Our Sermons

Bible Passage:Psalm 130:5
Pastor: Pastor Berg
Sermon Date:  November 30, 2022

It’s amazing how the same word can mean different things depending on the context. Take the word “fire” for example. It can refer to a flame that emits heat and can burn. It can describe the action of shooting a gun. It can describe the intent to relieve someone of their position of employment. And while you can make some connections between all three definitions, the context is key to understanding what “fire” really means. 

Perhaps, this truth is never clearer than when it comes to the word “hope.” Hope is tossed around so frequently and it has such a variety of meanings that it can be a hard word to truly understand, especially when it comes to how the Bible uses it. Let me give you just a couple examples from just this last week. On Sunday night, the Packers were still mathematically alive for a playoff spot. The reality is that they would need to win every game from this point forward. I can remember thinking, “I hope the Packers can make the playoffs.” But let’s be honest, that was a tenuous wish at best. And as it turns out, it was just a wish. On the same day, the Badger football team hired a new coach. The hopes of Badger fans are higher than ever because of the coach’s track record. I heard people say that they hope the Badgers can finally get over the hump and get into the playoffs. Is that the same kind of hope I had about the Packers making the playoffs? Not at all. And while it’s still not certain, there is much more confidence expressed in that hope.

Alright, enough of the sports references. But here’s the point. Our use of the word hope in those instances has differing levels of certainty. But in each case, there’s no guarantee that either desired outcome will happen. That’s the best we can do when it comes to hope from an earthly perspective. However, when that word is used in the Bible, hope doesn’t express uncertainty at all. Hope is not a tenuous wish, but rather, a confident expectation. Hope knows the outcome, the only question is when.

As we Wait Upon the Lord in this season of Advent, we know the outcome. We know that God kept his promise to send his Son as the Savior of the world. We know that Jesus accomplished God’s plan to save us by living perfectly in our place, by dying on the cross to take away all of our sins, by rising from the dead assuring us that God’s wrath had been appeased, that the penalty for sin had been paid. 

We know this, and that is why we wait. It’s very interesting that the Hebrew word we translate as hope can also be translated as wait. It’s the same word used in Genesis chapter 8 as Noah “waited” for the waters to recede. He knew the waters were going to go down. God had promised this. It was just a matter of when. And so Noah sent out the birds and when they came back he waited, he hoped for the waters to recede, which we know they eventually did. In this Psalm, the Psalmist describes his soul waiting for the Lord more than watchmen wait for, hope for the morning. They know morning is coming. They know the sun is going to rise, it’s just a matter of when.

And so it is true for us. We wait for the LORD. We wait for his coming again. We hope that he will come soon. And we know that to be true because God has promised it. It’s just a matter of when. So how can we wait in hope? What helps keep our thoughts heavenward, what helps fix our eyes on the skies is to remain grounded in God’s Word. That’s exactly what the Psalmist tells us. “My soul waits, and in his word I have put my hope.” My confident expectation that God will keep his promise is grounded in his Word. The fact that the LORD has forgiven us, that he doesn’t have an eye on our sins allows us to keep our eyes hoping for the LORD. We use God’s Word like a flashlight, showing us the promises of God, keeping us for putting our hope in the things of this world. We wait on the LORD with hope because we know that we can’t fix our problem ourselves. We know that God is the only one with the power and the skill and the strength to take us to be with him forever. And because he has promised, we expect it to happen, we know it’s going to happen. We wait in hope until it does.

May God help us to wait with hope this Advent season! May he remind us of the certainty we have in his promises. May we ever keep his Word in front of us, for it is there our hope is perfectly certain. AMEN