WOLNY-2024-03
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GOD OF HOPE
Romans 15:13 Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Humans can live—
40 days without food,
3 days without water,
8 minutes without air,
but only
1 second without hope!
Following God’s Plan is simple. We belong to Jesus, and everything is either:
Pleasing to Him, or
Not Pleasing to Him
The NT says, “This is the will of God,” five times, and the way to live that will is clearly taught in Rev 2-3.
It is amazing that Paul spoke more about this topic of being careful about not losing your life’s work to the Corinthians than to any other church. He seems to imply that their often out-of-control lives threatened them with irrecoverable loss.
1 Corinthians 3:15 If anyone’s work is burned, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire. NKJV
What does suffering loss mean in relation to our lives as believers? The New Testament uses this word several times but the clearest example of what it means is in Acts 27. Remember Paul on the ship that went through the terrible storm and then crashed on the rocks and was destroyed? In the midst of that event in Acts 27 we find a very good picture of what suffering loss is all about in our lives as believers.
Think of life as collecting the cargo in a ship. Everything important you carry down and stow in the hold. Now follow along in Acts 27.
Acts 27:44 and the rest, some on boards and some on parts of the ship. And so it was that they all escaped safely to land. NKJV
At the judgment seat of Christ, some believers, Paul warns, are going to see everything they lived for thrown overboard (burned up in the fire), and they will float to shore on a board.
All that will be left of life will be that they were saved (they shall be saved, yet so as by fire). That is such a description of so many lives that fill God’s Word; they began the race with great achievement but failed at the end because they ignored God’s rules. They did not lose their salvation, but they did lose their rewards (1 Cor. 3:15). It happened to Lot (Gen. 19), and to Samson (Jud. 16), and to Ananias and Sapphira (Acts 5). And, as Paul warns–it can happen to us!
Paul wanted to avoid at all costs the disastrous loss that would come if He ignored God and His will for life.
