LIVING LIFE IN HD: HOPE
PHILIPPIANS 3:1-21
SEGMENTED ILLUSTRATION 1: The Shawshank Redemption (www.ozsermonillustrations.com/frames/hope_frameset.htm)
The Shawshank Redemption is one of the best modern films made in my opinion. It has drama and suspense and turns your heart and stomach upside down. It is a film that will make a grown man cry… not that I would know about such things. I enjoy Morgan Freeman as an actor and so I was drawn to see this film as he is a co-star in the movie… maybe you have seen it. Set in 1940’s America it tells the story of Andy Dufresne, a gentle, quietly spoken banker who is falsely convicted of his wife’s murder and sent to prison. The prison is governed by the harsh and uncompromising Warden Norton. Life inside is even harsher. Red, a life prisoner who befriends Andy, puts it like this: "The first night’s the toughest, no doubt about it. They march you in naked as the day you were born, skin burning and half blind, and when they put you in that cell... and those bars slam home...that’s when you know it’s for real. A whole life blown away in the blink of an eye. Nothing left but all the time in the world to think about it."
And so Andy is subjected to the harsh realities of prison life. Yet he’s also very intelligent. Andy is co-opted by the warden to handle his accounts, including monies gained through corrupt and illegal activities. He develops careful and elaborate schemes to launder the money for the warden. And in return Andy is able to get some concessions for himself and the other prisoners - a library and basic educational services, a record player, and beer while on a prison chain gang. These concessions are like little tastes of heaven. When Red hears an Italian opera on Andy’s record player he says: "I have no idea to this day what those two Italian ladies were singing about. Truth is, I don’t want to know. Some things are better left unsaid. I’d like to think they were singing about something so beautiful it can’t expressed in words, and it makes your heart ache because of it. I tell you, those voices soared higher and farther than anybody in a grey place dares to dream. It was as if some beautiful bird had flapped into our drab little cage and made these walls dissolve away, and for the briefest of moments, every last man in Shawshank felt free."
I can imagine that being sentenced to prison for life is a situation that seems so dark and so terrible. Were you or I in such a situation, especially if we were falsely accused, we would be full of fear and any hope that we would have had for our life would have went down the drain… lost and washed out to sea. We would have such anguish and fear and uncertainty. I starting thinking about this and realized that there are many situations in life (it doesn’t have to be a prison sentence in Shawshank Prison) that would create these same feelings of hopelessness, fear, worry, and doubt.
Life is full of situations that test us beyond what we can bear and stretches our strength, faith, and hope to its very breaking point. We place our hope and trust in situations and people and they fall short. Let me give you some examples that you might identify with:
* We place our hopes in our finances. We put trust and money behind funds and businesses, but at times those fail and stocks are certainly unpredictable. One bad day in the stock market and some peoples’ whole livelihood is gone in an instant. The news is full of companies that did not make profits and whose employees are without pensions and 401Ks. We put our money in our home and then it is destroyed by a storm. Bad things happen and money can just seem to slip away. I heard this week that in Cape Coral, Florida that 1 in 80 homes is in foreclosure and that foreclosed homes is on the rise around our nation. Our society tells us that money makes the world go ‘round and when money goes away… our lives fall apart. Money fails.
* We place our hope in good health. There is no worse feeling than sitting next to a hospital bed of someone you love and their health is failing or they are sick. The person you love is in pain. They are in need of surgery because something in their body is making them unhealthy. You feel powerless. You feel inadequate to help them. You are hoping that medicine and doctors and nurses can heal. It is also stressful, difficult, and agonizing when you yourself are ill. We place such hope on good health so that we can work and play and do what we wish… but our health and the health of those around us can sometimes fail. You can take a look at our church prayer list and see dozens of families that are going through something like this because of illness, surgery, medical tests, or disease. Health fails.
* We place our hopes in the people around us. Life is not lived alone and we many times rely on other people for small things… large things… important things. We trust in our spouse. We raise children and grandchildren the best way that we can. We do our best at work and try to get along with bosses and co-workers. We hope and trust in business partners and clients. And yet, people can sometimes just stink. We rely on our spouse and he or she fails… and what is worse, maybe they were unfaithful. We trusted in our boss and they fired us with no warning. We trusted a business associate that did not come through. Our kids make the wrong choices and then look at us with blaming eyes. When we are around people, sin and mistakes will happen and they will let us down, it is part of life. People fail.
It seems like there are so many things that we can put our trust in that just fail… maybe you have thought of more examples of what we place our hope in that does not seem to live up to the hope that we give. There are many things that we think are important and base our life on… that when weighed… seem to come up short and wanting. There are so many things in this life that have value and are good, but in the end do not hold up under the pressure and stress of life. What are we to do? What does the Bible say?
READ PSALM 33:12-22
“Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD, the people he chose for his inheritance. 13 From heaven the LORD looks down and sees all mankind; 14 from his dwelling place he watches all who live on earth-- 15 he who forms the hearts of all, who considers everything they do. 16 No king is saved by the size of his army; no warrior escapes by his great strength. 17 A horse is a vain hope for deliverance; despite all its great strength it cannot save. 18 But the eyes of the LORD are on those who fear him, on those whose hope is in his unfailing love, 19 to deliver them from death and keep them alive in famine. 20 We wait in hope for the LORD; he is our help and our shield. 21 In him our hearts rejoice, for we trust in his holy name. 22 May your unfailing love rest upon us, O LORD, even as we put our hope in you.”
This Psalm to the Lord is telling us that hoping and trusting in armies (earthly things) will get us nowhere. God tells us that having confidence in our own strength will not help us escape one single enemy. No horse can be our hope of escape. The Psalm is telling us that earthly things fail and cannot hold true hope. Earthly things like money, people, business, entertainment, other religions, music… whatever earthly treasures we trust in… will fail us and cannot bring deliverance to us. This passage, and the passage we will read from Philippians in a moment, tells us that our hope should be set upon God alone. Nothing else is sure in this life. Everything else fails in this life. God is always sure. God never fails.
I want you to notice that the Psalm instructs us to wait in the Lord and trust in Him… give our hearts to Him… because He is the One that watches over us and cares for us and keeps us alive in the famine dry times in our lives.
SEGMENTED ILLUSTRATION 2: The Shawshank Redemption
Unlike the other prisoner Andy retains a sense of hope, hope that life can be more than the prison he was in, hope that he can one day be released and live again. When he hears Red playing his harmonica Andy comments "Here’s where it makes the most sense. You need it so you don’t forget. Forget that there are places in the world that aren’t made out of stone. That there’s a - there’s a - there’s something inside that’s yours, that they can’t touch."
Then one day, two decades after he enters prison, Andy is gone. It turns out that for those two decades hope has driven him on as he has painstakingly carved out a tunnel, hidden behind a Rita Hayworth poster on his wall. No one knew about it, but with his tunnel complete Andy crawls though the earth, through the stinkhole of the sewer to freedom. He’s liberated and free.
Andy now goes to the bank that held the false accounts he’s set up for the warden. Nobody has ever met the fictitious account holder, Peter Stevens, before. But Andy has been preparing for this for a long time. He has the required ID’s and the matching signature. Andy becomes Peter Stevens and withdraws all the warden’s corrupt money. And then he anonymously reveals Norton’s corruption to newspapers and police, to see Norton’s harsh fist removed from the prison.
What is hope? How can we define hope? Is hope something that we can put into words? I must confess that I have found it difficult to put hope into words. Is it an emotion? Is it an attitude? Is it a way of thinking?
Hope is confidence in the future.
Hope is belief that tomorrow will be better than today.
Hope is trust.
Hope is faith.
Hope is a state of mind and an attitude of the soul
Hope is to wish for something and to expect its fulfillment.
Hope is looking forward.
The Bible does talk about hope… 166 times in fact. Hope is all over the life of Abraham and fueled his steps as he marched with his family to the Promised Land. Hope is in the back of Joseph’s mind as he lived a godly life as a servant, in prison, and eventually as the second in command of Egypt. Hope is sweating from the brow of the Israelites in Egypt and hope is in between the lines of Moses’ life as he faced against Pharaoh in obedience to God to free them. Hope is certainly in the mind of Jesus as He called each of His disciples in the Gospels. Hope hung on the cross. Hope was on Peter’s lips as he got up on Pentecost and preached his heart out to thousands of people… many of whom were saved. Hope was on Stephen’s heart as he looked into Heaven as angry people threw stones to kill him. Hope was in the heart of the Apostle Paul as he sat chained to a Roman guard in Rome and wrote letters to churches. Hope is all over the pages of the Bible.
Let’s read what the Apostle Paul had to say to the Philippians in his letter. We have been looking at the letter of Philippians and drawing from the passages ways to live life more clearly. We have been looking at these words and applying them to our hearts so that we look at our lives and the lives of others with crystal clarity. That is what “High Definition” is all about. Let’s take a look at hope in this passage and see it clearly.
READ PHILIPPIANS 3:1-21
“Finally, my brothers, rejoice in the Lord! It is no trouble for me to write the same things to you again, and it is a safeguard for you. 2 Watch out for those dogs, those men who do evil, those mutilators of the flesh. 3 For it is we who are the circumcision, we who worship by the Spirit of God, who glory in Christ Jesus, and who put no confidence in the flesh-- 4 though I myself have reasons for such confidence. If anyone else thinks he has reasons to put confidence in the flesh, I have more: 5 circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the law, a Pharisee; 6 as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for legalistic righteousness, faultless. 7 But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. 8 What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ 9 and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ-- the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. 10 I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, 11 and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead. 12 Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. 13 Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, 14 I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. 15 All of us who are mature should take such a view of things. And if on some point you think differently, that too God will make clear to you. 16 Only let us live up to what we have already attained. 17 Join with others in following my example, brothers, and take note of those who live according to the pattern we gave you. 18 For, as I have often told you before and now say again even with tears, many live as enemies of the cross of Christ. 19 Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is on earthly things. 20 But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, 21 who, by the power that enables him to bring everything.”
Just like in Psalm 33, the Apostle Paul is telling us not to place trust and faith and hope in earthly things. Paul says that if anyone could have such confidence… he could. His family pedigree was one of honor and almost royalty. He was a Pharisee who knew the law of God backwards and forwards. He persecuted the church with a zeal for God. Yet, all of it was based on earthly hope.
Those things failed him.
Those things did not bring meaning.
Those things did not bring salvation.
Those things were empty.
So, the Apostle Paul in verses 7-21 of this chapter, Paul reflects on the eternal hope and confidence he has in Jesus Christ. Paul gives us several thoughts about hope:
#1 The beginning of hope is knowing Jesus (verses 7-11). Paul tells us that leaving everything else behind and “knowing Christ” is the beginning of hope for him. The beginning of hope in this life is knowing Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior. Paul reflected on his life before he knew Christ and saw only “rubbish” behind him. It was his hope in Christ that gave his life meaning, confidence, clarity, and direction.
#2 The purpose of hope is to keep us living in the right direction (verses 12-21). Paul has established that our hope should be in knowing Jesus. Because of that knowledge, Paul talks about the direction of his life. He says over and over that the purpose of hope in Christ in our lives is to give us direction. Hope tells us how to live. Hope tells us what is right and wrong. Hope spurs us to become more like Jesus Christ. Paul says it over and over in this passage. He says,
“I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me” = that is God centered living!
“Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead” = that is living out your faith!
“I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus” = that is constantly living for Christ and being faithful!
“Only let us live up to what we have already attained” = that is a call to faithfulness because of the hope Christ has given us!
I want you to see this morning that true hope in this life cannot be found anywhere else but in Jesus Christ. All other things fail, but Jesus. And because of the hope that Jesus brings, we can live a life full of confidence and trust and strength because that is what a life in Him brings to us.
Hope in Christ casts away fear
Hope in Christ brings strength when we feel weak
Hope in Christ brings confidence when we don’t know what to do
Hope in Christ gives you the gumption to stand up for righteousness
Hope in Christ promises eternal life
SEGMENTED ILLUSTRATION 3: The Shawshank Redemption
But one thing remains for Andy Dufresne. Andy’s good friend Red. Red is finally paroled but struggles to cope with the changed world outside. He longs to return to the world he knows - prison. He thinks of ways to break his parole, when he remembers a conversation he once had with Andy, a secret hiding place in the wall of a windblown field. Red goes there, finds a box with an envelope in it that says "Red" on the outside. Red opens the envelope and reads a letter from Andy:
"Dear Red. If you’re reading this, you’ve gotten out. And if you’ve come this far, maybe you’re willing to come a little further. You remember the name of the town, don’t you? I could use a good man to help me get my project on wheels. I’ll keep an eye out for you and the chessboard ready. Remember, Red. Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies. I will be hoping that this letter finds you, and finds you well. Your friend. Andy."
Red does remember the town they’d spoken of, and has in his hand $1000 Andy left for him. He sets off to find his friend, telling us "I find I am so excited I can barely sit still or hold a thought in my head. I think it is the excitement only a free man can feel, a free man at the start of a long journey whose conclusion is uncertain...I hope I can make it across the border. I hope to see my friend and shake his hand. I hope the Pacific is as blue as it has been in my dreams. I hope." Red does make it. The film closes with Red and Andy reunited by the sea. And the message rings loud and clear: "Fear can hold you prisoner. Hope can set you free."
