Old or New Hope
Good Morning Friends,
Today is the 4th Sunday in Advent. Here we see that when stories converge power is created. The beauty is that in reading Bible stories we get glimpses of encouragement and insights and compassion that can translate into our current experience of God. The objects of focus may change but the living of the emotion is the same whether it is Old or New Hope.
Scripture: 4For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, so that by steadfastness and by the encouragement of the scriptures we might have hope.
Romans 15:4 (NRSV)
In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. And he came to her and said, ‘Greetings, favoured one! The Lord is with you.’ But she was much perplexed by his words and pondered what sort of greeting this might be. The angel said to her, ‘Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favour with God. And now, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his ancestor David. He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.’ Mary said to the angel, ‘How can this be, since I am a virgin?’ The angel said to her, ‘The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be holy; he will be called Son of God. And now, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son; and this is the sixth month for her who was said to be barren. For nothing will be impossible with God.’ Then Mary said, ‘Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.’ Then the angel departed from her.
Luke 1:26-38 (NRSV)
Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the command of God our Saviour and of Christ Jesus our hope,
1 Timothy 1:1 (NRSV)
Message: In today’s epistles, taken in context, Paul is telling us to take as much as possible of fresh hope. He is hinting that the hope must be alive and I could not agree more, for hope that is not alive is not hope at all. Paul is stating the case for an abundant hope that overflows because we believe it. Believe in Jesus. Here is the deal… God created everything so that He could have a relationship with us and we could have a relationship with Him and others. And because God is timeless so too are the things that form our experience of the divine. This is never more evident than in God’s story of Jesus….God coming to live with us as hope and love. We are that important. And here we might just find that satisfying our need to comfort, encourage and give courage to others on the journey is one of the best ways of connecting our stories with the story of Jesus. It is not working hard or in material items that we rejoice but in discovering compassion and hope and love so deep that it must be expressed again and again as a relationship with Jesus. Sure, compassion costs us something. It is not free. But the grace of it, the hope of it, is as old as creation itself and as new as our last breath…the reality that Christ paid the price does free us. Here in this story, history and His story and our stories converge in the compassion the great commandment… a Jesus in a manger, a Jesus on the cross, a risen Jesus…and now Jesus in us. Friends, when we trust in God, we overflow with the hope of the Holy Spirit. When we seek first His kingdom… when we seek first to understand then to be understood, we open up the opportunity to accomplish more together than we could have possibly accomplished alone. Let us encourage each other through sharing study of the scripture. Let us be steadfast and focused on that which holds us together so our endurance would carry us to the finish line. Let us hope in the birth of a child.
Pray that the controversial issues we face do not distract us from our true mission in the world. Pray that we realize that we are Christ’s body of believers….that Jesus was born, lived, died and was resurrected so we might be as one. Pray that we live in harmony with one another glorifying God as He permeates our hearts…our minds and our souls, binding us together with His love. Pray
we accept what is, let go of what was and have hope in what we believe God wants us to be. Pray the God of hope fills us with the joy and peace in believing. Pray our minds and hearts are focused on the hope of Christ and the gift of his love we experience at Christmas. Pray we realize that Jesus is our Hope. Pray we realize that circumstances may change, people may change but that Jesus is eternal hope.
Blessings,
John Lawson
Daily Devotionals 