If you have a copy of God's Word, grab that and open up to the book of 2 Corinthians for our time in God's Word this morning. And thank you all for joining us this Sunday after Christmas. Pastor Eric is taking the week off, and so I get the privilege of bringing God's Word to you this morning. Normally, we are going through a verse-by-verse study through the Book of Romans, taking a few weeks off from that, and so this morning we'll be looking at just a few verses from 2 Corinthians chapter 1, just a few books after the Book of Romans. Well, it was May 31st, 1889, that the South Fort Dam, just north of the small town of Johnstown, Pennsylvania, failed and let out about 14.55 million cubic meters of water rushing towards the small town. The South Fork Dam was started in about 1839, finished in 1853. It was all part of a desire from the great state of Pennsylvania to build a cross-state canal system. And so they were building multiple dams. And this particular dam, the South Fork Dam, was started and was a cause of concern for many of the engineers and people who were building building it because a lot of the material that was being used was built with soft earth and sort of loose rock and many thought this is not eventually going to hold up to the pressure that it's going to need to withstand. Well then on May 30th, 1889, the largest rainstorm in decades hit the area and dropped about 10 inches or so of water in 24 hours. All of this rain ultimately caused the foundation of the dam to begin to loosen. And then around 2 PM on May 31, the dam broke and let all that water rush towards the unsuspecting town of Johnstown. The amount of water just, it's hard to imagine this 14.55 million cubic meters. It's about the equivalent of the Mississippi River running and rushing towards this small town. After the floodwaters receded, there were over 2,000 people who were killed, and then basically the rest of the town became homeless. $17 million worth of damage back in the day, which is over $600 million in today's currency. And you think about it, the damage that was caused by this flood, the damage that was done to this town was caused from really poor construction of the dam from the very beginning. While the dam seemed to be fine, seemed to hold up to the pressure for several decades, even though it went through multiple repairs throughout those decades, the dirt and the rocks used were insufficient to hold up to the eventual pressure that it would face. And in a similar way, when the pressures of our lives become too overwhelming, When things and the people we have placed our hope in, placed our trust in, placed our confidence in, when they fail us, they often leave us devastating in despair. The idea of hope, this time of year, we often hear this idea of hope, we sing songs about hope. This idea of hope that often seen in the culture in the world is one of really a general wish or a desire for something that we want. We want something good to happen, nice to happen. It may be something that is good even, that you want to come to pass. It may be something that you are just greatly desiring. But there's no guarantee that this thing will actually take place. Maybe a hope in a circumstance that might change. And when those circumstances do change, it brings temporary relief or brings temporary peace. It brings temporary comfort to our souls, but it will never last and will quickly fade. And often we are left with feelings of maybe sorrow or sadness. Hope, however, biblically speaking, as we will see in this morning's text, hope biblically speaking, however, is a firm trust in the confidence of God and His promises. A firm trust in the confidence of God and His promises and really the fulfillment of those promises. Really, you could just say, hope is really trusting that God will do what He says He will do. now you may be wondering why bring up such a terrible incident and talk about this right after Christmas you still should be thinking of jolly things and hopeful things and fun things but oftentimes around again a holiday season we many people are maybe in despair or in sadness or in times of seasons of sorrow and really again as people also think about the the upcoming year, the new year, we think about New Year's resolutions, we think about hope. I have a hope for 2025 that this will be my year, or whatever. This will be the year of change, this will be the year of whatever, fill in the blank. And for some people, the hope might be a new job, a new career, a new house, a new place to live, a new president, a new government, a new hobby, a new relationship. Some people even place hope in the idea of hope itself, that I've been hopeless for a long time and I need to have hope in something. So if I'm more positive and just hopeful and putting hope in hope, then maybe life will be better. I'll be more joyful and more happy as a result of that. Again, yet just as the floodwaters that destroyed that town, was caused by an unstable, shaky foundation, we will face a similar feeling of being destroyed or shaken because our hope, or if our hope, is placed in something other than Christ. This world is only unstable. We can never find full and true satisfaction and fulfillment in anything in this world. It's only found in Christ. Again, that's really what our text is about this morning in 2 Corinthians chapter 1. And so again, as one year ends and as another year is about to begin, may we place our hope in Christ. knowing that whatever we are about to face is from the good hand of God, as Richard read earlier from James 1. So follow along as I read 2 Corinthians 1, starting in verse 8 through verse 11. 2 Corinthians 1, verse 8. For we do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of our affliction which came to us in Asia. that we were burdened excessively beyond our strength so that we despaired even to live. Indeed, we had the sentence of death within ourselves so that we would not have confidence in ourselves, but in God who raises the dead, who rescued us from so great a peril of death, and will rescue us, he on whom we have set our hope. And he will rescue us. You also joining in helping us through your prayers on our behalf so that thanks may be given on our behalf by the prayers or by many persons for the gracious gift bestowed on us through the prayers of many. reading into the Word of God. Just briefly, a brief background of 2 Corinthians if you are unfamiliar with this book. It was written by the Apostle Paul in the early 50s AD. Most likely it's his fourth letter to the Church of Corinth. We only have two, but most likely, as some scholars say, this is probably his fourth letter that he had written to them. We have 1 Corinthians where he addresses multiple issues that the church was facing at the time, a lot of conflicts within the church, a lot of infighting, a lot of theological error. Paul is seeking to address. At some point in between, there is another letter or a couple letters written. Paul even addresses in 2 Corinthians, he says, I wrote to you a severe letter. I wrote to you the severe letter. We don't know what that severe letter was. They obviously got it because many of these church members and what Paul says are super apostles, sort of in a mocking term. We're making fun of Paul and we're saying Paul's not a real apostle. Paul's not a true leader of the church. He's not a true apostle. We shouldn't listen to him. Listen to us instead. Paul's being too harsh, he's being too mean, don't listen to him. And so Paul is seeking then to, in 2 Corinthians, really defend his apostleship, his authority that's given to him by God. In some senses, 2 Corinthians is Paul's most personal letter as he writes to the church. And one of the things that he does is he starts out his letter, this epistle, to this town, was by defending himself by looking at all the ways he's suffered for the sake of the gospel. All the different ways he has withstood difficulty and burden and pain and trial upon trial. If you read the book, you'll see not only in chapter 1, but also in chapter 4, in chapter 10, 11, and 12, especially those chapters, the immense pain and suffering Paul endured for the sake of the gospel. And so he's really saying, look, these super apostles are telling you to maybe live like the world, sort of integrate and and bring in the culture of the church to make the church less offensive and more attractive. Suffering is bad, and so you shouldn't suffer like Paul is. He's not really a true apostle, because look at all the bad ways that he's being treated. And so Paul's really opened up his letter, saying in spite of those hardships that he, and he even says, verse one, Timothy, has suffered, the suffering is from the Lord. It's not as though something abnormal were happening. He is trying to defend himself by saying, look, this is normal, but also yet remind, I need to remind you, Corinthian church, that God is in control of all this and God comforts us in our trials. God comforts us in our difficulties. God brings comfort and joy and peace to us, no matter the situation, no matter the trial, no matter what pressures we may face as we trust and as we hope and rely upon him. And so just in these few verses, taking notes, we'll see six reminders to give us hope in troubled times. Six reminders in this text from the Apostle Paul. Six reminders to give us hope in troubled or in difficult times. The first one, again, in verse 8, is this, that we need to remember that suffering and hardship are normal in this life. Suffering and hardship in this life are normal. As Richard wrote earlier with James chapter 1, not just one particular type of suffering, all kinds of suffering. We encounter trials of various kinds, multifaceted trials is the idea there. But verse 8, we do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that of our affliction which came to us in Asia, that we were burdened excessively beyond our strengths, that we despaired even to live. Again, Paul was spending the opening verses really of this letter to this church in Corinth, reminding them, letting them know of his hardships, letting them know of his trials. In many of Paul's other letters, his other epistles, he does the same thing. He mentions that to the church in Colossae and in Philippi and in Rome and others of his difficulties, the sufferings he has had to face for the sake of the gospel. And I don't think Paul is doing so. As we often may do on social media today, I'm suffering, you know, and we take a selfie of ourself or whatever. He's not necessarily counting the suffering to boast about his suffering, to boast about how hard life is, but I think to remind this church that suffering for Christ and suffering in general is common and is normal. Suffering is common and suffering is normal. He says the affliction that came to us in Asia, he's speaking about just part of his missionary journeys. Paul, in particular, he was speaking about his suffering that came through just his missionary journeys, his desire to preach Christ, to plant churches, to strengthen churches. Asia here is just referring to modern-day Turkey, where Paul traveled all over planting churches and meeting with churches and strengthening the leadership in those various different places. And oftentimes he would go from town to town and he would face different trials. He'd be beaten, he'd be whipped, he'd be stoned, he'd be shipwrecked. And you can read that account in 2 Corinthians 11 of all the different ways he suffered. So he's saying that, look, suffering is normal. Suffering for Christ is normal. And really, as a result, as we'll see, look, church, Corinthian church, this is also your calling. Suffering and difficulties in this life are just the most normal thing in the world. Difficulties in life are very, very common and very normal. You know, one of the great lies that we're told by the world, and often in many churches, is that when we suffer hardship, we suffer hardship for the sake of Christ in various different ways, or we suffer difficulties in this life, were inflicted with a disease, an incurable disease maybe, that you must have done something wrong. God's punishing you. If God was going to bless you, your ministry would not look like this. Your life wouldn't look like this. You would have this instead of this. Maybe you don't have enough faith. God's mad at you because this is what's happening to you. Maybe you've fought that before. Maybe you've been told that before. by somebody. And if you have that mindset, if I have that mindset that when hardship comes or when trials come or when suffering comes that somehow I'm doing something wrong or that God is upset with me, then I'm going to find every solution that I can to try to get out of whatever hardship I'm in. I'm going to try to make every excuse I can to say maybe it's not my fault, or maybe God is mad at me, and so I need to try to do something good in my own good deeds to try to make Him happy and appease Him. Or if I believe suffering shouldn't come to a believer, then when I do suffer again, I'm hopeless. Or maybe we can fall into a pattern of despair, or anxiety, or anger, or fear, or unbelief, because we have a wrong view of suffering. We have a wrong view of trials. We have a wrong view of what is God doing in and through this difficulty. If we're placing our hope in a life without pain, a life without trials, then we will utterly be like that dam and just be destroyed. We will live our entire Christian life in disappointment. Secondly, we continue on here. First reminder, suffering and hardship are normal. Secondly, despair. Verse 8, despair is a normal response to life in a broken world. Despair is a normal response to life in a broken world. And Paul says in verse 8, we were burdened excessively beyond our strength so that we despaired even to what? Live. To be burdened excessively here means to be weighed down. excessively weighed down, to be troubled by extraordinary means. It's not a normal sort of suffering like you stub your toe or something like that, but it's something unimaginable. A suffering that really tips the scales. You can't weigh it out. You can't compare it to anything else. His strength was gone, burdened excessively beyond all strength. There's just nothing. He's flat on his back. He can't move, so to speak. He can't continue on. He had no more physical ability, him and Timothy, no more physical ability to keep going. Why? Because of the suffering that he faced, whatever that was. We don't know exactly what kind of suffering that was. Maybe, was he talking about what he experienced in 2 Corinthians 11? Maybe, but we're not really quite sure all that he faced at that time in Asia there. But we do know that he suffered greatly to the point where he says, we despaired even to live, both him and Timothy and maybe whoever else was with him. The idea of despair here, the word means no exit, no escape. There's no way out. There's no way through. And when you're in despair, you have that tunnel vision. There's no end to this. I can't go forward. I can't go back. I can't get off this ride, so to speak. There's no escape. There's no way. I can't see any other way through, Paul's saying here, other than death. And for Paul, in the midst of his suffering and arrogance, he thought he was going to die. He thought, this is how the Lord is going to usher me into his kingdom. This is the end of my ministry. Some people point out that maybe Paul was in despair because he didn't think his ministry was over. He thought, I still have more to do. It could be partly true, because we see later on in 2 Timothy, Paul knows he's about to die, and he's not in despair there. He's more joyful during those moments. But I also think that Paul's suffering that he faced was so difficult, was so overwhelming, that this is just how he thought he was going to die. He just thought, this is it. This is it. I can see no other way through this. And probably, if you or I were put in that same situation, we wouldn't respond any differently. We'd probably respond similarly or maybe even worse. We're familiar with the sufferings of Job, aren't we? Turn with me briefly to Job chapter 7. Job chapter 7. Job is before Psalms. In your Bible, in the Old Testament, you have Job, Psalms, Proverbs. Turn with me briefly to Job. We're familiar with Job and his suffering. All of Job's kids, within a matter of minutes, as you read it, with minutes, Job's kids, all of his fields, his livestock, his health, are all taken away. But yet, how does Job respond? He worships God. Initially, he worships God. And then we know his goofy friends come. And they do one good thing. They sit in silence for seven days. That was the best thing that they did. And then they opened their mouth, and then Bali came out. But as they begin to speak unkind and unwise words, in chapter 8, verse 1, Bildad calls Job a windbag. I see there, verse 1, how long will you say these things in the words of your mouth? Be a mighty wind. In modern-day equivalence, you're a windbag. Don't say that when someone's suffering, by the way. Just in case, as a counselor, I'm gonna advise you don't counsel people that way. Don't call them a windbag, okay? But we see the false counsel that they're giving, but we also see Job then is beginning to struggle. Chapter 7 is often seen by many commentators as a prayer. The end of chapter 6 through chapter 7 is a prayer of Job to God. Just a few verses. You can just see Job's suffering. Verse 3, and so, in my apportioned months of worthlessness and nights of trouble are appointed me. Job's saying, I don't sleep. My life feels worthless. Verse 7, if I lie down, I say, when shall I arise? But when twilight comes, and I'm saturated with tossing until dawn, he's saying, I'm lying down, I can't sleep, I'm sleepless, and I'm thinking, when is it going to be daytime for me to get back up and go back to work? But then he's tossing and turning all night long, and he can't get any rest. Verse 5, my flesh is closed with worms. My skin is scabbed over. Verse seven, my life is but wind. My eye will not see good again. And then you see verse 12. This is where Job starts to get a little, maybe a little off. And this is a prayer to God. Am I a sea monster that you have to guard me? And God, what are you doing? If I say my bed will comfort me, my couch will ease my bitter musings, then you frighten me with dreams and terrify me with visions. God, you give me night terrors. What are you doing? And you can see and you can sense Job's suffering, can't you? Like Paul. You can sense, man, this man, unimaginable pain. All of his kids, all of his wealth, all of his livestock, everything is utterly gone. Now, turn back to 2 Corinthians with me. That's a prayer of Job to God. It's not a good prayer, and I wouldn't emulate that prayer, by the way. Don't pray that prayer back to God. in your suffering, in your trials. But we can learn from that prayer. What we can learn is that when we don't know what else to do in our despair, we pray. And there is a prayer like that at times. God, I don't know what you're doing. Life is too hard. God, I'm in total darkness and despair. I don't know what to do. As we see, and maybe you've experienced something like that. Maybe right now you're in a place where you think, I can resonate with Job. I can resonate with Paul. Don't think, as the culture would have you think, something's wrong with you. Something's wrong with you, and you need help, and you need medication, because you're sad and in despair. Don't think that. Don't think that way. Despair is normal in this life, isn't it? Why? Because God has given us emotions to respond to suffering in this life. As we'll see, prolonged despair isn't necessarily the best thing. But even though Job responded sinfully in some of his prayer against God, he still prayed to God, believing God is still in control and God is still sovereign. He says, you gave this to me. God, you did this to me. What is going on? Again, prayer is a helpful response in times of distress, in times of difficulty. But again, remember, despair is normal. To experience sadness is normal. Again, prolonged despair, though, is not a virtue. But our prolonged despair, through times and through seasons of sorrow, can lead to the fact that maybe we have a misplaced trust in something, a misplaced hope in something. And even in that scene, how God is, as we'll see in just a minute, how God is using that suffering, how God is using that despair to draw us to Him and to mature us and to sanctify us. Again, Godly men battle with despair like Job and like Paul and many others. Again, so that gives us hope knowing we're not alone, we're not some weird abnormal creature. But others have gone before us and they've endured as well. And God's given them the strength, he will give me strength. But we also, I can have to remember, just because Job and Paul and others, Bunyan and Lloyd-Jones and Charles Spurgeon and others, struggled with despair for many years of their life, doesn't mean I can just sit and wallow in self-pity and say, woe is me, I'm sad all the time. We need to adjust our thinking as we'll see in just a minute. But where might you be this morning? What trials may you be facing this morning? Do you feel like Paul? Do you feel like Job? And despair of life? Maybe your despair is because you think life should be easy and life is hard. Maybe you despair because circumstances are not going the way you wanted them to go and God is doing something different than what you wanted. Or maybe you're in despair because life is really hard. and you're suffering for Christ because you're being faithful and people are mocking you and tormenting you, families disowning you, or whatever the case may be. Be assured, there's nothing wrong with you when you feel that way, necessarily. Your feeling's not out of whack, your emotion's not out of whack, you're responding normally to life in a broken, fallen world. But it's what we do with that despair. It's what we do in those seasons of sorrow that really make the difference of am I going to follow God and hope in God or am I going to really be led by my despair down to maybe a deep pit like Paul or like Job. Well, third, sort of an answer to that. Third reminders, all suffering is meant to sanctify us. All suffering is meant, designed, to sanctify us, verse nine. Paul says this, indeed, we had the sentence of death within ourselves so that we would not have confidence in ourselves, but in God who raises the dead. Again, sometimes when we become hopeless in a situation, again, it's because life hasn't gone our way. Our lives have turned out differently from our dreams, our desire has not been fulfilled, we haven't realized certain things that we've wanted or planned out or mapped out or whatever. Again, maybe, again, the hopelessness is because of a trial, a physical trial, a difficult marriage, a difficult child, a difficult financial situation, ongoing conflicts. Whatever the case may be, whatever Paul's case, he said he just spared even to live. But thankfully, Paul says in verse nine, though he didn't stop there, he says, indeed, this sentence of death, meaning we thought we were gonna die, we were just spared in this situation. God really put us in this situation due to a spare of our life for a reason. Paul says, so that God put us in that situation to teach us to put our trust, our confidence in God and not in ourselves. This is the Apostle Paul. He raised people from the dead. He performed a lot of miracles. He did a lot of really cool things. I mean, you would think as Apostle Paul, he was maybe at times, maybe boasting, thinking, man, he can do whatever he wants. Paul's saying, God did this to cause me to trust in him and not in myself, and not in my own abilities, not in how great I think I am, and not in how awesome I think I am, or not in how much I've done. The idea of confidence means trust. Paul's saying God gave us this despair, this trial that led to our despair, so that we wouldn't trust in ourselves and our own abilities, our own thoughts, our own whatever, but to trust in Him. But God took Paul, as He often takes you and me, to the utter limits of our strength where we feel we cannot keep going on for the sole purpose of helping us to trust in Him. I think it was Puritan Thomas Watson said, God often throws us on our backs, we're forced to look upward. And we need these reminders. Paul needed these reminders. 2 Corinthians 12 verse 9, you're familiar with this. Paul is pleading with God to remove a thorn in the flesh. God says, my grace is sufficient for you, my power is perfected in weakness. A few chapters after 2 Corinthians 1 and chapter 4, verse 16, Paul says, Therefore, we do not lose heart, but though our outer man is decaying, our inner man is being renewed day by day. That God is putting, and Paul saw this, and we need to see this, and James saw this, as we read earlier, that God puts us through tests, puts us through trials to grow us and to mature us, to mold us to become like Christ. One way is we look to Christ as an example of Christ even saw in his earthly ministry, in his humanity, that the trials that he was going through was for his maturity as well. And not in the sense that he was sinful and needed to grow and become more sanctified because he was perfect, but to mature, as we see in Luke, to mature in wisdom and strength and in stature. But we also see in the midst of that Christ perfectly trusted in the Father in all ways and all different trials and all different temptations. Even as he was being crucified or as about to be crucified, Christ was praying, not my will, but yours be done, wasn't he? 1 Peter 2.23. speaks of Christ being beaten and punished, and he says this, who being reviled, did not revile in return. While suffering, Christ, while Christ suffering, he uttered no threats, but kept entrusting himself to him who judges righteously, which is the Father. That Christ, in the midst of his threats, in the midst of the sufferings, kept entrusting himself to God who judges righteously. Often we hear that verse and we think, man, Somebody is punishing me, somebody's harming me, somebody's doing wrong to me. I'm gonna trust God because they're gonna get it in the end. They'll get their justice in the end when God judges them. That's true, but I think what's more to the point here is that while Christ was bearing the weight of our sin, while he was being mocked and mistreated, he was trusting in God, knowing the outcome of his own suffering. He entrusted himself to God to do what was right, even though he knew what he was going through was beyond him. And that's what Paul is saying here, that when we go through these kind of trials, we go through these sort of moments where we just think, this is beyond me. This is too much. It's for the purpose of us trusting that God is in control and not ourselves. We're not trusting in ourselves, we're trusting in God. We're not trusting in our own abilities, our own wisdom, our own thoughts, our own ideologies, we're trusting in God. We're trusting in Him to do good. We're trusting in Him to use these things to reveal our sin, to reveal where we need to mature, to reveal where we need to grow and even becoming more like Christ in various different ways. maybe even to grow and have a greater, more accurate view of God. Where might, again, where might you be this morning? Where might you, this morning, need to adjust your view of God and His sovereignty over hardships? Of God's purpose for you and your hardship? Rather than simply trying to flee the suffering, embracing God's sovereignty over that. Rather than trying to just get out of it, how might you need to respond, no matter the trial, how big or how small, thinking, God is doing this for my good, to mature me. And I need to entrust myself to Him while responding like Christ. Fourth helpful reminder here. Fourth reminder to give us hope in times of difficulty is this, that God sees and God cares for you in your difficulty. Verse 10, God sees you and God cares for you in the midst of your difficulty. Verse 10, He rescued us from so great a peril of death and will rescue us. Early into verse 9, in God who raises the dead, and he rescues him, so it's a great peril of death. Again, Paul knew that God would safely bring him through the trials and tribulations he faced until it was time for him to go to heaven. Paul trusted that, look, God has ordained a set of time for me to die and go to heaven, and whatever trial he's gonna put me through, I know he will carry me through unless that's the trial he uses to bring me to glory. Again, for Paul, that was his mindset, thinking that if God, who he placed his confidence in, again for us, we place our confidence in God, who is powerful enough, the phrase there, excuse me, verse 9, who raises the dead, if God's powerful enough to raise Christ back from the dead or raise others back from the dead, eventually raise us back from the dead, if God is able to do that, powerful enough to do that, God can help me through my troubles and my trials now in this life. That there's no issue, no trial, no suffering that God is not able to rescue us from in his sovereign plan. that God sees us and God cares about us in that way, that he is faithful to come to our aid. God's faithful to come to the aid of his people. Lamentations chapter three, you can just listen as I read. Verse 21, that the loving kindness of Yahweh indeed never ceases. His compassions never fail. Verse 23, they are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness. 2 Peter 2.9, that the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trial. In that context, Peter's not saying God will rescue us from every hardship. Again, this is where many people mistake this and say God will remove believers from all hardship. And so if you are facing hardship, something's wrong with you. But God is saying ultimately He will remove us from all the different hardships in life. That He will spare us from the ultimate pain of judgment that we all deserve because Christ has taken that judgment for us. that in some sense God has rescued us from that divine justice, that divine judgment that we all deserve, that Christ bore on the cross as we sing about. And God will at times rescue us from the physical trials and the earthly trials that we face. But in the midst of those, he will continue to help us in the midst of those difficulties, in the midst of those trials, in the midst of the suffering, in the midst of the pain, to not always cave into those temptations and sin. And ultimately, God will spare us from the judgment that will come upon the world. But in the meantime, God at times removes us from the difficulty, but God always will give us the help we need in the midst of the trials, in the midst of the tragedies, in the midst of the sufferings, to trust Him and to love Him and to honor Him. And trusting in His good care for His people, trusting that no matter what we face, God has a plan, that God is there and God is good. Well fifth, fifth reminder, excuse me, fifth reminder is that true hope is only found in God. Verse 10, true hope is only found in God. Verse 10 again, He rescues from so great a peril of death and He will rescue us. He on whom we have set our hope. This is one word in the Greek. One word in the Greek, and it means to have a firm, again, confidence or trust in something. As I said earlier, again, we can, when we hope in a kind of a worldly sense of maybe a life without trials or a life of ease, that can lead to despair among many other sort of struggles. But a hope in God, even in the midst of difficulty and pain, can still bring joy and peace. and confidence and hope. And why? Why in the midst of suffering and pain can we still have times of hope and joy and peace? It's because God is faithful, as we just saw. God is faithful, God is good, and God is the same yesterday, today, and forever. God has not forgotten his promises. Hope is built upon the promises of God, and God has not failed. Because we celebrate Christmas, there's 300 some prophecies of Christ's first coming, and there's many more of his second coming. Those have not yet been fulfilled, but we know that they will. Because God keeps his word, God keeps his promises. God keeps his promises to you here and now, as believers on this journey into heaven now. and we can trust in what his word says he will do. Some of the promises that God has given to us in his word, Philippians 1.6 says that God will begin, or he will complete the work he began in us, that as God saves us, he will sanctify us until the end, he will keep us, he will help us to continue on. Another promise that we see in God's word in Philippians 1.29 is that suffering is normal. Again, suffering is normal. Suffering for Christ is normal. That's a promise. God promises that if you love Jesus, you will suffer. You will be persecuted. That's a promise. And so when we're suffering, we can be joyful knowing this is what God has promised will happen to me. In 2 Corinthians 12, 9, that no matter what we're going through, God says, my grace is enough for you. My grace is sufficient for you. Psalm 46, 1, God says, I'm with you. I'm near you. In your trials, in your difficulties, in your joys, good times and bad, I'm with you, I'm near you. Psalm 19 and Psalm 119, the promise that God's word is sufficient or enough to guide us through all of life's trials, no matter what they may be. Not to mention all the different promises I mentioned earlier of eternity with no more pain, death, suffering, trials, conflict, strife, or whatever. Those promises have yet to come to pass, but once Christ comes, those will be fulfilled. And our hope is not in this life, but our hope ultimately is in Christ's return and the fulfillment of those promises. That one day he will set up his earthly kingdom and right all wrongs and that the pain in this life will be gone. The suffering that Paul and that Job and that you and others experience will no longer be a normal thing. But hope that one day this difficult life will be gone. Hope that one day when Christ returns, I mean, unimaginable joy. But we hope now, we can have hope now in this life as we look forward to what God will do in the future and how he is sanctifying us through those different situations. I think John Bunyan illustrates this really well in his book, The Pilgrim's Progress. If you haven't read it, I'd commend it to you this year, 2025. Read The Pilgrim's Progress. You will be all the better for it. But in this allegory of the main character, Krishna, on his way to the celestial city, which is heaven, him and his companion, Hopeful, interestingly enough, find themselves in the dungeon of the giant despair, the dungeon of Doubting Castle. Giant despair, Doubting Castle. I wonder what verses Bunyan was thinking of. Probably this among others. But in this dungeon, they are tormented day and night. Christian hopeful, they're not able to rest, they get no sleep, they get no food, very little food, no water. Christian is eventually, he says, I'm ready to die and I want to take my own life. And yet hopeful though, corrects Christian, reminds him of the goodness of God, reminds him of the promises of God, reminds him of who God is. And then as you familiar with the story, Christian then all of a sudden perks up and says, oh wow, I remember I have a key in my pocket, near my heart called promise that unlocks every door in Doubting Castle. He uses this key to free himself from the giant despair and back onto the journey to the celestial city. I think what Bunny is trying to show us here is illustrated from what Paul is saying, that at times we are in seasons of sorrow. At times we're in seasons of despair. But even in those moments, we have to put on correct thinking. We have to put on right believing about God and who he is and what he is doing. that even in Paul's despair in these verses, we see that he is thinking rightly, that God did this for a purpose. God did this, he designed this for me to trust in him and not in me. For us to trust in what God is doing through me, not maybe just because of who I am. At times, you may struggle with hopelessness not because you don't know the Bible, but because you're not practically applying the hope and the promises of Scripture to your everyday life. And maybe you are hopeless at times because you don't know the Bible very well, which is why we commend that Bible reading plans to you, which are on our website. You can talk to myself or Jill or Colby or Richard if you need a Bible or need some more ideas on how to read the Bible this next year. But if you don't know the Bible, then you're not really gonna know how to really be putting on right thinking and right believing about who God is and what he's saying in the midst of great difficulties, to not give in to the total despair of our lives. Again, we may be placing hope in a person changing, in our lives changing, in a job, in a relationship or in a variety of other things, but they will never satisfy. because they will ultimately always fail us. But as we hope in the Lord, as we hope in God, we believe that he is at work transforming us, at work in us. Again, we hope in God not based upon our feelings and our emotions, but in spite of them oftentimes. That we trust in God no matter how we feel, no matter what our situation is, no matter what we can see or what we can even feel. In Corinthians 4.18, Paul says, we don't look to the things which are seen, we look to the things which are unseen. Often we place our confidence and hope in things that we can touch, feel, and grasp. Because there's, in our mind, we think there's some security to that. But really, these things are insecure. Because we place our hope and our confidence in things that are unseen, eternal, heavenly. We hope in God, ultimately, because of the future promises He has for us. And that allows us then to faithfully obey His commands now, trusting that He will ultimately do what He says He will do. Just as the fathers and the prophets in Hebrews 11 trusted in God, even though they didn't see the promises fulfilled of the coming Messiah. They didn't see that. They didn't see the promised land. They didn't see the promises that God gave to them of what He will do through them. but they still trusted in God and put their faith in God and their hope and their confidence in God and not in themselves. And the same is often true for us. Like Job, he didn't know what God was doing. For us, we might not know what God is doing in our trials or why he's doing these various different things. We might not see how God may come to our aid or how he might fulfill these promises he's given to us in his word, but we know that he will. We can trust that he will and that one day all of these promises will come to full fruition. Well, sixth and last reminder to put on, a reminder that we really need to have hope in the midst of difficult times is that we need one another's help and prayers in our trials. We need one another in our trials. We need each other's prayers. Verse 11. The gracious gift is the prayer. The gift of prayer. The gift of God's comfort and help through the prayers of His people, through the care of His people. In suffering, we need the church. We need each other. We don't do this alone. We need one another. We need each other praying for us, which is why, again, we have corporate prayer, and other times we pray for each other. We don't need this because God can't do something without us asking or praying. It's not like God's up in heaven waiting for us to pray, for God to be aware of something or to act. But God uses means. God is sovereign over what he will do. God is in control of what he will do, yet he uses means, and one of those is he's commanding us to pray, so we pray. We pray to him on behalf of ourselves and on the behalf of other people. To intercede, that God would intercede on behalf of other people. Paul says in Philippians 119, for I know that this, meaning his jail sentence in Philippians, or in Rome when he wrote to the church in Philippi, that this will turn out for my salvation and through your prayers and the provision of the Spirit of Christ. Now he's not saying salvation in the sense of being like saved from hell, but being saved from jail. He was released. Romans 15 and 30. We'll get there eventually in another couple of years. Paul says to strive together with me in your prayers to God for me or on my behalf. Paul often tells the church he's writing to, look pray for me. I need your help. I need your prayers. What does this have to do with hope and comfort? Again, because we know that other people in the church are praying for us and praying on our behalf to the Father. And that we are doing the same for other people in times of trial and difficulty. We can see how maybe God may answer their prayers and we can have hope that if God hears their prayers, if God hears our prayers and God heard the prayers of us in the past, that he will continue to hear us. He'll continue to come to our aid. He will incline his ear to us and hear us and hear others as they pray for us and as we pray for one another. As we pray that others can be freed from trials, as we pray that others will be sanctified through the trials. They would trust God in the midst of the trials, that we need each other no matter how small or how big the trial may seem. That we can trust that God will hear our prayers as we commit to the one another, as we're praying for one another. Again, as we just saw in these few brief verses, again, hope, It's a steadfast confidence in God and in his promises as we face various trials and sufferings of this life and place our hope in the God of all comfort. That we hope in what our good and faithful Lord is doing through us in the midst of the trial. That we hope in God as he begins to transform us from the inside out in the midst of whatever we are facing. That we hope that one day Christ will return and set up his kingdom where the ultimate rest, the ultimate peace was found In Corinthians 1 verse 3, Take comfort, friends. Take comfort that the Lord is at work and that the God who calls himself the God of all comfort will come to your aid. will comfort you as you hope in Him, as you trust in Him, as you cling to Him, as you cry out to Him, as you pray to Him, no matter what you are facing. Whether like Job or like Paul, I'm at the end of myself. For the purpose of maybe being flat on your back and saying, God, I need to trust in you. Help me to trust in you even more. Again, may this coming year be one in which we hope in Christ and His promises all the more. Let's pray. Father, we thank You for Your Word. Again, we thank You for Your promises. We thank You for the hope that we have in Christ, not in ourselves, not in this world, but with the hope we have Christ in Your Word, in Your coming. Whether You are with us, You are near us, Father, that you are Christ, that you are coming again one day. We thank you for these good and helpful words. May we cling to you and trust in you this year. We pray all this in the name of Christ. Amen.