Sermons

Christmas is about waiting, it’s about eager anticipation. Children waiting for school to break up, waiting for Santa, waiting to be allowed to open presents. The whole of 2020 has been about waiting, waiting for lockdowns to end, waiting in queues to get into shops and the post office, waiting for vaccines to come through. Praise God that they are on the way.

Hope is about eager anticipation or expectation.
Worldly hope can pretty vague and often disappointed
I hope it won’t rain today, I hope the bus will be on time, I hope my delivery will arrive today.

Biblical hope is much surer. It is as Wendy Bauckland wrote is “the fervent expectation that good is coming, based on the promises of God”
The book of Hebrews 6 describes hope as a”sure and steadfast anchor for the soul”, based on the fact that Jesus has gone before us. He rose again!

The title of this sermon “The thrill of hope” comes from my favourite Christmas carol “Oh Holy Night”. The lines “a thrill of hope, the weary world rejoices, For yonder breaks a new and glorious morn” is the basis of the next sermons leading up to Christmas.

It’s a beautiful carol very apt for this year as it expresses the hope that Jesus brings in the midst of darkness and suffering. But it had a weird beginning. A French Catholic priest commissioned a local poet to write a Christmas poem and picked the a local non-churchgoing, winemaker poet to write it. Then a Jewish musician, who would not have understood who Jesus is and what He came to do wrote the music. It was immensely popular very quickly. The Catholic church banned it because of its provenance. Somehow it got across the Atlantic and was picked up by a slave absolutionist during the American civil war, because of the lines in verse 3 about slavery and oppression ceasing. Then it was supposed to have been the first music broadcast on the radio on Christmas eve. Mad!
Despite its’ provenance it an amazing carol chock full of Biblical truth about the thrill of hope – the surprise birth of Jesus

The first verse goes like this
<em>O Holy night! The stars are brightly shining
It is the night of our dear Saviour’s birth
Long lay the world in sin and error pining
‘Til He appears and the soul felt its worth
A thrill of hope the weary world rejoices
For yonder breaks a new and glorious morn
Fall on your knees; O hear the Angel voices!
O night divine, O night when Christ was born
O night, O Holy night, O night divine!</em>

The problem we have is that the world is in sin and error pining. We live in a broken world – we can see that with Covid and Cancer, Poverty and Pollution, Weakness and war.
But the brokenness isn’t just out there. It’s in here. It’s in our hearts. Jesus said in Matthews Gospel 15:18 “What comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart and this defiles the person. For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander. These are what defile a person.”

All that makes the world weary, it groans with the effects of our evil behaviour – eating things poached from forests (how Ebola kicked off again in 2014 and probably Covid in 2019), 84% of people don’t isolate when told to. Our selfishness makes it worse!

So we need the thrill of hope. Jesus breaking in. a thrill of hope the weary world rejoices. The cute baby in a manger at Christmas is God come in the flesh, to get down and dirty with us while staying pure and holy. Wicked men put him to death in a vile torturous way. But that was all part of the plan. Christ dying in our place, a perfect sacrifice able to be the sacrifice for the sin of the whole world.

Old story – but when ex-Muslim now Pastor Naem Fazal was speaking at a university event, he met a Muslim outside after and ended up going for Waffles, as you do. They get talking about sacrifices their families made back in Pakistan. And how sometimes families would get together and make a bigger sacrifice. A lamb. Then he asks the man, how big a sacrifice would be needed for the sins of the whole world. “Well that would be a God sized sacrifice.” And that is what it was – Jesus.

That’s the thrill of hope – that the God of heaven came down to take your place. To die on your behalf. To take away all your brokenness.
And all we have to do is turn and believe.
You many times people say to me let me get cleaned up first, and then I will follow Jesus – Nooo! That’s like having a wash before a shower!
It is Jesus that washes us clean. That’s the thrill of hope!

We turn to Him and we believe in what He has done
Sorry, Thank you, Please

Text in if you have prayed that prayer and have turned to Jesus this morning.

There’s two lovely bible passages (of many!) that unfold this thrill of hope you can have by becoming a follower of Christ and do have if you are a follower of Christ!

Rom 15:13 May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.
God is the God of hope. There are no hopeless cases, only those who don’t yet have hope. God is the hope bringer and the hope He brings, fills you with all joy and peace. So much so that you will overflow with hope to others.

We’ve got a jacuzzi. If you put a little bubble bath in it, there will be bubbles, and bubbles and bubbles and bubbles. When the kids were little they used to put way too much bubble bath in and the bathroom would be overflowing with bubbles.
One of my kids started a normal bath and fell asleep for an hour waiting for it to fill. It overflowed and water got everywhere – coming through light fittings and creating cracks in the ceiling. Not a blessing.
But hope – the thrill of hope. When God fills you with hope – you will overflow with that hope to others – seeping in to every crack of the broken world around you.

The other passage I want to highlight is 2 Thess 2:16-17
May our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who loved us and by his grace gave us eternal encouragement and good hope, 17 encourage your hearts and strengthen you in every good deed and word.
Christianity isn’t just that ticket to heaven when you pray Sorry thank you please on our livestream or at an Alpha, we et Jesus Christ himself. We get a relationship with Jesus and with God as Father. He’s not a remote figure sitting on a throne, looking a bit like a grumpy Father Christmas ready to judge you. He is your Father, a perfect father – the good, good father. They love you. They give you by grace. They give you as an undeserved gift – eternal encouragement. That’s encouragement for ever. And they give you hope that is good.
The result of that is your heart is encouraged and strengthened to do good to others – deeds and words. To bring hope. To help other find and grow in the thrill of hope.

Let’s pray.
God of all hope – fill us with hope.
Those that don’t know you – open their hearts and minds.
Those that are weary – bring the refreshing of hope.
Fill us with your Holy Spirit to overflowing with hope to bless us and all that we come into contact with. May hope be more contagious than coronavirus!

Oh Holy Night