"Hoping in God, even if ..."
Good morning. It is a gift to
be able to share with you this morning what God has placed on my heart. As I
look out over this congregation I see more than friendly faces – I see my
family. Thanks Don, for giving me the privilege of speaking this morning.
By the way, I promise not to
touch the centerpiece on the altar. [Each Easter there is this beautiful centerpiece
on the altar that has an Easter lily growing out of this giant boulder]. For
those of you who were not here last week at the second service, Kathy LeBlanc
(my oldest daughter) and I were moving the altar off the platform and I lost
control of my end and the rock went sliding off. Everyone of course thought it
was Kathy - but it was me. Don was both quick and gracious and turned the mess
I made into an object lesson about how Jesus rolled the stone away. No wonder
we love him so much. Any way, I promise to stay away from it this week.
If you have your Bibles, If
you would turn with me to Dan 3:16-18. As you are turning there let me
provide a little background to the passage. As most of you know, the Book of
Daniel was written during a time of great trial for the people of Israel. In
spite of repeated warnings and admonitions from God through His prophets, their
disobedience caused God to destroy their beloved temple and to expel them from
the Promised Land. He forced them to settle in a godless land and through the
Prophet Jeremiah told them to settle down there. Our main characters in this
passage, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednigo are three young men who did just that.
God honored their faithfulness and gave them positions of honor and leadership.
They are charged with treason for not bowing down to an image the King had
made. Standing right before the King, we hear their reply:
Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego
answered and said to the King: "O Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to give
you an answer concerning this. If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to
deliver us from the furnace of blazing fire; and He will deliver us out of your
hand, O king. But even if He does not, let it be known to you O king, that we
are not going to serve your gods or worship the golden image that you set
up."
We’re going to come back to
this passage at the very end, so place a bookmark here to come back to later.
It will be a long time for you to keep your finger there ----- Well it won’t be
that long. This morning, I would like to talk with you about Hope. Certainly,
in this Easter season, we hear a lot about hope. The resurrection was the most
hopeful event that has occurred in the history of man. Spring is always a
season of hope - whether it is the earth coming back to life after the deadness
of winter - or if you are a baseball fan, the hope that your team will do
better next year. But do we really have a biblical understanding of what hope
is? What does it mean?
It’s easy to use terms and
phrases that we don’t really understand. Last week, as we stood around the
Easter table, I asked our younger grandchildren why we were celebrating Easter.
They knew that Jesus rose from the dead but did not know what it meant for us.
In the same way, we can be using words without really knowing what they mean.
So we will be spending a little time looking at the meaning of the word hope.
We will also be looking at
some other questions:
How do we appropriate the hope we have been given?
How do allow the Holy Spirit to cause Hope to abound in
our life as Paul prayed in Romans 15?
Hopefully, the Lord will use my words today to
not only help us understand hope, but to cause hope to abound among us by the
power of the Holy Spirit. Let’s ask the Father to do that this morning.
Lord,
may my words be your words today. As you have given us the gift of hope through
the power of your resurrection, use my words to help us unwrap this gift and to
begin to use it in our lives this day. Amen
For me, it is always helpful
to begin with definitions. Let’s define the words we are using so we have
common ground. On an every day basis we use the word hope in a number of ways:
I hope I get this new job
I hope my daughter gets home
safely tonight
I hope I don’t tip over the centerpiece
on the altar today
Another thing about the way
we use hope is that we only use hope concerning positive things in the future.
The thing we are looking to with expectation is a positive thing. It is
something we desire. We never hope for something we don’t want to happen.
A second aspect of the
traditional use of hope is that it carries with it a sense of expectation that
the thing we desire is going to happen. Older Webster’s dictionaries define the
verb to hope as - "To desire with expectation of fulfillment". As our
culture has continued to drift from its moorings of faith, this aspect of hope
is fading. Hope is more and more often used as a replacement for
"wishing." "I hope it doesn’t rain this afternoon."
But there is still a
difference between wishing for something and hoping. How would you feel if your
son came home and said:
I’m wishing for good grades
Versus
I hoping for good grades
Even in our every day usage,
hope still carries with it more certainty than wishing.
With the contemporary
definition aside, let’s take a few minutes and look at the biblical definition
of hope.
As you know, the Old
Testament was primarily written in Hebrew. And in the OT, there are four
separate and distinct words used for hope. I am not going to try and pronounce
them. I struggled with Nebuchanezzar. If you want to know them, you can talk to
Brad, our resident Hebrew scholar. These four words however are so similar in
meaning, that when the OT was translated into the Greek shortly before the time
of Christ, the same Greek word that is used for hope in the New Testament
(elpis) was used for all of them. The one thing that these words have in common
is that they all carry with them a root meaning of waiting.
Now wait a minute - this is
supposed to be a positive sermon about hope. I don’t know about you but hope is
a positive word and waiting is a negative word.
I don’t like to wait in line,
wait at the traffic light, wait for my family to get ready to go.
What does waiting have to do
with hope?
To really get into the
biblical understanding of hope we have to understand the active role that
waiting plays in hope. Biblical hope is always in something for which there is
no tangible evidence. Paul says in Romans 8:24 that hope that is seen is not hope.
Being from the Chicago area,
it is not using hope biblically to say:
I hope the Chicago Bulls win the NBA this year
but in one sense, it is using
hope biblically to say
I hope the Chicago Cubs win the NL pennant this year
The difference is that one is
on the horizon and the other is not. Waiting for the Bulls to win the NBA is
not the same as waiting for the Cubs to win the pennant.
But another thing that we see
in the scriptures about hope is that even though there is no tangible reason to
hope, there is a certainty in Biblical hope. This is where biblical hope
differs from the way we use it in every day life. Hebrew’s 6:11 talks about the
believer exercising spiritual disciplines so as to attain to the "full
assurance of hope." Paul describes biblical hope as a hope that does not
disappoint. And the writer of the book of Hebrews says that faith is the
evidence of a certain hope. In fact, all of the objects of hope – i.e. what we
are to hope in - are things that the Christian can have full assurance that it
is going to happen:
Eternal life
Salvation
Righteousness
To Be like Jesus
Essentially, the object of
Hope in the New Testament is God and what God has clearly spoken of as the
inheritance of the believers.
The words used for hope in
the Hebrew Old Testament and other sources written in Greek at the time the New
Testament was written, all carry with them a sense of waiting for both good
things, a fearful anticipation of bad things or just plain waiting for
something to happen. Under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, the writers of
the New Testament took this word and applied to the disciplined, confident and
positive waiting for God to be God that we now call hope.
So,
if we were provide a definition of biblical hope it would be:
the patient, disciplined,
confident, waiting for and expectation of God to be God.
Ok, we have that behind us.
We have a common understanding of what we are talking about when we use the
word hope.
It is God’s desire for us to
see hope abound in us - to become people of hope. Let’s look at some things
that help hope grow and some of the things that hinder hope from abounding in
our lives.
Lies
One of the things that I have
found crushes hope in my life is when I find myself believing certain lies that
deny certain aspects of God’s truth. One of these lies goes like this:
As a child of God, as one who
faithfully serves God, as one who lives a sacrificial life for Jesus, I should
never have to suffer.
This, brothers and sisters is
a pervasive and subtle lie right from the pit of hell. Although there is ample
evidence in the scripture to support the fact of God’s care for us and his
provision for us and for his will for good health for us, there is much
evidence that suffering is also part of the life of the believer. As evidence
about how dangerous and diabolical this lie is, remember the time in Matt 16,
just after Peter confessed Jesus as the Anointed One - God’s chosen? Jesus
began to tell the disciples about how He was going to suffer and be killed. Do
you remember Peter’s response? No not you Lord. And do you remember Jesus
response? Get thee behind me Satan.
Even though I know that this
is a lie, it’s easier to believe when things are going well than when things
are going bad. Satan, the whisperer will be right there -
You are suffering because you’re not really a Christian
If God is so loving, why is He letting this happen to you
(or your family)?
We need to recognize these as
straight from the pit and renounce them as such. If we entertain such lies,
hope will be crushed.
As many of you know, our
daughter Abby got mononucleosis about 3.5 years ago. And since that time, she
has never completely recovered. She has had to miss an immense amount of school.
She had to drop out of all of the activities she loved (drama and music) and
had to severely limit her activities. It was only last year that someone
finally diagnosed it. Once we knew what was wrong, I said to myself that I
needed to seriously seek God for her healing and began coming over to the
church every night for prayer. I felt that God had shown me that He would heal
her. After many months and no major change in the situation, I was very
discouraged. Then this fall, when it got so bad that Abby had to drop out of
school (in her senior year), my hope was far from abounding.
Then one night, I felt that
God showed me how I had begun to focus my hope on her healing rather than on
what God was doing in the present moment. My focus was so on her future healing
that I was missing what He was doing today. My hope was no longer on those
certainties that are the object of Biblical hope. God showed me that He is only
and always in the present. We can only experience God in the present moment. As
my focus shifted to the day Abby would be healed, I was missing what He was
doing today when she was not healed.
This proved to be a critical
juncture for me. I began to ask the Lord to show me how He was working in my
life, in Abby’s life, in our family TODAY. I was missing so much. And my
misdirected hope was surely a disappointment.
So, what can we do to allow
hope to abound in our lives. I want to mention two things that I have found to
provide a nurturing environment that allows hope to grow.
The first and obvious
antidote to lies is truth. And of course the greatest source of Truth is this
book. This book is a great source of hope for us as believers. Let me share
with you just three examples of hope from God’s word:
Of course, one of the
greatest scriptures concerning hope is found in Romans 8:28 I am sure most of you are very familiar
with it (All things work together for good…). What Christian has not found
these words to break through in some of the most hopeless situations?
Let me share with you one a
little less obvious. Leading up to Easter, our family has been watching an old
videotape we have of the Jesus of Nazareth mini-series. As I watched it again
this season, I was struck by the passion and the intensity of John the Baptist.
Michael York captures the passion and the fire of that great man of God. As I
watched John, my spirit would cry out to God for the passion and the fire of
John.
Lord
change me – give me that passion – uh, but I’d rather not have the locusts
although the wild honey would be okay. Also, You know, beheadings aren’t done
any more, so may my landing be a little gentler.
One morning after watching a
particular moving segment concerning John the Baptist, I read from Matt 11:11
where Jesus says:
He who is least in the kingdom of Heaven is greater than
John.
Brothers and sisters, that is
a scripture full of future and certain hope. One day you and I will be so
transformed that our passion will make John’s passion here on earth pale in
comparison. PRAISE GOD. That hope is certain. That hope is sure. WE SHALL ALL
BE CHANGED. And changed so that the least in the kingdom of heaven are greater
than John as he lived on this earth.
In my family, Barbara and I
have this THING. You probably have these kinds of THINGS in your family too.
Well, when I read a book, you start from the beginning and you work your way
through until the end. NO FAIR PEEKING ahead. Barbara on the other hand, reads
books in any which order! Appalling!!
Well, brothers and sisters, I
have peeked at the ending and guess what.
JESUS WINS!
And you know what else?
BECAUSE HE WINS, WE ALSO WIN!
Now that is true biblical
hope!
Turn with me to Romans 5:1-5
We exult/rejoice/celebrate in hope of the Glory of God
We exult in our tribulations;
knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance proven
character and proven character, hope - and biblical hope does not disappoint
Here
Paul lays out a progression. Tribulation leads to perseverance, which leads to
proven character, which leads to hope
As I reflected on this, I
could see how, if we allow God to have His way in trial and tribulations, they
would build character and perseverance in me. But hope? How do these situations
build hope?
What I felt that God showed
me in my own life was that as I took time to reflect on how God had worked in
situations in the past, hope would grow in me. One of the things I felt God
direct me to do during my times of seeking Him, was to write down all the
places I saw him at work in Abby’s life from the very beginning until now. Each
night as God brought various memories back and I filled my notebook with these
reflections, hope was being built for my present situations. Spiritual
Reflection on past trials and tribulations can be fertile soil for growing hope
in our lives. And that is how trials build hope as we take the time for
spiritual reflection.
Now, I promised to get back
to Daniel (That also means I’m at the end). This passage beautifully
illustrates biblical hope in the midst of a very difficult circumstance.
Shadrach, Meshach, & Abednego affirm their faith that God is able to deliver
them from the furnace. They affirm their faith in the fact that God will
deliver them out of the King’s hand. These are strong words of faith. Some
would not call it faith because of the next line
Even if He does not
Those words are heresy to
those who hold the Word of Faith view of believing. I believe that Shadrach,
Meshach, and Abednego are exercising true Biblical Faith and Hope. Because, it
is not a certainty that God was going to deliver them the way they wanted to be
delivered. But He was going to deliver them!
Henri Nouwen says:
When
we live with hope we do not get tangled up with concerns for how our wishes
will be fulfilled. So, too, our prayers are not directed toward the gift, but toward the
one who gives it. In the prayer of hope, there are no guarantees asked, no
conditions posed, no proofs demanded. You expect everything from God without
binding God in any way. Hope is based on the premise that God gives only what
is good. Hope includes an openness by which you wait for the promise to come
through - even though you never know when, where or how this might happen
Shadrach, Meshach, and
Abednego are exercising that kind of hope.
For us to become a people of
hope we need to expect everything from God but trust Him to do as He will. Our
call is then to faithfully serve Him.
My prayers of late have
repeatedly contained two phrases:
Even if …
and
Come what may
Lord,
even if I don’t see Abby’s complete healing today, I will love you and serve
you
Lord,
come what may I will worship you. For you are my hope - my only hope
Lord, we are full of wishes,
full of desires, full of expectations
Some of them may be realized,
many may not - but in the midst of all our satisfactions and disappointments
We hope in you
Lord, may we grow in hope
this day
Amen
Sunday April 19th, 1998 –
First Week after Easter
EDITORIAL NOTE: Two weeks after
this sermon was preached, Abby was healed after 3.5 years and has been well
ever since!! Praise God!