Pastor Kyle continues: Our ultimate hope is not that things are going to get better in this “fallen in sin” world. Our ultimate hope is, as followers of the Lord Jesus Christ, is that one day we will be in the loving arms of Jesus in Heaven. It is a “sure hope” and a hope only because it hasn’t come to fruition yet, as faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen … yet. We hold this hope in the one hand, while holding the reality of this fallen world in the other. It is the hope of Jesus that allows us to deal with the reality of this God-rejecting world system around us. The reality here is a tool that every Believer can use to point others to the hope that we have in the Lord, the Savior of the world. Only disciples of Christ can tell unbelievers that it gets better; that God has a better plan than anything and everything that they are currently going through right now. We must balance the hope of Jesus with the reality of this “lost in sin” world. In doing so, it helps us manage our expectations in life, helps us avoid disappointments and helps us make better decisions.
Jesus said in Matthew 5:44-46 “But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven; for He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. For if you love those who love you, what reward have you?”
There are some Christians so out of balance about the reality of this world that they are very pessimistic. In their mind, everything seems to be hard and the first thing they see in every blessing is that it can be a burden. It drives them to be a devil’s advocate at times. Yet on the other hand, other Christians are too unbalanced towards the positive hope of Christ (example: thinking that bad things in life cannot happen to them) that they end up getting crushed when the reality of this “Fallen” world strikes home. Bad things happen to godly people and ungodly people all the time on this side of Heaven. We should lean on the hopeful side, but we need to balance our expectations about the world that we live in today.
God gave Moses a “head’s up” that times were going to get tough, and we don’t get the luxury of being forewarned of difficult seasons and events coming our way. But, Jesus did tell us in John 16:33, “These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.” Life is harder than it has ever been for most of us because of this worldwide pandemic and it’s effect of society. We need the hope of Jesus more than ever these days. Do not let fear dominate your life rather than faith. Are you balance in hope and reality today?
Exodus 4:24-26 Now it happened at the lodging place, that the Lord met Moses and sought to kill him [making him deathly ill because he had not circumcised one of his sons]. Then Zipporah took a flint knife and cut off the foreskin of her son and threw it at Moses’ feet, and said, “Indeed you are a husband of blood to me!” So He let Moses alone [to recover]. At that time Zipporah said, “You are a husband of blood”—because of the circumcision.”
We live in the age of grace and the new covenant through the blood of Jesus, but the people of God in Moses’ time, the circumcision was their sign of their covenant commitment to the Lord. Sin is not just “bad and wrong stuff that we do”. It is also the “good and right stuff” that we do not do. In other words, doing what Lord God tells us not to do is equally as wrong as not doing what Almighty God tells us to do. They are both sin against a just and holy sovereign God. We might think that some sinful issues would slide by unnoticed by our omniscient Creator, but they are not. God holds us accountable for our sin and morality. We’ll never become more moral without God and that begins with us embracing and modeling God’s Word, Will and Way in our own lives before going into all the world teaching everything that Christ commanded, modeling Jesus and making disciples. You cannot teach what you do not know, understand and believe.
I just want to encourage you now to have your own “mountain top” experience with God. God has brought you to this point right now so that you can commune and connect with Him so that He can prepare you for what He has in store for you, that He can give you hope that you desperately need, and that you can get a sense of how He sees you and how He want you to be in Christ to use for His glory in this world and time.
Blessings in Christ, Brian
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