What do you want for Christmas?
Imagine that I’ve got a Christmas present here. The box is wrapped up beautifully. You’ve probably got presents like this under your tree at home. At least, I hope you do! Hopefully, all of you are on the nice list this year and you’ll have even more when you wake up Christmas morning!
Here’s the thing about presents, you can’t see a present, especially a present with your name on it, and not experience HOPE.
If you want to produce hope, take a gift, wrap it and put someone’s name on it! As soon as you do and as soon as they see that present with their name on it, you’ll see what hope looks like!
Hope is a powerful thing for us.
We hope our team will find a way to win the game.
We hope that next year is going to be better than last year.
We hope we’re getting a raise at work.
We hope our kids are going to turn out ok.
We hope we’re going to make good grades on those exams coming up.
We hope… And hope is a powerful thing for us.
It’s the loss of hope that is catastrophic and often devastating to people. Both to individuals and to relationships. It’s the loss of hope that destroys families, marriages, relationships, and lives.
Have you ever lost hope? It’s a scary place to be!
People Need Hope
The good news is that we serve a God of HOPE! And people have always needed hope. The people of God have always needed hope.
Throughout this series, we’ve been walking through some of what Paul once wrote to a church in the ancient city of Rome. Living in Rome in that day and time, while it was the center of the world in so many ways, the center of culture and affluence, it was also a very dark place. And not an easy place to live as a follower of Jesus.
As Paul writes this letter that we now call Romans he wants to remind the people of God in the city of Rome of the faith they have… but not just faith. He also wants to remind them of the hope we hold onto as followers of Jesus.
Rejoice?
Here’s what Paul says in Romans 5.3-5:
We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they help us develop endurance. And endurance develops strength of character, and character strengthens our confident hope of salvation.
Now let me pause right here and just ask a simple question…. Who REJOICES when they run into problems and trials? Not me!
I don’t know about you, but when I run into problems and trials, my instinct is to run the other way! Most people when they run into problems and trials either respond with Fight, Flight or Freeze! We revert to those basic instincts when we run into trouble.
But Paul says we now have a fourth option. As followers of Jesus because of the FAITH we have when problems and trials come our way we can respond by REJOICING!
Trials, Adversities, and Christmas
Why in the world would we start praising God every time we hit a speed bump in life? Why would we give thanks every time difficulty came our way, or difficult people were put in our path, or something else broke or broke down at the house?!
Because as people who have FAITH in Jesus we understand this TRUTH… that problems and trials… help us develop endurance.
Can you imagine what it would have been like for Mary and Joseph?
First, you find out you’re pregnant. But you’re not married yet. Telling people you had a divine encounter with God is probably going to raise a few eyebrows. This is by every definition an unplanned pregnancy! For the next 9 months they’re faced with either trying to dodge questions and avoid the judgmental stares or try to explain the unexplainable! But Mary and Joseph decide to stay together and make it work.
But that’s only the beginning of their problems! Because right after they find out they’re pregnant they find out they have to make plans to travel to Bethlehem for a census. Getting from Nazareth to Bethlehem is not an easy trip, especially when you’re pregnant!
Then, after making the trip to Bethlehem, they discover there’s no place to stay. Every hotel is booked! They couldn’t Airbnb anything. Motel 6 didn’t leave the light on for them! And what’s worse, Mary is about to go into labor!
The problems and trials continue. The adversity they face is real. And after all of that, after Jesus is born and things are finally looking up again, Herod, the reigning king of the land, hears of the birth of a new king and decides to kill every Hebrew boy under the age of two. So now, another angel comes to tell them to flee to Egypt!
Through every trial, every adversity, every problem, they keep going. Why?
Because of HOPE. Because they have confident hope.
Not Ordinary Hope
Maybe you thought your problems and trials were a problem. You’ve prayed for God to take them away. Maybe you didn’t like or enjoy the struggle.
But every problem, every struggle, every trial, every trouble brought you right back to God. Every adversity you faced brought you face to face with God. Why? Because your HOPE is in HIM!
That’s why we rejoice! Because everything the Enemy puts in our way to bring us trouble just turns us to where we are face to face with God, asking for His help again and putting our hope in Him!
Paul says we can REJOICE because…
Endurance strengthens character.
Character strengthens hope.
But it isn’t ordinary hope.
It’s not the kind of hope that hopes things will get better. It’s confident hope, faith-filled hope, fully assured hope of our SALVATION. So come what may… you’ve got hope that no matter what happens in this life, God will SAVE you. God’s got you. You’ve got nothing to fear, not even death, because you can be confident of this… your God will SAVE you!
Hope + Love
And then Paul says this, and I believe this is a game changer…
And this hope will not lead to disappointment. For we know how dearly God loves us, because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love. – Romans 5.5
Because we are loved by God we have confident hope! This hope will not disappoint because God’s love will never fail!
This hope is certain because the Holy Spirit is present. And where the Spirit of the Lord is there is always HOPE!
It’s our confident hope of salvation that is the real reason we celebrate Christmas! This is the good news we believe. This is our faith. And this is our confident hope. And it’s this hope we have in Jesus that we want to share with the world.
So what are you hoping for this year?
There may be a lot of different things you’re hoping for. Maybe you have a long wish list this year of things that would be nice to have. But I think what a lot of people are hoping for is… HOPE.
And if that’s true, then here’s the good news we get to share this Christmas…
God has a gift for you this Christmas. It’s a gift filled with Hope. And this hope has a name. His name is Jesus.
Who can you share this good news with this week?
Want more from this Series… Click here.
