Luke 1:5-23
In our own lives, and as a nation, we face events and times when things look hopeless. In the spring of 1958, I was single, working, and living in my parents’ home. I had a closet full of nice clothes; shirts, pants, jackets, coats, and shoes. But one day, I experienced how fast a life can change. Lightning struck our home that day and started a fire. We had no rural fire department. That night I stood on the cement steps of the house and looked at the smoldering ashes that once had been our home. My Dad, being a farmer, did not have fire insurance. We lost many items and keepsakes that had been a part of our family history. We lost the picture history of our family. At that moment I felt a deep hopelessness. Our family was always a part of our little country church. It was the church family, friends, and family members that put faith into action and together we rebuilt the home before the end of that summer. It was the hearts of a Christian family that restored me to being a person that lived with hope. This was long before we had Habitat for Humanity.
You see, real hope only lives in the life and hearts of Christians that believe and know the hope of the living Christ.
December 7, 1941, the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. We lost most of our Navy and had thousands killed in that attack. Our family gathered around an old AM radio and listened to the news. Even though I was only five years old, I knew something very bad had happened to our nation. It was an event that pulled us together as a nation, and by 1945, after a long, hard war that had cost suffering, loss and death to people in our country, we saw the men and women in our military give us hope for peace as we defeated our common enemies. In those dark days of World War II, our church houses were filled with people that would bring hope to life again by faith in God.
Charles Schulz captured the spirit of many that fought for our freedom. He had Snoopy as a G.I. in a fox hole with a machine gun. He was in the rain and mud. G.I. Snoopy wrote this letter to his mother. “Dear Mom, Just a note to tell you I am well. They say we will be home by Christmas! I hope so.”
We turn to the scripture to see faith in God as the true source for lasting hope even in our dark hours. We read in Luke about the hopelessness of a man named Zechariah and his wife Elizabeth. They had grown old and they had wanted children. Now they faced a deep hopelessness that they would never know the joy of having a son or daughter. They were a people of faith but had given up hope for a child because of their age. When things that we believe as humans seem hopeless, we see the God of hope change the outcome of lives and events.
“One day Zechariah was serving God in the Temple, for his order was on duty that week. As was the custom of the Priest, he was chosen by lot to enter the Sanctuary of the Lord and burn incense. While the incense was being burned, a great crowd stood outside, praying.
While Zechariah was in the sanctuary, an angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing to the right of the incense altar. Zechariah was shaken and overwhelmed with fear when he saw him. But the angel said, ‘Don’t be afraid, Zechariah! God has heard your prayer. Your wife Elizabeth will give you a son, and you are to name him John. You will have great joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth, for he will be great in the eyes of the Lord. He must never touch wine or other alcoholic drinks. He will be filled with the Holy Spirit even before his birth, and he will turn many Israelites to the Lord. He will turn the hearts of the fathers to their children, and he will cause those who are rebellious to accept the wisdom of the godly.’
Zechariah said to the angel, ‘How can I be sure this will happen? I am an old man now and my wife is also well along in years.’
Then the angel said, ‘I am Gabriel! I stand in the very presence of God. It was He who sent me to bring you the Good News! But now since you didn’t believe what I said, you will be silent and unable to speak until the child is born. For my words will certainly be fulfilled at the proper time.’
When Zechariah’s week of service in the temple was over, he returned home. Soon afterward his wife, Elizabeth, became pregnant and went into seclusion for five months. ‘How kind the Lord is!’, she exclaimed, ‘He has taken away my disgrace of having no children.’”
Only a faith in Jesus Christ will produce the power of hope in our lives, or in a nation’s life. The world we live in does not have the power to change hopelessness. That night as I stood and watched the embers of the fire that had destroyed our home, it changed the way I looked at life. I knew the things that I had valued, like a closet full of clothes, wasn’t what could ever produce hope. Hope is born out of our faith in Jesus Christ. It is the hope I gained by faith that even in that hopeless moment has sustained me for the past sixty-two years. Even in the dark hours of the attack on Pearl Harbor, we saw hope reborn as we fought to survive as a free people. We are living in some very hard times now in 2020, but a true faith in Jesus Christ will get us through the hard times and restore the power of hope in our life.
Zechariah and Elizabeth knew by their own experience that the God they believed in and served was the source of lasting hope.
All things don’t turn out the way we thought they would but in faith God turns things out the way they should. He is our lasting source of hope. Turn your hearts to the God of Hope.
