Real Life Community Church Richmond, KY

Week 1 | The Hope of Advent | Romans 15:13

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Hope isn’t a mood you try to maintain. It’s a promise you learn to trust. We launch Advent by going straight to Romans 15:13 and asking three simple questions that change everything: What is hope? Where does it come from? And how do we abound in it?

Along the way, we contrast wishful optimism with the Bible’s confident expectation grounded in God’s character and his unbroken track record—from Abraham to Bethlehem to the empty tomb.

Romans 15:13 teaches that true hope flows from God, is empowered by the Holy Spirit, and is experienced as we walk with Him.

Advent starts with hope because every other Advent theme—peace, joy, and love—flows from it. Our call is not to cling to a thin thread of hope, but to overflow with it as we prepare our hearts for Christ’s return. 

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Romans chapter 15. When you have it, say amen. Well, hope is to the heart, what oxygen is to the lungs. Without hope, the soul suffocates. Hal Lindsay said this. He said, man can live about 40 days without food, about three days without water, about eight minutes without air, but only one second without hope. The great Russian novelist Fyodor Dosievsky said this. He said, To live without hope is to cease to live. Well, today, as you know, it marks the beginning of the Advent season. The word Advent again comes from the Latin Adventus, which just means arrival. And we look back in in Advent to Christ's first arrival when he came born in a manger to give his life as a ransom for many. But we also look ahead to another arrival, the hope that Christ will come again to consummate his kingdom, to raise us bodily, all who have gone on to be with him. Their bodies will be raised, every tear wiped from our eyes, the earth will be renewed, and we shall forever be with the Lord. And so, as you know, there are four weeks to Advent, each with a different theme. And the first theme is hope. And that's what I want to talk about this morning. And I want to do so through the lens of one verse. Don't think that my sermon is going to be five minutes just because it's one verse, all right? But here's the hope today through Romans 15 verse 13. The hope is that we would abound in hope. That's the aim, that we would abound in hope as we rest in the promise of Christ's return. So Romans 15, 13. May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope. So through the lens of this text, here's what I want to do. I just want to address five questions around this theme of hope. Number one, what is hope exactly? And the reason I bring this out is because there is quite a difference between what the world uh means by hope and what the Bible expresses in the word hope. So let's talk about the secular meaning of hope. So, hope in the world is simply this: it is a desire for a particular outcome without certainty. I hope to get this job, but it's uncertain. I hope this girl will fall in love with me. It's probably uncertain for most of you, all right? You know the Christmas season is littered with many uncertain or faux hopes. Do you know this? It's like you hope for a civil family gathering. That everybody just get along and that the weird uncle wouldn't do something too abnormal. Come on, how many have the weird uncle? All right. I am a weird uncle. All right, fair enough. I love that. But you, but but you know, that's the hope. You might hope for the the the uh just a particular gift or the newest gadget. Ladies, the Hallmark movies offers dubious hopes. All right. Let me just say the hope of meeting perfect you know, Prince Charming when the snow is falling. You just serendipitously meet, you know, run into this one whom you're meant to be with. Or if you are married, it's the hope that that spark this year during the holiday season will be rekindled. Now, to be sure, hoping for these things is not inherently wrong, but these hopes are uncertain, which really what worldly hope is, it's not hope at all, truly. It's what would you say, wishful optimism. We know that that these hopes don't come to pass so often. I mean, think about this you don't get the gift you wanted. There is a blow up around the dinner table. You don't meet Prince Charming, you don't get the Christmas bonus that you hope for, you get a subscription to what? Jelly of the Month Club. All right. So worldly hope is uncertain, but but listen to me. Biblical hope is totally different. We can take biblical hope to the bank. The word, the Greek word for hope in the New Testament is alpis, and it means, as you heard earlier, confident expectation. Confident expectation in something yet to come, which is, by the way, the hope that Paul is referring to in our text. And how do we know that? Well, he's already talked about this. Flip back with me to Romans chapter 8, and I want to read verses 23 and 24. Paul has just talked about the fact that the world, created world itself, is groaning because God is not just gonna raise our bodies on the last day, but do you know he's gonna renew the earth? We're not gonna spend eternity somewhere up in the sky. God is renewing the earth, and we shall ever uh forever be with the Lord here in a much, you know, the the world, the world will be um rid of corruption and decay. It's an amazing thing. So after addressing that, Paul says, but we ourselves, Christians, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, we groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons. We're in this already but not yet season where we are in waiting. And here's what that hope is it's the redemption of our bodies. That will happen on the day of the Lord when he returns. For in this hope we are saved. So in verse, or excuse me, in chapter 15, verse 13, when Paul is speaking of hope, he is talking about particularly uh, yes, hope in God in general, but he is talking about the hope and and the the confident expectation that Jesus will return, bring justice to the earth, and consummate his kingdom. Worldly hope, see, it's based on possibilities, but biblical hope is based on promises. Let me say it again. Worldly hope is based on possibilities, biblical hope is based on promises, which begs the question this morning: where are you putting your hope? Because I fear too many Christians even are saying, Yeah, we believe that we can hope in God, but you're really banking your life on what the world does, on politicians and on uh finances, so on and so forth. Beloved, that's not the hope you need. That is not the hope you need. The worldly hope is based on possibilities, biblical hope on promises. Second question: what is the source of our hope? Look with me at verse 13 again. May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace and are in believing. What's Paul saying? God Himself is the source and the supplier of our hope. Think about this. Without a transcendent being, hope cannot exist. Here's why. You know, people make promises, right? But people are fallible. Just look at the person next to you. You know, think about this. Politicians make promises, and even with the best intent, there are too many variables to guarantee that they're gonna hold true to those promises, and generally they don't, by the way. You know, think about wedding vows. Promises are made, yet human beings are fallible and fickle, and often those covenants, those promises are broken. See, hope that we can bank on depends not just on promises. Get this, but it depends on a being who can actually have the power to bring about those promises, to deliver those promises. You know, the Bible offers many promises. You know, the New Testament says that God will never leave us nor forsake us. It says that nothing can separate us from the love of God. That the Bible says that Jesus is returning to renew the earth. It says that one day every tear will be wiped from your eye and my eye. It's a beautiful thing. Eyes, both of them. And here's the thing: God not only promises those things, but friend, he is able to deliver. He's that powerful. Now, your argument this morning may be, well, sure, I believe God's all powerful, he's sovereign, he's omnipotent, but how can I be sure that God's actually going to come through? Well, Paul actually handles that for us in the preceding verses. He's writing here to the church of Rome, and here's what he says to them. Go up chapter 15, verses 8 and 9. For I tell you that Christ became a servant to the circumcised, that's Israel, to show God's truthfulness in order to confirm the promises given to the patriarchs, and in order that the Gentiles might glorify God for his mercy. Here's what Paul is saying. See, the Roman church, it's made up of both Jews and Gentiles. And they're having to learn to do life together, these people who come from quite different backgrounds. And what Paul is reminding them of is that Paul or God's promises in the Old Testament were not just for the Jew, but they were also for the Gentile. You know, go back to the covenant God made with Abraham in the book of Genesis, who would become the great patriarch of Israel. God didn't just say, through you, your nation will be blessed. He said, Abraham, through you, all nations would be blessed. Why? How? Because let me tell you why. Let me tell you how. Because through Abraham's lineage, God the Son would come and take on flesh, and he would redeem mankind. The promise has always been for Jew and Gentile. So the the Old Testament is rife with promises about this coming Messiah who would redeem God's people. And what Paul is saying here in the first, you know, verses uh what is it, eight and nine, he's saying, listen, God kept good on those promises. I mean, for centuries, the Israelites waited on their Messiah. They must have thought, man, when's he gonna come? But God shows up right on time, amen. That night in Bethlehem, God kept his promise. Then what Paul does, verses 9 through 12, he quotes a bunch of Old Testament passages, rehearsing those promises of God fulfilled in Christ's first advent, his first arrival. In verse 9, he quotes 2 Samuel 22 and Psalm 18 in verse 10. He cites Deuteronomy 32 in verse uh 11, Psalm 117, and uh he cites Isaiah 11, verse 1. Here's the point of all this. In verse 13, Paul is saying to these Christians in Rome, I want you to abound in hope. The hope of Christ's return. I want that to stir your spirit and give you strength to carry on. And if you're doubting, oh Christian, if you're doubting that God will keep good on his promise, what he's saying to Rome is just think back. God has proven himself faithful. How many know God has a pretty good track record? Amen. He is a faithful God. It's a beautiful thing. If you are, if you're struggling with trusting God, just think back to how faithful he's already been. Read the Bible and look at how he's fulfilled promises. The reason we know we can trust God is because of his track record. Let me just illustrate this. Um, you know, many of you know my youngest son Connor, uh, when he was in the military in AIT infantry training, he got very, very sick, went through one thing after another. He he graduated, uh, but as soon as he graduated, he started losing weight and become became very, very, very ill. And for four years, about four years, he has gone from doctor to doctor, from medical practice to medical practice, but no one could offer any true help. They were just like, you know, try this, try this medicine, throw in medications at him. And it's like every as time went on, every doctor's office that he went to, he lost a little bit more of hope. And after four years, I think he just resigned to the idea that this is my life from here on. But something changed a few months ago. I I go to a doctor who's unbelievable, and she's trained not just in, you know, what would you say, pharmaceuticals and treating symptoms, but she's actually trained in functional medicine. She gets to the to the root of the problem, not just the symptoms. And so she's a great Christian lady, and I had an appointment. She's got a three-year waiting list, by the way, um, for the right tie this morning. I can hook you up, but I'm just um listen, I had an appointment a few months ago when I said I said, Dr. Wesley, I told her how sick Connor was. And I said, Dr. Wesley, any way you can squeeze him in with tears in my eyes. I said, He's giving up hope. He's 22. And she worked him in graciously. And so just a couple of weeks later, I took Connor to that appointment. And I told him before I went in that myself, along with at least three other members of this church, go to Dr. Wesley. And I had an ailment that I moved here with that I had gone to doctor after doctor in three different states to no avail. She helped me get better in like three months. It was amazing. So I'm telling Connor this on the way, and I'm telling you this, he went in to meet her, went into the exam room, and when he came out of that room, Stephen his countenance had changed, his demeanor had changed, his posture changed, his smile changed. Why? He had not taken a prescription yet. He had not done anything that she prescribed yet. It's she's been out of the office 30 seconds. Why the change? Because Dr. Wesley gave him hope. And you know why he believed her claim that that he just might be able to get better? Because she had just had a young lady in her office that had dwindled away to 80 pounds, who had given her just resigned. I'm just going to die. And she came to Dr. Wesley. Dr. Wesley figured out what was going on, very similar to what Connor has. And listen, she was made well. And Connor heard that. And because of her track record with this young lady and with myself and other people in this church, Connor was stirred and hope began to rise. And all of a sudden, he said, I really believe I can get better. And by the way, three months in, and he is better. Hallelujah. Now, to be sure, Dr. Wesley is still a fallible person. Okay? She cannot guarantee that you're going to get well. But I I use that illustration to say that you can trust God because time and time again, when you look back, he has been faithful. Number three, third question. Why does Advent begin with the theme of hope? Have you ever wondered that? Here's why. Because the experience of every other, what would you say, godly blessing flows from hope. Look again at verse 13. I'm milking this thing for all it's worth, all right? May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace. May the God of hope fill you with joy and peace in believing. You know, joy and peace are promised. Well, let me say it like this the joy of Christ and the peace of Christ are promised to believers to enjoy both in this life and then fully in the life to come. But here's the thing: if you don't hold on to hope in God, you will never experience the peace and joy that He gives you. You will be anxious, you will be worried, you will be downtrodden and heavy laden. Because hope is necessary if we are to experience these other blessings. As a matter of fact, we can use the Apostle Paul himself as a case study for this. He knows all too well what he is writing about. There's a letter that he wrote to Timothy. We call it the book of 2 Timothy. And while writing this letter, the Apostle Paul is in a Roman prison cell and he is on death row. He is awaiting his execution. And by the way, he's under the Roman Emperor Nero. It's going to be a painful execution. This is Paul's situation when he writes the letter. Now, what would you say? What would be your demeanor when writing that last letter? Would it convey worry? Would it convey anger or bitterness or resentment? Not the Apostle Paul. I mean, you read through the letter and it's just like, man, Paul has peace, unbelievable peace that surpasses all understanding and even joy in that situation. Let me just read you an excerpt from that book. 2 Timothy 4, verses 6 through 8, one of my favorite passages in the New Testament. Paul writes this as he's awaiting execution. Timothy, for I am already being poured out as a drink offering. He doesn't say I'm going to die. He says, My life is being poured out. And the time of my departure. He doesn't say the time of my death, because if you're in Christ, you're not just dying, you're just moving. Amen. And he says, looking back across his life, I fought the good fight. I have finished the race, and I have kept the faith. Now listen to what he says. Here's the secret to his peace and joy. Henceforth, there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness. That's eternal rewards, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that day. He's talking about the return of the Lord. And he says, This promise is not only to me, but to all who have loved his appearing. In other words, all those who have cried out this morning very intentionally, very heartfeltly, come, Jesus, come. So if you're lacking peace or joy and you are a Christian, here's what I would ask you just to consider today. Think about this. Are you abounding in hope? Are you thinking about the return of Christ? Like you should think about that. About every moment of every day, you ought to rehearse the fact that Jesus is coming again. When you do that, you will abound in hope. And then you'll have, as you look around at the mess our world is, you'll say, It's all right, Jesus is coming. Soon and very soon, we are going to see the King. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. We are going to see the King. Question four: Who are the recipients of this hope? Really important. Verse 13 again, may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in what? In believing. Hear me, friends. Those of you watching online, those of you here today. The hope of God is not universal. Not everyone has the hope of God. What's Paul say? This hope comes to us in believing. The way that you are blessed, given this gift of hope from God, that happens when you come to Jesus with repentant faith. When you believe upon his death, his burial, and his resurrection. And you say, Oh, forgive me, Lord, a sinner, come into my life. I turn to you in faith. I give myself away. I submit to you as Lord and Savior. When that happens, when you are saved and you become part of his family, you get his hope. But those who are not in Christ, sadly, they have no hope in this life nor in the life to come. You know, this is why the world is so angry. The people in our culture. Have you noticed? They're angry, they're confused, they're militant. You know why that is? Because they live in the same crazy world that we live in right now, but they don't have the hope that we have. I mean, can we be honest? Is it not hard enough to go through this life? Isn't it hard enough to go through this life with hope in Christ? How do you do it without Jesus? No wonder these people are so angry and hurt and broken and confused. If you're here today and you don't know the Lord, you don't have hope. But the good news is this Jesus bids you to come this morning. May today be the day of salvation. We just sing, the time is right now. There's no need to wait. There's no need to wait. Your past can be washed in rivers of grace. If you'll come to the Lord today, and we're gonna have an altar call in just a couple of minutes, a few minutes. We would love to tell you how you can know Jesus for yourself. Because it's only the godly, those in Christ, who have hope. Jesus said, Come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I'll give you rest, and he will, and he'll give you peace, and he'll give you joy. It's amazing. Final question: How is it that we can abound in hope? Because look here, Paul doesn't just want us to have a little hope. He doesn't want us to dabble in hope. Beloved, he wants you and I to abound in hope, to overflow with hope. Look one more time at verse 16 or verse 13, excuse me. How is it that we abound in hope? May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope. Here's what I want to leave you with. When it comes to abounding in hope, the Holy Spirit has a job, and we have a job. Let me show this to you. So, number one, let's talk about the work of the Spirit. In Romans chapter 8, verse 16, Paul says this about the Holy Spirit. The Spirit Himself bears witness with our Spirit that we are the children of God. How can you have hope? How can you know that you are God's child? It's the witness of the Holy Spirit that if you are in Christ, you are indwelt with. And then Paul writes in Ephesians 1:13 and 14, in Christ, you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, you were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of your inheritance. How do you know that the inheritance in heaven is not gonna fade away? How do I know Jesus is gonna come back and he's gonna bring me to him? I'll tell you how, because God has given you the deposit already, he has given you the Holy Spirit, who is the deposit, to say that inheritance, that eternal life, it is coming to you. So it is the power of the Holy Spirit, it is the presence of the Holy Spirit, it is the work of the Holy Spirit that stirs our hearts and makes us hopeful. But we've got a job too. In Galatians 5:16, Paul tells us to walk by the Spirit, and this is in context of the fruit of the Spirit. He talks about love, joy, and peace and kindness and goodness and gentleness and self-control. And in the context of that, Paul says, you know, this fruit is yours by the Holy Spirit. But he says, you need to walk by the spirit, and then in verse uh, what is it, 25, he says, if we live by the spirit, let us keep in step with the spirit. I'm almost done here. Stay stay with me. This is very important. What's it mean to walk by the spirit and to keep in step with the spirit? It is to live, listen, believer, it is to live moment by moment under the influence and by the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Here's what that means it means we've got to guard from what we call sins of omission and sins of commission. Well, what are sins of omission? Uh sins of omission would be to fail to practice spiritual disciplines that the Bible tells us to practice. It means we don't pray faithfully, it means we don't attend church regularly, it means we don't partake in communion. And we could go, it means we don't we're not in the Bible. If you do not do those things, you are committing sins of omission and you are not feeding on the word of God. And the way the Holy Spirit works is that what we put in, the Holy Spirit brings out. So if you're not feeding on God's word, if you are not meeting with God in prayer, what are you giving the Holy Spirit to work with? His voice will fade in your life if you are not doing those things, and hope will fade with it. And then there's sins of commission. When we walk, hear me, in unrepentant sin. So if today, you're a habitual liar. I hope you're not. If you're greedy, if you're lustful, if you're living in sexual promiscuity, watch this. If you're a gossiper, you know the Bible calls that out. It puts it in a list of sins with murder. If you are in habitual unrepentant sin, you grieve the spirit. If you are walking in resentment, in bitterness, in unforgiveness, Ephesians says you are grieving the Spirit, and you the Holy Spirit's voice will become all it will dissipate. It will become all but completely gone. And you will not experience hope nor any other of the blessings of God. And what that means is this morning, if you if you're not hopeful, if your heart is melting with fear or anxiety, perhaps, I'm not saying this is always the case, but perhaps, perhaps you need to pray more, read your Bible more, fellowship more with other believers, come to church more faithfully. Be faithful in taking communion, the elements, all means of grace to strengthen your faith and your hope. Or maybe this morning, you're still walking in those besetting sins that so easily entangle you. And beloved, they offer you a lot. Those sins offer you a lot, but they cannot deliver. They will not deliver, and they will rob you. Not only will they not deliver what they promise, they will rob you of every blessing God has for you. Repent. She has a very, very serious type of cancer, which there's no cure for. All they can do is prolong the inevitable. We all believe, my whole family believes in healing. We believe God can do exceedingly more than we could ever ask, think, or imagine. My mom believes that, and we she's come to this church, and we've anointed her with oil and prayed the prayer of faith over her, and we are believing for that, while at the same time, we've all come to terms with the fact that healing is not guaranteed to come in this lifetime. That's a hard pill to swallow. But what's remarkable about this is that my mom in this, she has a peace that cannot be explained. Why is that? It's because of the hope that she has in Christ. Because here's the truth healing is coming in this life or in the life to come. Healing is coming. That's the hope that's available to each one of us today if we're in Christ. You know, life is full of disappointments. Every one of us, you know, we experience disappointments. We live in a world of pervasive evil and heartache and grief and loss. We live in a violent world, a chaotic world. If we look around, you know, our hearts could just melt with fear. If it were not for the hope of God. But I want you to know today that in the in the chaos that's out there, you can daily walk in God's peace, you can daily even walk in his joy if you will abound in hope. May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.