Hope
I’ve been thinking on hope for some time. Especially since Pastor Rod was diagnosed with cancer some months ago. While the illness has not been the best (is it ever?) – it has been a true blessing and ultimately a witness to see Rod’s hope. It surpassed the hope one might have in things that don’t last – like health, family, money etc.
Rod, and his wife Liz, recently decided to resign from the current church in light of his illness and the continuing growth of the church. It is with this (and his illness) in mind, that (I feel) he has begun a sermon series on HOPE. It’s been a good look into the history of Biblical hope, not just the hope given to Christians through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, but throughout the Old Testament of the Bible as well.
Faith, Hope and Love – and the greatest of these is love. -1 Corinthians 13
The first week we looked at God’s promises to Abraham AKA Abram (Genesis 12). That he would give him a land, descendants and would bless him; and yesterday we looked at the hope of Joseph in Genesis 42-46 focusing on chapter 45, where Joseph reveals himself to his brothers. Though he had been sold to slave traders by his brothers, falsely accused and thrown into prison – and away from his family and home for some 20 years – he still had hope. Would you? Would I? Hope isn’t found in our current circumstances, in the life we have here, the things we own or even the friends or family we have. None of that lasts – hope of the eternal kind can only come from something or someone beyond the laws of our current world – in someone that surpasses time and decay – in God.
God is our hope and our strength. If we have faith in Him there is nothing he won’t do. He is our redemption, and it is in His redeeming glory that we find our hope. Hope is more than a feeling, it is a knowledge. It is the knowledge that the Almighty God is above all that we face, and that, if we trust in Him, He will hold us ever so close in His loving embrace. God Bless you.