December 2007 Advent Series – “Why
Christ Came: Hope”
1 John 3:1-3
Sermon preached at Curwensville Presbyterian Church – December 2, 2007
Prayer Introduction:
During the four Sundays of Advent we are going to look at “Why Christ Came.” And
see four reasons, corresponding to the four themes – reflected in the candles of
the Advent Wreath – Hope, Peace, Love and Joy. This morning, from
READ
I. What is Hope?
First, I would have you see the answer to the question, What is hope? It’s probably best to begin by defining what hope is not. It is not optimistic wishing. This is how the world defines hope.
Zig Ziglar says, “I'm such an optimist I'd go after Moby Dick in a rowboat and take the tartar sauce with me.” Another person comically said, “The optimist is the kind of person who believes a housefly is looking for a way out.”
Optimism may be a benefit of hope, but it is not the same thing as hope. The optimist says the glass is half-full and the pessimist says the glass is half-empty. But the one with hope says, “There is a glass of living water flowing eternally reserved for me.”
Optimism alone brings a great deal of false hope. One person said, “Probably nothing in the world arouses more false hopes than the first four hours of a diet.”
My blog – www.gluttonyisasin.blogspot.com – deals with the reality that optimism – built on worldly desires such as health, beauty, and feeling good about myself – will not bring repentance of this sin. Only a genuine hope in Christ – desiring the eternal delights of heaven over the temporary delights of this world – can bring true change.
So what is hope? John Calvin said it very well: “The word hope I take for faith; and indeed hope is nothing else but the constancy of faith.”
Faith is hope lived
out in real life. When we studied the Book of Hebrews we came to that great
definition of faith in
We live our lives based on where we place our hope. Of course, our natural tendency is to mis-place our hope; to place our hope in the wrong things.
Someone wiser than me (and there are lots of them) said, “No man knows what he is living for until he knows what he'll die for” (Peter Pertocci).
We sometimes jokingly say things like, “Those shoes are simply to die for.” Or, “I’d kill for a good night’s sleep.” But our natural tendency really is to live for the temporary things of this world: a Golden Tide, or Nittany Lion, or Steeler championship.
I used to live for my beloved Michigan and Detroit teams, until I realized how temporary even the celebrations of championships are. Two days after the Detroit Pistons won, the expansion of the league meant they had to get rid of two players. The day after the Red Wings won, a coach was killed, and a player severely – and permanently – injured, in a car accident.
Now sometimes false hope grows out of a misunderstanding. An elementary school teacher tells the story about a problem with students throwing rocks. The principal made an announcement warning students that anyone caught throwing rocks would be taken home by him personally. Later that day, during afternoon recess, a teacher admonished a kindergartner for throwing a rock. “Didn't you hear what the principal said this morning?!” the teacher said in disbelief. “Yeah,” replied the proud lad, grinning from ear to ear. “I get to go home in the principal's car!”
Our natural tendency is to live for things we can see, hear, touch, taste and smell – but those are things that don’t last; and, in fact, often bring greater despair.
So what is
hope? According to
When was the last time you reflected on the fact that you are a child of God? When Jen was out of town I had some extra time to play with my kids – and I recalled the joy of childhood:
Decisions were made by saying, “eeny-meey-miney-mo”
Mistakes were corrected by simply exclaiming, “Do over!”
Being old referred to anyone over 20.
The worst thing you could catch from the opposite sex was cooties.
Ice cream was considered a basic food group.
Abilities were discovered because of a “double-dog-dare.”
Getting a foot of snow was a dream come true.
It was a big deal to finally be tall enough to ride the “big people” rides at the amusement park.
We forget the joy of being children of God when we grow apart from the one who calls us his children. One of the most beautiful things we see in children is their dependence. From the very moment they are born they are dependent on others for everything: food, cleaning, learning. We live in a world fixated on independence. But our hope is found in God who shows us a need for dependence on him.
How great is God’s love? We can only see how great his love is, when we see how lost we are without his love. The wonderful truth is that we are adopted as children of God due to his love, and his love alone. We are saved not because we are good, but because we belong to God. And when we belong to God we are “called children of God.”
And this hope changes us. Verse 3 says, “Everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself, just as he is pure.” According to verse 2 we are being changed to be like Christ. “We know that when he appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.”
And that is “why Christ came,” and why he is coming again – so that we might become like the one in whom we are putting our hope. Christ came not to bring us hope, but to be our hope.
II. Where is the Hope?
And so, I would have you see the answer to the question, “Where is the hope.” Where is the hope in a world gone mad?
Listen to the words of Chuck Colson – “Where is the hope? I meet millions who tell me that they feel demoralized by the decay around us. Where is the hope? The hope that each of us has is not in who governs us, or what laws are passed, or what great things we do as a nation. Our hope is in the power of God working through the hearts of people. And that’s where our hope is in this country; that’s where our hope is in life.” And then Steven Curtis Chapman goes on to sing of Jesus as “Heaven in the Real World.”
Where is the hope? It is in heaven. But heaven has come to earth, and is coming again. Where is the hope? It is in the God who sent His Son that we might be called children of God.
God’s Word
also speaks of “the hope of salvation” (cf.
In fact, the Bible uses the word “hope” at least 166 times. Only once does the word “hopeless” occur: “You were wearied by all your ways, but you would not say, 'It is hopeless.' You found renewal of your strength, and so you did not faint” (Isaiah 57:10).
God’s Word is a word of hope in a world that is hopeless. Christians are never hopeless, because our hope – our confidence – is in Christ who has come and is coming again.
So how do we live in hope? How does Christ’s advents – his comings – affect the way we live in today’s world?
First, we must live not in the past, but live for the future. Charles Spurgeon tells of an old theologian who once said, “Who chides a servant for taking away the first course of a feast when the second consists of far greater delicacies?” Who then can feel regret that this present world passes away when he sees that an eternal world of joy is coming? The first course is grace, but the second is glory, and that is as much better as the fruit is better than the blossom.
Joni Eareckson Tada who became a quadriplegic in a diving accident said, “I have hope in the future. The Bible speaks about bodies being glorified. I know the meaning of that now. It's the time after my death here when I, the quadriplegic, will be on my feet dancing.”
Payson said, “Oh, when we meet in heaven, we shall see how little we knew about it on earth.” And I think about the little girl who was taking an evening walk with her father. Wonderingly, she looked up at the stars and exclaimed: “Oh, Daddy, if the wrong side of heaven is so beautiful, what must the right side be!”
Do you know the inheritance that God has reserved for you in heaven? The Apostle Paul said to the people of the church in Ephesus – “I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and his incomparably great power for us who believe” (Ephesians 1:18-19a).
Live not in the past, but live for the future – it is a glorious future.
Second, allow present trials to transfer your focus to the future. One of the pastors that had a huge influence on my life told me that he wasn’t even a Christian when he first became a pastor. He thought he was. He “believed in God” and liked talking about a loving God and singing hymns and doing church things. And then one day a church member’s son committed suicide and he realized he had nothing to say to that family. It was then that he came to know the truth that we sing, “When darkness veils his lovely face, I rest on his unchanging grace…when all around my soul gives way, he then is all my hope and stay. On Christ the solid rock I stand, all other ground is sinking sand…My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus’ blood and righteousness; I dare not trust the sweetest frame, but wholly lean on Jesus’ name.”
This week as I sat in hospital rooms with Jack Bellmore and Minnie Test coming to the end of their earthly lives, I was comforted with the reality that my hope is not built on my flesh and blood – but on the sacrificed flesh and blood of Christ.
Neither is our hope is built on our accomplishments, but in the redemption accomplished by Christ. As one person put it: “Our hope lies, not in the man we put on the moon, but in the Man we put on the cross” (Don Basham).
The Apostle Paul said, “We also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us” (Romans 5:3-5).
When Luther's puppy happened to be at the table, he looked for a morsel from his master, and watched with open mouth and motionless eyes. Martin Luther said, “Oh, if I could only pray the way this dog watches the meat! All his thoughts are concentrated on the piece of meat. Otherwise he has no thought, wish or hope.”
The purpose of our
present sufferings is to give us greater hope in the future devoid of suffering.
And so
We are about to sing, “The hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight” (O Little Town of Bethlehem). May we put our hope in Christ, who has come and is coming again – to bring us an eternal salvation found in him alone. It’s why Christ came.
MAY THE TRUTH SET YOU FREE – AMEN!