OUR HOPE FILLED FUTURE
KEY TEXT
1 Peter 1:3-5 (ESV) – 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, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.
INTRODUCTION
- Disasters in Aviation sector for year 2024
Title
OUR HOPE-FILLED FUTURE
Outline:
- A Gloomy Ending and A Gloomy Future
- Our Living Hope in Jesus
- Benefits of Hope
- “Played out” by Hope – “We had hoped”
MAIN POINTS
(I) A GLOOMING ENDING AND A GLOOMY FUTURE
January 29, 2025 – CNY – Year of the Snake – Negative forecast
(II) OUR LIVING HOPE IN JESUS CHRIST
1 Peter 1:3-5 (ESV) – 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, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.
SALVATION is a gift of GOD’S MERCY.
Believers are given “a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.”
What exactly does Peter mean when he speaks of “a living hope?”
- The New Birth Provides Our Living Hope
- Hope Is Not Wishful Thinking
- The Real Meaning of Hope
- ‘AN EAGER, CONFIDENT EXPECTATION.’
- This hope of the believer is not only “living” but “lively.”
- The CEV translates the phrase as “a hope that lives on.” –
- This “living hope” is energizing, alive and active in the soul of the believer.”
- “We live with great expectation,” as the NLT puts it.
- Our Living Hope originates from a living resurrected Savior.
- Hope Gives Us a Secure Future Despite Bleak Circumstance
- The Anchor of the Living Hope
- Living Hope is anchored in the PAST – Jesus rose from the dead (Matthew 28:6).
- It continues in the PRESENT – Jesus is alive (Colossians 3:1).
- And it endures throughout the FUTURE – Jesus promises eternal, resurrection life (John 3:16; 5:24).
- Living hope also enables us to live without despair as we encounter suffering and trials in the present life.
- “Therefore we do not give up. Even though our outer person is being destroyed, our inner person is being renewed day by day. For our momentary light affliction is producing for us an absolutely incomparable eternal weight of glory. So we do not focus on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal” (2 Corinthians 5:16-18, CSB).
- The Object of Our Living Hope
- The object of our living hope is described in 1 Peter 1:4 as “an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you” (CSB).
- We have an inheritance that will never be touched by death, stained by evil, or faded with time.
- It is DEATH-PROOF, SIN-PROOF, AGE-PROOF, FAIL PROOF
- No Hope, No Survival
- Living Hope Is Solid and Secure
“We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure. It enters the inner sanctuary behind the curtain. Jesus has entered there on our behalf as a forerunner, because he has become a high priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek” (Hebrews 6:19-20 CSB).
(III) THE BENEFITS OF THE LIVING HOPE
It is no coincidence that the Bible ends with Revelation, a book that looks toward Christ’s and the Christian’s final victory in heaven, on earth, and in the New Heaven and the New earth.
The Christian hope is explained, inflamed, and sustained by God’s Word.
Hope has lots of friends. It never lives alone. It comes with a happy company of other blessings and benefits.
What are the benefits of our living hope?
- Hope Moves You Forward
- Hope Energizes the Present
Almost every economic and social change or trend points in the positive direction, as long as we view the matter over a reasonably long period of time. That is, all aspects of material human welfare are improving in the aggregate.
- Hope Lightens Darkness
To put it simply, expecting an event can bring as much benefit as the event itself. How much joy we are missing by not exercising hope!
- Hope Increases Faith
Faith fuels hope, but hope also fuels faith.
As Hebrews 11 makes clear, hope and faith are very closely tied together, the one enlivening the other.
Without faith, we cannot soar in hope, but without hope, faith will limp home. The greatest believers are the greatest hopers and vice versa.
- Hope Is Infectious
- Hope Is Healing
- Hope Is Practical
Hope motivates action.
- Hope Purifies
Everyone who has this hope in Him purifies himself, just as He is pure. – 1 John 3:3
- Hope Broadens the Mind
- Hope Stabilizes in the Storm
Like the anchor, hope grabs what is out of sight.
The cable of faith casts out the anchor of hope and lays hold of the steadfast rock of God’s promises.
- Hope Is Realistic
Norman Vincent Peale’s idea of hope is founded on a denial of reality. In the Power of Positive Thinking, he wrote,
Expect the best at all times. Never think of the worst. Drop it out of your thought, relegate it. Let there be no thought in your mind that the worst will happen. Avoid entertaining the concept of the worst, for whatever you take into your mind can grow there. Therefore, take the best into your mind and only that. Nurture it, concentrate on it, emphasize it, visualize it, prayer-ize it, surround it with faith. Make it your obsession. Expect the best, and spiritually creative mind power aided by God power will produce the best.
This is more like self-hypnotism than hope in God.
Christian hope sees reality, faces it, feels it, accepts it, and yet rises above it on the wings of faith.
In his most extensive treatment of Christian hope, the apostle Paul describes the blessed duet of groaning in pain and soaring with hope.
- Hope Defends
Paul also depicts hope as a defensive helmet that must not be taken off and laid aside until the battle is over.
That image points us to the main area of vulnerability and danger – the mind or thoughts. That’s the key area in building up hope.
(IV) “PLAYED OUT” BY HOPE
Maybe at a certain point in your life, you “had hoped” for something in Christ but you were greatly let down.
The narrative of the 2 disciples walking down on the road of Emmaus (Luke 24:13-32).
They had hoped that Jesus would be their Messiah.
“WE HAD HOPED” (Luke 24:21)
One of the grievous words we have ever uttered in OWN road of Emmaus
The words we speak on our road of Emmaus are words of
- PAIN
- DISAPPOINTMENT
- BEWILDERMENT
- Words we say when we have come to the END OF OUR HOPES – when our EXPECTATIONS HAVE BEEN DASHED, OUR CHERISHED DREAMS ARE DEAD, AND THERE’S NOTHING LEFT TO DO BUT LEAVE, DEFEATED AND DONE.
BUT WE HAD HOPED.
In the Gospel in Luke 24:13-32, Cleopas and his unnamed companion said these same words to the stranger who appears alongside them as they walk to Emmaus on Easter EVENING.
“But we hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel” (verse21).
Jesus – as far as they know – is dead.
JESUS DIED FOR ALL OUR UNFULFILLED HOPES, DREAMS AND DESIRES. HE TOO HAD HOPED THE FATHER WOULD REMOVE THE CUP OF SUFFERING ON THE CROSS BUT HIS HOPE WENT UNHEARD. HE TOO HAD HOPED HIS DISCIPLES WOULD FOLLOW HIM ALL THE WAY THROUGH BUT MANY RAN AWAY AND ONE BLATANTLY DENIED HIM THREE TIMES. JESUS HAD HOPED BUT WAS DASHED CRUELLY ON THE CROSS. HE DIED FOR “ALL THE THINGS WE HAD HOPED FOR BUT DIDN’T MATERIALIZE.”
The resurrection that comes for Cleopas and companion takes LONGER than three days.
Sometime new life comes in fits and starts.
Sometimes, SEEING AND RECOGNIZING THE RISEN CHRIST IS HARD.
The road to Emmaus – the road of brokenness, the road of failure – is a SACRED ROAD. A road that Jesus walks. A road that honors our deep disappointment, even as it holds our possibilities of nourishment and revelation.
The Emmaus narrative reveals about the heart and character of Jesus.
Jesus is not who we think He is, and not who we necessarily want him to be.
Who is the would-be stranger on the broken road? How does He respond when your hope is lost?
Notice the following from the gospel story:
- A Quiet Resurrection
Application: We had hoped Jesus would be more dramatic. More convincing. More unmistakably divine. Part of the disappointment we face on the Emmaus road is the DISAPPOINTMENT OF A QUIET RESURRECTION. The disappointment of God’s maddening subtlety and hiddenness. The disappointment of a Jesus who prefers the quiet, hidden encounter to the theatrics we expect and crave.
- Healing Through Story
As soon as Jesus falls into step with the companions on the road, He invites them to tell their story.
They tell Jesus the whole story.
And Jesus listens.
He hears them out and then when they are done – He tells the story back to them and as He does so, the story changes.
In His retelling, it becomes what it really always was – something far bigger, deeper, older, wiser and richer than the travelers on the Emmaus road understood.
When Jesus tells the story, He restores both its context and its glory.
He grounds the story in memory, in tradition, in history, in Scripture.
When Jesus tells the story, the death of the Messiah finds its place in the sweeping, cosmic arc of redemption, hope and divine love that spans the centuries.
When Jesus tells the story, the hearts of his listeners burn.
Application: When we walk on our own Emmaus road, we always narrow our story. Our lens become very small, very myopic. We lose all sense of the big picture. We lose all our ability to place our life in the broader, more expansive context of God’s all-encompassing STORY.
Like Cleopas and his companion, we all need Jesus to meet us on the road and weave memory, Scripture, context, pattern, purpose and history back into the tiny narratives we cling to. We need the WORDS – eternal and all-loving – to shape, hone, chasten and enliven our words.
“But we had hoped the story was bigger. We had hoped it would have a better ending.”
Well, it is.
And it does.
- Freedom to Leave
When the travelers reach Emmaus, Jesus gives them the option to continue on without him.“ Stay with us.” That was what Cleopas and his companion say to Jesus. Stay with us.
An invitation. A welcome. The words a patient Jesus waits to hear.
Application: Here we can all see Jesus’ unwavering commitment to our freedom. He will not impose. He will not overpower. He will not coerce. He’ll make as if He is moving on, giving us space, time and freedom to decide what we really want. Do we desire to go deeper? Are we ready to get off the road of our failures and defeats and disappointments? Are we willing to let the guest become our host? Do we really want to know who the stranger is?
- The Smallness of Things
Once Jesus and his companions are seated around the table, Jesus takes bread. He takes, blesses, breaks and gives. So small a thing. So small a thing that changes everything.
The Emmaus story speaks to this power – THE POWER OF THE SMALL AND THE COMMONPLACE TO REVEAL THE DIVINE.
God shows up during a quiet evening walk on a backwater road. God is made known around our dinner table. God reveals God’s self when we take, bless, break and give. God is present in the rhythms and rituals of our seemingly ordinary days.
What does this mean right now?
It means God is in any small good gestures you do to anyone in His name.
If the Emmaus story tells us anything, it tells us that the risen Christ is not confined in any way by the seeming smallness of our lives. Wherever and whenever we make room, Jesus comes.
“But we had hoped.”
Yes, we had. Of course we had.
So very many things are different right now than we had hoped they’d be.
And yet. The stranger who is the Savior still meets us on the lonely road to Emmaus. The guest who becomes our host still nourishes with His Presence, Word and Bread.
So, keep walking.
Keep telling the story.
Keep honoring the stranger.
Keep attending to your burning heart. Christ is risen.
He is no less risen on the road to Emmaus than He is anywhere else.
So, look for him.
Listen for Him and when He lingers at your door, honoring your freedom, but yearning to feed you, say what He longs to hear: Stay with me.
That is how the gospel story of Jesus enables you to have a hope-filled future – regardless the disappointment and brokenness the road of Emmaus for year 2025 may lead you to.
CONCLUSION
We are all born again to the living hope through the resurrection of Jesus.
There are so many benefits being hope-filled.
And should you today be those who had been played out by hope and being let down, then let the gospel story of the 2 disciples on the road of Emmaus encourage you to believe there is a quiet resurrection beside you now though you couldn’t recognize Him.
Let the Presence, the Word and Bread stay with you even though the things YOU HAD HOPED “seemingly” died.
Stay hopeful and declare by faith – despite all the negative predictions.
Year 2025 is going to be a HOPE-FILLED future because WE ARE BORN AGAIN WITH THE LIVING HOPE LIVING INSIDE US.
