Hoping, Faithful,Expectant

This week I want to talk about hope and how faith and being expectant help dig that anchor of hope in. Hope is an interesting thing. I counted the word 18 times in the book of Job. If you know anything about Job, you know he had it pretty rough yet the word hope is used 18 times in this book alone. I counted it 32 times in Psalms, and around 180 times is hope mentioned in the Bible according to my Bible app on my phone. So, go beyond some of the verses I will include today and find hope in His word. Hope is a buzz word right now. Hope for a cure. Hope for normalcy to return soon. Hope for vacations to not be cancelled. Hope for revival. Hope those stimulus checks are on their way. Hope that Walmart has Lysol in stock. As hope gets the thrown around more and more, I start to get anxious about how many people are actually hoping and actively expecting the fruition of that hope. How many people are expecting?

Are you expecting revival? Are you expecting normalcy to return? Are you expecting a cure?

I hope you’re being expectant. (catching a theme yet?)

If you’re hoping for something to happen, you’re expecting it to, right?

Hope is empty without some knowledge of what you’re hoping for is going to come eventually. Why hope for something you’re never going to be expecting? Without us being expectant, we are lacking faith. If we do not expect God to show up for us and we do not expect God to answer praises and heal us, then why are we even hoping? Perhaps, Hebrews 11:1 comes to mind for you. ”Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.”

If you continue in that chapter, you will find all these great examples of faith. All these people who hoped, were living by faith and died but in 11:13 it says they saw these things and they even welcomed them from afar because they were foreigners of the earth. They were all commended on their faith but did not receive what had been promised because God planned something better. (11:39-40) This may not look like what we had hoped for, but we should still have the faith these people did because God is still working, just like He was then, on something even better. We are foreigners. Yes, we should be hoping for things to be done. We should be hoping for God to show up but hoping alone isn’t going to do it. Hope is the anchor. (Hebrews 6:19) It’s going to require some leg work on your part. You also need to be expecting. Faith believing that change is coming. Hope isn’t a bad thing, but it can’t be the only thing either. Do you think Noah looked at the ark and said “I hope this gets finished in time”? No, Noah had faith that God would provide, that he would have time to build this ark and it wasn’t easy. People thought he was crazy but Noah also was expecting. He was expecting a flood. What we need now more than anything is to pray big things; expect God to show up which will be a test of faith. We have to have the hope to keep believing this will end. It has to end. I’m expecting healing. I’m expecting revival.

But also, praise. Praise is important right now. We already know this will end and healing is coming so why not take that faith and hope and expectancy a step further and praise God for what He’s already done, doing and going to do?

Acts 2:26 -“Therefore my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices; my body also will rest in hope.”

Galatians 5:5 - “For we through the [strength and power of the Holy] Spirit, by faith, are waiting [confidently] for the hope of righteousness [the completion of our salvation.]” (AMP)

2 Corinthians 3:12- “Therefore, since we have such a hope, we are very bold.”

Psalms 62:5- ”My soul, wait thou only upon God; for my expectation is from Him.”

As my preacher would say, ”don’t pray for rain then not carry your umbrella.”

I guess in this case we could say, “don’t pray for Lysol then not add it to the list.”

Love you all. Stay safe. Hang on a little longer. Have faith, have hope and expect change.