Amen!
Notes
Transcript
Telos: We have a Living Hope! It is not over until the final Amen!
It is Finished!
Information
But we were hoping that it was He who was going to redeem Israel. Indeed, besides all this, today is the third day since these things happened.
For most of human history, the smallpox virus has been one of the great plagues of the earth. During the last 100 years of its existence, smallpox killed 500 million people. (6,837,601 people have died from Covid. 0.7 percent infected died from Covid, 30 percent infected died from small pox) But the beginning of the end for smallpox came when physician Edward Jenner in England developed a vaccine to immunize people against smallpox. After much study and testing, he decided to try it on a little 8 year-old boy, named James Phipps. Dr. Jenner injected James with the vaccine. And then three weeks later, he decided to try it out: he exposed little James to smallpox. Days went by — and he showed no symptoms. No fever; no rash; no scars — and most importantly: no death!
Because that boy lived, Jenner knew that there was hope for all of us, and that everyone who took that vaccine could live, without fear of smallpox. And now as a result, of course, smallpox has been eliminated from the earth.
Because that little boy lived, it gave hope to the world that smallpox was defeated, and we could all live. And even better: when Jesus rose from the grave, it gave us all hope that we too could all live eternally through faith in Him! Sin was defeated; The Savior lived who could give us the same Eternal Life that He Himself has. Jesus isn’t promising us anything He can’t deliver. He Himself rose from the dead — and He promises to give us the same eternal life that He showed He already has.
Because He lives, we can live. Jesus’ resurrection is the life that makes hope viable.
Inspiration
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,
to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you,
The Greek term for “hope” in the passage means “an eager, confident expectation.” This hope of the believer is not only “living” but “lively.”
The CEV translates the phrase as “a hope that lives on.”
“We live with great expectation,” as the NLT
Bible scholar and teacher F.B. Meyer called this living hope “the link between our present and our future.”
Revelation
This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and which enters the Presence behind the veil,
We have this certain hope like a strong, unbreakable anchor holding our souls to God himself. Our anchor of hope is fastened to the mercy seat which sits in the heavenly realm beyond the sacred threshold,
Application
Because of the resurrection- We have:
1. The Promise of Hope
1. The Promise of Hope
Christ has Risen from the Dead
2. The Power of Hope
2. The Power of Hope
I am He who lives, and was dead, and behold, I am alive forevermore. Amen. And I have the keys of Hades and of Death.
Hope sees the invisible, feels the intangible, and achieves the impossible!
3. The Perseverance of Hope
3. The Perseverance of Hope
Remember, God makes a promise, faith believes it, hope anticipates it, patience quietly awaits it.
47 Trust means you anchor your heart in the reality of God’s awareness of your situation.
James MacDonald
“I Choose to Trust” devotional (2010)
James MacDonald
Transformation
Do you have this living hope, or are you with those having no hope.
1 My hope is built on nothing less
than Jesus' blood and righteousness;
I dare not trust the sweetest frame,
but wholly lean on Jesus' name.
2 When darkness veils his lovely face,
I rest on his unchanging grace;
in every high and stormy gale,
my anchor holds within the veil.
3 His oath, his covenant, his blood,
support me in the whelming flood;
when all around my soul gives way,
he then is all my hope and stay.
4 When he shall come with trumpet sound,
O may I then in him be found:
dressed in his righteousness alone,
faultless to stand before the throne.
Refrain:
On Christ, the solid Rock, I stand:
all other ground is sinking sand;
all other ground is sinking sand.
Altar Call