Three days into the year, how is the hope within your heart? Is there hope within you? There must be, because hope is essential to the human soul.
Hope influences our perspective, colouring our world with excitement and anticipation. And hope directs our purpose in our life, determining what we do with our days.ย
Hope affects your person and the persons around you. What you hope in has a say on your self-esteem, values and aspirations for life. Hope affects the way you view and treat others, and receive care and affection from them.
Suffice to say, hope is crucial.
And so, what we place our highest hopes in must be something that can never be taken away. Such a hope must be solid and unchanging, and the good news is it does exist in Jesus.
As we turn to these five hope-filled verses in the Word, be reminded that there is hope today!
“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,” (1 Peter 1:3)
Praise God the Father! Out of His mercy for the world, He gave us Jesus. Through Jesus’ resurrection, God gave us the opportunity to be born again, into a living hope.ย
Have you been born again? It’s not the same as washing your face or wiping your hands. It’s a whole new life as a whole new person โ a brand new life lived in the Saviour who sanctifies.
Jesus is our living hope, because He resurrected from the dead. He alone enables us to boldly stand before God as righteous people.
That is why all our hope and trust must be placed in Him, for we serve a risen Saviour!
If you are feeling hopeless, turn to Jesus. You will find hope and life in Him.
“I will give them an undivided heart and put a new spirit in them; I will remove from them their heart of stone and give them a heart of flesh.” (Ezekiel 11:19)
In this chapter, God is speaking to the remnant of Israel, who had been exiled and dispersed through the years as a result of their unfaithfulness to Him. God promises this remnant that He will bring them back home and into relationship with Himself.ย
This undivided heart that God promises to give the remnant will result in a walk does not turn away from Him and a life that keeps all His commandments.ย
Because this will be fulfilled in the millennial kingdom, we can look forward to a coming reality where we will have a new spirit and a new heart of flesh, and desire to obey God fully.
We should keep this in mind when we face personal failures and setbacks in our attempts for change. Our true hope for change is God, and He is changing everything.ย
He is the one who saves us, sanctifies us and someday brings us Home.ย
“But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope: The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness” (Lamentations 3:22-23, ESV)
Whenever you bring this truth to mind, you’ll have hope โ God’s love and mercy for you will never run out.
God’s love is not like any other kind of love. It is infinite, it cannot be taken away from you. It is freely given to you.
God’s mercies never come to an end. And so every morning when you wake up, remember His mercy and faithfulness!
“You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; to be made new in the attitude of your minds;ย and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.” (Ephesians 4:22-24)
Put off your old self, put on the new self. The old self is corrupted, the new self is created to be like God.
This verse gives us hope because it reminds us that we are not slaves to our old selves and our old way of life.
As slaves of Christ, we must make an intentional choice to put off the things we used to say, be or do that were corrupt.
And it doesn’t stop there โ we are to be made new in the attitude of your minds. We need to shift our mindset, and begin living godly lives in righteousness and holiness.
Change a perspective, change a purpose, change a person.
So this verse gives us hope because there isn’t some list of things or criteria that we have to sort out before we get right with God.
No, God says just get right with Him. And we can start doing that today.
โForget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.ย (Isaiah 43:18-19)
Hope looks ahead to the future. Disillusionment looks into the past… and stays there.
The Israelites who were being addressed in Isaiah 43 would have every valid reason to stay disillusioned โ if the speaker were not the Creator of the whole universe.
We serve the Almighty God who is in the business of doing new things. And when He does so, nothing can stop Him.
He makes a way through the wilderness, He makes streams in the wasteland.
The same God who did it for Abraham and the Israelites who were freed from Egypt โ that’s the same God who can do it in your life today.
Yes, your whole life may look like a wasteland. You may feel lost and that there’s nothing fruitful worth looking forward to.
But don’t stay there, and don’t believe the lie that God can’t lead you safely through. He can. And He can provide miraculously, infinitely โ even if you can’t see it.
Friend, there is hope. Choose to believe that โ and in the One who gives it.
