even more specific about this word HOPE and use it in the same manner for both the believer and the non-believer.

In reference to death and what comes after this life, do both groups, the non-believers of Jesus as well as the believers, not share the same understanding when they use the word HOPE as an expression of what befalls them when they leave this life?

That is, if the non-believer in Jesus says that they have “a hope” of something better in the next life and the believer in Jesus says that they have “the hope” for when they leave here, are these two uses of HOPE for the after life not the same?

And to cover all bases, let me ask it one more way as to the use of the word HOPE.

So that it isn’t just secular versus Biblical use of the word.

Is the use and the understanding of the word “HOPE” in the Old Testament different than that of the use and understanding of the word “HOPE”, in the New Testament?

When David writes the 39th chapter of Psalm, in which he states in verse 7, “And so, Lord, where do I put my HOPE?

My only HOPE is in you”, is this not the same HOPE as we find in the New Testament.

My only hope is in you.

Is it different from the HOPE that we see in , where Paul says to Timothy, “For to this end we toil and strive, because we have our HOPE set on the living God, who is the Savior of all people, especially of those who believe”?

I am going to go through this rather expediently, so as to get to the matter of the fact and give an answer and make a point for everyone.

So, let’s look at a definition of the word HOPE, as used within the dictionary: HOPE - a feeling of expectation and desire for a certain thing to happen; to want something to happen or be the case.

There are different ways in which the world uses the word HOPE:

“I HOPE that I get that promotion!”

“I HOPE Tennessee has a winning season next year!”

“The only HOPE of us making it on time for dinner is if traffic is not bad!”

In each of these statements, the use of the word HOPE has an expectancy and a desire for something to take place.

“I HOPE that I get that promotion!” - the desire for the promotion and thus the expectation of more money.

“I HOPE Tennessee has a winning season next year!” - The desire of actually winning a ball game for a change and the expectation of keeping a coach for more than a season or two!

“The only HOPE of us making it on time for dinner is if traffic is not bad!” - The expectation to be somewhere at a set time with the desire of no traffic to impede.

Each time that you see the word HOPE used, as in these very basic examples, there is an expectancy, there is that desire of something taking place or coming into being, BUT the desires and the expectancy for each use of the word HOPE, is always met with UNCERTAINTY!

The general use of the word “HOPE”, that is, the natural, secular use of, has a future expectation, but without security and held with uncertainty.

Everyone has HOPES and expectations.

Parents have hopes for their children and their futures.

A Mother was taking her four-year-old daughter to school.

She was a doctor and had left her stethoscope on the car seat.

Her little girl picked it up and very excited began to play with it.

Excellent, thought the Doctor, My daughter wants to follow in my footsteps!

Then the child spoke into the instrument:

"Hello and welcome to McDonald’s, may I take your order?"

All parents have high hopes for their children.

All parents have high hopes for their children.

When someone in the world, that is, an unbeliever says, “I hope that I am ready for whatever comes after this life”, their statement is riddled with much uncertainty and that is so horribly sad!

However, what is even more sad, is when someone who has sat in church for a large part of their life and professes Jesus as their savior makes a statement like, “I HOPE that I am ready to die!”

There is a staunch difference between the HOPE that world perceives and speaks of and that of the BELIEVER’S HOPE!

And this !

And yes, there is even a difference in HOPE that we find within the Old Testament and that of the BELIEVER’S HOPE within the New Testament.

There is