Advent Week 1 - Hope
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Intro
Intro
I’m a fan of Marvel movies.
- The impossible stories of hope
HOPE An expectation or belief in the fulfillment of something desired. Present hurts and uncertainty over what the future holds create the constant need for hope. Worldwide poverty, hunger, disease, and human potential to generate terror and destruction create a longing for something better. Historically, people have looked to the future with a mixture of longing and fear. Many have concluded that there is no reasonable basis for hope and therefore that to hope is to live with an illusion.
What brings us to the point of need?
How do we experience God as the source of all hope?
Read Psalm 25
Of David.
1 To you, O Lord, I lift up my soul;
2 in you I trust, O my God.
Do not let me be put to shame,
nor let my enemies triumph over me.
3 No-one whose hope is in you
will ever be put to shame,
but they will be put to shame
who are treacherous without excuse.
4 Show me your ways, O Lord,
teach me your paths;
5 guide me in your truth and teach me,
for you are God my Saviour,
and my hope is in you all day long.
6 Remember, O Lord, your great mercy and love,
for they are from of old.
7 Remember not the sins of my youth
and my rebellious ways;
according to your love remember me,
for you are good, O Lord.
8 Good and upright is the Lord;
therefore he instructs sinners in his ways.
9 He guides the humble in what is right
and teaches them his way.
10 All the ways of the Lord are loving and faithful
for those who keep the demands of his covenant.
11 For the sake of your name, O Lord,
forgive my iniquity, though it is great.
12 Who, then, is the man that fears the Lord?
He will instruct him in the way chosen for him.
13 He will spend his days in prosperity,
and his descendants will inherit the land.
14 The Lord confides in those who fear him;
he makes his covenant known to them.
15 My eyes are ever on the Lord,
for only he will release my feet from the snare.
16 Turn to me and be gracious to me,
for I am lonely and afflicted.
17 The troubles of my heart have multiplied;
free me from my anguish.
18 Look upon my affliction and my distress
and take away all my sins.
19 See how my enemies have increased
and how fiercely they hate me!
20 Guard my life and rescue me;
let me not be put to shame,
for I take refuge in you.
21 May integrity and uprightness protect me,
because my hope is in you.
22 Redeem Israel, O God,
from all their troubles!
Pray
God wants us to experience Him as the source of all hope
God wants us to experience Him as the source of all hope
1 To you, O Lord, I lift up my soul;
2 in you I trust, O my God.
Do not let me be put to shame,
nor let my enemies triumph over me.
Seventy-two psalms—almost half the book—speak about enemies.
Enemies are those who oppose not only us, but also God’s way of living.
We can view temptations—money, success, prestige, lust—as our enemies. And our greatest enemy is Satan.
David asked God to keep his enemies from overcoming him because they opposed what God stood for. If his enemies succeeded, David feared that many would think that living for God was futile. David did not question his own faith—he knew that God would triumph. But he didn’t want his enemies’ success to be an obstacle to the faith of others.
I want to draw your attention back to the first verse of this Psalm.
“The beginning, end, and arrangement of Psalm 25 are major clues to understanding its character. It begins with a line that is a profound description of prayer: ‘To you, LORD, I life up my soul’ (v. 1; 86:4; 143:8).
In Israel, lifting up one’s hands in a stretched-out position was a gesture of earnest used in prayer. To lift up the soul to God is a metaphor for what the gesture means.
The metaphor portrays prayer as an act in which individuals hold their conscious identity, their life, in hands stretched out to God as a way of saying that their life depends completely and only on the help of God” (James L. Mays, Psalms, Interpretation [Louisville, KY: John Knox Press, 1994], 124).
Psalm 25:16-20 Do life’s problems always seem to go from bad to worse?
16 Turn to me and be gracious to me,
for I am lonely and afflicted.
17 The troubles of my heart have multiplied;
free me from my anguish.
18 Look upon my affliction and my distress
and take away all my sins.
19 See how my enemies have increased
and how fiercely they hate me!
20 Guard my life and rescue me;
let me not be put to shame,
for I take refuge in you.
God is the only one who can reverse this downward spiral. He can take our problems and turn them into glorious victories.
The most important step is that we, like David, must cry out, “Turn to me and be gracious to me.” When we are willing to do that, God will do his work in us and in our situation. The next step is yours—God has already made his offer.
Hope is formed in a process of God “teaching me as we go”.
Hope is formed in a process of God “teaching me as we go”.
Dr. Jim Diel
4 Show me your ways, O Lord,
teach me your paths;
5 guide me in your truth and teach me,
for you are God my Saviour,
and my hope is in you all day long.
Circle or underline these words in your bible
Show me, Teach me, Guide me, Teach me
Then write “Teach me as we go.”
I love the picture that develops here. This is not a picture of God removed from our lives, watching us flounder, struggle, get discouraged...
This is a picture of God walking with us in whatever we are going through.
It is a picture of God patiently helping us understand who he is so that our hope is firmly established in where our should be placed.
My wife was explaining to me the process she uses for teaching new concepts to her students.
“I do, We do (maybe repeated as necessary), You do”
What I see in this passage and in my experience is that Hope is established in the process of God showing us who he is, teaching us who he is, guiding us in who he is, and teaching us in who he is
Nothing in our life is wasted. Not only can God redeem it, he uses it
Our life is a process of establishing our hope in God alone.
How do we find ourselves in this process of “show me, teach me, guide me, teach me”?
David expressed his desire for guidance. How do we receive God’s guidance? The first step is to want to be guided and to realize that God’s primary guidance system is in his Word, the Bible. Psalm 119 tells of the endless knowledge found in God’s Word. By reading the Bible and constantly learning from it, we will gain the wisdom to perceive God’s direction for our lives. We may be tempted to demand answers from God, but David asked for direction. When we are willing to seek God, learn from his Word, and obey his commands, then will we receive his specific guidance.
This is sanctification being worked out in our lives
Hope is a clear picture of who God is and accurate picture of ourselves
Hope is a clear picture of who God is and accurate picture of ourselves
Psalm 25:10-12 (NIV - Anglicised)
10 All the ways of the Lord are loving and faithful
for those who keep the demands of his covenant.
11 For the sake of your name, O Lord,
forgive my iniquity, though it is great.
12 Who, then, is the man that fears the Lord?
He will instruct him in the way chosen for him.
Psalm 25:12 To fear the Lord is to recognize God for who he is: holy, almighty, righteous, pure, all-knowing, all-powerful, and all-wise.
When we regard God correctly, we gain a clearer picture of ourselves: sinful, weak, frail, and needy.
When we recognize who God is and who we are, we will fall at his feet in humble respect. Only then will he show us how to choose his way.
This clear picture develops when we act and respond in humility to the holiness of God
Psalm 25:10 The Hebrew term used here, chesed, is one of Yahweh’s essential characteristics. When paired with emeth, the Hebrew word for God’s faithfulness (as it is here), chesed, describes God as absolutely dependable to fulfill His promises (see Exod 34:6 and note).
This term is used 245 time in the OT, 127 times in the Psalms alone.
10 All the ways of the Lord are loving and faithful
for those who keep the demands of his covenant.
1 Barry, John D. et al. Faithlife Study Bible. Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2012, 2016. Print.