The God of 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.
(Romans 15:13)

You know, the times are so bad so many places, we all just need to remember the HOPE. Not just any hope, "THE Hope." All of God's promises and works poured into and poured through the Amen, Jesus Christ. Look at the Romans verse, Paul used hope twice. Once to describe God as the God of Hope and once to pray we abound in hope.

Octavius Winslow wrote in 1870, "The present title of God, the "God of hope," is peculiarly expressive and endearing to the believing mind. His title as the God of love, has especially to do with our present. His title, as the "God of hope," has to do with our future life. ... Extinguish hope in the human heart, and you have enthroned grim despair, like a demon of darkness, upon the soul. Life has lost its sweetness, the creature its attraction, the world its charm, and all the future of the soul is shrouded in midnight gloom. My reader, are your circumstances trying? are your resources lessening? are clouds gathering? and do you find yourself tempted to succumb to despondency and despair? There is hope for you in God! All other sources and gleams of hope may have expired, but God is the "God of hope," and in His power and love, in His word and faithfulness, you may hope, even against hope. Take heart, then, and look up."

This verse earlier in the book of Romans, chapter 8:24-25, made me smile: Paul was saying we eagerly await our adoption as sons of God, the redemption of our bodies, and-

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

With incredible logic the Spirit formed the thought into Paul's mind and with impeccable recall Paul wrote the wonderful truism, 'who hopes for what he sees?' Matthew Henry lived in the 1600s, he wrote of this verse,

"The sufferings of the saints strike no deeper than the things of time, last no longer than the present time, are light afflictions, and but for a moment. How vastly different are the sentence of the word and the sentiment of the world, concerning the sufferings of this present time!"

"Yet this deplorable state of the creation is in hope. God will deliver it from thus being held in

bondage to man's depravity. The miseries of the human race, through their own and each other's wickedness, declare that the world is not always to continue as it is. Our having received the first-fruits of the Spirit, quickens our desires, encourages our hopes, and raises our expectations."

"Believers have been brought into a state of safety; but their comfort consists rather in hope than in enjoyment. From this hope they cannot be turned by the vain expectation of finding satisfaction in the things of time and sense. We need patience, our way is rough and long; but He that shall come, will come, though he seems to tarry."

We have hope because He is the God of Hope!