Moments With God.
Advent Week 1
HOPE
Tuesday, November 30
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Are you hoping for this to be the best Christmas you have ever had? What would it take to make it the best? Restored relationships? The joy you can give another? Great revival in your church? Something that might bring tears of joy?
Christmas is a time of hope. From the time we were small children we had various hopes for every Christmas.
When I was 9 or 10 I hoped for a ventriloquist doll for Christmas. I had read a little pamphlet on how to be a ventriloquist and practiced and practiced talking without moving my mouth. Of course I didn't do it in front of anyone else because that would look silly. If I only had a ventriloquist doll to practice with, then I could become good enough to do it in front of others.
I hoped and hoped. I circled the figure I thought looked best in the wish book (Christmas catalog), but year after year I was disappointed. I had learned long before that not to beg for something because that would make the "no" more firm in our family. I thought that if I could only get a ventrioquist doll that would make that Christmas the best one I ever had.
After two or three years of hoping I gave up. I no longer circled the figure of my interest. I decided I seldom got what I wanted anyway. You guessed it. That year my folks really paid attention to our interests. I had begun enjoying chess and I got a nice wooden chess set. I had become pretty good on my grandparents carrom board and wouldn't you know I got one of those, too. In fact there were a number of things that I had showed an interest in and it seemed like it had been a particularly good year financially because not only had I received many things that fit my interests but so had my brothers and sister. You might have thought I would have been pleased with what I received, and I was, but in the midst of it all I kept thinking to myself, "I wish I would have shown an interest in a ventriloquist doll this year." The fact is I was very disappointed with myself for not making it clear what I really hoped for.
I'm sure you know as well as I do that a ventriloquist doll wasn't what would make a Christmas the best ever. The problem is, I'm not sure any of us really knows what it would take to make this Christmas the best celebration of the birth of Jesus we have ever experienced
The only one who really knows what is best for us is God. I don't know, but I think the one attribute of our celebration that would make one Christmas better than any other is to truly get the slightest glimpse of the great magnificence of God's love for us revealed in the gift of his Son.
On Christmas the answer to our emptiness was born -- the true friend in our loneliness, the restoration to our broken relationship with God. We sing, "The hope of all ages was born." God had the same emptiness and loneliness we did. God knew what was necessary to really make Christmas best for not only us but also for Him. He had seen the real need and had provided, but the world didn't recognize Him because they thought they needed something else.
Israel thought they needed a military leader to overthrow the local government. They thought they would be happy if they could continue in their old ways and be established by God as a people to do so. Through the years of listening to prophecies of the Messiah they had formed their own picture and opinion of just who and what He would be. They couldn't see the answer to their lives when He came because they couldn't see their own corruption. They were begging for God to send a Messiah who would come and tell the world that they were His people and who would defend them to the bitter end no matter how they treated Him or each other.
God does not want a begging, clamouring people. He wants a praising, loving people. These people begged for things their way and God loved them enough to provide the true way. They pleaded with Him to meet their wants and He wanted to provide for their true needs and have them so full of praise to Him that it didn't matter what else might happen to them. If they would be that kind of people fully trusting in Him He could then fulfill some of the desires of their hearts out of His own heart of love.
Jeremiah 14 paints a picture of true hopelessness. In verses 11 and 12 we read, "Then the Lord said to me. 'Do not pray for the well-being of this people. Although they fast, I will not listen to their cry; though they offer burnt offerings and grain offerings. I will not accept them. Instead, I will destroy them with the sword, famine and plague.' "
Why did God say this? Verse 10 gives us the answer. "This is what the Lord says about this people: 'They greatly love to wander; they do not restrain their feet. So the Lord does not accept them; he will now remember their wickedness and punish them for their sins.' "
This is a true picture of hopelessness. There is nothing that the people could do. There is nothing we can do to bring God to answer our plea. We have no way of getting God to give us the best Christmas we have ever experienced. Why is that? Because, without realizing it, our hope is in ourselves. Our hope is in praying enough, fasting enough, caring enough, giving enough.
God said He wouldn't listen to their prayers or pay attention to their fasting or sacrificing because they still went their own way when all was said and done.
It sounds to me like all hope is lost. Sometimes it seems like that is what God wants. If you give up all hope then you can recognize that God is providing after all. We have trouble recognizing that we have a misplaced hope.
If you read on through the rest of that 14th chapter of Jeremiah it seems that God is saying, "now that they have no hope I can express my own true feelings." Verse 17 says, "Speak this word to them: "'Let my eyes overflow with tears night and day without ceasing; for my virgin daughter--my people--has suffered a grievous wound, a crushing blow...' You see God weeping over His people after they have lost all hope completely.
Jeremiah is told to pray in front of the people asking the inevitable question after all is said and done. "Have you rejected Judah completely? Do you despise Zion? Why have you afflicted us so that we cannot be healed? We hoped for peace but no good has come, for a time of healing but there is only terror." (Jeremiah 14:19)
He then leads the people in a prayer of repentance. "O Lord, we acknowledge our wickedness and the guilt of our fathers; we have indeed sinned against you."(v 20)
If we can't put our hope in God we can no longer have any hope. We can only put our hope in God if we put it in no other gods including ourselves. Verse 22 says, "Do any of the worthless idols of the nations bring rain? Do the skies themselves send down showers? No, it is you, O Lord our God. Therefore our hope is in you, for you are the one who does all this."
Jesus' life demonstrated this same singular hope. When Jesus asked the twelve if they were going to leave him Peter said, "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life." (John 6:68) The only way to have the best Christmas ever is to give up all hope of it and praise the one who has already provided the only true hope who came to this earth and to know this single hope personally as you celebrate His birth.
I wish you a hopeless Christmas so you can recognize your only hope in Him. :-)
Ron Pruitt
Prayer
Sometimes we wonder why things seem so hopeless, Father. We see our faith tested. At times You are trying to get our attention, but we rest assured by verses like today's that even when we feel we have to give up all hope, there is still hope in You. We find it true that there is no other place to have our hopes met than in You. Thank You for knowing our hopes and for giving us what is best. We truly love You.
Amen
[Psalms 5,6] [Amos 3:1-11] [II Peter 1:12-21] [Matt. 21:1-11]
or suggestions to Yvonne Edwards.
Edited: Nov. 17, 9:00 a.m.
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