When God is Your Only Hope

There are seasons in life when it's all honey blossoms and sunshine and laughter fills the air. Then life comes at you and the sky darkens and the wind begins to blow and quite suddenly you find yourself in the storm of your life. Some of you may only know the sunshine and honey blossom time.

Others of you may know what it's like to experience both, which come from the providence of God. The unseen hand moves in mysterious ways his wonders to perform. When Joseph was still among his brethren he wore a coat of many colors and he was the apple of his father's eye and he even dreamed that each of his family bowed to him but he never dreamed that his rosy circumstances would suddenly change when his own kin turned on him and disposed of him.

He never dreamed he would be snatched from the comforts of his home and his father's loving gaze to be thrown into a cold pit and a prison from which he could not extricate himself. When Moses and the Jews were trapped at the Red Sea and their backs were against the rocks and the Egyptian armies were fast approaching and Moses himself couldn't hire a ship or wrangle a way to get them across that water. They were entirely shut up to God for deliverance.

Have you ever been there friend? Do you know what it's like to have all your human resources evaporate and your friends desert you and the walls cave in upon you? Well, if you do then you know what it's like to be entirely cast upon your God when the storm is unleashing its fury down upon your head and the seas are quickly flowing into your ship and it all begins to sink and all you can do is close your eyes and pray because you have entered the place when God is your only hope. And that's the title of my message this evening friends. When God is your only hope.

My text can be found in Matthew's Gospel in chapter 9. You can turn in your Bibles there now friends. We will be in verses 20 through 22. Let me read us this familiar passage of scripture about a woman who had come to the place in her life when God was her only hope.

Here now is the Word of God and may God's Spirit attend the reading of his holy word. You know the scene before us friends. Jesus is confronted by a ruler named Jairus whose daughter lay dying and Jesus agrees to follow this man home.

So he and his band of disciples are making their way through thick crowds who are pressing upon Jesus both out of their curiosity and their need. And along comes a woman who was quite unnoticed in the crowd. She'd be unnoticed anywhere.

But she pushes her way through that throng with determination into that inner circle where the master is because she is desperate. Have you ever been there friend? Have you ever been desperate enough to get to Jesus? Well, this woman was. We read in our text and behold a woman which was diseased with a issue of blood 12 years.

Let me pause here friends. 12 years. Have you ever been in a desperate place for a long time? Have you ever been so weary of your prolonged trial that you know only a miracle is the only hope you have? Well, guess what friends? God is still a God of miracles.

Yes, he is. Do you believe me? It's true. In another gospel it tells us that she had spent all her money on physicians.

I guess doctors were always expensive, but she'd not been cured by them and all her resources were exhausted on them. She is at the place of desperation. She needs a miracle and she knows it and she knows that Jesus is the miracle working man.

So she must get to him no matter what. So here she comes with her arms outstretched to touch the hem of his garment. Verse 21 tells us, For she said within herself, If I may touch his garment, I shall be whole.

She has no money. She has no hope. But she has faith.

She knows that God is her only hope. How about you friend? Have you tried everything else to no avail? Are you exhausted and at the end of your rope? Get to Jesus. Get to Jesus.

Because if you need a miracle, you've come to the right place because God is still a miracle working God. Oh, you better believe that friend. Go to him in faith and cast yourself there.

Let your prayers reach out for his garment tonight. We see in verse 22, But Jesus turned him about and when he saw her he said daughter be of good comfort. Thy faith hath made thee whole.

And the woman was made whole from that hour. When God is your only hope, Then cast yourself down at his mercy seat and believe that he not only cares about your friend. But that he will get you through.

He will bring you through. When God is your only hope, then rest in that hope. Let us pray.