© CleanBible.com
According to Strong’s Greek Bible dictionary, godly hope is defined as:
“an expectation of
what is sure or certain.”
Is our present hope sure or certain? It can be. Everyone can learn how to have this kind of Godly hope.
We get godly hope by us making a choice to establish God's hope in our life according to the instructions of how to do it as outlined in the scriptures. When we do, there is also a spiritual connection created to the real God that made the heavens and the earth.
Let's talk about what real hope is and how to get it.
You and I have the ability to control how much and of the quality of hope that we have. We would be wise to establish our hope before we encounter life's difficulties so we are prepared. But sometimes things happen and that just isn’t possible. It is not if trials will come, but when will they come? We don't know what the future holds.
Our hope is different than our “earnest expectations” as in Philippians 1:20 below. We naturally often call our earnest expectations hope, but God doesn’t.
“According to my earnest expectation and my hope, that in nothing I shall be ashamed, but that with all boldness, as always, so now also Christ shall be magnified in my body, whether it be by life, or by death.”
The word "and" means both. Hope, expectations, and believing all work together almost seamlessly. Yet they are all different. Is the hope we put in ourselves, others, and the things of this world, sure or certain? Life proves to us such hope can be elusive and is often easily crushed or fades away. We all live in a fallen world.
Hope is one of those things that we often don't pay attention to, until it's needed. So we don’t generally establish, our hope ahead of time. Instead people tend to naturally make subconscious decisions and their hope naturally falls out of that. It is usually in what we want or what we feel we can trust, such as in ourselves, in others, and in the things of this world.
If we call ourselves a Christian, it does not mean that our hope is Godly hope. It does not happen automatically.
We will look at five scriptures that are just absolutely incredible. I have read or maybe more accurately skimmed over these 5 scriptures for over 30 plus years before I realized what God was saying.
Our scriptures will be Hebrews chapter 6 verses 17-20 and Hebrews chapter 7 verse 19. Don’t laugh, there is a mountain of detail in these 5 scriptures. These scriptures, even though written in conversational speech, are very condensed, so please take the necessary time to unpack them.
Hebrews 6:17
“Wherein God, willing more abundantly to show unto the heirs of promise the immutability of his counsel, confirmed it by an oath:”
God wants us know how Godly hope works. Just saying that just does not convey how important it is to God for us to fully understand what godly how is and how it works.
Where it says "God, willing more abundantly to shew unto the heirs of promise", the intensity of the words "willing more abundantly" is much stronger, in a good way than we often perceive. It is even deeper than a good parent's deep love towards their own children. That does not mean that God will change His character to accommodate our sin. He does not change, so we should learn His way and not expect Him to change to our way.
This statement is for those "heirs of promise". God desires that all people, be or become one of the "heirs of promise".
Additionally God Himself swears by an oath that this is how godly hope works. It is not a warm Bible story, given to make us feel good. It is an eternal personal promise between God and each one of us that believe to cause us to overcome the trials of life! This is really important stuff folks!
Let's look at the word “immutability of his counsel” which means a characteristic of God's truth that will never, ever change. God will not change it, circumstances won’t change it, and no human will ever have the power to change it.
It is important to realize, Godly hope is NOT blind faith. Hope has to be in something that is real, something achievable, something trustworthy.
Exercising godly hope helps us make right choices. With good decisions we can have a better quality of life and likely a far better future.
Hebrews 6:18-20
“That by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us: which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and which enters into that within the veil; where the forerunner is for us entered, even Jesus . . .”
Here in the 6th chapter of Hebrews, God declares that there are two immutable points concerning hope. This is in addition to the immutability of His council. Both of these two additional points are incredible, but the second immutable point, we believe you also will agree, is absolutely fantastic, its even beyond incredible!
Not everyone understands or believes basic Christian doctrines. However, when someone gets a clean understanding, in context, of Bible precepts like these, it’s hard to conclude anything except that these Biblical precepts are incredibly logical.
These scriptures, even though written in conversational discourse, are very condensed, so please take the necessary time to unpack them.
Scriptures:
"That by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie,"
Some would assume that one of those immutable things spoken of here, is that it is impossible for God to lie. While it is true, it is impossible for God to lie, as we study further, we realize that, this is NOT one of these two immutable points.
The first immutable point here is;
"the hope God . . . set before us:
. . . . (is) both sure and steadfast."
In other words godly hope is real hope "(is) both sure and steadfast".
Because Godly hope "(is) both sure and steadfast" we are provided with "a strong consolation"
By these two precepts or truths, if we take them to heart, we receive a strong consolation or encouragement. In other words God intentionally desires to console or encourage us in the trials of life, much like a parent would console or encourage their children.
The intensity of this consoling or consolation is more than strong enough to strengthen those who turn to God in whatever situation they are in. It needs to be, as we face many varied and difficult challenges throughout life. This consolation is NOT an empty or false hope.
This Hope is for those "heirs of promise, who have fled for refuge". The picture is of one running from trying to fight life's battles in our own natural strength and abilities to a refuge of where we are trusting in the true living God. We flee to this refuge of safety which is where our faith is in God alone. We are much stronger here than we ever were by trusting in ourselves. To the world this looks weak, but in reality it is the strongest position we can take. Most of the miracles in the Bible happened when someone chose to trust God.
There is a huge difference in fighting life's battles in the strength of our flesh vs God fighting them with or for us.
When God does the fighting for us we are not passive. We are submitted to and trusting in God. In other words:
God may work through our hands and feet,
OR
He may have us stand aside and we watch Him fight for us.
When we face a challenge, we may not be as close to God as we should be, so if we are wise, we flee to God for refuge where we should have been all the time. This includes unbelievers and believers alike. However as living humans, we sometimes can reject and drift from God. God sees our turning to Him and He sets hope before us so we can take a hold of it. This is usually by our turning to and trusting the promises of God written in the scriptures which is sometimes called the Logos. But it also may be our trusting a rhema, which means an inspired word given directly to our spirit from God for that situation. The words Logos and Rhema are Greek words and a rhema will never conflict with the logos which is the written word of God or what we call the Bible. It is very important to realize that a rhema is not a feeling or a thought prompted by any fear, doubts or of life’s pressures. This is a deep biblical concept and a person should be careful to get it right.
God has given us a free will and we can choose of whether or not to take ahold of God’s word and trust it. It is not far away nor impossible to find, it is set before us even if we have to open a Bible to find it. We find that often our natural beliefs and emotions work to block our trusting of God in times of a severe trial. Our emotions can overwhelm us to where we make really stupid decisions. God never intended for our emotions nor our non-biblical beliefs to be our the controlling influence in our lives.
“which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast”
Godly hope, when applied by faith, in context, is a steadfast and sure anchor to our soul. There is no deception in God’s word. It will not drag anchor. It is sure and steadfast.
We naturally assume that godly hope will in the end give us all that we hoped for. Instead godly hope gives us "an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast". The emphasis of godly hope is to anchor us and keep us safe in a God centered reality, regardless of what is happening in the world around us. If our hope is truly in the will of God, in context, and it is the appropriate time, God will give us what we were hoping for, but the real function of hope is to safely anchor us. If God is not the center of our reality, then our reality is not true reality.
Have we ever been in a difficult situation and the situation changed our integrity to do something we didn’t want to do? We allowed our hope to slip back to things that were not steadfast and sure.
When trouble comes, our soul, needs a real refuge. An anchor is a great illustration. First when we are using an anchor, it is out of sight on the ocean floor. Once we choose to use it, it is designed to "set" itself so that it holds us in a safe place. We have the freedom to move all around within the area that is safe. The anchor keeps us from being blown on to the beach, or on to the rocks or adrift out to sea by the storms of life. Scriptures are very clear, when our anchor is Godly hope, it is steadfast and sure. Sure means solid, it will not ever let go.
When the Bible tells us “to lay hold upon the hope set before us” it means that we are to hold hope fast and we are not to let it go.
Now on to the second immutable point which is absolutely fantastic!
The second immutable point is:
that our hope
“enters into that within the veil”,
or into the holy of holies.
Many assume here that it is talking about us physically entering within the veil.
But instead it is saying, that it is our hope that “enters into that within the veil”.
So what is within the veil?
It is God's actual presence. The same God that created the universe. The veil is referring to the veil of the temple and it represents the separation between God and mankind. Yes, it was torn on the cross so we have access and this is how our hope has access to God. Remember that with Christians their body is the temple of the living God.
1st Cor 3:16
“Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?”
Our hope, when we believe God as He intended, actually enters into the very presence of the God of Creation!
WOW!!!
To have our hope enter the actual presence of God is what we all desire. A real connection to the real God. This can be experienced by any Christian.
Many think it is impossible, yet God, through the scriptures, says that this is one of the two immutable things that cannot be changed. And God confirmed it by an oath to each and every of those "heirs of promise". Our hope through faith in God, enters into the actual presence of God! And that is how we draw near to God!
Whether we feel any different or not, does not matter. God says this is how He put His plan together and it is one of these two things that are immutable and it will never change.
For our hope to actually enter the very presence of God is a new understanding for many people.
Lets role play for a moment.
Let's pretend that “YOU” were the God of the universe, holy loving and all powerful. You have given instructions to the
people you made, on how they can have the highest quality of life in this fallen world. You instructed them on how to have real hope.
Then into your holy presence comes someone’s hope who is trusting your precepts and promises in context.
What would you, as God, do?
Wouldn’t you bless that person for actually trusting your word in context? Of course you would.
We need to understand that God is truly the King above all other kings. God is not a vending machine. It is not like the quarter goes in and the candy comes out. He is the one in control, not us. We don’t push His buttons to get everything we carnally want. We do seek God for all things that pertain to real life expecting that He will provide.
As this issue is so huge and it affects all people, let us look at it from a completely different angle. Every living person is in one of two, distinctly different mindsets or core belief systems in their hearts. It may not look like it on the outside but in our hearts we all have chosen to believe one view or the other. Either we believe the world should be centered on and serve us or . . we believe everything is actually centered on the real God that made the heavens and the earth. If we believe everything should be centered or revolve around God, then we come to realize that the true God is our heavenly father, our daddy. There is a personal relationship here. We don't use sophisticated formulas and games to try and manipulate God. Nor do we try to strengthen our will to get God to give us what we feel He has to give us according to the scriptures. Instead we trust God as our incredible spiritual dad. We petition our daddy according to His will and then choose to trust our dad to fulfill our hope righteously as He truly has a pure personal love for us. The difference here is in us subtly trying to manipulate God versus believing that He will do what He says. This sounds so simple but it isn't. In fact even in Bible college, 2/3 rds of the instructors missed it. Almost all of them had impressive alphabet soup behind their names.
With God, there is a time for every purpose under the heaven. He will always answer at the appropriate time. If that time is now, then the fulfillment of our hope will happen, right now.
If the right time is later, then it will happen later. It could be soon or could be even many years later. We should trust that God will answer the hope of every prayer that we pray, that is in line with His will. It is fine with a real believer if God answers later. God will always answer at the right time. God will not be late. Our flesh may think so, but to the Christian, our flesh is no longer our king. We have chosen Jesus Christ to be our real king and He truly does know best. Some of our hope, we may exercise in ignorance contrary to God's will. God will not embarrass us with those, but that hope likely won't be fulfilled. Genuine hope only comes from what God has actually stated or promised. Hope that is not Godly hope, God will most likely not fulfill and has no obligation to. God has the highest level of pure love for each one of us and we can and should trust him.
People sometimes say that they have tried this and it doesn't work. It has been my experience that those have expected, maybe without realizing it, that they were expecting God to be their servant rather than their heavenly father. It is so easy to miss the motivation of our own hearts. It is not that it doesn't work, it does. Something is out of place and it isn't God.
Romans 1:25
"They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served what has been created (in this case the me or self) instead of the Creator, who is praised forever. Amen"
Psalm 139:16
"But as for me, my prayer is unto thee, O LORD, in an acceptable time: O God, in the multitude of thy mercy, answer me in the truth of thy salvation."
If we are believing the world should serve us and we don't get what we want, it is so easy for us to reject the real God of truth, and take on a man made religion to justify ourselves. Even though we may not realize it, it does prove the real belief that is in our hearts. Often it takes hardship to cause us to stop playing games with God and to start looking for the truth. The truth is not far away, we are just blinded by being focused upon ourselves. Every person will experience this battle, whether they like it or not.
Our trusting God for the appropriate time, we call that real faith.
Our stressing over our own timetable is simply our old flesh trying to reassert itself as our king. Doing so we are just wasting our energy.
Our responsibility is to simply hold on to our hope that is in line with God's word. Just as the anchor line should stay connected to the boat. If we do, we will find our hope is absolutely steadfast and sure. It does not matter what the storm of life looks like or how much our flesh wants to let go or run.
Our hope has truly entered into the actual presence of God and God will fulfill that hope at the appropriate time.
When studying the scriptures, we should exercise caution in taking a single scripture or paragraph and building a doctrine upon it. So God has placed a wonderful scripture in the next chapter, chapter 7 verse 19 of Hebrews to confirm this precept written in chapter 6.
Hebrews 7:19
"For the law made nothing perfect, but the bringing in of a better hope did; by the which we draw near to God."
The words “the bringing in” is where our hope is actually ushered into God’s presence. The result is:
". . . by the which we draw near to God."
We, meaning our hope.
This confirms our understanding that our hope actually enters the close presence of God and we draw close to God through that process.
This is absolutely awesome ! ! !
This is Incredible ! ! !
This is the God of the universe. There is no higher authority than God. It doesn’t say it could happen, but instead it confirms it does happen each and every time we exercise hope as instructed in the Bible. Then our hope is actually brought close into the very presence of God! Remember it was so important to God, that He swore an oath to us that this is how it works.
Some would wrongly assume that it is like being at a rock concert where you are in the presence of the performer but in reality you are so far back you never clearly see the performer’s face and they never notice or care about yours. No, our hope enters the close presence of God and God is very, very aware of our hope and of us. We definitely have His attention no matter whether we feel it or not. This is why godly hope is such an awesome hope.
“For the law made nothing perfect, but the bringing in of a better hope did”
So what is the better hope? As a natural man we put our hope in worldly things. That didn’t work real well. As a baby Christian we put our hope in God as our heavenly father. That was a definite improvement but was limited as we really didn’t know Gods will and we often, in ignorance hoped contrary to the will of God.
“but the bringing in of a better hope did”
The better hope is us believing the precepts of God’s word. It is specific and with it we come to understand God’s will for whatever situation we are in. When we put our hope in the precepts of the scriptures, in context, our hope enters into the very presence of the God of all creation. The real King of kings. This is the better hope. It is the hope that is better than any other types of hope people have. Trusting God as our heavenly father can be greatly improved upon by trusting the precepts and details of God’s word, the Bible. We don’t toss out trusting God as our heavenly father, but as we grow, we exercise a better hope by putting our hope in the precepts of the scriptures. There are likely millions of these precepts in the Bible and we will only get them as we study and believe God’s word. Putting our trust in the word of God is the life of faith that gives us real hope!
When God says “For the law made nothing perfect, but the bringing in of a better hope did” why is God contrasting godly hope with law?
The natural man often assumes that following the law leads to a better life. But it doesn’t. It doesn’t matter whether the law we place our hope in is a governmental law, a religious law or any other law we have made to ourselves. Its all law. II will do this and I won’t do that. Some of these are very subtle.
Believing God’s word in context then framing our daily decisions based upon what we have chosen to believe, that can truly give us a better hope and a better life. A spiritual life does not come by us adhering to any dead religion or legalistic procedure.
Jesus again and again was amazed by the unbelief of the Jewish people.
They, like us considered themselves as God’s people so they assumed that they had faith in God. They believed in God but were often unaware of the precepts of God’s word. This caused them to miss out on much of the goodness and blessings that is had in a life in Jesus Christ. When a person is only vaguely aware of God’s word, it is natural to think "it is God's law so we must obey God’s laws". Instead a real fulfilled life comes from choosing to actually believe the scriptures in context. The law does not bring life, Jesus does
"All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:" [2nd Timothy 3:16]
“My days are swifter than a weaver's shuttle, and are spent without hope.” [Job 7;6]
“That they might set their hope in God, and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments”. [Psalms 78:7]
“For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believes; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith.” (Romans 1:16-17)
© - Copyright CleanBible.com ,2009 - 2024
