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. Romans 15:13 ESV

     The God of HOPE… who is the God of HOPE ? He is the God who by His word created the world and everything in it. He saved Noah from the flood, delivered Daniel from the lions, helped David conquer Goliath, and made Gideon a mighty warrior. He is God for whom nothing is impossible. He is the one that can make everything in life have a purpose for good; even if to us, the situation seems bleak. He is the God who gave us hope by sending His only Son Jesus to save and redeem us from our sins. He is the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. He is Emmanuel, God with us!! This is just the tiny tip of the iceberg as to whom He is and the depth of His greatness. Such a great God gives us much hope; for not only is He in the world, He lives in us by the Holy Spirit. The same Holy Spirit by which Mary conceived a child, now indwells every person that believes, repents, and calls upon the name of Jesus who is the only hope for the lost in this world.
 
LET US STAND IN HOPE:
     And NOW I STAND here on trial because of my HOPE in the promise made by God to our fathers. Acts 26:6 ESV
 
     We may not stand on trial as Paul did before Agrippa for our hope in God’s promise, but we stand everyday in the court of the people of this world. They are looking to see is we are living in the hope of the Savior of whom we profess as Christians. Are we different as the result of the promised Holy Spirit living in us as professing Christians? When we stand in the Hope and belief of all that God has promised and promises yet to be, we should display a hope the world would desire to have. Our prayer should be, “God make me a testimony of the HOPE that is within me; let me shine as the star over Bethlehem pointing people to you.”
 
LET US REJOICE IN HOPE:
     Through him we also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we REJOICE IN THE HOPE of the glory of God. Romans 5:2 ESV
 
     The word rejoicing as a noun means, great joy or jubilation; and as a verb, it means to feel or show great delight. Perhaps it is easy to rejoice when everything is going good, but how about when things aren’t going so good? The times it may become difficult to rejoice is when we suffer, yet Paul tells us, in the verses following Romans 5:2, even in suffering we should rejoice….. Not only that, but we rejoice in our suffering, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces HOPE, and HOPE does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. Romans 5:3-5 ESV Understandable in times like these we may not feel joyful, jubilant, or great delight if your are looking only at the the circumstance; but when you look to God to carry you through such times, it can change our outlook from despair to HOPE. When you rejoice in the most difficult situation, you are displaying trust in God who is greater than you circumstance. (Romans 8:28) Rejoicing in suffering may not come across in the same way as rejoicing when things are going well, but it is the evidence of our Hope in God that brings a Spirit of rejoicing as a testimony to glorifying God in every situation.
 
HOPE IN THE SAVIOR:
     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. 1 Peter 1:3 ESV

     From a manger to a cross, from a cross to the grave, from the grave to live again forever as King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Because of His life and by God’s mercy, we can have a life filled with HOPE . We are born again into life everlasting because God sent His only Son into the world to save us from our sins. What compassion! What mercy! What grace that God would give to us such a precious gift…. life in His Son!! May we live in the HOPE outwardly for the world to see the evidence of the the HOPE we have in the Savior of the world.
 
Because of His Grace ~ Pastor David