Tag: hope

Expect a third day. Not always quickly. Not always in the way we imagine. But the third day comes. A day when what was hidden is revealed; when what was broken begins to heal; when what seemed dead begins to live.

We are pointed to Advent truth: that Christ comes suddenly, tenderly but disruptively – spraying God’s graffiti of hope across the walls of our lives.

Malachi ends with hope so gentle it almost feels fragile: “The sun of righteousness shall rise, with healing in its wings.” God’s justice is not cold. God’s truth is not cruel. God’s light is not violent. It is the rising sun – the warmth that thaws the frozen, the light that reveals the path, the dawn that says, “There is a future, and it is full of healing.”

The Blues is more than music. It’s a theology of brokenness and hope, pain and survival. Written on dusty roads and freight trains, on back porches and in bars. It tells the truth about suffering and injustice, sin and redemption. A theology which embraces Good Friday as well as Easter Sunday.

There’s a very close relationship between the words ‘faith’ and ‘hope’. As we’ve seen they are often used interchangeably. But there is a difference.

Rather than a sudden burning-bush-type-moment, it appears that the word of God comes to John as a slow-burn over a number of years until he was ready to share it.

Jeremiah has a reputation for being a miserable so-and-so. He isn’t often known for bringing for bringing hope and comfort.

This Christmas may you unwrap hope and discover the presence of God. Look in the ordinary places. You’ll be surprised.

Isaiah spoke a word of hope and joy that was out of place with the rest of the narrative. A word that wouldn’t wait until things improved.

May the faithfulness of Abraham and Sarah be an example to us so that we too may prove faithful and hopeful in whatever the future holds for us.

No matter how rubbish, how disappointed, angry or frightened we feel, there’s hope. But there’s a challenge for us too. An expectation of us.

God sustained us in the past and will take us through the present and into the future too. But, but, he may do it in a completely new way.

As we’ve seen in response to Ukraine from everyday people in Poland and other European countries – there is enough of that love to go around.

Today is Bible Sunday. There are 39 books in the OT, and 27 in the NT. Appropriately our reading today is from Isaiah, which has 66 chapters.

Jeremiah isn’t often known for hope and consolation. Indeed he has a reputation for being a miserable so-and-so, mournful and sorrowful.