BUILDING HOPE THROUGH BEING IN GOD'S WORD (DEVO)

God offers us hope through His Spirit as we have faith and listen and walk by His Spirit. One of the ways that THE HOLY SPIRIT strengths our hope is through His word.

God offers us hope through His Spirit as we have faith and listen and walk by His Spirit. One of the ways that THE HOLY SPIRIT strengths our hope is through His word.

​ ESVFor whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.

THINK ABOUT WHAT THIS VERSE IS SAYING; One of the main reasons that God has given us and preserved His word for us is so that we can be encouraged by it and have hope.

(If you are struggling to have hope in your heart right now I want to encourage you to turn off all the media and coverage of the virus, and get into, and think on God’s word AND PRAY to be filled with joy and peace through His Spirit)

If you do your heart will change and your hope will be built up. I know this is true because it happens regularly in my life and we see it in scripture. GOD GIVES US EXAMPLES OF HOW HIS PEOPLE WENT FROM HOPELESS AND IN DESPAIR TO FILLED WITH HOPE BY THINKING ON GOD’S WORD AND WORKS AND CHARACTER. JEREMIAH IS ONE OF THE BEST EXAMPLES OF THIS Jeremiah; If anyone could have lost hope it could have been Jeremiah. But even in the midst of what was happening God gave Him a reason to hope. Listen to how hopeless he sounds in;

​ ESVHe has made my teeth grind on gravel, and made me cower in ashes; my soul is bereft of peace; I have forgotten what happiness is;

But then he shifts his focus in the following verses:

​ But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. “The Lord is my portion,” says my soul, “therefore I will hope in him.” The Lord is good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him.

is much like this as it shows us how we need to respond to feeling hopeless. Notice how it starts off in verse 2 saying “my soul refuses to be comforted” and verse 4 “I am so troubled that I cannot speak” but then verses 10-12 everything shifts.

​ ESVThen I said, “I will appeal to this, to the years of the right hand of the Most High.” I will remember the deeds of the Lord; yes, I will remember your wonders of old. I will ponder all your work, and meditate on your mighty deeds.

After this the rest of the Psalm is the Holy Spirit through the Psalmist Asaph recalling God’s wonders in Israel specifically in parting the Red Sea and delivering the Israelites. WE CAN RESPOND IN THE SAME WAY EXPECT WE HAVE EVEN MORE ACCOUNTS OF WHAT GOD HAS DONE THAT ARE EVEN MORE INCREDIBLE.

SCRIPTURE THAT SHOW WHEN TIMES SEEM THE MOST HOPELESS WITH GOD THERE IS ALWAYS HOPE!

Israel at the Sea; The Israelites thought that being trapped in between the Red Sea and the Egyptian army of chariots. i. But remember what Moses told them… 14 The Lord will fight for you, and you have only to be silent." (ESV)Abraham: When all seemed impossible for God’s promise to give Abraham a son to come true, it did. mentions the hope Abraham had even when it seemed hopeless.

​ ESVIn hope he believed against hope, that he should become the father of many nations, as he had been told, “So shall your offspring be.” He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead (since he was about a hundred years old), or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah’s womb.

THOSE WHO CAME TO CHRIST: Think about the many people who came to Christ during His ministry who had no other hope than Jesus to help or heal them or their love one. The blind, the paralyzed and even those whose loved ones were dead, but they still found hope in Jesus. (In a similar way all of us find our only hope for salvation in Jesus.) The Bible is filled with stories of people who were in hopeless situations who turned to God and found hope and help in their time of need. THE GOSPEL IS THE GREATEST STORY OF HOPE WHEN EVERYTHING SEEMED HOPELESS.