Hope Found

Last week, we considered what it is like to be without hope. As followers of Jesus, it is our responsibility to continuously point people to the hope that is in Jesus Christ.

False Remedies

We live in a time when all kinds of false hopes are offered as solutions to real problems. In the Spring 2014 unit of Bible Studies for Life, Pete Wilson explains, “We live in a culture that floods us with remedies. We try to mask our ‘lives of quiet desperation’ (to borrow from Thoreau) with pharmaceutical remedies, religious practices, a change in lifestyle, or a calendar full of activities. We can try to mask our need, but we can’t remove it.”¹ Like placebos in place of antibiotics, there are plenty of false, ineffective hopes.

The ministry of Jesus on this earth was a ministry of hope. Whether healing people (Matthew 8:1-9), forgiving people (John 8:2-11), or teaching His followers about the kingdom of God, Jesus exuded hope. Real hope. Jesus was and is the hope of Israel and the world. It is little wonder the Apostle Paul related the mystery of salvation to the hope found in Christ: “God wanted to make known among the Gentiles the glorious wealth of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.”²

When we run to the false remedies offered in culture, we receive the worst of all assurances: false hope. False hope is not bad only because the object of the hope is weak, but also because we are deceived into thinking we have real hope. We stop looking for real hope since false hope has settled our hearts and minds.

There is hope for you

What are areas of your life where you need hope? Marriage? Parenting? Ministry? Education? Friendships? Never allow any one of those to become the object of your eternal hope. Temporary solutions never build eternal hope. Look to Jesus and Him alone so that your hope, as the hymn says, will be “built on nothing less than Jesus’ blood and righteousness.”

If you have not yet checked out Bible Studies for Life, I want to encourage you to do so. It is a biblically grounded, ongoing Bible study. It provides practical application in every session so those who use it are not left with head knowledge only. Click here to get more information on the unit studies, and here to friend Bible Studies for Life on Facebook.

Yours for the Great Commission,

Ronnie W. Floyd

Senior Pastor, Cross Church
General Editor, Bible Studies for Life

¹– Bible Studies for Life, Let Hope In, by Pete Wilson
²– Colossians 2:27, HCSB