The Power Of Hope

The Power or Hope

December 7, 2008

Continue our lessons on hope

Many times we use this in a less-than-certain way

I hope the Cowboys win, the Red Sox, I get a good grade

WE use it most often for good fortune, or chance

We sit back and see what happens

That is not the biblical view of hope

Not a wishy/washy emotion

It is a state of mind that motivates us

Quote form a long obedience

Hoping does not mean doing nothing. It is not fatalistic resignation. It means going about our assigned tasks, confident that God will provide meaning and the conclusions.

Eugene Peterson

Without hope we resort to nothingness,

One night at dinner a man, who had spent many summers in Maine, fascinated his companions by telling of his experiences in a little town named Flagstaff. The town was to be flooded, as part of a large lake for which a dam was being built. In the months before it was to be flooded, all improvements and repairs in the whole town were stopped. What was the use of painting a house if it were to be covered with water in six months? Why repair anything when the whole village was to be wiped out? So, week by week, the whole town became more and more bedraggled, more gone to seed, more woebegone. Then he added by way of explanation: "Where there is no faith in the future, there is no power in the present."

Loss of hope leads to neglect

Hope has a real effect on our lives

Hope motivates

Great hope makes great men – Thomas Fuller

Ever hear the expression – given up hope

How would that look?

Look through Scripture and see what Hope does

1. Promotes integrity

We tend to lose sight of who we are when we lose hope

Compromise

Games when you’re being blown out you tend to act out

Psalm 25

16 Turn to me and be gracious to me, for I am lonely and afflicted.

17 The troubles of my heart have multiplied; free me from my anguish.

18 Look upon my affliction and my distress and take away all my sins.

19 See how my enemies have increased and how fiercely they hate me!

20 Guard my life and rescue me; let me not be put to shame, for I take refuge in you.

21 May integrity and uprightness protect me, because my hope is in you.

1 John 3

1 How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him.

2 Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when he appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.

3 Everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself, just as he is pure.

2. Confidence/Boldness/Courage/Strength

Psalm 71

5 For you have been my hope, O Sovereign LORD, my confidence since my youth.

Psalm 31

24 Be strong and take heart, all you who hope in the LORD.

2 Cor 3

12 Therefore, since we have such a hope, we are very bold.

Isaiah 40

29 He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak.

30 Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall;

31 but those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles;they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.

A number of years ago researchers performed an experiment to see the effect hope has on those undergoing hardship. Two sets of laboratory rats were placed in separate tubs of water. The researchers left one set in the water and found that within an hour they had all drowned. The other rats were periodically lifted out of the water and then returned. When that happened, the second set of rats swam for over 24 hours. Why? Not because they were given a rest, but because they suddenly had hope!

Those animals somehow hoped that if they could stay afloat just a little longer, someone would reach down and rescue them. If hope holds such power for unthinking rodents, how much greater should is effect be on our lives.

We can do more than we think if we have hope

Amazing Race – the older people would gain energy as they saw the finish line

3. Produces Joy

The joy of heaven trickles down to us even today. Hope is not just some far off wish of heaven, it is the joy of heaven being experienced even now.