May 20, Ascension Sunday, Armed Forces Day

Lesson: 1 Corinthians 12:31-13:7c

Sermon Title: Hopes All Things

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Two rural church deacons were having a sociable beer in the local tavern when they saw their minister drive by and take a good long look at their pickup trucks parked outside.

One deacon ducked down and said, "I hope the reverend didn't see us or recognize my pickup."

The other replied indifferently, "What difference does it make? God knows we're in here...and he's the only one who counts."

The first deacon answered, "Yeah, but God won't tell my wife."

"I hope the reverend didn't see us or recognize my pickup."

INTRODUCTION:

  1. What kind of hope is this?

  2. What is hope anyway?

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MAIN BODY:

  1. Hope is not "I hope so."

    1. Hoping for a particular outcome.

      1. You may not have any influence or control over that which is sought.

      2. This is not hope, but wishful thinking.

Richard Fairchild tells a story from his childhood: When I was a kid I remember a time when my mother decided to make up some chocolate nut fudge or something very tasty like that. (1)

She had all these wonderful ingredients assembled on her kitchen counter and all these lovely smells wafted around the room, and she was busy whipping something up on the stove.

I checked it out--and discovered that it was a pan half full of this lovely chocolate sauce and so I did what all normal children would have done--I asked for a taste.

Mother told me that I could have some when it was ready--but I of course put on a sad little face and said, "Just a little taste please!?"

She then told me I wouldn't like it but I didn't believe her--I mean, what was there not to like--lovely chocolate sauce--just a little spoonful--and so, relenting, she gave me a taste.

It was awful. It was bitter. It wasn't like chocolate at all. Yet it looked like chocolate and my mother assured me, as she laughed at my puckered-up face--that it was all chocolate and nothing but chocolate.

And that was the problem with it: It was nothing but chocolate. It lacked something very essential to make it taste really good: It lacked sugar.

"Though I have all chocolate, but have not sugar"

      1. Although not explicitly stated, This is the result of I hope so.

    1. I suppose that to understand hope, one might turn to a dictionary for a definition.

      1. HOPE (2) -noun

          1. the feeling that what is wanted can be had or that events will turn out for the best: to give up hope.

          2. a particular instance of this feeling: the hope of winning.

          3. grounds for this feeling in a particular instance: There is little or no hope of his recovery.

          4. a person or thing in which expectations are centered: The medicine was her last hope.

          5. something that is hoped for: Her forgiveness is my constant hope.-verb (used with object)

          6. to look forward to with desire and reasonable confidence.

          7. to believe, desire, or trust: I hope that my work will be satisfactory.-verb (used without object)

          8. to feel that something desired may happen: We hope for an early spring.

          9. Archaic. to place trust; rely (usually fol. by in).--Idiom

          10. hope against hope, to continue to hope, although the outlook does not warrant it: We are hoping against hope for a change in her condition.

      2. This is helpful.

      3. The definition is incomplete.

    2. What might the Poet offer?

      1. Emily Dickinson wrote Poem Number 254

    "Hope" is the thing with feathers--
    That perches in the soul--
    And sings the tune without the words--
    And never stops--at all--

    And sweetest--in the Gale--is heard--
    And sore must be the storm--
    That could abash the little Bird
    That kept so many warm--

    I've heard it in the chillest land--
    And on the strangest Sea--
    Yet, never, in Extremity,
    It asked a crumb--of Me.

  1. Emily Dickinson uses the metaphorical image of a bird to describe the abstract idea of hope.

  2. Hope, of course, is not an animate thing, it is inanimate, but by giving hope feathers, she begins to create an image hope in our minds.

  3. The imagery of feathers conjures up hope in itself.

  4. Feathers represent hope because feathers enable you to fly and offer the image of flying away to a new hope, a new beginning.

  5. In contrast, broken feathers or a broken wing grounds a person, and conjures up the image of needy person who has been beaten down by life. Their wings have been broken and they no longer have the power to hope. (3)

      1. This is also helpful.

      2. This imagery may or may not be a biblical image of hope.

    1. To create a biblical image of HOPES ALL THINGS, we can turn to the biblical commentaries.

      1. Adam Clarkes Commentary on the New Testament First Electronic STEP Files Copyright © 1999, Parsons Technology, Inc. Clarke, Adam

      2. Hopeth all things--Ðáíôá åëðéæåé When there is no place left for believing good of a person, then love comes in with its hope, where it could not work by its faith; and begins immediately to make allowances and excuses, as far as a good conscience can permit; and farther, anticipates the repentance of the transgressor, and his restoration to the good opinion of society and his place in the Church of God, from which he had fallen.

      1. JFB Commentary First Database © 2000 iExalt, Inc.

      hopeth--what is good of another, even when others have ceased to hope.

  1. All of this helps to create a vision of hope.

  2. Then we need to flesh out the concept.

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  1. Hope, first of all, is hope in people.

    1. HOPES ALL THINGS relates to what is desired for people.

      1. Each person carries a spark of the divine.

      2. In some people this spark is but it is such a tiny spark that you wonder if it will ever blossom into flame.

      2. Archibald MacLeish retells the story of Job in his stageplay J.B. The final scene shows J.B. and his wife reflecting upon the experience of his suffering. She says to him, "You wanted justice, didn't you? There isn't any . . . there is only love."

      God and Satan, watching the scene from high above the stage, are both baffled. Together they ask:

      Who plays the hero, God or him?

      Is God to be forgiven?

      Isn't He? Job is innocent

      You may remember.

      J.B. forgives God and as the curtain falls his wife wonders aloud:

      The candles in the churches are out,
      The stars have gone out in the sky,
      Blow on the coals of the heart
      And we'll see by and by.

      1. Because each person carries a spark of the divine, there is hope.

      2. There is no one who is hopeless.

      3. We hope all things.

    1. Hope stand beside a person regardless.

      1. Hope is not simply a desire, it is also an action.

      2. The book Every War Has Two Losers recounts the life and work of William Stafford, the American poet and pacifist of the last century. In the introduction, his son told this account of his father's childhood: (4)

      "My familyhas a founding story. Sometime around 1920, the young William Stafford came home from school and told his mother that two new students had been surrounded on the playground and taunted by the others because they were black.

      "And what did you do, Billy?" said his mother.

      "I went and stood by them," Billy said.

  1. Standing by.

  1. As an unknown author has stated:

      "What we do for ourselves dies with us. What we do for others and the world remains and is immortal." (5)

  1. Jesus is the one who is always standing by.

...for he has said, "I will never leave you or forsake you." Hebrews 13:5 (NRSVA)

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  1. Hope is secondly, hoping in the plans and purposes of God.

    1.   To know the plans and purposes of God, it is necessary to connect with God.

    2.  We allow God to find us.

      2. A man is climbing a mountain, at the top of which he hopes to find God. By ascending the heights, the seeker expects to leave all the cares and miseries of life behind in the valley.

      But while he climbs, God is coming down the mountain into the toil and grief. In the mists of the mountain God and the man pass one another.

      When the man reaches the mountaintop, he will find nothing. God is not there. What then will he do? He knows the climbing was a mistake, but in agony of that recognition, will he fall down and despair? Or will he turn to retrace his path through the mists and into the valley to where God has gone seeking him?

      1. We do not find God.

      2. God finds you and me.

      3. When we connect, what expectations do we have?

      4. Are we willing to accept is offered?

    1. There is a marvelous passage in Romans 8:18-25 (NRSVA) that reveals the nature of hope and its rewards.

      2. 18I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us. 19For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; 20for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope 21that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. 22We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now; 23and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies.

      24For in hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what is seen? 25But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.

    2. We do not fully know, nor can we fully comprehend what God has prepared.

    3. Again Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 2:9 (NRSVA)

      4. 9But, as it is written,
              "What no eye has seen, nor ear heard,
                  nor the human heart conceived,
                    what God has prepared for those who love him"--

    4. It was Edward Mote who wrote My Hope Is Built.

      5. 1
      My hope is built on nothing less
      Than Jesus'' blood and righteousness.
      I dare not trust the sweetest frame,
      But wholly trust in Jesus'' Name.

      2
      When darkness seems to hide His face,
      I rest on His unchanging grace.
      In every high and stormy gale,
      My anchor holds within the veil.

      3
      His oath, His covenant, His blood,
      Support me in the whelming flood.
      When all around my soul gives way,
      He then is all my Hope and Stay.

      4
      When He shall come with trumpet sound,
      Oh may I then in Him be found.
      Dressed in His righteousness alone,
      Faultless to stand before the throne.

      Refrain

      On Christ the solid Rock I stand,
      All other ground is sinking sand;
      All other ground is sinking sand.

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CONCLUSION

  1. It was Norman Cousins who wrote:

      2. "The tragedy of life is not death, but what dies inside while we are living...We must recognize that we get our basic energy not from turbines but from hope." (6)

  2. It was Francis of Assisi, who wrote this prayer:

      3. "Our Father, each day is a little life, each night a tiny death; help us to live with faith and hope and love. Lift our duty above drudgery; let not our strength fail, or the vision fade, in the heat and burden of the day. O God, make us patient and pitiful one with another in the fret and jar of life, remembering that each fights a hard fight and walks a lonely way. Forgive us, Lord, if we hurt our fellow souls; teach us a gentler tone, a sweeter charity of words, and a more healing touch. Sustain us, O God, when we must face sorrow; give us courage for the day and hope for the morrow. Day unto day may we lay hold of thy hand and look up into thy face, whatever befall, until our work is finished and the day is done. Amen."

  3. We live with and in hope.

    1. Love hopes all things.

    2. Live in love.

Amen!

1. Richard Fairchild, "The love test," Spirit-net.ca. Retrieved August 15, 2006.

2. American Psychological Association (APA): hope. (n.d.). Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1). Retrieved May 17, 2007, from Dictionary.com website: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/hope

Chicago Manual Style (CMS): hope. Dictionary.com. Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1). Random House, Inc. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/hope (accessed: May 17, 2007).

Modern Language Association (MLA): "hope." Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1). Random House, Inc. 17 May. 2007. <Dictionary.com http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/hope>.

3. Retrieved from: essortment: http://ut.essortment.com/emilydickinson_rqnb.htm

4. Kim Stafford, ed., Every War has Two Losers (Minneapolis, Minn.: Milkweed Editions, 2003), 7.

5. Source unknown.

6. Norman Cousins, as quoted by Laurel Arthur Burton's Making Chaplaincy Work: Practical Approaches (Haworth, 1991), as cited by Marty E. Marty in Context,July 15,1991, 3.

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