156 Sermon Illustrations on Hope

156 illustrations Page 1 of 4

Hope in Christian preaching refers to confident expectation in God's promises and the ultimate salvation through Christ, providing believers with encouragement and perseverance (Romans 15:13). Illustrations often use images of future deliverance, joyful anticipation, and freedom from bondage to symbolize this assured trust (Hebrews 11:1).

Charity, Remuneration of

The charitable have the sure hope of God's promises, unlike worldly ambitions.

When Alexander set forward upon his great exploits, before he went from Macedonia, he divided among his captains and friends all that he had; for which, when one of his friends reproved him, saying that he was prodigal because he had reserved nothing for himself, he answered, that he had reserved much unto himself; namely, hope of the monarchy of the world, which, by the valor and help of his captains and nobles, he hoped to obtain. The charitable have no such contingency but the certainty of God's word. Spencer.

Hope, Benefit of

Hope prolongs life by motivating people toward a meaningful goal.

Hope is the most beneficial of all the affections, and doth much to the prolongation of life, if it be not to often frustrated, but entertaineth the fancy with the expectation of good: therefore the which fix and propound to themselves some end as the mark and scope of their life, and continually and by degrees go forward in the same, are, for the most part, long-lived; inasmuch that when they are come to the top of their hope, and can go no higher therein, the commonly droop, and live not long after.

— Lord Bacon

Hope, Danger of

Excessive hope can lead to ruin, though hope often sustains life.

Hope is to a man as a bladder to a learning swimmer: it kept him from sinking in the bosom of the waves, and by that help he may attain the exercise. But yet it many times makes him venture beyond his height; and then, if that breaks, or a storm rises, he drowns without recovery. How many would die, did not hope sustain them! How many have died by hoping too much! This wonder we find in Hope, — that she is both a flatterer and a true friend. Feltham.

Hope, Fruition of

God's deliverance is certain, like the awaited arrival of rescuers during a siege.

In 1683, Vienna was besieged by the Turks: the Emperor of Austria fled; and the people sent to the King of Poland for aid. They knew in which direction the Poles must come, and watched the way long and anxiously. At last, they saw the lances of their rescuers gleaming on the mountains. That very day, their foes were defeated, and Vienna set free. The rescue of the besieged Christians is more sure than they.

Hope, Wrecked

False hope without Christ leads to destruction despite confident expectations.

A noble ship was nearing home after a long voyage. On her deck stood many a weather-beaten sailor, who thought, "I shall be at home to-morrow!" There were old men who had not seen their childhood's home for long years, who said, "We shall land to-morrow!" A mother, lifting up her little one to look at the far-off land, whispered, "We shall be at home to-morrow!" But their to-morrow never came. That evening, the gentle breeze became a furious gale; the sails were split into ribbons; the rudder was broken; the vessel became unmanageable: she drifted upon the terrible quicksands, became a wreck; and all on board perished.

Infidelity, Madness of

Rejecting Christianity is like rejecting a lifeboat in a shipwreck, leading to ruin.

The infidel, who, by his cavils, would undermine the foundations of Christian hope, is like the madman who recklessly pushes from him the lifeboat which is his only hope of rescue from the wreck. Christianity does hold out hope: it is a hope which has proved substantial and consolatory to thousands. But what has infidelity done? Its highest achievement is to produce temporary insensibility to a fate which cannot be averted, and which, when it does come, will crush the obdurate unbeliever into perdition.

Time, Irrecoverable

Time once lost cannot be regained, bringing despair to those who waste it.

A woman in the agonies of despair cried out to those who sought to comfort her, "Call back time again! If you can call back time again, then there may be hope for me; but time is gone."

COMING TO CHRIST—as a Sinner

Hope and faith can lead to deliverance even through a long, dark, and difficult path.

In one of the coal-pits of the north, while a considerable number of the miners were down below, the top of the pit fell in, and the shaft was completely blocked up. Those who were in the mine, gathered to a spot where the last remains of air could be breathed. There they sat and sang and prayed after the lights had gone out because the air was unable to support the flame. They were in total darkness, but a gleam of hope cheered them when one of them said he had heard that there was a connection between that pit and an old pit which had been worked years ago. He said it was a long passage through which a man might get by crawling all the way, lying flat upon the ground; he would go and see if it were passable. The passage was very long, but they crept through it, and at last they came out to light at the bottom of the other shaft, and their lives were saved.

It is reported that in the Tamul language there is no word for

Some languages lack a word for hope, illustrating the misery of hopeless souls in hell.

hope. Alas! poor men, if we were all as destitute of the blessed comfort itself as these Tamul speakers are of the word! What must be the misery of souls in hell where they remember the word, but can never know hope itself!

Age, The New

Future unity and peace will end discord and hatred among nations and sects.

Frederick Lawrence Knowles writes this optimistic outlook for the future:

When memory of battles, At last is strange and old, When nations have one banner And creeds have found one fold,

When the Hand that sprinkles midnight With its powdered drift of suns Has hushed this tiny tumult Of sects and swords and guns;

Then Hate’s last note of discord In all God’s worlds shall cease, In the conquest which is service, In the victory which is peace! (Text.)

Anchor, An

Hebrews 6:19

A small anchor held a ship in a storm, illustrating hope as a steadfast anchor for the soul.

Every ship has an anchor, and there are times when the safety of the ship depends on its right use of its anchors. When I was a boy in Constantinople, an American captain visited our house. He told us that his ship was anchored in an exposed harbor in one of the islands of the Ægean, when a violent storm broke upon them. Both of the anchors which they had down began to drag, and it was only a question of time when they would be cast ashore. They had one little anchor still unused, and tho they did not hope much good could come from dropping it they took the chance. To their great surprize and equal delight, tho the two larger anchors would not hold, the smaller one held, and they rode out the storm in safety. When they came to weigh the anchors, the two large ones came up easily, but the smaller one came with great difficulty. When at last it appeared above the surface of the water, lo and behold, the fluke of the anchor had caught in the ring of a large man-of-war’s anchor that had been lost there long before! The man-of-war’s anchor had been embedded in the soil, and this accounted for the fact that the little anchor held.

Every man voyaging on the ocean of life ought to have an anchor. The apostle speaks about a good hope, which he says we have as an anchor sure and stedfast entering into the unseen, which is within the veil.--A. F. SCHAUFFLER, _The Christian Herald_.

Dreams

Despite loss and hardship, holding onto dreams sustains the soul with hope and renewal.

(“Behold, this dreamer cometh”)

They stript me bare and left me by the way To pine forsaken in a lonely land; They gave me to night-frosts and burning day To griefs none understand.

They took my silver from me and my gold, The changing splendors of my rich array; Night’s silver rain of dew escaped their hold, And the fine gold of day.

On the world’s highway in vain pomp they tread; By paths unknown I stray and hidden streams; They took all else and left me there for dead; They could not take my dreams.

Still, morning comes with marvel as of old; Still in soft rose descends the eventide; Still in the castle of my heart, grown bold, The sweet, swift thoughts abide.

Pass by, pass by, O clamorous folk and wild! To this last fortress of the soul I cling; Men gave me winter weather from a child, But God has given me spring. (Text.)

--ROBIN FLOWER, _The London Spectator_.

Future Possibilities

Human progress and invention hold boundless possibilities for the future.

The field of mental effort is not measurable, and so far as we know, is unlimited. To fix its bounds would be to set an arbitrary limit to the progress of the human race. In science, art, literature--in all that exalts and embellishes life--the space yet available for progress comes as near infinitude as anything we are capable of conceiving. To one who stands in a valley, the horizon is near; let him climb a hill, and his view is expanded. When he attains a greater height the prospect appears still wider. The inventive genius of the world is rising higher and higher every day. Its prospect never appeared so utterly boundless as now. All that has been achieved, all the grand conquests that are recorded, are but an atom in the balance weighed when brought against the possibilities of the future.--_The Inventive Age._

Future, The

The future holds unseen beauty and knowledge beyond present understanding.

Ethel Ashton writes of the value of the things not yet in view:

Beyond the forms and the faces I see ineffable things, Above the cry of the children I hear the beating of wings; Gracing the graves of the weary are blossoms that never were blown, And over the whole of knowledge stands all that shall yet be known.

The city is not my prison--the world can not stay me there; For whole wide earth and its beauty there’s beauty beyond compare. The wealth of the wind-blown music, the gold of the sun are mine. In light of the light men see not--in sight of the things divine.

For truer than all that is written is all that has not been told. The yet unlived and unliving are truer than all the old. The fairest is still the furthest; the life that has yet to be Holds ever the past and present--itself the soul of the three.

--_The Outlook_ (London).

Future Welfare

Future generations may enjoy continual progress and a better world through divine providence.

A nation may now become educated; a people may now be safe against poverty or famine; the world is even now probably past the critical point and sure of unintermitted future progress. We may be allowed to hope that later generations may continue to see an interminable succession of advances, made by coming men of science and by learned engineers and mechanics that shall continually add to the sum of human happiness in this world, and make it continually easier to prepare for a better world and a brighter. Who knows but that the telescope, the spectroscope, and other as yet uninvented instruments may aid us in this by revealing the secrets of other and more perfect lives in other and more advanced worlds than ours, despite the head-shaking of those who know most of the probabilities? Who can say that the life of the race may not be made in a few generations, by this ever-accelerating progress of which the century has seen but the beginning, a true millennial introduction into the unseen universe and the glorious life that every man, Christian or skeptic, optimist, or pessimist, would gladly hope for and believe possible? (Text.)--R. H. THURSTON, _North American Review_.

Good Shall Prevail

Though good and evil coexist, ultimately good will prevail and overcome evil.

Near Geneva two great rivers meet but do not mingle. Here the Rhone pours out its waters of heavenly blue, and there the Arve, partly from the glaciers from which it largely comes, and partly from the clay soil that it upheaves, meet and run side by side for miles, with no barriers save their own innate repulsions, each encroaching now and then into the province of the other, but beaten back again instantly into its own domain.

Like mighty rival forces of good and evil do these rivers seem, and for long the issue is doubtful; but far down the stream the muddy Arve is mastered, and the Rhone has colored the whole surface of the stream with its own tinge of blue. So in the end the good shall prevail. (Text.)

Hope

Hope persists even when circumstances seem dark and discouraging.

Have hope! Tho clouds environ round, And gladness hides her face in scorn, Put thou the shadow from thy brow; No night but hath its morn.

— SCHILLER

Hope

Hope inspires generosity and support for those who encourage optimism.

* * * * *

The world has no time and no use for the man who has no time and no use for hope. A gentleman on being asked to contribute to the erection of a monument replied: “Not a dollar; I am ready to contribute toward building monuments to those who make us hope, but I will not give a dollar to help perpetuate the memory and influence of those who live to make us despair.”

— JOHN E. ADAMS

Hope

Hope is the vital possession that sustains courage facing life's challenges.

* * * * *

Hope was the one thing that remained in Pandora’s box. While it remains men may courageously face life and the future.

When Alexander the Great crossed into Asia, he gave away almost all his belongings to his friends. One of his captains asked him, “Sire, what do you keep for yourself?” “I keep hope,” was the answer of the king. (Text.)

Hope Deferred

Hope can be tenacious, returning even after repeated disappointments.

Once there was a woman whose harmless madness was to believe herself to be a bride, and on the eve of her wedding. Waking up in the morning, she asked for a white dress, and a bride’s crown; smiling, she adorned herself. “To-day he will come,” she said. In the evening sadness overmastered her, after the idle waiting; she then took off her white dress. But the following morning, with the dawn, her confidence returned. “It is for to-day,” she said. And her life passed in this tenacious, altho ever-deceiving, certitude--taking off her gown of hope, only to put it on again. (Text.)

Hope Energizes

Hope energizes and motivates action even in desperate situations.

Hope is energy. The provisions have failed; the boat leaks, the seas rise, strength is gone, and intolerable thirst alone remains. But, upon the horizon there rise the masts and then the hull of the liner. Hope at once energizes. With the vestige of remaining strength, the distress signal is hoisted, it is seen; it is answered, the steamer’s course is changed, and rescue is at hand.

— JOHN E. ADAMS

Ideals

Exodus 14:15

Hope in God's promises motivates progress toward the promised land.

See ASPIRATION.

IDEALS AND PROGRESS

The Israelites were urged by the voice of God at the Red Sea to go forward. But they were not left without inspiring motives. There was a “promised land,” and to the hope of this Moses could appeal.

Man has not reached a very high life until he can look on to future achievement and blessing, and find in these his highest incentive to go on.

Light

The recurring dawn symbolizes new life and hope for weary hearts.

See SHINING AS LAMPS.

LIGHT AFTER NIGHT

Mary Elliot interprets the moral cheer of recurring dawn in these musical lines:

Dawn of the red, red sun in a bleak, abandoned sky That the moon has lately left and the stars are fast forsaking-- The day is drawing the cloudy lids from his bloodshot eye, And the world impatient stirs--a tired old sleeper, waking.

O most unwearying prophet, ever-returning morn! Thou giv’st new life to a world grown old, and marred in making; With ever an old faith lost, and ever a pang new-born, But ever a new, new hope to hearts that were well-nigh breaking. (Text.)

--_The Metropolitan._

Wrong Retroactive

Though years never return, memories bring comfort and hope in Christ.

YEARS, THE UNRETURNING

Each day the tide flows out and in, Each day the gray ships leave, Each night the mute-lipped stars appear, Each night the waters grieve; But from their distant harbor home Toward which our hearts are yearning, No more with laden ships of dreams We see the years returning.

Each year that passed the silent bar Went out beyond forever; Tho on the heights we watch and wait, The ships are sighted never; But in our hearts old memories Come to the heart’s discerning, And comfort us if nevermore We find the years returning. (Text.)

--ARTHUR W. PEACH, _The Sunday-school Times_.

There's Always Hope

Job 14:13

Sermon in Job series. Job's hope in resurrection. Job 14:13-17

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THERE'S ALWAYS HOPE

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I. Dark night of the soul.

II. Hemmed in by God and circumstances.

A. Life is short and hard.

B. We don't measure up.

C. We must live within strict limits.

III. Hope for trees but not for me?

A. Cut-off trees rejuvenate, but not people.

B. Sometimes life doesn't hold out much hope for us.

IV. Life after death?

A. If we cannot come back to this life, is there another one?

1) O.T. doubts: Eccl 9:4, Isaiah 38:18, Psa. 6:5, Psa. 88:11-12

2) Glimmers of hope: Psalm 16:10, Psalm 49:15, Job 19:25

B. All he can do is wait.

C. Heaven is worth waiting for.

V. Hope in God makes a difference.

Looking On the Bright Side - Without Blinding Yourself

The positive side (and perils) of positive thinking.

Perils of positive thinking:

1. Guilt, shame, and dejection may accompany shattered expectations.

2. One begins to live in the future rather than the present.

3. An excessive optimism can lead to complacency about evil.

Experiments indicate one type of negative thinking - anxiety over

contemplated failure - can motivate high achievement.

"What we therefore need is neither negative nor positive thinking, but realistic thinking - thinking characterized by enough pessimism to trigger concern, enough optimism to provide hope."

Genuine Christian humility:

1. Humility is not self-contempt. (This is false humility)

2. It is not straddling between egotistical vanity and self-hatred.

3. It is not easily obtained.

It is possible to realize self-denial without self-rejection, and self-affirmation without vain self-love.

Dennis Voskuil, a Reformed thinker who has written thoughtfully about Robert Schuller's positive thinking, states the phenomenon in Christian terms: The refreshing gospel promise is "not that we have been freed by Christ to love ourselves, but that we are free from self-obsession. Not that the cross frees

us for the ego trip but that the cross frees us from the ego trip." This leaves us free to esteem our special talents and, with equal honesty, to esteem our neighbor's. Both are gifts.

When the Answer Is No

Luke 13:34

How do you deal with the guilt and "What ifs" that come when a loved one dies without Christ? Sherri Langton's grandfather was hardened to the gospel and eventually died of emphysema. His family witnessed to him but he would not convert, believing he had everything he needed. They sowed seed, but it didn't take root. All God expects is for to do what we can.

When It Was Most Hopeless, Help Came

The total helplessness of God’s people often proves to be the backdrop for Yahweh’s deliverance.

It looked that bleak for the Federal frigate MINNESOTA one Saturday night in 1862 near Hampton Roads. That day the Confederate ironclad, the VIRGINIA (formerly the MERRIMAC), had revolutionized naval warfare. The VIRGINIA had already sunk the CONGRESS and CUMBERLAND, and when three additional wooden ships, including the MINNESOTA, had hurried to assist they had run aground.

The VIRGINIA withdrew for the night since the ebb tide prevented her from coming within effective range of the stranded MINNESOTA. After dawn the next day the VIRGINIA steamed toward her helpless prey for a certain kill. Suddenly, something looking like a raft with a boiler on it darted out from behind the MINNESOTA heading for the VIRGINIA. It was the MONITOR, the Federal ironclad commanded by John L. Worden. The MONITOR engaged the VIRGINIA in a four-hour duel that proved a draw. But the MINNESOTA was saved. The MONITOR had arrived during the night, put in alongside the MINNESOTA, and had kept her steam up. When it was most hopeless, help came.

That is frequently Yahweh’s way with his Israel. That is why the remnant refuses to lose heart. Not that his people enjoy their helpless condition; it is simply that they have seen God create deliverance out of nothing too many times to give themselves over to total despair.

________

From Shelby Foote, “The Civil War, A Narrative,” volume 1, “Fort Sumter to Perryville (New York: Vintage, 1986), pp. 255-63.

Light

Luke 4:18

Charles Colson and several other Christian leaders once met with President Borja of Ecuador to discuss Prison Fellowship International's ministry in Ecuadoran penitentiaries. They had no sooner been seated in luxurious leather chairs and begun to speak when the President interrupted the conversation with a story -- the story of his own imprisonment years before being elected to the presidency.

He had been involved in the struggle for democracy in Ecuador. The military cracked down, and he was arrested. Without trial, they threw him into a cold dungeon with no light and no window. No one knew where he was, and for three days he endured the solitary fear and darkness that can drive a person mad.

Just when the situation seemed unbearable, the huge steel door opened, and someone crept into the darkness. Borja heard the person working on something in the opposite corner. Then the figure crept out, closed the door, and disappeared.

Minutes later the room suddenly blazed with light. Someone, perhaps taking his life into his hands, had connected electricity to the broken light fixture. The darkness of the dungeon was gone. "From that moment," explained President Borja, "my imprisonment had meaning because at least I could see."

Even more important than the light we see with our eyes is the light that Christ brings to our hearts, giving our lives the understanding and meaning only he can give.

#3145

Tamil Has No Word For "hope"

A Methodist minister from Sri Lanka told the Faith and Order Commission of the WCC meeting in Ghana in 1974 that he had invited some Hindu friends to tea and asked them to give an account of the hope in them. It turned out not only that they had great difficulty in understanding what he was driving at, but also that the Tamil language had no word for what Christians mean by hope.

There is simply nothing comparable to the biblical concept of hope in the great religions of the East.

Concept of Hope In the Old Testament Prophets

The concept of hope in the OT prophets:

1. They denounced all false hopes.

God is opposed to all attempts to find satisfaction and security in

anything less than himself and his will for mankind.

2. Israel's persistent failure to live in obedience to God should mean the

end of her relationship with him, but God will bring about a new

beginning.

3. Hope is available, and is based on God's burning love.

4. God is creative.

New David, Jerusalem, Temple, relationship with God, covenant, heart,

exodus, heavens and earth.

Three general conclusions:

1. God acts in and controls history.

2. There is both continuity and discontinuity between God's action in the

past and in the future.

3. The future should be viewed in terms of expanding horizons.

Summary of 3 phrases concerning hope:

1. God will come.

2. God will be with his people.

3. God will rule.

Why Can't I Deal With Depression?

Acts 2:26

Depression is a common human ailment, and is exemplified by Karl Marx and Sigmund Freud. Psychologists have long suspected that hope fosters health, both physical and emotional. Depression has a very negative impact on health.

Hope is different from expectation, which carries with it a high degree of certainty. Hope does not have this. Menninger defines hope as positive expectations that go beyond the visible facts.

DEPRESSION

==========

A. Parallels of Marx and Freud.

1) Both had devout fathers, and fought with them.

2) Both wrote much and were rejected.

3) Both had no friends and died bitter and disillusioned.

B. Clinical depression.

1) Awareness of a gap between our ideal for ourselves and how far we fall short of that ideal.

a) This is a cause of depression as well as a feature.

b) Christian response:

1> The NT says there is a gap between us and God's ideal.

2> Christ bridges the gap.

3> New birth is free, good works are the result.

A> God wants not just good men, but first of all new men.

4> We then have inner strength to become what we ought to be.

A> Forgiveness and ability to start over.

2) Low self-esteem. (related to first)

a) Most people feel inadequate.

1> It is important how we handle this feeling.

A> Some are paralyzed.

B> Others work to disprove them.

C> Others project them. (racism, sexism)

2> Christian response:

A> I cannot improve my worth in God's eyes.

B> Our worth is what Jesus has done for me.

3) Hopelessness. There is no way out, things will get worse.

a) Concept of "hope" is alien in scientific society.

1> But science is built on hope, so that it often ends up being

a substitute for religion.

b) Lack of hope can ruin physical health.

1> Univ. of Rochester Sch. of Med.: 80% of patients who died after

surgery were depressed.

c) Hope is not wishful thinking or even optimism, but belief that what is

desired is attainable. (Rom 8:24)

d) Christian view:

1> Christ Jesus is our hope.

2> Thoughts of C.S. Lewis on death and hope.

#2488

Not What You Would Expect

Luke 24:13

Easter sermon, 1993. Luke 24:13-33

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NOT WHAT YOU WOULD EXPECT

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I. Expectations and reality do not always mesh.

A. Has your life come out as you expected?

B. Expectations have an awesome influence on us.

II. The first Easter was a clash of expectations.

A. Two disciples on road to Emmaus were defeated.

B. Hint of other expectations.

C. The reality was more than they could expect.

III. What can we expect of God?

A. Expecting nothing.

B. Expect great things.

C. Expect even more than you can expect. Eph 3:20

D. Be prepared for things you cannot expect.

IV. Why our expectations can turn out unfulfilled.

A. Unfulfillment provides us with opportunities for growth. Phil 3:12

B. We need to discover what we REALLY want in life.

C. Unfulfillment sharpens our relationship with God. Heb 10:23

V. Choose your expectation.

VI. Live in expectation.

VII. Changing expectations in light of Jesus' resurrection.

God Alone Is Great

Job 14:7

Hard reality of death. Funeral sermon for Louis XIV of France, the "Sun-King." Most famous preacher of the day, Masillon, looked down at the dead king's coffin and then at the thousands gathered in Notre Dame. "God alone is great, my brothers." Death reduces all of us to our proper size.

Death is unwelcome because it leaves things unfinished. Dylan Thomas to his dying father: "Do not go gentle into that good night, Old age should burn and rave at close of day; Rage, rage against the dying of the light." [see #19253]

Death is an embarrassment in the twentieth century. Humanist authors avoid the topic. Bertrand Russell - "I believe that when I die I rot." (p 163).

Her Addictions Didn’t Slay Hope

1 Peter 5:8

Twenty years ago I was about to go stay overnight with one of my friends. I was so excited.

Then it happened. My mom committed suicide.

The struggles were hard. The addictions were beyond belief. The way out seemed gone.

She didn’t always make the best decisions, but let me tell you she did make some good ones.

She took us to church. She decided against having an abortion so that I and my sister could live.

She would have us pray with her. She knew deep in her soul that Jesus brought hope.

I was with her at times when she would just want to stop the addictions but couldn’t. She would sit and weep because of the tensions.

Yet there were times when she would have us stop whatever we were doing to go out of our way to help people, spending the last money she had.

Just because someone struggles does not mean they don’t love Jesus.

I know the tears and have seen the agony of someone struggling with being a drunk, going to the store, spending money on more alcohol, and then driving home and throwing everything out the window because of the tension between doing what’s right versus what they still want to do.

When it comes to suicide, people have many opinions, but I want you to know we have a real enemy. He literally wants to destroy your life. As we’re exhorted in 1 Peter 5:8: “Be sober-minded, be alert. Your adversary the devil is prowling around like a roaring lion, looking for anyone he can devour.”

As a 13-year-old boy I thought I would never smile again. I remember sitting in a restaurant seeing people smile and getting mad that I couldn’t.

Know this: Help the ones people give up on. Love those who frustrate you. Share your struggles in order to share hope with people -- not just hope of overcoming but the hope of true freedom found in Jesus.

Let us place the words of Hebrews 12:1-2 in our hearts: “Therefore, since we also have such a large cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us lay aside every hindrance and the sin that so easily ensnares us. Let us run with endurance the race that lies before us, keeping our eyes on Jesus, the source and perfecter of our faith. For the joy that lay before him, he endured the cross, despising the shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.”

I know the day of my mom’s suicide comes each year no matter what. It’s OK. It’s what God has given me to remind me there are many out there who need hope. Thank you, Jesus, for a reminder to help anyone and everyone I can.

As followers of Jesus we must realize that struggles and tensions are there. As the apostle Paul wrote: “We don’t want you to be unaware, brothers and sisters, of our affliction.... We were completely overwhelmed -- beyond our strength -- so that we even despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death, so that we would not trust in ourselves but in God who raises the dead” (2 Corinthians 1:8-9).

[Original illustration at this number was deleted for being obsolete]

Play Reveille For Me

Job 14:14

Winston Churchill had planned his funeral, which took place in Saint Paul's Cathedral. He included many of the great hymns of the church and used the eloquent Anglican liturgy. At his direction, a bugler, positioned, high in the dome of Saint Paul's, intoned, after the benediction, the sound of

"Taps," the universal signal that says the day is over.

But then came the most dramatic turn: as Churchill instructed, as soon as "Taps" was finished, another bugler, placed on the other side of the great dome, played the notes of "Reveille" -- "It's time to get up. It's time to get up. It's time to get up in the morning."

That was Churchill's testimony that at the end of history, the last note will not be "Taps," it will be "Reveille". The worst things are never the last things.

[also found in Boice, JOHN, 3:208]

The Death Sin - Unbelief and Doubt

John 16:9

Relationship of doubt to unbelief is explored. Doubt is good, unbelief bad.

I. Doubting is normal.

A. The Bible doesn't warn against "doubt" as such.

B. Doubt and belief are compatible.

1) You can doubt and believe at the same time.

2) Without beliefs, you cannot question.

C. What doubt is.

1) Doubt is the act of questioning, the expression of

uncertainty.

2) Doubt is the humility of a mind asking real questions and

seeking real solutions.

D. Formaldehyde faith is dangerous.

1) We comfortably mouth a set of faith formulas, without passion.

2) It is easily threatened. (Paul de Vries and S.S. class)

3) Christians need to learn to ask serious questions.

II. Unbelief is sin.

A. Deliberate denial, disobedience, rebellion, resistance.

B. Doubt is the sincere question, but unbelief is the unwillingness

to hear the answer.

C. Unbelief is the condition of being closed and out of touch with

God.

III. Intellectual disdain.

A. Blanket assertions that something is impossible.

1) "Laws of nature."

2) Our understanding of nature is always limited.

B. Doubting the resurrection of Jesus.

1) Not unusual to doubt it. It flies against our experience.

a) Even the disciples doubted it.

b) This is why it is such incredible good news.

2) Unbelief leaves no room for the Easter surprise.

a) It refuses the possiblity that dead bodies rise anew.

b) Doubt still says that renewal is possible.

IV. Dashed hope.

A. Our desire FOR miracles is equal in strength to our DOUBT that

they can happen.

1) Many can recall earnest prayers as a youngster.

a) "God, please make Daddy forget who broke the window."

2) Serious prayers - for healing of loved ones, who died.

B. Our anger at God is an expression of doubts that He is running

the world the best that he can.

1) The psalms include much anger and sing of doubts and

disappointments.

2) God is there and cares to listen.

3) By contrast, in a state of unbelief our anger would be

completely pointless and absurd.

a) Jesus expresses doubt on cross, but keeps faith. Ps 22.

V. Spiritual numbness. [expanded in sermon 4/3/94]

A. Faith can be an enterprise, without feeling.

B. Paul de Vries doubted Christ's presence in his life, even

though he said he did during evangelism.

His pastor admitted he did not feel it, either.

Dobut ended up giving him hope.

He doubted that this formal profession of faith was all God

had for him.

He doubted that his knowledge was the extent of Christian

faith because he sincerely hoped that there was more.

Still believing the Bible, he asked questions.

Strangely, he would not have asked, knocked, or even sought,

if he had not doubted.

Professing what we do not have and promoting what we do not

know is a deceitful form of unbelief.

It is deadly, but also amazingly attractive.

Our lives are perfectly under our own control.

We can also miss the incomparable power of God's presence

and the authentic light of his truth.

VI. Constructive doubt.

A. We see through a glass darkly. 1 Cor 13:12.

1) What we see is always clouded by our limitations and sin.

2) Therefore we must doubt, but we also have to strain to see

what we can through the glass. We must seek.

B. We know only in part. 1 Cor 13:12.

1) Humility of mind must characterize our most enthusiastic

professions of faith.

2) The power of God's Word does not depend on our assertions.

3) God has authority, we must have humility.

C. Our doubts must make us hungry to know God.

1) Pray for the time when we will know him as well as he

knows us. 1 Cor 13:12.

2) This hunger excludes unbelief.

By Lillian Eichler Watson

John 12

The prayer of Saint Francis of Assisi:

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace;

Where there is hatred, let me sow love;

Where there is injury, pardon;

Where there is doubt, faith;

Where there is despair, hope;

Where there is darkness, light;

And where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek

to be consoled, as to console;

To be understood, as to understand;

To be loved, as to love;

For it is in giving that we receive,

It is in pardoning that we are pardoned.

And it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen.

The Fine Art of Encouragement

Acts 4:36

How to give the right words at the right time, just as Winston Churchill did for England in the darkest days of WWII.

1. Be sincere and simple.

Mark Twain: "I can live for two months on one good compliment."

Even a little nod of acknowledgement, given deftly at the right moment,

can stir a soul. John Wooden, the great U.C.L.A. basketball coach, told

his players that when they scored, they were to smile, wink or nod to the

player who had passed them the ball. A team member asked, "What if he's

not looking?" "I guarantee he'll look," Wooden replied.

2. Be sensitive to time and place.

During one of the last major offensives of WWII, Dwight Eisenhower was

walking near the Rhine and came upon a GI who seemed depressed. "How are

you feeling, son?" he asked. "General, I'm awful nervous." "Well,"

Eisenhower said, "you and I are a good pair then, because I'm nervous

too. Maybe if we just walk along together, we'll be good for each

other."

No sermon. No special advice. But what words of encouragement!

3. Recall personal examples of struggle.

4. Take time.

Depression and Suicide

Sermon on depression and suicide.

1. Depression is a sign of our culture.

a. Especially true of young people.

b. Contributing factors.

2. Christian attitude toward depression.

a. Seen as a sin.

b. Old Testament view is graphic.

c. Experienced by greatest people in Bible.

d. Experienced by great people in Church history.

3. Clinical features of depression.

a. Awareness of a gap between ideals and reality.

b. Low self-esteem.

c. Hopelessness.

4. Christian response.

a. Gap has been bridged by Jesus.

b. We have worth in God's eyes.

c. Jesus is our hope. (C.S. Lewis on death and hope)

5. How to help those who are depressed.

a. Be friends to others.

A Prisoner's Shattered Hope

Job 4:5

Major F. J. Harold Kushner, an army medical officer held by the Vietcong for over five years, cites an example of death because of an attitudinal failure. In a fascinating article in {New York Magazine} this tragic yet true account is included:

“Among the prisoners in Kushner’s POW camp was a tough young marine, twenty-four years old, who had already survived two years of prisoncamp life in relatively good health. Part of the reason for this was that the camp commander had promised to release the man if he cooperated. Since this had been done before with others, the marine turned into a model POW and the leader of the camp’s thought-reform group. As time passed he gradually realized that his captors had lied to him. When the full realization of this took hold he became a zombie. He refused to do all work, rejected all offers of food and encouragement, and simply lay on his cot sucking his thumb. In a matter of weeks he was dead.” (1)

Caught in the vice grip of lost hope, life became too much for the once-tough marine to handle. When that last string snapped, there was nothing left.

__________

1. Douglas Colligan, “That Helpless Feeling: The Dangers of Stress,” (New York) July 14, 1975, page 28.

Charles R. Swindoll, “Man to Man” (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1996) pages 64-65.

Death

Acts 2

When John Owen, the great Puritan, lay on his deathbed his secretary wrote (in his name) to a friend, "I am still in the land of the living."

"Stop," said Owen. "Change that and say, I am yet in the land of the dying, but I hope soon to be in the land of the living."

God's Ways Are Unreasonable

John 4:35

In a sermon entitled "God's Ways Are Unreasonable," missionary professor Del Tarr uses powerful illustration from West Africa (where he served fourteen years with the Assemblies of God) to illumine Psalm 126:5-6: "Those who saw in tears will reap with songs of joy. He who goes out weeping, carrying seed to sow, will return with songs of joy, carrying sheaves with him."

I grew up in a preacher's home in the little towns of Minnesota and South Dakota. I spent most of my free time with deacon's kids on John Deere tractors, International Harvesters, Cases, Minneapolis-Molines. I learned how to drill oats, plant corn, and cultivate. And never once did I see a deacon behave like Psalm 126 says. What was there to weep about at sowing time? I was always perplexed by this Scripture... until I went to the Sahel, that vast stretch of savanna more than four thousand miles wide just under the Sahara Desert, with a climate much like the Bible lands.

In the Sahel, all the moisture comes in a four month period: May, June, July, and August. After that, not a drop of rain falls for eight months. The ground cracks from dryness, and so do your hands and feet. The winds off the Sahara pick up the dust and throw it thousands of feet into the air. It then comes slowly drifting across West Africa as a fine grit. it gets in your mouth. It gets inside your watch and stops it. It gets inside your refrigerator (if you have one). The year's food, of course, must all be grown in four months. People grow sorghum or milo in fields not larger than this sanctuary. Their only tools are the strength of their backs and a short handled hoe. No Massey-Fergusons here; the average annual income is between eighty-five and one hundred dollars per person. October and November... these are beautiful months. The granaries are full - the harvest has come. People sing and dance. They eat two meals a day - one about ten in the morning, after they've been to the field awhile, and the other just after sundown. The sorghum is ground between two stones to make flour and then a mush with the consistency of yesterday's cream of wheat. The sticky mush is eaten hot; they roll it into little balls between their fingers, drip it into a bit of sauce, and then pop it into their mouths. the meal lies heavy on their stomachs so they can sleep. December comes, and the granaries start to recede. Many families omit the morning meal. Certainly by January not one family in fifty is still eating two meals a day. By February, the evening meal diminishes. People feel the clutch of hunger once again. The meal shrinks even more during March, and Children succumb to sickness. You don't stay well on half a meal a day. April is the month that haunts my memory. The African dusk is quiet, you see... no jet engines, no traffic noises to break the stillness. The dust filters down through the air, and sounds carry for long distances. April is the month you hear the babies crying in the twilight... from the village over here, from the village over there. Their mothers' milk is now stopped. Parents go at this time of year to the bush country, where they scrape bark from certain trees. They dig up roots as well, collect leaves, and grind it all together to make a thin gruel. They may pawn a chair, a cooking pot, or bicycle tires in order to buy a little more grain from those wealthy enough to have some remaining, but most often the days are passed with only and evening cup of gruel. Then, inevitably, it happens. A six-or seven-year-old boy comes running to his father one day with sudden excitement. "Daddy! Daddy! We've got grain!" he shouts. "Son, you know we haven't had grain for weeks." "Yes, we have!" the boy insists. "Out in the hut where we keep the goats- there's a leather sack hanging up on the wall - I reached up and put my hand down in there - Daddy, there's grain in there! Give it to Mommy so she can make flour, and tonight our tummies can sleep!" The father stands motionless. "Son, we can't do that," he softly explains. "That's next year's seed grain. It's the only thing between us and starvation. We're waiting for the rains, and then we must use it." The rains finally arrive in May, and when they do, the young boy watches as his father takes the sack from the wall... and does the most unreasonable thin imaginable. Instead of feeding his desperately weakened family, he goes to the field and - I've seen it - with tears streaming down his face, he takes the precious seed and throws it away. He scatters it in the dirt! Why? Because he believes in the harvest. The seed is his; he owns it. He can do anything with it he wants. The act of sowing it hurts so much that he cries. But as the African pastors say when they preach on Psalm 126, "Brothers and sisters, this is God's law of the harvest. Don't expect to rejoice later on unless you have been willing to sow in tears." ...And I want to ask you: How much would it cost you to sow in tears? I don't mean just giving God something from your abundance, but finding a way to say, "I believe in the harvest, and therefore I will give what makes no sense. The world would call me unreasonable to do this - but I must sow regardless, in order that I may someday celebrate with songs of joy."

#2065

Notorious Conversions

Acts 28:4

Some conversions are hard to accept, but show the mercy of God:

Westley Allan Dodd was executed by hanging at the Washington State Penitentiary earlier this year. Moments before the sentence was carried out, the convicted serial child killer was given the customary opportunity for last words. Here was a man who had viciously abused and mutilated three young boys. He was a man who said he would do it again, who said there was no hope he would ever be released from the hideous darkness within his soul. He final words came as a shock: "I was wrong when I said there was no hope, no peace. There is hope. There is peace. "I have found both in the Lord Jesus Christ."

According to an eyewitness, the father of two of the boys murdered by Dodd "hissed quietly" when Dodd invoked the name of Jesus. No one can fault this father for his contempt and skepticism. Until then, Dodd had shown no remorse. He would mutilate and murder again, he said, if not put to death.

Hearing that a notorious criminal has professed to find forgiveness, hope, and peace in Jesus Christ should not surprise us. Instead, it should cause us to rejoice, as we reconsider the miracle of God's mercy and grace - wide and deep enough to cover everyone's sin, mine especially.

He Had Done Nothing

John 9:33

In 1744 Louis XV of France was smitten with a sickness which threatened to cut his days short. The historian Thomas Carlyle tells us that France was in terror, and Paris seemed like a city taken by storm. The church resounded with supplications and groans, and the prayers of priests and people were continually interrupted by their sobs. This widespread manifestation of tender interest and deep affection for Louis XV brought him the surname of “Louis the Well-beloved.” The love of the people for their young king was not inspired by what he had done, but by what they hoped he would do. For years the nation had been crushed under the heel of a cruel tyrant, and they regarded the accession of Louis XV as the dawn of a brighter and happier day. They loved him because in him rested all their hopes. That was in 1744.

Thirty years later, Louis XV again lay sick. But the churches did not resound with excessive groanings. Sobs did not now interrupt any prayers, for no prayers were being offered. In fact, “Louis the Well-beloved” had become the most hated man in France. In 1744 he might have asked, “What have I done to be so loved?” and in 1774, “What have I done to be so hated?” The truth is, he had done NOTHING.

He Refused To Die

Combat story of Private Ed Reeves. In the frantic retreat from the Chosin Reservoir during the Korean War, Colonel Faith’s Task Force attempted to break out with over 500 wounded men on November 30. The trucks were so overloaded they tied wounded on the fenders and hoods; as more soldiers were hit they had to be left on the side of the road. Chinese mortars and machine guns raked the column mercilessly.

One truck broke down and was left behind. Chinese soldiers surrounded it and took the able-bodied as prisoners. Later a Chinese officer appeared at the tailgate. He was obviously important since he traveled alone without a political watchdog. He wore polished leather boots and a clean, long greatcoat. “Good day, gentlemen,” he said with a clipped British accent. The wounded men reminded him of the Geneva Convention rules for POW treatment: shelter, doctors, food. “I am sorry I can give you none of those things,” he replied regretfully. “If I am heard talking to you like this, I will be shot. I stopped to say, God bless you, the Lord be with you.” He turned and walked away. The other wounded men were angry that this Chinese officer had not helped, but Private Ed Reeves felt that God was telling him, “You’re not alone. I know all about this.” Besides being physically miserable, Reeves felt the ache and helplessness of being a POW. Needing help and hope he took out his pocket New Testament, turned to the 23rd Psalm and read it aloud. His comrades listened quietly.

The next morning the entire convoy was wiped out. Most of the trucks were burning. Private Ed Reeves lay among the dead; he was the only survivor on his truck. He tried to get off the truck but fainted each time. “God, why am I alive when everyone else is dead? If you want me off this truck, you do it. I can’t.” At night the Chinese would climb into the truck searching for combat boots. Reeves would watch them feel the GIs’ feet through the sleeping bags. If they found leather boots, they pulled the body out, took the boots and put them on. Each time they felt Reeves’s feet, he held himself stiff like a frozen body. They wanted leather combat boots and he only had canvas ones. They would leave and he’d try to get off the truck again. Then pray.

On December 4 the Chinese were boldly moving on the roads and ridges in daylight. Reeves knew help must be far away. He peeked out and watched them loot GI bodies, then pile them in the road behind his truck. After looting and stacking the bodies from his truck, they unzipped Reeves’s bag. Holding stiff, he played dead while one searched his pockets. A fist hit his face. The communist had felt the warmth of a live body. They beat him, then threw him off the truck. His prayer to God was answered. He at last was on the ground. But he couldn’t stand no matter how much the Chinese ordered, kicked and hit. Finally two lifted him by the hair and held him against the tailgate while a third went through his pockets. After pitching him onto the pile of corpses, they picked up their rifles. Reeves said, “Jesus, here I come.” They pounded his head with rifle butts. He tried to protect his head with his hands but his broken fingers hurt too much. A Chinese lifted his head by the hair and looked into his face. “Don’t blink or breathe,” Reeves told himself. “Just stare up the road.” The Chinese let go of his hair. He and the other communists left with their loot.

Reeves crawled from the corpse pile to a tree beside the road. Grasping the tree, he worked himself up to his feet and tried to walk. Three times he fell flat. Sitting against the tree, looking at the far shore of the reservoir, he prayed aloud in anger, “Lord, if the mortar didn’t kill me, the shooting didn’t kill me, and the beating didn’t kill me, you must want me out of here. But I can’t walk. How can I get outa here?” An answer came to mind. “You must crawl before you can walk.”

He crept on elbows and wounded knees through snow-covered fields toward the reservoir. Chinese on the hills watched but didn’t shoot or try to stop him. He crossed railroad tracks and more fields. Smooth hardness under the snow caused him to stop and clear snow away with an elbow. Thick ice! He was on the reservoir. He began to sing. Over and over he repeated, “Yes, Jesus loves me!” By now it was dark. He started crawling across the ice and doggedly kept moving until his strength was almost gone. His elbows and knees kept slipping out, dropping him to the ice. Each time it took longer to force the limbs back into position to crawl. Needing rest, he rolled into a ball with hands under his armpits inside the open jacket. Just starting to doze, he heard the squeak of feet in the snow. He rolled to his back to see, forty feet away, a Chinese with a submachine gun moving cautiously toward him. After all the pain and effort of escape, this Chinese would loose one burst and it would be all over. In disgust he threw out his hands and shouted, “Ahh, no!”

The startled Chinese turned and ran away. Reeves watched in amazement till the enemy disappeared into the night. The Chinese had a gun. Ed had no weapons, yet the Chinese had run. Why? Wide awake now, he rolled over and crawled on. Cadence count didn’t help him keep moving so he softly sang songs of boyhood faith over and over. “Yes, Jesus loves me, the Bible tells me so,” and “Jesus loves the little children, all the children of the world. Red and yellow, black and white, all are precious in his sight… “ Another mile of ice was covered.

Overwhelming exhaustion and numbing cold kept him from feeling much pain. He willed his limbs to move. They responded, one limb at a time. He didn’t know when dawn of December 5 came. (He meets a wounded GI and they wave at three Marine Corsairs overhead, who notice them.) A Marine jeep drove out to get him and he was immediately placed on a C-47 that was idling. As the plane vibrated into the air Ed thought, “He answered. Every time I asked God, He answered.” The prayers weren’t always answered the way he expected, but they’d been answered.

(At the hospital he received his first medical treatment in a week and the first hot food in 9 days. They removed his shrapnel, and tried to amputate his arms and legs but he wouldn’t let them. They placed him in a special ward for the dying but he refused to die. God hadn’t brought him this far for that.)

The Importance of Memory

Luke 22:19

The importance of memory. Some people have a disease that erases their memory. Society tries to recall the past with nostalgic films, etc. The Bible covenant emphasizes memory, especially with the great events of the past like Passover. Jesus told his disciples to remember his words and actions.

Memory can catalyze and renew, and lead to a present filled with the vitality of an earlier time. Many spiritual movements get their impetus from the past. God is involved in the little details of our lives. Because God is present in so much that has happened to us, memory not only helps us to live in the present, it can point us forward and give us hope. Remembering is inextricably tied to expectation.

French theologian Jacques Ellul writes, “[The Bible] tells us to REMEMBER the great deeds of your God, remember your deliverance from the land of Egypt, and FROM THAT learn what the future will be, for your God is the same, he is faithful, he is the one who will make that future. The future is not a matter of chance. Amidst all the random strokes of fate you can see the traces, like a crimson line, of the will of the same God who has shown both his creative power and his fidelity in your past.”

When Hopes and Dreams Have Died

Job 4:5

We live in a world that can cause great despair. When General Douglas MacArthur was recalled from Korea, he was afforded an opportunity to address the United States Congress. As he spoke, he said, “I am closing my 52 years of military service. When I joined the army, even before the turn of the century, it was the fulfillment of all my boyish hopes and dreams. The world has turned over many times since I took the oath on the plain at West Point, and the hopes and dreams have long since vanished.”

What a sad day that must have been, the day his hopes and dreams died. How very similar for the disciples as they hid in a room in Jerusalem behind locked doors. They had believed Jesus and left their jobs and their families to follow the Christ. But the dreams were dead, and the one they had believed in and loved was buried in a tomb. Hope seemed nonexistent on that lost weekend. Then God did something totally awesome, and hope was reborn. On that resurrection morning, hope broke through stone walls. The door to the tomb was open, and the Savior was alive. Who would have ever dreamed that this kind of hope was possible?

The God of Great Surprises

Job 4:5

Samuel Taylor Coleridge said that "Hope without an object cannot live." If you have ever lost the focus of life, you understand hopelessness. Perhaps you have invested much into your job, marriage, or the struggles of life; and then you saw it all destroyed. The object of your hope is gone, and you feel dead and aimless.

Psychologist William Marston asked 3,000 people this question: "What do you have to live for?" 94 percent responded that they were merely enduring their lives, hoping someday that things would get better. I suppose that this is an expression of hope to a small degree, hoping that the future will be better than the past or present. Yet, this seems so inadequate. If our only encouragement is found in hoping for a better tomorrow, is this an adequate hope? It has been said that some people see only a hopeless end, but the Christian sees an endless hope. The Bible says that hope will always remain.

The God of Great Surprises

Acts 2:24

In 1936 Ralph Neves, a famous jockey, was riding his mount in a race at Bay Meadows. The horse tripped as he entered the stretch and threw Ralph headfirst into the rail. The track doctor rushed to his side, but he was too late. He could find no pulse; Ralph was dead. The ambulance came anyway and rushed Ralph Neves to the hospital. After several attempts to revive him, he was pronounced dead and covered with a sheet.

The people at the racetrack were in shock. Ralph's wife had been called to meet with the president of the racetrack. The jockeys were taking a collection for the widow. Then Ralph Neves came walking into the clubhouse. The jockeys screamed, his wife fainted, and Ralph told his story.

He said, "I knew I didn't feel dead, even if I was sore all over." He spoke out to the doctor through the drape sheet, so they rushed him on a gurney into a room. Ralph thought that was a waste, so he put on his clothes, rode to the track in a cab, and rode the horse, Instigator, in the seventh race that same day.

Life is full of stories of unexpected results and the triumph of life over death. May today bring a rebirth of hope in our lives. I pray that the God of surprising outcomes will bring a renewal of hope to your life today.

================

Letter to David Holwick dated May 26, 2002:

Your story about Ralph Neves was very entertaining, but I would like to set a couple of facts straight for you. My Grandmother, Marjorie, was his wife at the time, and I must tell you that she was not "called by the President of the racetrack", nor was she there when he returned to the track. And most certainly, she did not faint. She told me the story quite differently. In fact, she and her girlfriend were at the beach and later shopping that day. She did not go to the track. So as inspiring as your stories are, I hope that you will check the facts a bit more closely the next time.

Sincerely,

Joan Clarke

===============

Version from Wikipedia:

[Neves] is best known for an incident at Bay Meadows Racetrack in San Mateo, California on May 8, 1936. After being thrown from his horse, Flannikins (another newspaper account says it was Lady Valorous in the third race), he was pronounced dead due to heart failure after a hasty examination and sent to the local hospital, where the track physician administered a shot of adrenaline to the heart.[4] Neves made it back to the racetrack and demanded to be allowed to ride the rest of his mounts that day (he was not permitted to do so until the next day).

The story has been told many times since, familiar to many jockeys, and as a result has gathered a number of variations. Two different doctors have been said to have given the key injection in two different places, and even Neves' Hall of Fame plaque states incorrectly that he won five races the following day. Instead, Neves would go on to ride four winning horses on May 14. The incident was covered extensively in local newspapers at the time; the San Francisco Examiner is particularly remembered for the headline "Neves, Called Dead in Fall, Denies It."

Isaiah's Vision

by A.B. Simpson

The sermon explores Isaiah's vision of the future glory of the Lord's house, the present failure, and the later vision of redemption and glory.

Abounding Hope 44:48

by Alan Martin

The sermon emphasizes the importance of hope in the Christian life and how to achieve the full assurance of hope by focusing on God's promise and not on circumstances.

Hope Only In Christ 55:15

by Alan Martin

Alan Martin teaches that true and abiding hope is found only in Christ, who fulfills God's promises beyond earthly expectations and sustains believers through faith and endurance.

The Hope of His Calling 44:42

by Alan Martin

Alan Martin explains that the hope of the Christian calling is rooted in the person of Jesus Christ, who will return to judge evil, redeem believers, and establish a new heaven and

Having Hope Amidst Great Uncertainty and Fear in Society 16:47

by Anna Ng

Our hope is built on nothing less than Jesus Christ and his righteousness, and it gives us the strength to endure trials and tribulations.

What We Need In Times Like These 9:55

by Annie Poonen

Annie Poonen emphasizes the importance of anchoring our hope in Jesus Christ, the steadfast rock, especially in perilous times, urging believers to purify themselves and hold firml

Real Hope for Desperate Times (Video) 53:35

by Anton Bosch

Anton Bosch teaches that the resurrection of Jesus Christ is the foundation of a living and sure hope for believers, especially in desperate and uncertain times.

Real Hope for Desperate Times 53:03

by Anton Bosch

Anton Bosch teaches that true and living hope in desperate times is found only in the resurrection of Jesus Christ, assuring believers of their future resurrection and eternal life

Prayer - 1 Peter 1:3-5, Part 3

by A.W. Pink

A.W. Pink's sermon explores the profound implications of regeneration through Christ's resurrection, emphasizing the believer's living hope and eternal inheritance as joint-heirs w

Christmas Breezes

by A.W. Tozer

Christmas holds a special place in the hearts of many people, a time to reflect on the Savior's birth and the qualities of love, mercy, and sacrifice.

Doors of Hope 40:57

by A.W. Tozer

The door of hope is a symbol of God's love and redemption, available to us in times of trouble and despair.

False Hope and Certain Hope

by A.W. Tozer

A.W. Tozer explores the distinction between false hope and the certain hope found in Christ and God's promises.

These illustrations have been gathered from many sources over many years and are offered to preachers as a study aid. Each is credited wherever the source is known, and we have made every effort to respect the rights of authors and publishers.

If you hold the rights to anything here and would like it credited differently or removed, please write to us and we will act promptly.