Life in Hope

Time of Teaching: Abundant Life Series (“Bring them to me.”)

Over the holidays we watched one of the all time Christmas classics, The Grinch Who Stole Christmas (original animated version)

Story centers on the Grinch, who’s just a miserable creature, full of malice and envy. He sees all the Who’s enjoying life, and just thinking about their upcoming Christmas celebration drives him nuts - rather than just letting them experience joy of that, he’d prefer to make them miserable like him.

So he makes grand plan - he’s going to steal their Christmas. So he and his dog Max make their way into Whoville and take everything related to Christmas - the gifts, the trees, the lights, even cleans out the fridge - the who pudding and the rare who roast beast.

Spoiler alert, it doesn’t work. In spite of all the stuff associated with Christmas being gone, on Christmas morning the Who’s gather together in the town square, join hands and sing together in celebration.

And it confounds him, makes no sense. At least initially, until he has this grand realization that Christmas means a little bit more - that it had a deeper meaning for the Who’s that didn’t depend on their circumstances.

And this realization transforms him - “the Grinch’s small heart grew three sizes that day!”

There’s something going on in this story that I think is an example of what we’re looking at this morning - “Living Hope”. About how we can come to experience the abundant life that Jesus came to give us through his hope.

We’ve been talking about how Jesus does it better, that he really is source of life itself - abundant life.

That we are saved by him, we were dead in our transgressions and sins, made alive in Christ - experience life in his grace.

That we are being saved by him (Jesus gives us the ability to live into this new life, gives us not just freedom from but freedom for) - and so we experience life in his power.

Today, that we will be saved by him, promise of abundant life includes promise of eternal life - and so we experience life through hope in him.

Prayer / Scripture - 1 Peter 1:3-9

What Controls Us

Imagine if story of the Grinch Who Stole Christmas had played out differently - if it had turned out the way the Grinch thought that it would.

All of the Who’s of Whoville had woken up on Christmas morning and looked around in utter dismay…Where’s the Christmas tree? The gifts are all gone! Even the stockings! There’s nothing in the fridge!

They’d wander into streets, dazed and confused. Children really crying, boo hoo! I would bet that some of the Who’s would have gotten incredibly angry, just ready to get whoever did this. (get, who?)

It would have revealed exactly what Grinch assumed - that it was the gifts, decorations, food that they were most looking forward to. That’s what they loved about Christmas most.

And because those things were now gone, they were crushed, sad, angry.

Their hopes for joyful Christmas smashed to pieces - because he had taken their stuff away.

Of course, that’s not what happened. Because that’s not what they treasured most. That’s not where their hope was.

Hope is powerful aspect of human life, so essential. But where our hope is in makes all the difference.

So, let’s talk about hope - and in particular, living hope.

I want to spend some time talking about why hope is so essential to us - and especially where our hope lies.

Second, I want to talk about why it is in Jesus that we truly experience living hope.

Future Expectations

Thinking together about hope for moment - what is hope?

(this comes from Tim McKay, the Bible project) Hope has to do with what you anticipate happening in the future. One of words for hope in Hebrew, Yakhal, simply means waiting. You wait for what you expect to happen.

It’s different from optimism, which is choosing to see, in any set of circumstance, how things could work out for the best. You’re always looking for the potential positives.

Pessimism, of course, is just opposite, you’re assuming the worst, always looking at the negative possibilities.

But hope is defined as expectation, feeling of anticipation that future is going to be better than present. And it’s absolutely essential for healthy human existence - we don’t function well when we are hope-less, if we can’t see possibility of good in our future.

It’s interesting that another word for hope in Hebrew, Qavah, has sense of tense expectations. The root word, Qav, means cord. When cord is pulled tight, it creates tension. Qavah reflects tension we feel in waiting - will what we hope in, what we’re waiting for, come true?

Sometimes that future anticipation results in joy. We are expecting good things to come!

While most folks look forward to celebration of Christmas, the Grinch was hoping for a town of Who’s boo-hooing over the loss of the Christmas. He looking eagerly for it - that was his hope - and deeply disappointed when it did not happen.

We experience joy in anticipation - family get-together, your team playing in championship (there’s tension - what if they lose!?!), vacation time, movie you’ve been wanting to see.

But there’s another side to that…what you anticipate about the future can also result in fear for us. This is where what we put our hope in matters so much.

Jeff Vanderstelt says that what you love most, you also fear losing the most. And whatever threatens what you love most controls you.

Parents naturally and rightfully love their children. But if you build your life around them, if your hope for joy and happiness is in well being of your children - then fear of anything bad happening to them will control you. You’ll do whatever it takes to keep any perceived harm coming to them.

Same can be true of our marriages, our careers, our finances.

Or, for instance, if I love most approval of others, if that’s where my hope is, then what I will most fear is losing that approval. I’ll center my life constantly trying to win that approval.

If I love comfort and feeling secure - then I will fear and avoid anything that makes me uncomfortable or uneasy. I will avoid risks - because what we love most has controlling power over us.

These are kinds of things that can hinder us in engaging in mission God calls us to do - make disciples…if I’m afraid of looking foolish or feeling uncomfortable, I’ll avoid those situations.

It’s amazing to consider the transformation of Jesus’ first followers, how they went from running and hiding out of fear to boldly going and proclaiming good news of Jesus - even and often in the midst of persecution.

Those are exactly the circumstances in the churches to which Peter is writing this letter.

Living Hope

In his letter, Peter talks about hope, but he doesn’t just use word “hope”, he calls it a “living hope”: “In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade.”

Literally, it is hope that makes us alive! The Greek word for living comes from our word, Zoe. Spiritual life, divine life. That energy and vitality. We experience abundant life through our hope in Jesus.

Think again about the story of Grinch - it’s that moment when he sees the Who’s still celebrating and he realizes he’s made a mistake stealing everything, that there’s something more, something better than just stuff of Christmas - and the Who’s have it.

And just at that moment the sleigh starts sliding down mountainside until it hang perilously over cliff about to crash thousands of feet below.

And what happens? His heart is filled with hope. Anticipation of something better. Such a fun illustration of him being filled with life - as his heart grows with hope, so does his strength (strength of ten grinches, plus two), and he lifts sleigh up and off cliff’s edge.

And they go zooming down mountain towards Whoville, Max sitting at front, joyfully waging his tail.

Moving into new life in Jesus gives us living hope, this hope that fills us with life, strength, joy - and away from fear.

But how is that? What’s so special about hope in Jesus, why is it so life-giving?

Remember, hope is all about what you anticipate happening in future. What you are expecting, waiting for.

If you can be absolutely sure that what you hope in will come to be, that it really will deliver a better, brighter future, then it really will be life giving.

I cannot know what will happen in the lives of my children, in life of this nation (no matter who has political power at moment), if my sports team is really good enough to win big game, what will happen in my career or with my wealth. None of it. The Who’s certainly did not expect to wake up Christmas morning with all their stuff gone.

But our hope is in who God is. His character. We may wait a long time - in fact, hope always involves waiting. As Romans 8 says, For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.

We wait patiently on God. Because we trust his character. We know he is faithful. We know he will keep his promises - he always has.

Here’s promise: He has given us a new birth into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade. Nothing can happen to it, it will be there for us. God’s got it under lock and key, it is guarded by his power.

Salvation of our souls will happen - we will move into life eternal, with full and absolute healing and newness.

I’ve been going through a course that ECO is offering called Emotionally Healthy Spirituality, working through process of being more aware of pains and wounds of past, especially my family of origin, how they have affected me (my emotional health).

Some of it is not fun, facing reality of those wounds - and how they have impacted me (my own sinful responses).

This is where hope is so powerful, why hope in Jesus is so life-giving…because I do this trusting who God is, that the “salvation of my soul” is God’s working in me, my heart, to bring healing and wholeness, helping me to become someone who receives and gives love freely.

I’m long way off - I have a lot to learn about that. A lot of old ways of being to take off before I can put on the new God has for me. But because I can trust God - that this is part of his healing, saving work in me, let’s go. I’m willing to dig in. I’m expecting that he will do great things, because of who he is. That’s what God does, he saves. He redeems. He binds up brokenhearted.

(quick plug here, author of Emotionally Healthy Spirituality, Pete Scazzero is first speaker at National Gathering this Friday, starting at 6:00 p.m. And ECO will be offering EHS course again through Zoom beginning in March I believe. I’ll be serving as table leader).

To hope in God, means we are making the choice, as Tim McKay says, “to wait for God to bring about a future that is as surprising as a crucified man rising from the dead.”

We talked about how hope, what we’re expecting to happen, can result in both joy and fear. I want to spend last bit of our time talking about how this life-giving hope moves us into joy and out of fear.

Remember, fear is about perceived future possibilities (I’m going to lose this and that will cause me suffering, I’m going to look foolish, I’m not going to have enough).

One of most amazing statements in Bible comes from 1 John 4. There is no fear in love. But perfect love casts out fear, because fear has to do with punishment.

Wouldn’t that be amazing? It’s almost unimaginable, to live without fear. For it to be cast out of us. Can I really live without fear of having enough, of what others think of me, am I being good enough as person? I don’t want them to get angry at me.

Those verses about perfect love cast out by fear come in context of John writing about how we live in God and God lives in us:

“If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in them and they in God. And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them”…in other words, when we experience life in Christ, him in us - his love in us, fear is cast out.

Reason why we’re so strongly encouraging all of us to pursue spiritual formation - to get involved in these groups, to center our lives in spiritual practices - this is where we learn to live in God. To live in his love. To experience God living in us, loving us…casting out our fear.

Casting out our fear because we’ve learned to trust God, his love, his grace, his power in us.

Enduring times of difficulty, trials have a way of revealing what we love most (and therefore what controls us).

That was essence of the Grinch Who Stole Christmas - Grinch inflicted a trial on Who’s, stealing all their Christmas stuff, trial revealed that’s not what was most important to them, it’s not what they loved most and where they found their joy.

Exactly what Peter is talking about in his letter to early churches who were experiencing suffering and persecution, 1 Peter 1:6-7

In all this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith - of greater worth than gold…may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.

You’ve been suffering, you’ve been grieving, you’ve had to endure all sorts of trials.

But these trials have come because, like gold refined in fire, they have refined your faith. These trials have served as purification process, revealing what you truly trust in.

In other words, it reveals what you love most - because if you love comfort and material goods and admiration of others - you would have abandoned Jesus. These trials would not have been worth it. You would have been too afraid to give all that up.

But that wasn’t their experience! Even in the midst of trials what they experienced was joy.

Peter begins this whole section of his letter by erupting in worship, Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ!

At the very end, it screams joy: Though you have not seen Jesus, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy

Here’s a question that’s worth asking ourselves…do I know that joy? Do I ever at least have moments when I am filled with inexpressible and glorious joy?

That was joy of Who’s on Christmas morning, even with everything taken away. They sang their hearts out!

Peter’s saying you’re filled with it! If I’m not, why not? Why has that not been my experience? What does it say about where my hope is?

Let me finish with this: Hope is about a future event, but it is a present state. When Peter describes God has given us a new birth into a living hope, he’s saying that we can have a hope that makes us alive right here and now. That we can know the abundant life that Jesus came to give.

And that we can know it even in hard aspects of life. This is not optimism, always looking on bright side of life. Peter here recognizes genuine trials. That we really do suffer hardships and difficulties, just like those Who’s.

The whole theme of the Grinch Whole Stole Christmas is ultimate about relationships. Having others - this idea that joy of Christmas Day will be ours as long as we have hands to grasp, as long as we are heart to heart and hand to hand.

That’s really why their joy can be ours. Because we have a hand to grasp. Because we are heart to heart with Jesus, he is living in us, and we in him. We know and rely on his love, his perfect love - you cannot lose that love. Our hope is in Jesus. He’s our living hope.