Sunday Service: 30/01/2022
Supporting Scripture: Proverbs 13:12-19
Title of Message: Keep Hope Alive!
Delivered by: Pastor Mercy
“Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but when the desire comes, it is a tree of life.”
Hope is an instinctive feeling that God has instilled within us. The Psalmist testifies to this in Psalms chapter 22 vs 9.
“thou art he that took me out of the womb: thou didst make me hope when I was upon my mother’s breasts.”
We start life with a deposit of hope put in our spirit and it takes a lot to kill or exhaust it. It lasts most people through life. Even though the difficult experiences we pass through can weaken it, we cannot completely kill it. There is an old saying that I strongly believe in: “Where there is life, there is hope.”
What is hope?
- The feeling that what one wants will happen
- To expect/ anticipate
Hope is a source of great strength.
It leads the entrepreneur to consider that the future may be worth all the hard work, waiting, worrying and failures along the way. It gives him/her boldness to enter new ventures. It carries him/her along during many struggles and through much difficulty. When he/she is weary, when everything seems to be against him/her, and when he/she is stuck, hope sustains him/her to the end.
Hope makes the parents of a prodigal keep praying that their wayward son or daughter will eventually come back home and back to God.
Hope enables the terminally ill person to be always on the lookout for a cure for his disease. Hope is also a constant source of joy. If the devil can rob you of hope, he will deprive your life of a very large share of its satisfaction. But if you will set your sights on the glory that is yet to be revealed, and not be deterred, you can bear your cross gladly believing that good days are ahead. As it is written in Psalm 30:5b, “Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.”
God’s promises are sure, though to us the fulfilment have almost always been slow, as we count time. And because of that, sometimes, we think that God has forgotten us. Abraham and Sarah waited for a long time. (Gen. 12:1-3) He & Sarah had been promised a son. That hope was deferred for many years. But Abraham did not let the delay deter him and eventually he won. (Rom. 4: 17-18).
As is it written, “I have made you a father of many nations,” in the presence of Him whom he believed – God, who gives life to the dead and calls those things which do not exist as though they did, who, contrary to hope, in hope believed, so that he became the father of many nations, according to what was spoken, “So shall your descendants be.”
They believed even though everything around them said otherwise. (Rom. 4:19-20).
“And not being in weak in faith, he did not consider his own body, already dead (since he was about a hundred years old), and the deadness of Sarah’s womb. He did not waver at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strengthened in faith, giving glory to God.
This is a very important part of the waiting process. While you wait, you give God glory. While you trust Him, you give Him glory. While you accept the fact that, even though you may be delayed in getting to your desired destination, He has not forgotten you, you give Him glory. (Rom. 4: 21)
“And being fully convinced that what He had promised, He was also able to fulfill.”
Abraham was fully persuaded that, what God had promised, he was able also to perform. He and Sarah had to put their hope in the LORD, not in themselves. Genesis 21:1 lets us know that when God promises, He will by all means fulfill; for it declares: And the LORD visited Sarah as he had said, and the LORD did unto Sarah as he had spoken. For Sarah conceived, and bare Abraham a son in his old age.
You see, logical thinking will discourage you at times; it may even move you to try to help God bring his promises to pass; but if you focus on Jesus, you will be encouraged.
It may help us to think of the time that seems so long as not mere delay, but preparation. While the seed lies in the soil, even though unseen a process is going on, without which the perfect plant could not be formed. (Mk 4:26-29)
- If you have been disheartened by slow progress in receiving your breakthrough,
- If the opening of doors that would prove a great opportunity is not forth coming.
- If your financial breakthrough has delayed, your healing, has not happened, I would suggest that you let the word of God build you up! All the promises of God are ‘yea’, and ‘amen’ in Christ Jesus.
- Just keep hoping. Keep praying. Keep praising God; keep giving Him glory; keep a right spirit. In his own time God will make his promises good.
Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but if the desire is godly, it will come to pass! It is imperative that we exercise the patience of hope as we look to Jesus to perform His miracle for us. (Ps 27:13-14).
“I would have lost heart, unless I had believed that I would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait on the Lord; Be of good courage, and He shall strengthen your heart. Wait I say on the Lord.”
Let us take this strengthening testimony and advice of the psalmist to heart: You need to hold on to hope when the situation seems hopeless.
God will give you the desire of your heart. Though it tarries long, wait for it, for “the desire accomplished is sweet to the soul!” Just don’t lose hope. It’s the one essential ingredient.