We can turn back together to our reading in Romans chapter 15. Romans chapter 15.
!
Hope for a time and try and whet your appetite to either come along yourself or to invite others to come along to encourage us to learn more just about how precious a thing this hope is that we find in the scriptures.
What do you think of when you think of the word hope?
We use it in many different ways, many different contexts.
But when we use it, so often there's an element of doubt.
We say, for example, I hope it doesn't rain or I hope the ferry sails.
But when we use it in that kind of context, we've always got an element of doubt in the back of our mind because we know the reality is that it's going to rain or there will be days that the ferry doesn't sail.
So that hope isn't always certain.
It's not always guaranteed.
But that is not the kind of hope that the Bible speaks about.
When the word hope is used as it is here in Romans 15, it's a very certain hope and a hope that is secure because it's got a foundation that is Jesus Christ and God who has given us this great hope.
If you read, for example, in Hebrews 11, verse 1, it speaks there of hope.
Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.
That hope is not maybe it will come to be, but it is a certainty.
It is a hope, an assurance, even in the things that we do not see just now.
It is still a certain and a sure hope that we have through faith because that hope is fixed on an object, on a person, on Jesus and what will come through him.
And that's the hope that the Bible speaks to us about.
As one writer put it, hope puts something glorious on the far horizon that is worth striving for.
Something glorious on the far horizon.
We know it's there and we find it through Jesus Christ.
And let's read verse 13 together.
See what it says there.
May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.
It's just a short verse, but it says so much to us.
But when you read a verse like this, you ask yourself, does that verse come close to describing me?
Does it come close to describing what my life is like just now?
Can I say that my life is filled with all joy and peace in believing?
And that I am abounding in hope, overflowing with hope.
We would love to be able to describe ourselves like that.
And to varying degrees, we want to be able to.
And sometimes we do.
We can say, yeah, I've got joy, I've got peace, I've got hope.
But there's always a time when we all fall short of experiencing what this verse speaks about.
And it's not just speaking to those who haven't come to believe in Jesus yet or who aren't members in the church as yet.
It's speaking to every one of us.
Even those who have been Christians for many, many years, this verse speaks to every one of us.
Asking that question, are we filled with joy and peace in believing?
Are we abounding in this hope?
We should be when we look to Jesus.
But there's things that rob us of that joy and peace and hope.
And so it's important for us to always come back and look, well, where is this hope found?
I can't imagine anybody here, anybody in life really saying, I'm not interested in having joy and peace.
I don't want to abound in hope.
We all want, we all need these things.
Everybody is looking for it in this world, that joy, that peace, that hope.
But the question is, where is it found?
How can we know it?
There's a hymn that starts with a question.
What is your hope in life and death?
It's a great question.
It's an important question for us as we come to look at this word.
What is your hope in life and death?
How do you answer that?
What is your hope in both these scenarios?
As we live our lives and as we know the reality of death, what is your hope?
Well, the hymn answers the question for us.
But do we know it?
What is your hope in life and death?
Christ alone.
Christ alone, the hymn says.
Is that your hope in life and death?
Well, as Paul concludes this section in Romans 15 at verse 13,
he is doing so in this verse with what is really a prayer.
A prayer that we would know this joy, this peace, this hope in Christ.
So I want us to focus on the word hope.
What we're going to do is break it down into its individual letters.
H-O-P-E.
And look at hope from four different perspectives.
And where we can find this hope.
So the first letter, H, help.
The opposite of hope is hopeless.
Like we're thinking of those who had leprosy in Jesus' day.
They didn't have hope.
They felt hopeless.
Because there was nothing that could help them.
And that's the way we are in our sin.
We are hopeless.
And so the word hope reminds us that we have a great need.
Think of the question, what is my hope in life and death?
Is your answer one where it's an uncertain hope that this world offers?
Where you're not sure and certain of what lies ahead?
Of what's going to help you in your time of need?
Or is it the certain hope that the Bible speaks about found in Jesus Christ?
We need help.
And the word hope reminds us that there is help.
Because God has come to help us.
And so we see that help and hope has a history.
It has a past.
When you look at this chapter and verse 4, what does it say there?
Romans 13 verse 4.
For whatever was written in former days was written for you our instruction,
that through endurance and through the encouragement of the Scriptures,
we might have hope.
So hope has a history.
And it's a history that speaks to us of the help that God has given to us.
That's what it was saying here as Paul was writing to them
and saying to ourselves as well,
that the Scriptures, what was written in the past,
was written for our instruction and our encouragement,
that we might have hope.
And so God is one who has come to give us help, to give us hope.
The foundation of our hope is God,
as verse 13 makes very clear for us.
May the God of hope.
He is the God of hope.
And it is the God who has come to help us.
So there's a foundation to this hope.
There's a history to this hope.
And it is God who has made all things,
who has created the heavens and the earth.
And although sin has come in,
he came to give help to his people.
And so, as verse 13 says,
may the God of hope fill you.
Well, if you are to be filled with something,
the obvious question is,
where is it going to come from?
If you are to be fed when you're hungry,
you need a source of food.
You need to find food.
If you are going to go on a journey in your car,
you need fuel.
So you have to go and fuel up before you go on that journey.
And so for ourselves,
if we're asking this question,
if I am going to be filled with joy and peace and hope,
we have to ask,
are we going to the source?
Are we looking in the right place for it?
Well, if we're looking around us,
we see so many things that offer hope,
but it's always temporary.
It's always uncertain.
But when we look to the scriptures,
we find the God of hope
who is able to fill you.
God is already described in verse 5
as the God of endurance
and the God of encouragement.
He is the source of all of these things.
And here we see He is the source of joy and peace
and hope abounding,
the help that He gives.
Because when you look through the Old Testament,
that verse 4 speaks about
the scriptures that were written.
You go to Isaiah 41, verse 10.
And there in the midst of a people who felt hopeless,
God's people who were captured by a foreign nation,
taken into captivity,
God speaks to them and says,
Fear not, for I am with you.
Be not dismayed, for I am your God.
I will strengthen you.
I will help you.
I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.
He is one who is able to help.
And so He is the source of hope.
And we are to come to that source.
As Hebrews 4, verse 16 makes clear to us,
Let us then with confidence
draw near to the throne of grace
that we may receive mercy
and find grace to help in time of need.
Hope reminds us that there is help for us.
The second thing is the letter O.
And this speaks to us of opportunity.
And two ways we see opportunity here
is that God is speaking
and He is speaking to all, to everybody.
As you read through the book of Romans,
you find, and as you read through the scriptures,
you find very often that there are two groups of people mentioned
that this world is made up of.
There are Jews and there are Gentiles.
That's what the Bible makes very clear to us.
There are Jews and there are Gentiles.
Jews are directly descended from Israel,
from the people of God,
and all other nations, all other people are Gentiles.
And so we therefore fall into the category of Gentiles,
Gentiles, at least most of us will anyway.
And what God is saying to us
is that it is for everyone.
You look in the Old Testament,
God was looking after His own people.
But here you see in the book of Romans
that the word is going out to all.
And you see it in how often it is quoted
in these verses from 9 through to verse 12
where scripture is quoted.
You see the word Gentiles used in each of these verses.
And it's reminding us that this is an opportunity for us all.
So when you look at Romans 15 verse 12,
the root of Jesse will come,
even he who arises to rule the Gentiles.
In him the Gentiles hope.
It is speaking of Jesus,
the root of Jesse,
and it's speaking to us as a people,
the Gentiles,
that our hope is to be found in him.
So God is speaking.
And he is speaking to all.
So that none of us need feel
that we are far away from him,
that we are not
welcome to know this hope,
that we are undeserving.
There is no way we can have this hope.
He is speaking to us all
that we might find in him this hope.
So there's an opportunity for all.
But the opportunity also speaks about time.
Everyone lives,
but only for a time.
And it is this time to find this hope in Jesus.
And now is our time.
Now is our opportunity.
Now is your opportunity.
If you don't know this hope,
or you feel you've lost this hope,
it is your opportunity to know it again,
or to know it for the first time.
Psalm 95 verse 7 to 8 says that to us.
Today if you hear his voice,
do not harden your hearts.
Today.
But so often we're living in view
that this life
is just for us to live as we want.
And there's nothing afterwards.
Living day by day,
as the phrase goes,
you only live once.
Or as 1 Corinthians 15, 32 puts it,
let us eat and drink,
for tomorrow we die.
But there's no thought of eternity.
There's no concern for our soul.
Our hope is just for this life.
Nothing else.
But the scripture hope is so different.
Because the scriptures tell us
that there is an eternity.
That there is a day of judgment.
That death is not the end.
But that the Lord will come again.
And so this life is our opportunity,
our only opportunity,
to prepare for eternity.
As C.T. Studd said,
only one life,
it will soon be past.
Only what's done,
for Christ will last.
So we have opportunity.
And again,
what is your hope
in life
and death?
There was a man called
John Harper.
He was a minister in Glasgow,
and then laterally
in the city of London.
He was a great evangelist.
He was known as a great evangelist.
And he was invited to preach
on a couple of occasions
in America
to go to Chicago,
where Dwight Moody was ministering.
And the second time he was going,
he traveled to Southampton
to board a ship
to make his way to America.
He was a widow,
but he had his six-year-old daughter,
Annie, with him.
And so together,
they boarded the ship
to cross the Atlantic.
The name of the ship,
Titanic.
And it is recorded for us
afterwards
what happened in his life
by others,
because he never survived.
But his daughter did.
And she was able to recall
how she was woken urgently
by her father at midnight
and how he took her to a lifeboat
to make sure that she was saved.
But he went back on board.
And what he did
was speak to others
about their need of Christ.
And several months
after the sinking of the Titanic,
there was a man
who stood in a prayer meeting
in Ontario, in Canada.
And in tears,
he recounted his story
because he had been on board
Titanic that night as well.
And he had ended up in the water
clinging to a piece of the wreckage.
And he said that on two occasions,
a wave brought a man close to him.
And this man was John Harper.
And the first thing he said,
John Harper said to this man was,
man, are you saved?
And the man replied,
no, I am not.
And John Harper said to him,
believe in the Lord Jesus Christ
and you shall be saved.
And then the waves
took him away again.
Short time later,
the waves brought him back
near this man.
And he said to him,
are you saved now?
And he called out,
no.
And John Harper said to him,
believe in the Lord Jesus Christ
and you will be saved.
And then just moments later,
the cold got to John Harper.
He let go of the piece of wreckage
and he slipped under the water.
Well, in those moments,
this man looked to Christ
and was saved.
And a lifeboat came near,
plucked him out of the water.
And not just was he saved physically,
but he was saved eternally.
And this was him months later,
recalling this night.
And he said,
I am John Harper's last convert.
With his last breath,
this man was pleading with others
to be saved
because the opportunity was then.
Today is your opportunity.
Today is the time that you are given.
But are you making the opportunity count?
Are you listening?
Are you finding this God of hope
who will fill you with joy and peace
in believing?
In believing in him
that you might abound in hope.
There is opportunity.
There is thirdly, peace.
P is for peace.
If you don't have this hope,
you cannot have peace
because there is no peace
apart from Jesus Christ.
And you will find in this life
when you maybe feel
that you have peace,
that you are going on
and everything is fine,
that your peace will be interrupted.
It will be interrupted by things
that will come your way.
Sadness and sorrow and illness
and uncertainty and fears.
All of these things.
And then you have to face up to death.
And what then?
What is your hope in life and death?
We have to know the source of hope and peace.
As G.K. Chesserton once said,
it's only when everything is hopeless
that hope begins to be a strength.
And it's so often true for us.
Sometimes God has to bring us down
to our lowest point,
to feel that hopelessness.
When we've tried everything else in this world,
but to see that hope and peace
is not found apart from Christ.
So is your hope today in finding peace
based on your own thoughts,
your own ways,
or is it based on Christ alone?
If we are to be filled,
we think of it in this way,
as we may be filled with joy and peace
and hope and believing.
When does it end?
The hope of this world,
it may make us feel full for a time,
but ultimately it leaves us empty.
When you're thinking of eating food
or filling the car,
there's always a point where you're saying,
oh, I'm just full.
I can't eat anything else.
Or when you're filling your fuel tank,
it will always stop.
It won't overflow.
But when we see Paul's prayer here,
it's not just that we will have
a little joy and peace,
like a little trickle into our life.
It's that we will be filled.
May he fill you with all joy and peace,
abounding in hope.
This is overflowing.
And this is the kind of peace
that God is able to give
through hope,
and hope that is found in him.
God is the God of hope.
But do you have peace in him today?
So often we fall short.
We settle for the little things in this world,
just a partially full life.
But God offers a peace
that abounds,
that overflows in hope
by believing in him.
The fourth letter is E.
And E speaks of the eternal nature
of this hope.
There is an eternity before us,
but this hope is eternal.
This hope has a history,
as we see in the beginning.
It goes back,
the foundations of God speaking to us.
It has a present
where it speaks to us
for this life,
what is our hope in life.
But what is our hope in death
and beyond?
The phrase is used,
hope springs eternal.
People use that
because they want to have
an optimistic outlook in life.
There's always a hope
that things will be better.
But this worldly hope
is always uncertain.
But this hope,
the biblical hope,
abounding in hope,
is eternal.
There's no end to it.
There is this hope
on the horizon,
as one writer puts it
when he's looking at the Bible
and how it concludes.
The Bible concludes
with a stunning vision
of a far horizon
that lies ahead of us.
is that where our hope
is focused,
on the eternal nature of it
through faith in Jesus.
And he's speaking there
about the book of Revelation
and how it speaks
about this hope fulfilled.
And especially the last two chapters
of the book of Revelation
where all things are made new.
Where everything is,
that was wrong and hurtful
and painful in this world
is gone.
And where Jesus makes
all things new.
Peter puts it
so wonderfully
in his first letter,
1 Peter chapter 1,
where it speaks
of this eternal nature
of hope.
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.
It's a living hope.
through the resurrection
of Jesus Christ
from the dead
to an inheritance
that is imperishable,
undefiled,
unfading,
kept in heaven
for you.
This hope
is eternal.
This hope
will not let you down.
This hope
will not fail you
because it is secure
in Jesus Christ.
But what horizon
are you looking to?
There was a question
asked of people
in Scotland.
What is closer to us,
America
or the moon?
And the answer
is obvious
to most,
but one person
replied
and answered,
the moon.
And so the person
asked,
well,
how do you conclude
that?
How can you say
the moon
is closer than America?
And he said,
well,
I can see the moon
from here.
I can't see America.
But the moon
is 240,000 miles away.
America
is 4,000 miles away.
The difference
in his mind
was,
I cannot see it.
And for many,
that's the way
they live
in looking for hope
in this world.
the things
that we can see
are what our hope
is based on.
But Hebrews 11,
verse 1,
says to us,
now faith
is the assurance
of things hoped for,
the conviction
of things
not seen.
Just because
we can't see America
doesn't mean
it's not there.
Ships
and planes
set off
every day
knowing
it is there
over the horizon.
and knowing
that they can
reach it.
And that's the life
of faith.
It is knowing
that the hope
is there,
that eternity
is before us,
that blessings
are ours
from Christ.
We don't fully
see it,
but faith
is the assurance
of things
hoped for.
So what horizon
are you looking
to today?
The things
of this world
that you can see
are the hope
that is on
a glorious horizon
for all
of God's people.
This hope
is what reminds us
of the help
that God
has given.
It reminds us
of the opportunity
that we have today.
It reminds us
of the peace
that he can give
and it reminds us
that this hope
is eternal.
So again I ask,
what is your hope
in life
and death?
The answer
is Christ
alone.
Do you have
him as your hope?
Let us pray.
Lord,
our gracious
God,
we thank you
for all
that you reveal
to us
through your word,
even the things
that are at times
hidden from us
that we cannot see,
even as we think
of Jesus
in our lives
and how at times
or in times
in our own experience
where he has
been unseen
and unthought of,
we thank you
for your spirit
that helps us
to have our eyes
opened
to understand
our need of him
and we thank you
that he is there
for us
even in times
where we feel
he's not
or that he cannot
be seen.
Broaden our horizons,
Lord,
and help us
to know
through faith
that hope
of Christ alone.
Hear our prayers
and pardon our sins
in Jesus' name.
Amen.
We're going to conclude
by singing
in Psalm 130,
the Singed Psalms
version of it.
The tune is
Martyrdom.
Psalm 130,
page 173.
Psalm that reminds us
and speaks of
the hope
that we have in God.
Lord,
from the depths
I call to you,
Lord,
hear me from on high
and give attention
to my voice
when I for mercy
cry.
And then the last verse,
O Israel,
put your hope in God
for mercy is with him
and full redemption
from their sins.
His people
he'll redeem.
We'll sing the whole
of this psalm
to God's praise.
Amen.
Lord,
from the depths
I call to you,
Lord,
hear me from the night
and give attention
to thy voice
when I for mercy
cry.
Lord,
in your presence
you have stopped
if you are
sinned
to be part
but yet
forgiveness
is with you
that we may fear you,
Lord.
I wait,
my soul
waits for the Lord
My hope is in his word
More than the Lord
I wait for God
My soul
waits for the Lord
O Israel
good
your
broken God
For mercy
is with him
And full
redemption
From
their sins
Let
be
the
Lord
Heal
Greetings
After the benediction
I'll go to the door
to my right
We'll close with the benediction
Now may grace
mercy
and peace
from God
Father
Son
and Holy Spirit
rest upon
and abide with you all
now and forevermore
Amen
Thank you.