11/07/2020
Are you distraught today? Is your life filled with disappointment, and are the things you once placed great value in being drawn away from you? If you feel morose in this way then you are losing hope in life, and perhaps your faith is under attack as well. Hope in our earthly life, and hope in faith, walk arm in arm with one another, and together they give us an abundance of life. So think on those things that give you hope, and take refreshment in your faith, and life, from them.
“But I will hope continually and will praise you yet more and more.”
Psalm 71:14 ESV
I knew a man who had most everything that life could provide him. He was a man of faith, and a kind doctor who had saved many lives. He was wealthy beyond measure, was surrounded by friends, and had a family that he cherished deeply. So it was that he lived his life, but eventually he grew old, his children took on lives of their own, and his wife, who was the great love of his life, was confined to a wheelchair. Yet in his advancing years he held fast to his faith, hope, and the fullness of life. His days continued to be joyous.
As it is for each of us, death was assigned to him, and his wife. In keeping with this promise his wife became ill, and after a valiant struggle to live she passed away. The old man mourned her, and should have gone on living, but he died within four days of her death. He didn’t die of disease, and he never lost his faith, so, many around him attributed his sudden death to heartbreak. Heartbreak is an incredible sadness, and at its root is hopelessness. The old man had not lost faith, but he had lost hope, and life can’t exist without some small seed of hope. You see, he still loved her, but the loss of her love for him had stripped him of his earthly hope... and sapped the life from him. He gave up the ghost.
“And Jesus cried with a loud voice, and gave up the ghost. And the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom.”
Mark 15:37-38 KJV
We have worldly hope, but more than that we possess a spiritual hope, both the old man in my story, and Jesus on Calvary, gave up their worldly hope. Our hope in faith can sustain us here in this life, but many times it calls us on to stand before God in heaven... it is our ultimate hope, and holds our hand during our journey to eternity... it sustains us in eternal life.
So, when it is time to weigh our worldly hope against our spiritual hope, in which will we find ourselves leaning most heavily? Will we go swiftly to join Jesus, or will the hope we have in our wife, or children, sustain us in our earthly life a while longer? God is merciful, and good, and His finger rests on the scale of our hope as He decides to call out to us “Come!”... or to simply say “Stay a while longer!”
“There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call—”
Ephesians 4:4 ESV
Prayer:
Father, thank you for the hope we find in our earthly existence, but thank you most for the hope we find by way of our faith in you. Let the hope we have in the world sustain us as we go about doing your will here, and may the hope of faith we find in you lead us to eternal life as we praise you always. Holy, Holy, Holy, are you our God who gives us on earth the image of your heavenly hope, that we might know what awaits us, and provides us with a burning desire for an eternal life of joy. Praised be your name Lord for every seed of hope we are given... the loves, friendships, and glimpses of you in our everyday lives. Hear us as we worship you, and long to increase our hope in you as we approach the gates of your kingdom. Help us strengthen our hope on earth and in heaven, and through these, strengthen the peace, and joy, we find in you. Wash us clean of our sins Father, let the blood of Jesus purify us, and His sacrifice give us hope in your every promise of life. Hope is life, and no life greater than that which we find in you.
“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,”
1 Peter 1:3 ESV
Rich Forbes