Advent 2008 week One WAITING HOPE Isaiah 64:1-9 (NLT) Oh, that you would burst from the heavens and come down! How the mountains would quake in your presence! 2 As fire causes wood to burn and water to boil, your coming would make the nations tremble. Then your enemies would learn the reason for your fame! 3 When you came down long ago, you did awesome things beyond our highest expectations. And oh, how the mountains quaked! 4 For since the world began, no ear has heard, and no eye has seen a God like you, who works for those who wait for him! 5 You welcome those who cheerfully do good, who follow godly ways. But we are not godly. We are constant sinners, so your anger is heavy on us. How can people like us be saved? 6 We are all infected and impure with sin. When we proudly display our righteous deeds, we find they are but filthy rags. Like autumn leaves, we wither and fall. And our sins, like the wind, sweep us away. 7 Yet no one calls on your name or pleads with you for mercy. Therefore, you have turned away from us and turned us over to our sins. 8 And yet, LORD, you are our Father. We are the clay, and you are the potter. We are all formed by your hand. 9 Oh, don't be so angry with us, LORD. Please don't remember our sins forever. Look at us, we pray, and see that we are all your people.
Mark 13:22-27 (NLT) False messiahs and false prophets will rise up and perform miraculous signs and wonders so as to deceive, if possible, even God's chosen ones. 23 Watch out! I have warned you! 24 "At that time, after those horrible days end, the sun will be darkened, the moon will not give light, 25 the stars will fall from the sky, and the powers of heaven will be shaken. 26 Then everyone will see the Son of Man arrive on the clouds with great power and glory. 27 And he will send forth his angels to gather together his chosen ones from all over the world--from the farthest ends of the earth and heaven.
YOU WILL NOTICE IN THE IMAGE . . . A GAP . . . GIBBERISH . . . UNDISCERNABLE . . . its where we live. Its life between where we have been and what we look forward to tomorrow.
IN EDEN, ADAM AND EVE LOOKED FORWARD TO THEIR WALK WITH GOD.
Between one of those times with God (when they should have been waiting for God) they listened to another voice and they lost their walk with God. Suddenly we came face to face with who we are without our walk with God. Suddenly we became aware of what we had, what we lost, what we have done. Isaiah the prophet writes; We are all infected and impure with sin. When we proudly display our righteous deeds, we find they are but filthy rags. Like autumn leaves, we wither and fall. And our sins, like the wind, sweep us away.
Every since then we have longed and looked forward in hope for something better, for that renewed, refreshing walk with God. God gave us reason to hope, to look forward expectantly . . . promise of a Savior, Redeemer, Sacrificial Lamb. So life in the white space has something. It has a promise. The white space is not empty. It has hope. But it is hope that is waiting.
IN THE OT THE PEOPLE OF GOD LONGED FORWARD TO THE PROMISE OF GOD. Oh, that you would burst from the heavens and come down! How the mountains would quake in your presence!
Hope is power. Hope is the feeling that we have a future.
Hope changes the way you live, the way you approach life.
Economists know that when people are hopeful they spend money. The economy booms when people feel good about the future. When people feel insecure about the future, they stop spending money, or at least slow down their spending, even if they have money that they can spend. Black Friday I guess there is hope yet?
Is that hope? Not really. Not in the greater sense.
What if you don’t get that big screen TV . . . What if your kid doesn’t get that ipod? What if you don’t get a new car? What if GM doesn’t make any new cars?
What is that compared to if tomorrow if You have no access to clean water?
You have no access to food?
You had no home? You are diagnosed with terminal cancer. There is an earthquake that destroys our community? Those things don’t matter much do they?
Even these things have there perspective.
What if this life is all there is?
What if all your failures, all your hidden sins have no covering?
What if there is no true justice in the universe?
What if you have no hope of a walk with God . . . ever. Not you not your children not their children not your neighbor, not anyone in the world. What if we are just a blip of cosmic dust that came to live for a moment in eternity.
What if there really is no tomorrow, anywhere, for anyone.
What if God has turned away from us and turned us over to our sins forever? (v7b)
Swindoll: Prisoners of war without hope die … students without hope drop out of college … athletic teams without hope go into a slump and lose … writers, longing to publish, without hope lose their determination … addicts return to their habits … marriage partners divorce … inventors, artists, entertainers, entrepreneurs, even preachers lose their creativity without hope … hope is not just a nice option … that helps us get over a hurdle, hope is essential to our survival!"
Here is hope . . . Since the world began, no ear has heard, and no eye has seen a God like you, who works for those who wait for him!
Here is hope
We are all infected and impure with sin. When we proudly display our righteous deeds, we find they are but filthy rags. Like autumn leaves, we wither and fall. And our sins, like the wind, sweep us away. 7 Yet no one calls on your name or pleads with you for mercy. Therefore, you have turned away from us and turned us over to our sins. 8 And yet, LORD, you are our Father. We are the clay, and you are the potter. We are all formed by your hand. 9 Oh, don't be so angry with us, LORD.
Here is hope Please don't remember our sins forever. Look at us, we pray, and see that we are all your people.
Hope is what keeps us going. without hope "we are plunged into deepest darkness...stopped dead in our tracks, paralyzed."
Hope is perhaps man’s most obvious need. Chuck Swindoll says it best: "Man/Woman can live about 40 days without food, about 3 days without water and not one minute without hope." Years ago, off the coast of Massachusetts, a submarine was rammed by a surface vessel. The submarine sank immediately. The crew was trapped in a death house. Every effort to rescue them failed. Toward the end of the rescue attempt, a deep sea diver heard a tapping sound coming from the wall of the submarine. He put his helmet against the vessel, and recognized the tapping as Morse Code. He listened carefully, and he heard this question being tapped out in code, "Is…there…any…hope?"
GOD IS THE GIVER OF HOPE. God is in the hope business. God always provides hope.
Hope began in the garden.
Hope continued with the people of God in the OT.
Isaiah 9:6-7 (NLT) For a child is born to us, a son is given to us. And the government will rest on his shoulders. These will be his royal titles: Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. 7 His ever expanding, peaceful government will never end. He will rule forever with fairness and justice from the throne of his ancestor David.
ADVENT CELEBRATES THE TIME OF WAITING IN HOPE. We look back to the birth of Jesus, what the people of God waited thousands of years for. Advent also celebrates a “waiting forward” to Jesus coming again.
Then everyone will see the Son of Man arrive on the clouds with great power and glory. And he will send forth his angels to gather together his chosen ones from all over the world--from the farthest ends of the earth and heaven.
In life we look around and often see nothing. . . white space. But God’s white space is not empty. This is the space where God is at work. Since the world began, no ear has heard, and no eye has seen a God like you, who works for those who wait for him!
So this is a space where the enemy of your soul does not want you to remain long. All he needs so is distract us. Cause us to lose our focus (Maid Marion and Robin Hood) Do not wait! Waiting doesn’t mean not acting, it does mean not acting until God says. It means losing our focus on what God is doing, saying. It means waiting. Asking before acting.
THE TARDY OXCART. -Charles R. Swindoll
There was once a fellow who, with his dad, farmed a little piece of land. Several times a year they would load up the old ox-drawn cart with vegetables and go into the nearest city to sell their produce.Except for their name and the patch of ground, father and son had little in common. The old man believed in taking it easy. The boy was usually in a hurry...the go-getter type.
One morning, very early, they hitched up the ox to the loaded cart and started on the long journey. The son figured if they walked faster, kept going all day and night, they'd make market by early the next morning. So he kept prodding the ox with a stick, urging the beast to go faster."Take it easy, son," said the old man. "You'll last longer."
But if we get to market ahead of the others we'll have a better chance of getting good prices," argued the son.Four hours and four miles down the road they came to a little house. The father smiled and said, "Here's your uncle's place. Let's stop in and say hello."
"But we've lost an hour already," complained the hot shot."Then a few more minutes won't matter. My brother and I live so close, yet we see each other so seldom," the father answered slowly.
The boy fidgeted and fumed while the two old men laughed and talked away an hour. On the move again, the man took his turn leading the ox. As they approached a fork in the road, the father led the ox to the right."The left is the shorter way", said the son."I know it", replied the old man, "but this way is much prettier."
"Have you no respect for time?" the young man shouted."Oh, I respect it very much! That's why I like to use it to look at beauty and enjoy each moment to the fullest."
The winding path led through graceful meadows, wildflowers, and along a rippling stream...all of which the young man missed as he churned within, boiling with anxiety. He didn't even notice how lovely the sunset was that day. Twilight found them in what looked like a huge, colorful garden. The old man breathed in the aroma, listened to the babbling brook, and pulled the ox to a halt.
"Let's sleep here," he sighed. "This is the last trip I am making with you," snapped the son. "You're more interested in watching sunsets an smelling flowers than making money!"
"Why that's the nicest thing you've said to me in a long time," smiled the dad. A couple of minutes later he was snoring...as his boy glared back at the stars. The night dragged on slowly, the son was restless. Before sunrise the young man shook his father awake. They hitched up and went on. About a mile down the road they happened upon another farmer..a total stranger...trying to pull his cart out of a ditch.
"Let's give him a hand," whispered the old man. "And lose more time?" the boy exploded.
"Relax son. You might be in a ditch sometime yourself. We need to help others in need...don't forget that." The boy looked away in anger. It was almost eight o'clock that morning by the time the other cart was back on the road. Suddenly, a great flash split the sky. What sounded like thunder followed. Beyond the hills, the sky grew dark.
"Looks like a big rain in the city," said the old man. "If we had hurried, we'd be almost sold out by now," grumbled the son. "Take it easy, you'll last longer and you'll enjoy life so much more," counseled the kind old gentleman.
It was late afternoon by the time they got to the hill overlooking the city. They stopped and stared down at it for a long, long time. Neither of them said a word. Finally, the young man put his hand on his father's shoulder and said, "I see what you mean, Dad." They turned their cart around and began to roll slowly away from what had once been the city of Hiroshima.
Sometimes waiting is Good. It is in the waiting God is redeeming the world. It is in your waiting God is preparing your future.
LORD, you are our Father. We are the clay, and you are the potter.
If in this life only we are hoping, we are of all people most to be pitied” I Corinthians 15:19
Christmas season . . . wait . . .
Advent accents the waiting . . . but it does so by pointing back to what God has done with the first Coming of Christ and gives us reason to wait with expectation for what God will yet do in the Coming of Christ.
Then everyone will see the Son of Man arrive on the clouds with great power and glory. And he will send forth his angels to gather together his chosen ones from all over the world--from the farthest ends of the earth and heaven.
O Come O Come Emmanuel