30 November 08
Today I want to talk about our need for assurance in life.
One of the most fundamental questions of life, concerns hope;
“What is the hope of the world? “Can I count on anything in life”?
Is there any hope for world peace or of eradicating world poverty?
On a personal level is there any hope for my failing health, or struggling marriage, or my business or finances? Is there any hope?”
We can survive forty days without food, three days without water, and eight minutes without air. But it’s hard to last a single day without hope.
Dr Harold Wolfe a professor at Cornell University Medical School conducted a study on the effects of hope on the human body.
He studied 25,000 ex- prisoners of war over a long period of time to see what difference hope made in their lives. All of them experienced brutality, abuse and solitary confinement during their imprisonment.
What Dr Wolfe found was that the prisoners able to get on with their life, without post traumatic stress, were those who had an extraordinary high level of hope.
Hope makes all the difference in the world. We need hope to handle the inevitable crises of life.
Professor Wolf’s conclusion was that,
“When a person has hope he is capable of bearing incredible burdens and cruel punishment. But when hope is gone people fall apart, emotionally, physically and spiritually.”
Q. So where do we find hope? Remember also that we need to have lots of hope in the bank before problems come.
There is only one source of reliable, enduring hope in this world and this is found in our Creator God who is the hope of the world and His name is;
Jehovah Shammah; ‘The God who is always there’.
The Psalmist wrote, “In your name I will hope, for your name is good.” 52:9
Q. What does that mean? How can a name be a promise of hope?
When Hebrew parents gave names to their children they didn’t use pretty or sophisticated names like Tiffany or Amber, they would choose names because of what they meant.
God’s Hebrew names always convey meaning and hope.
Jehovah Shammah means that ‘there is no place where we can be without God’, whether we are aware of it or not.
Now if God is truly with me, no matter where I am, this means that there are three things that I can be sure of amongst the many uncertainties of life.
The Bible calls these three things anchors for the soul. So let’s consider them. # 1 Because God is always with us;
1. He is Present Watching Over Us
The older I get the more I realise just how much of my life is out of my control.
Maybe you are feeling a little the same, especially if you are concerned about the global recession.
But because God is always with us, we can be confident about the future.
(God) “Don’t worry, because I am with you. Don’t be afraid because I am your God. I will make you strong and I will help you. I will support you…” Isa 41:10 NCV
Regardless of what happens to us we don’t have to go through any part of our life alone, we have a God who is bigger than any problem we are asked to face and who will walk with us.
We can face the rest of our lives with confidence just because God is with us.
Psychologists tell us that the fear of being abandoned and left alone is one of the greatest causes of hopelessness today.
‘What if my husband or wife leaves me’? ‘What if my children don’t need me after they leave home’? ‘What if they aren’t there for me when I am old’?
What we can be sure of is that God will never leave us, the Bible says,
God watches over us and cares for us. (He has a lot of resources He can call on to help us in practical ways.)
I will guide you along the best pathway for your life I will advise you and watch over you.” Ps 32:8 NLT
We don’t know what the future holds and we don’t control the future but God does and He is willing to show us the way. There is great hope in that.
Feelings of hopelessness come from not knowing why something bad is happening to us – Job experienced, feeling of hopelessness.
If we can see the benefit that will come from something bad then there is a little more hope in that.
Now what if you knew with certainty that God knows why and because He is in charge we don’t have to know?
We don’t have to understand, all we have to do is trust in God’s amazing love for us. There is great hope in that.
Lamentations says, “I have hope when I think of this: The Lord’s love never ends; His mercies never stop. They are new every morning.” 3: 21 -23 NCV
This is a wonderful scripture on which to build our lives. Nothing can ever stop God from loving us.
Even if we let go of Him He’s not going to let go of us.
Q. Do you ever have one of those days when you wish you could live the day all over again?
You feel a bit hopeless because you have made such a mess of things.
Well the Bible says; “God’s mercies are new every morning.”
I need that – a fresh start, a new day to live in the power of God’s hope.
So this is our first anchor. God is watching over me.
The second source of hope is because;
2. His Purpose Is Being Worked Out In Our My Lives
No matter what is happening in my life, good, bad or ugly God is working out His purposes.
As I said, one of the most difficult questions to answer in life is,
“Why is this happening to me?
Why should I be the one who has a rebellious child, or a freak accident, or sudden illness?
This is very hard question to handle, especially if we feel that we have kept faith with God. We might even feel that He owes us an explanation – Job certainly did.
But when we see a greater purpose behind every problem it gives us hope and the strength to cope.
God says, “I’m working in your life and I can use everything that happens to you to achieve my purposes”.
Let’s look again at Romans 8:28, we come back to it again and again.
We know that God causes all things to work together for good for those who love God and are called according to His purpose.” NAS
This is such a significant verse; it makes sense of life, when life doesn’t make sense. But notice what it doesn’t say;
It doesn’t say everything works out the way we want it to. We would love to interpret this way but that’s not what it says.
And it doesn’t say that every story has a happy ending, because that’s not true either. Many things do not have a happy ending as we know.
Not every patient gets well, not every couple gets married and lives happily ever after. Not every problem gets solved.
Let me summarise what Romans 8:28 does say;
i. “We know”
Paul speaks of certainty; we don’t imagine, or wish; our faith is not based on false hopes or the power of positive thinking.
It’s not the view of the optimist that says ‘somehow things will turn out alright in the end’.
No, we can know with certainty!
What we know comes from the next phrase.
ii. “God causes” – There is a master plan and a Master Planner. History is His-story. Christians don’t believe in fate, or chance or karma.
That doesn’t mean that we believe that everything that happens is according to God’s perfect will; Not at all!
Sometimes God lets us experience the consequence of our mistakes. This is how we learn.
What we know is that God is ultimately in control, and He is working out His plan. “We know, that God causes”, what!
What does “God cause”?
iii. “all things” – This is a very long list of things, including; illness, divorce, unemployment, freak accidents, foolish decisions, etc. Anything and everything can be made to fit into God’s plan.
iv. “to work together for good”- Notice that Paul does not say that ‘all things are good’ and he certainly doesn’t say that God causes all things. God is not responsible for the violence, war, famine, poverty or disease and premature death in the world.
To attribute any of the world’s evil and tragedy to God would make Him a monster.
God is simply not capable of doing evil.
Instead His work is to bring good out of evil.
What else does Romans 8:28 say?
It’s a bit like putting together the ingredients of a cake, flower, raw eggs, baking powder, salt, vanilla essence and sugar.
None of them, except perhaps the sugar tastes any good on their own but blended together in perfect balance and baked in an oven they make something good to eat.
There are many things in life that are bitter to taste and difficult to swallow.
We certainly wouldn’t call them good but they work together for good.
God wants to take all the experiences of your life and make a cake. And don’t forget that not all cakes are the same but they are all good. Then the final clause in this great verse is God’s qualification; God’s miracle of transformation is not for everyone, it’s;
v. “for those who love God” – ‘all things do not work together for good for everyone.
For those who thumb their noise at God or have no time for God, things do not work out for good; in fact the opposite is true.
Roman’s 8:28 is a promise for people who love God and want to have a relationship with Him.
This is a promise for people who are dedicated to live according to God’s purpose which is spelt out in verse 29, ‘to make us like Jesus’.
Another very special verse for those trying to live according to God’s purpose is Jer. 29:11. God says,
“I have good plans for you, not plans to hurt you. I will give you hope and a good future.”
Often we struggle to find the good in what is happening around us but God asks us to trust Him;
“My plans are good.” “Will you trust me whether I heal you or deliver you from your struggles or not?”
God chooses what is best for us to fit into His perfect plan and He wants us to hope and not despair because He is in control.
Now if you have walked away from God and you think, will I was close to Him once but now I’m not sure if I will ever recapture that, then our next verse should give you hope.
Paul, “God began doing a good work in you and I’m sure He will continue it until it is finished when Jesus Christ comes again.” Phil. 1:16 NCV
When God starts something in our lives, He will bring it to completion. God says, just give me back the pieces of your life and I will give you my peace.
In Rom. 15:4, Paul said, “For everything written in the Bible is written for our hope and encouragement”.
The more we read this Book – the Bible the more hopeful we will become. Conversely the more we immerse ourselves in the secular media the more of the world’s hopelessness we are going to feel; there is not a lot of encouraging news to greet us each day.
So we have identified that our hope is based on;
i. the Lord’s is present with us and
ii. God’s purpose is being worked out in our lives.
iii. Our third source of hope is point # 3
3. God’s Place Is Waiting For Us.
When things get unbearable in our life remember that our ultimate hope is heaven.
Paul says; “If our hope is only for this life, just here on earth, we should be pitied more than all people. But the truth is we have an ultimate destination.” 1 Cor. 15
Life is just the warm up exercise on the sideline; the game will begin when Christ has assembled His team.
In John 14 Jesus told a worried group if followers;
Don’t be troubled. You trust in God, now trust in me…I am going to prepare a place for you.”Jn. 14:1 & 2 NLT
The key word here is ‘place’.
Heaven is a place, a real place that Jesus is getting ready for us.
There are two things we know about Heaven is that it is a place of relief and a place of release. No fear, no pain, no sorrow, no conflict. No more problems.
The Bible says of heaven;
“That God will wipe away all tears from their eyes, and there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying, nor pain. All of that is gone forever.” Rev. 21:4 LB
This is another wonderful reason for hope. (Story of the little girl)
The acid test of our faith is how we handle the loss of a loved one.
I have conducted funerals where there has been utter despair in the faces of the people before me.
I also know how every much different things are when the grieving family have certain hope of seeing their loved one again.
Of course we grieve; we grieve for what it means for those who are left but when a Christian dies, don’t grieve for them, they are more alive than ever in a much better place.
They have passed through something we will all eventually face.
Of course we grieve but not as people without hope.
The Bible often says ‘grieve but don’t be afraid’, because we know where we are going when we die.
If you are feeling hopeless this morning about something that’s happening in your life, it’s because you have forgotten or not fully understood just how much God cares for you.
“Listen! I have upheld you since you were conceived and have taken care of you from your birth. Even when you are old I will do the same. Even when your hair is grey, I will take care of you. I made you and I will take care of you. I will carry you and save you. Can you compare me to anyone? No one is equal to me or like me!” Isa. 46: 3 -5 NIV & NCV
What a wonderful God we have!
If any of you have any sense of hopelessness today then remember these three things; they are Christen certainties in a world of uncertainty.
i. God is present watching over you
ii. God’ purpose is being worked out in your life even when you don’t think so.
iii. God’s place is waiting for you; in heaven we will have perfect peace.
“Those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles: they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.” Isa. 40:31
Illustration.
Corry Ten Boom used to hold up picture of a crown and shawl, beautifully embroidered on a piece of cloth; which she described as God’s plan for our life.
She would then flip over the embroidered cloth and show the tangled, confused underside; illustrating how we view our lives from a human viewpoint.
The she would read this poem;
“My life is but a weaving, between my God and me.
I do not choose the colours, He worketh steadily
At times we weaveth sorrow and I in foolish pride,
forget He sees the upper and I the underside.
Not till the loom is silent and the shuttles cease to fly
will God unfold the canvas and explain the reason why.
The dark threads are as needful in the skilful Weaver’s hand. As the threads of gold or silver in the pattern He has planned.”
Prayer
Father I’m sure that there are people here today who are feeling overwhelmed by the circumstances of their lives and others who are distressed about what might lie ahead of them.
You love us very much and I pray that we may all know your comfort and the power of your hope.
Why don’t you pray?
Dear Lord Jesus, “You know exactly how I am feeling. You have seen the confusion and sadness in my soul and today I want to turn it all over to you.
You alone are my hope. Help me to be more aware that you are always with me and that you are always watching over me.
I want to thank You for working in my life even when I didn’t know it.
Thank you for giving my life purpose, I want to build my relationship with you. Please help me never to wander from your path.
In your wonderful name. Amen.