Hope

"If we cannot look ahead through all the unknown and have HOPE, then what do we really have , and what are we really living for?"

Friends of mine wrote this in their Christmas letter and I've been mulling it over for days now. Where does my hope truly lie? It's easy to say I hope in the Lord when all is going well, when everything has turned out okay, but in the midst of crisis, it's also easy to see all the superficial things I really put my hope in.

"Blessed are those who mourn..." because those who mourn have the opportunity to know, to understand, that the Lord really is the only One, the only relationship, the One who beyond all circumstances, is our earthly and eternal refuge. He only disappoints when my hope is not in Him, but rather in what I think my life should look like especially when compared to someone else.

My hope is not in Him if I so bitterly lament the further, inevitable deterioration of this already crippled, temporal body. I'm not saying that this will be easy or enjoyable or that He won't provide any physical comfort because He has and most certainly will, but that my hope is in Him when I rejoice in the fact that this life, and certainly the next, is about so much more than whether I'm free from such aches, pains, and further limitations.

"Now may the Lord Jesus Christ himself, and God our Father, who loved us and gave us eternal comfort and hope through grace, comfort your hearts and establish them in every good work and word" 2 Thessalonians 2:16-17

The Gospel

17Brothers, join in imitating me, and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us. 18For many, of whom I have often told you and now tell you even with tears, walk as enemies of the cross of Christ. 19 Their end is destruction, their god is their belly, and they glory in their shame, with minds set on earthly things. 20But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, 21who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself." Philippians 3:17-21

This is why the prosperity gospel is so contrary to the Gospel of Christ. If an abundant life consists of the fulfillment of our earthly desires, the justification of gluttony and greed, what is Paul doing in a jail cell suffering for proclaiming the gospel? It's not that the Lord won't supply all of our needs (and many of our wants), because he most certainly will, but that's not the point. Christ didn't come to die for our sins, to bring us into a right relationship with God so that we could enjoy every earthly pleasure. He died to make us citizens of heaven, so that we could spend eternity with God and no amount of fleeting earthly pleasure or pain can possibly compete with that. If He did nothing else, if He withheld every other blessing, He would still be utterly worthy of our eternal praise.