2. Biblical hope puts an unstoppable spring in our steps! “Through Him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.”Rom. 5:2 The victory is already ours. Thus, we can rejoice, we can even rejoice exceedingly! So where is all the celebrating?! It is the greatest triumph ever when Jesus defeated death and now offers eternal life. Look at how Paul tells it in 1 Cor. 15:54-57; three times he mentions our victory. It is the victory that is greater than any other triumph. So again, why aren’t the believers celebrating?

Hope makes you a happy winner. It really can put a spring into your step. Got a bad boss? Will that be a big deal 100 years from now? Struggling with sorrows? It says God will one day wipe away every tear. Got a financial crisis? Hey, you’ll spend eternity walking on streets of gold! Is your body dying? You’ll get to trade in that worn out thing for a new imperishable one soon! All this brings hope! Hope encourages us to never quit.

It also enables us to rejoice exceedingly. I mentioned this earlier but I want to emphasize it again. The war is basically over. Everything is complete except a final mop-up operation and then the awards ceremony. Hope makes us undefeatable, because of Jesus, we have already won. We will share in His victory. His victory is our victory. We rejoice because of the anticipation of what’s coming!

Hope enables us to press on and serve God even in tough times. Paul goes on in Romans 5 and shares how when we rejoice even in our suffering that brings endurance which produces character and that produces hope. Hope enables us to keep going. So, keep on, keep praying. Remember with all the bad news the media likes to repeat over and over again, there is a lot of good news out there as well.

Chris recently sent me this that I thought would be good to pass on to everyone as well.

“While in quarantine, Shakespeare wrote King Lear.While in quarantine, Isaac Newton developed calculus and discovered gravity.While under house arrest, Paul wrote part of the New Testament. While in prison, John Bunyan wrote ‘Pilgrim’s Progress.’ Consider what kingdom work you could do while staying home!”