Can You Hear Me Now Pt 3

There is an old legend of a man who found the barn where Satan kept his seeds ready to be sown in the human heart. On finding the seeds of discouragement more numerous than others, he learned that those seeds could be made to grow almost anywhere. When questioned, Satan reluctantly admitted that there was one place in which he could never get them to thrive. "And where is that?" asked the man. He replied sadly, "In the heart of a hopeful person."

Hope is a choice

So much of our hope is based on our choice to walk it out. We all know people who are glass half empty kinds- everything is always negative. They are looking out for the worst of every situation. If they were a cartoon character they would be Eyor for Winnie the Pooh.

Many times we do not have a choice in the things that this life brings us, but we always have a choice in what to focus on.

Listen to Paul’s encouragement to the church in Colossae:

Colossians 3:1–2 ESV

If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth.

Today we are thinking about those who have fought a battle with cancer. I can guarantee you that no one that we honor today chose cancer- but many of them chose mindset. They chose a path; they chose to focus on the hope of Christ in the midst of it.

John McNeil tells the story of a young eagle he had raised with a flock of chickens. The out-of-place bird had never learned to fly. One day McNeil thought he would teach this bird how, so he tried throwing it up in the air. But each time the bird would look down and fall to the ground. Then he had an idea. Lifting the eaglet's head, he made it catch a glimpse of the bright sun above. That did it! The eagle pushed out its wings. Then, lifting its head with a shriek, it jumped from his hand and began to soar higher and higher until it was lost to sight in the face of the sun.

Hope is a universal Language

The good news is that hope is threaded throughout our world. Springtime flowers blooming again; the birth of a new baby; the sunrise each morning- each is a vision of hope.

There is a desire for hope ingrained into every human heart.

People want to have hope. We do not need to invent anything to offer hope- it is not an emotion or way of living that people need to be convinced of.

What most people need is not convincing them to hope; but convincing them to hope in something different.

They have likely hoped in someone or something before- perhaps even in that moment- but what they hoped in failed them and now they are lost. They were hoping their wealth would satisfy them; they were hoping the new love would complete them; they were hoping the treatments would cure them- and it fell short.

Yes, most people do not need you to convince them to hope- they need you to convince them to hope in Jesus. They need a guide, an example, a reason to trust in Christ. That is why our stories, our testimonies, our journeys are so important. We all receive promotions for hope every day- hope in political candidates; hope in the newest weight loss plans; hope in the market or the newest trends of the day. I wonder, as Christians do we “market” our hope in the same way? There are people lost and dying in the world that need a message of hope- and we have the ultimate answer for them- we have every opportunity to share the message of hope. The question for us is are we willing to step out and do it.

Communicating hope is a daily decision

One of the best ways to communicate hope in moments of darkness is to call back the hope we have communicated in the moments of light.

Jesus is our hope in all things- and we should take every opportunity to remind ourselves and those around us of God’s promises and they way he has saved us.

I love the way the David puts it in Psl 59:

Psalm 59:16–17 ESV

But I will sing of your strength; I will sing aloud of your steadfast love in the morning. For you have been to me a fortress and a refuge in the day of my distress. O my Strength, I will sing praises to you, for you, O God, are my fortress, the God who shows me steadfast love.

Notice that David makes a commitment to praise God in the morning- meaning every morning- every day. David did not wait until the moment of distress to declare God as his strength, or to declare God love and protection- no it was a daily commitment he was making.

Some might call this reciting the story of hope. I think that there is great power in this idea. How do we take hold to the hope of Christ in the grimmest of circumstance, like cancer or death, or trail? We rehearse the story in the best of times as well.

Imagine being cast for a main role in play and not rehearsing any of your lines until showtime. The curtains rise and the lights go on and the whole audience is staring at you- and you have not rehearsed a single time- probably not going to go well, right? You would need to practice it, rehearse it, and go over it so that when the right time came you were prepared. Reciting the hope of Christ is a lot like that.

Communicating hope is a labor of light

As Craig T. Kocher in his commentary on our text states, "Christian hope is fundamentally different from optimism. Christian hope locks its steely eyes on the devastation of the world around it, and readily acknowledges that things may not get better. Christian hope does not bury itself in displaced cheer, this hope pushes its way into the brokenness of the world clearing a path in the wilderness so the true light might burst into the darkness."

Make no mistake, friends, hope is not easy to come by. There is a labor in hope. Foolish optimism is easy- it is easy to act as though everything is okay. Christian hope is not an act- it is not pretending that there is not evil and not bad news in the world. Christian hope is laboring through that which is bad.

Hope takes effort because it calls us to look past the obvious. Have you ever walked through a dark forest towards a light on the other end? It can be easy to loose the light, can’t it? When I was younger we had an old hunting camp we used to go to and my treestand was at the end of the hollow. To get to the stand there was a wide open field and then a thick patch of woods that my stand was located in. I never had any problem seeing the light of our camp from the field, because it was wide open. There was nothing obstructing the light so the front porch light shined like a billboard from the view of the field. But once I got in the thick of the woods it was almost impossible to see the light. Trees and limbs blocked the way; the terrain shifted; lowered and rose- and it was easy to lose the light. Not because the light moved, but because my view of it changed.

Sometimes we need to change our attitudes, change our perspectives, and change our habits to find hope again. And sometimes we need to communicate that to others.

Sometimes it takes effort to find the hope in the world around us- we have got to look for it!

But we also know that hope is a labor of light. When light and darkness battle- light always wins. It will never be too dark for the light of the sun to stop. It cannot be too dark for a flashlight to light a path. In fact, some would say that light thrives in the darkness because that is when it does it best work.