Carrubbers' Blog

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The Shape of Hope

Perhaps there has never been a time when people need to hear the gospel message: "There Is Hope!"  One of the great secular myths is the hope of progress.  The shape of this secular hope can be represented as: / - the theme tune would be "Things can only get better!"  We didn't get this from the ancients, as the pagan religions believed that history was shaped as an O - an ever repeating cycle.  Instead it was the Jews and Christians alone who believed that history is going somewhere - that it is His (God's) Story - that one day all the rights and wrongs of history will be vindicated and avenged by God. 

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The secular humanists liked that story of a world that lives happily ever after, but believed it would build such a world without God, that we could build the heavenly city out of earthly materials.  Believing in the essential goodness of man and the principle of the survival of the fittest - they believed that we should go from strength to strength: that we should steadily grow in wisdow and knowledge, technology and science, wealth and health with each successive generation.  However, that hope has hit the rocks in the last 12 years - first with the Financial Crisis and now with Coronavirus.  Before the current pandemic Millennials were already confronted with the reality that their lives will be worse off than their parents', with fewer choices and greater struggles.  The shape of things to come isn't / but .

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However, the Christian has a hope that is unshakeable in times like this because it is shaped differently.  This is the shape of the Christian hope: V .  This is the shape of resurrection.  Things don't always go from good to better, from strength to strength - that was not Jesus' experience nor the shape of Jesus' career.  Instead, we hold onto God's promise: "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness" (2 Corinthians 12:9).  Our hope is found in the fact that God does not create strength out of strength, but strength out of weakness - and so when things are on the downward slope, when we feel weak, then those are the times when Hope shows up in our lives through the Holy Spirit.  So welcome Him today and pray for His grace to help you and fill you with hope!


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