Hope and Healing (Mind Battles) (Youth)

Josiah

Mind Battles • Sermon • Submitted 2 years ago

Hope

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Intro

I’ve used this illustration before:

President Snow (the villain) and Seneca Crane who was the head gamemaker for the 74th hunger games. They were talking about the Capitol’s strategy for the Hunger Games, which pits tributes against each other in a televised battle where there is only one victor.

It was a tactic to keep the 12 districts in line

Snow: “Seneca, why do you think we have a winner?,”

“Hope. Hope, it is the only thing stronger than fear. A little hope is effective, a lot of hope is dangerous,”

“A spark is fine, as long as it’s contained.”

There is something very true about that. A little hope, keeps us from utter despair, but if there is too much hope....it changes how we live.

That’s what President Snow was afraid of…he was afraid that this hope, that was being embodied by Katniss Everdeen, would lead to a rebellion against the capitol, which it ultimately did.

So his solution was to contain hope.

Over the last couple of weeks, we’ve been talking about some of the mind battles we go through....we talked about anxiety and depression

Last week, when we were talking about spirituality....I listed three spiritual realities about the devil and they were as follows:

THE DEVIL IS REAL

THE DEVIL WANTS TO DESTROY YOU

THE DEVIL RESPONDS TO A HIGHER AUTHORITY

Our adversary, the Devil, is like President Snow, in that…he wants to contain your hope.

Because there is something powerful about hope.

Often what anxiety and depression, and discouragement will do, is drown out any sense of hope in our lives, and that is where the devil wants to keep.

Because He knows that HOPE changes how we live.

So we are going to punch the devil in the face tonight, we are going to shut our ears to the lies he wants to perpetuate, and we are going to look at what God tells us about hope!

HOPE

So what is hope?

General definition: A desire for something good in the future and the motivation to persevere towards that good thing. It is accompanied by a reason for thinking our desire will be fulfilled.

“Biblical hope is a confident expectation and desire for something good in the future.

What differentiates the two is confidence or certainty

When we generally use the word hope, we express uncertainty rather than certainty.

EG. Hope my team will win

Hope the weather will be nice

I hope we are going to have good snacks at youth tonight

I hope Josiah’s lesson isn’t going to take too long!

Hope for the Christian has to do with certainty!

Hope is looking to the reality of the future, in faith

Hope in Christ is based in eternity, its based in heaven, it’s based in a God who eternally loves us and who defeated sin and death!

When we talk about being born again at the end of the lessons each week, that is what we are talking about.

Paul’s Prayer

Ephesians 1:16-19 - I pray...that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him, 18 having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, 19 and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the working of his great might

The HOPE to which he has called you (Hope)

Future Hope

Hope of a future with God, free from pain, sin, and death

Heaven is spending an eternity in the presence of a Holy God, free from the clutches and consequences of sin that we all deal with on a daily basis

When I am grounded in this hope, things may be hard, but Hope keeps my head up…it keeps me looking to God

Present Hope

Sometimes the future just doesn’t seem real....it’s too far off.

We can tend to be more concerned about our present rather than the future.

But God does supply his power and grace for you now

He is active in your life now through purpose…we’ll come to that in a moment.

The riches of his glorious Inheritance in the Saints (Value)

This word saint is basically referring to those who are placed their trust in Christ

Those who have commited themselves to be a Christ follower

Not only do we have hope, but we have ultimate purpose in the fact that God loves us, wants us, and considers us to be His inheritance.

It doesn’t matter what happens or happened in your life....God values you.

You may not see your own value at times, but God does.

The immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe (Purpose)

God has endued you with a power to make a difference in this life.

We are his body here on earth

We represent Him, and so He wants to fill us with his power

These things were already true, Pauls prayer was that they could see it..Hope…Value….Purpose.

Story (WW11 Analogy)

It was D-Day, June 6, 1944. An unbelievable price was paid to gain just a toehold, just a few feet of Omaha Beach in Normandy and that price was paid in blood.

At the end of D-Day, in one sense, really nothing had changed. The vast majority of the continent of Europe was still as it had been the day before, under the power of the swastika. Evil reigned through the whole continent. There was only this one little plot of ground, a few feet of sand on an obscure stretch of beach in one lonely country, that was not under the domination of the enemy. But that one tiny stretch of land, that one tiny little beach, that was enough.

The truth is, at the end of that one day, everything was changed because now there was an opening, just a crack -- a tiny little crack at first. But it would get a little larger the next day, and a little larger the day after that, and a little larger the week after that. And the forces would get stronger every day.

There still was a lot of fighting to do and a lot of suffering and a lot of dying. But from that day on it was just a matter of time.

Then the day came when Paris was liberated. And then the day came when all of France was liberated. Then the days came when the concentration camps were overrun and prisoners got set free.

Then the day came when Hitler destroyed himself in the bunker. And judgement came to that particular beast as it always does, as it always will. And then victory in the Pacific and the soldiers could come home. The war was over, and the enemy was defeated. But the truth was -- that really victory was sealed on D-Day. It just took a while --- the battle raged for a long season.

But after D-Day.........victory......that was just a matter of time.

John reminds his readers and us -- this earth has fallen under a dark power, and then one day a woman gave birth to a son, a male child, who was to rule all the nations.

Then one day, at a cost that none of us will ever fully understand, He took upon himself, on the cross, all the brokenness, all the suffering of D-Day, and all the suffering and all the sin and pain of every other day of the history of the human race since the Fall.

And on the first day of the week, when his friends went to care for his body, the stone was gone. And in one sense, nothing had changed. Pilate and the chief priests were still in charge. Caesar still reigned in Rome. He didn’t even know the name of this obscure Messiah in some remote country.

The Herods and the Neros and the Hitlers would come and go, and pain and suffering and death go on today as they went on then, and nobody knew at first except a couple of women. Nobody knew it, but that was D-Day. Now there was an opening in this fallen world, tiny at first, no bigger than the entrance of an empty tomb.

But now there was an opening, and the truth is, every time you resist sin, every time you proclaim the Gospel, every time you give a portion of your resources for the spread of the kingdom, every time you offer a cup of cold water in Jesus’ name to the poor, that opening gets a little larger, and the darkness gets pushed back a little more, and the light gets a little stronger.

That’s why we exist as a church. That’s why we are called to struggle and pray and work and suffer and labor because one day liberation will come. In the meantime -- there will be a lot of fighting and a lot of suffering and a lot of dying, but D-Day already happened when hardly anybody was looking. And at the end of that one day, everything was changed, and now it’s just a matter of time. So John encourages his readers, "Hang on."

The old age remains, but it has been dealt a death blow. The final consummation of the new age still awaits us.

This is why Paul says:

Romans 15:13 “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.”

You can walk in hope.

ABC of Salvation

That ultimate hope starts with being born again.

Jesus said that noone can get to heaven unless they have been born again.

Admit

Believe

Confess

Salvation Prayer: Dear Lord Jesus I believe you're the son of God. I believe that on the cross you took my sin, my shame, and my guilt, and you died for it. You faced hell for me so I wouldn't have to go. You rose from the dead to give me a place in heaven, a purpose on earth, and a relationship with your father. Today Lord Jesus I turn from my sin to be born again. God is my father, Jesus is my savior, the Holy Spirit is my helper, and heaven is my home. In Jesus’ name, Amen.