THERE IS HOPE WITH HOPE
Psalms 25:4,5 Show me your ways, O Lord, teach me your paths; guide me in your truth and teach me, for you are God my Savior, and my hope is in you all day long.
Hope is a very important part of everyone’s life and certainly for the Christian’s life. We live by faith constantly doing what we say we believe, but our hope motivates us to do what others may say is foolish. The world has no reason to even hope for what they feel they can not see or have experienced. They say, “Seeing is believing,” but for the Christian believing results in a hope that will eventually if not sooner will be seen.
Hope will get us through the hard times in life when it seems that our beliefs becomes hard to believe in. When we look at our loved one in the casket and know that they are not going to open their eyes. and soon their body will be placed in the ground, we are shaken. The world says, “Now where is your God?” But the Christian can say in all sincerity that they are with the Lord, because of their hope in their belief in Jesus’ promises for eternal life with him. Unlike faith, hope does not require action. Hope says, “The house looks sturdy and safe.” Faith says, “I’ve never done this before, but I am going in!” Both are needed for the Christian to receive all that God has promised and wants to give us. At times hope may even be harder to hand on to than the desperate act of faith when we have nothing else to lose. Hope may have to last for a lifetime as in regards to our resurrection and eternal life with God in heaven. We certainly can’t count on the world to help us for hope. Sometimes regarding faith they will be curious and tell us to go ahead and try it, with the intention of them seeing the results. The world looks at our hope. and laughs in their heart thinking that we are worse than foolish.
Our hope comes from our belief. The more we read the Bible, study it and fellowship with like believers the stronger our hope becomes. The more we trust that the Bible is God’s inspired word to us, the more we will trust in it and the more steadfast hope will come from it. It take a strong belief to have a strong hope. And it takes a correct belief to have a fulfilled hope. To believe a lie no matter how sincere we may be it will always be a lie, and we will be let down and disappointed because of it. God has not only given the Christian his word to look to, but he has also given us the Holy spirit as a sign or guarantee as to what God has promised. The world can not benefit from the Holy Spirit’s assurance until the world listens and obeys the Holy Spirit’s drawing them to salvation through Jesus. Until then they have eyes and ears to see and hear, but can do neither regarding the things of God so they have no hope.
Sometimes things in a Christian's life will tear away at our faith and even our belief, but when hope remains strong there will always be that openness to allow God to pick us up and carry us into our blessed hope in Jesus. When we are weak Jesus is always strong. Don’t give up on him no matter what the world or even what you may feel. In II Timothy 1:12 it says, “That is why I am suffering as I am. Yet I am not ashamed, because I know whom have believed, and am convinced that he is able to guard what I have entrusted to him for that day.” When you don’t think you can hang on to Jesus any longer, crawl up into his loving arms!
Prayer: Holy Spirit, thank you for helping us to believe and trust in Jesus. Thank you for helping us to have faith to respond to your call, and thank you for the blessed hope of the truth in the sure salvation and reconciliation of Jesus.
