Holding on to Hope

Review

Last week we discussed:

Grief isn’t just about death; it’s about loss.

Grief is a necessary step to healing; God-given

We tend to try to ignore grief or speed through it. We must dig in to the hard work of grief.

If we choose not to grieve, we will reap the consequences of unresolved grief through sinful developments.

Christian Grief Remembers Hope

1 Thessalonians 4:13 ESV

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.

In this specific passage, Paul speaks of grief in the Christian life. He mentions death, specifically, but as we remember last week, grief is associated with loss. It’s not that this Scripture is reducing grief to only death, rather Paul is saying that grief is associated with death, which we already know. This form of grief and grieving… ANY form of grief and grieving for the Christian should always be answered with HOPE. That’s the inference you see here in this Scripture.

For the Christian, the underlying principle here that we must understand is that all of our grief should be done in remembrance of our great hope. As we said last week, and I want to reiterate… The Scripture does not say IGNORE your grief, but keep your grief in perspective of truth.

So what is our hope? Our hope is that the Lord will one day make all things right. He is not done with this earth. As a matter of fact, He’s just gotten started!

This means that every loss will be turned to gain. Every difficulty will be rewarded. Every wrong deed will be brought to justice. Every sickness healed, every impairment rectified.

We as believers in the immortal Christ know that He will have victory, and through Him, we share in that victory. So while the battle may look grim, or the tide may look like it’s going the way of the enemy, we know that Christ will reign supreme in the end.

And that’s the course-correction we need in the midst of grief. That’s the medicine. Again, it’s not something we say in order to minimize or rid ourselves of grief, but to orient ourself in the midst of grief.

See, grief is like being in the middle of an ocean. Sometimes there are storms that toss the ship of your life every which way. When those come, you have to be able to know which way to begin sailing by reorienting yourself.

Ancient sailors would utilize something so far off and so seemingly unattainable in the midst of their travels to reach their destination. But by these far-off objects, the sailors could determine their position and direction. Those objects were the stars in the sky. They could use these to make sure they were headed in the right direction. That’s hope.

Hope is something that in the midst of grief feels so far off and so unattainable… And for us as believers, we know that our destination in grief is emotional and spiritual healing. To get there, we have to remember the One who can deliver us, not only by the stars, but TO the stars!

This kind of hope brings great healing in our lives.

Hope Heals

The nature of hope is healing.

As a matter of fact, there was a study done by the University of Berkeley back in the 90s that found that people with optimistic outlooks (read: hopeful) had 20% less likelihood of developing narrowed arteries. This is about the same risk as smoking a pack of day vs. not smoking at all, for reference.

A lack of hope can be fatal. That’s why God’s nature is so important to us, because He is the God of Hope!

Romans 15:13 ESV

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.

Paul, in this passage, wants his readers to understand that followers of Christ can have hope because we are in relationship with the God of hope! Follow me for a moment here. This is where the doctrine of God should really shape your life. Do you believe God to be infinite? Do you believe Him to be infinitely hopeful? Then that should carry significant weight for your day-to-day.

The God of hope fills us with joy and peace in believing. Believing! What do we do to access this joy and peace? We believe God.

I read something about basketball and what it’s like to coach basketball at different levels this week. It turns out that coaching at the professional level is quite different from coaching say, high school ball. In the NBA, you’re working with professionals. The players look to you for leadership, but maybe not in the same way that a younger player would. Professionals have perfected their craft.

With younger players, a coach has to take a more direct role. He has to help players develop, stay in shape, and execute plays. What that requires on the part of a young ball player is belief in the coach—Belief that he can lead this young player in perfecting his craft… Helping him to maximize his potential as a player.

Sometimes, this belief and trust in the coach is immediate because of what the player knows about this coach already. Sometimes it takes time to develop that trust because of things in the player’s past, or just a general unfamiliarity with the coach.

In this scenario, you and I are the player, and God is our coach. How much we believe and trust in Him has a real determining factor over the amount of hope you experience in your day-to-day life. Will you trust Him fully? Will you surrender? He is the source of hope. Any other hope is limited and frail.

Then, the personified fuel that is the Holy Spirit, the Scripture says, makes us to ABOUND in hope! Do you need hope? Healing hope? Your only shot is God, who is but a moment’s call away.

But how does this hope heal? Again, to go back to what we discovered last week… The Bible is not a band-aid. It can do good, surgical work on our souls to repair what’s broken. So we find this hope in God and His promises. Look what the prophet Isaiah had to say about the hope that’s found in the Lord!

Isaiah 40:31 ESV

but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.

That phrase, “wait for the Lord,” show that they who do so are putting their hope and trust in Him. This waiting and trusting and hoping in the Lord is what renews the strength of a believer. What renews your strength is not at the bottom of a bottle. It’s not in countless hours of netflix and social media. It’s not in forgetting and disengaging. It’s in pursuing what’s difficult with the Lord together! Yes, it’s painful! Yes it’s trying! But just as your surgery hurts for a while, it ends with healing.

And when the pain of grief sets in and tells you that there is no hope, you answer it back with Scripture. You answer it back with God’s promises. You answer it back by remembering that there is none who can stand against the Lord.

This God of Hope will carry us through all things.

Hope Carries Us Through

Look with me at this next passage.

2 Corinthians 4:16–18 ESV

So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.

First thing I want you to notice… “Though our outer self is wasting away…Light, momentary affliction… Look not to the things that are seen… the things that are seen are transient”

Second thing I want you to notice… “Our inner self is being renewed day-by-day… eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison… the things that are unseen… are eternal.”

The grief, the sadness, the downright attacks and abuses that are heaped upon you in this life, Paul says, are but a light, momentary affliction in the sight of eternity!!! Listen, if you need a boost of hope, you must remember how glorious Heaven will be!

I don’t know how clear I can make it, or how well I can do at describing the gloriousness of the promise here, but let me try anyway… The life we now live will pass. It will fade from view in light of eternity. What we do here is preparation! for the life to come. When you understand that the deepest pains of this life are, according to the Bible: light, momentary afflictions, it truly puts all things into perspective.

I’m not saying this in order to cover up your pain or try to act as though it doesn’t exist. I’m trying to give you ammunition when the pangs of doubt and despair settle into the deep recesses of your mind, so that you can break free from their imprisonment! Hell may have your attention, but Heaven is coming for you!