HOPE SENT
Hope Sent There's a moment in most epic adventure movies when all seems lost. The lone hero stands against seemingly insurmountable odds, and defeat seems inevitable. I imagine you've seen it multiple times onscreen.
Luke Skywalker races down the trench in his X-Wing as Darth Vader locks onto him in his Tie Fighter. As the Dark Lord prepares to fire, the Rebel base comes in range of the Death Star, and it powers up its main gun to blow the heroic Rebellion out of the galaxy once and for all.
Frodo decides not to toss the One Ring into the fires of Mount Doom but to keep its power for himself and puts it on, vanishing. Sam screams, as, outside the gates of Mordor, the battle starts to turn in favor of the enemy.
Captain America straps what's left of his shattered shield onto what's left of his shattered arm and prepares to face down Thanos and his army alone. If he falls, the whole of existence will be destroyed and rewritten by the Mad Titan in his image. But by himself, Cap cannot hope to prevail.
It's a tense moment. Yet, if you're familiar with these stories, these scenes don't fill you with despair because if you've seen the rest of the movie, you know something the characters don't.
Hope is about to be sent.
Hope is sent in the form of Han Solo and Chewbacca arriving in the Millennium Falcon and rescuing Luke from Vader, allowing the young Jedi-in-training to fire a "one in a million" shot. The Death Star is destroyed before it can fire, and the Rebels are saved.
Hope is sent ironically in the form of the hideous Gollum attacking Frodo, biting off his finger and taking the Ring, but ultimately falling with the Ring into the flames below. The threat of the enemy is vanquished, and the free people of Middle Earth are saved.
Hope sent in the form of Falcon's voice sounding over Cap's communicator, portals opening, and dozens of heroes stepping through. The battle is joined, and the day is saved.
It reminds me a bit of one of my favorite Christmas carols, "O Come, O Come, Emmanuel." That might sound a little odd but hear me out.
With most Christmas hymns, we sing about the wonder ("Silent Night," "O Little Town of Bethlehem" "O Holy Night") or sheer joy ("O Come All Ye Faithful," "Go Tell it on the Mountain," "Joy to the World") at Jesus' birth. But "O Come, O Come Emmanuel" is a different kind of song. The singer of this carol is not rejoicing or wondering in awe at the Christ Who has come. No, he's looking over the ruin and seeming defeat of God's people and trying to peer beyond the veil of despair to the hope of the promise of the Christ's coming. Consider the lyrics of the first verse:
O come, O come, Emmanuel,
And ransom captive Israel,
That mourns in lonely exile here,
Until the Son of God appear.
The scene pictured is not too different from those harrowing climaxes. God's people are defeated and held in exile. They had been taken away to foreign lands, and only a remnant would ever return to the land of Israel. But even then, they were under the thumb of other rulers. They were powerless and seemingly defeated. All seemed lost.
But hope was promised to be sent. And the chorus rings it out:
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to thee, O Israel
Emmanuel is coming! The Christ will come and put right what is wrong. The broken will be mended. And Israel's hope will be fulfilled.
And Emmanuel did come. Jesus was born to Mary, confirming the word of the prophet:
"Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel (which means, God with us)." (Matthew 1:23, Isaiah 7:14)
But He didn't restore the earthly kingdom of Israel. He didn't take the throne. You see, just like in those epic movies, the stakes were higher than just one lone hero. The need was more significant than just one group of people. The need was as big as the whole fallen world.
Jesus brought all who would believe in Him from all peoples and places the hope of eternal life and peace with God. He came to us from heaven we could not attain. He lived the sinless life we could not live. He died the sinner's death that we deserved to die. He rose with the life we could not gain. And He returned to God the Father we did not know and promised to come again to take us back with Him.
He didn't just defeat the Empire, Sauron, or Thanos. He beat death and hell.
And we have that hope in us. Hope that was sent that first Christmas in the Person of the Son of God. Hope will be sent to us again at His return. And looking toward His coming, we cry and sing, "O Come, O Come Emmanuel, and ransom captive Israel!"
At Grace Alive, we say,
"We don't follow Jesus for a better life. We follow Jesus because He's better than life."
And the hope He gives us eternally is a hope we get to live out right now.
And it's a hope we are called to send on to a dying world around us.
Recently, Leroy Jackson preached on 2 Corinthians 5, reminding of us Paul's words:
"All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation." (2 Corinthians 5:18-19)
The hope in us from Christ is the hope that we are called to share with those around us.
It's hope for the next generation. Grace Alive Kids is relaunching for elementary students this month, where we will be able to pass on the hope of the gospel to the youngest among us and where—through events like the 2nd Annual Grace Alive Kids Toy Drive—we're giving those young ones a chance to become pass on that hope as well, showing the love of Jesus to other needy kids in our community.
It's a hope for the hurting and hungry. Grace Alive has been blessed to partner with other ministries to personally feed hundreds of families through our food basket and Thanksgiving giveaways and to gather our Grace Alive College group for a Friendsgiving Feast.
And it's a hope for believers as well in. After all, the gospel is not just the ABC's of Christianity; it's the A-Z of Christianity. And Grace Alive Community Groups are meeting and growing together in God's Word every week, sharing needs, praying for one another, and connecting personally.
People are the mission. And that mission is to proclaim the hope of Jesus.
For many people, 2020 might feel a lot like one of those desperate epic moments. Everything is uncertain, and we might even feel like we're on the verge of losing hope.
But hope is never lost. Hope was sent eternally in the Person of Jesus Christ.
And now, that hope is being sent through us in His name.
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