Open the Bible

Colin Smith: Our hope is from God. It is through Christ. And this hope is given. It is not earned.

Steve Hiller: Welcome to Open the Bible with Pastor Colin Smith. I'm Steve Hiller, glad you're with us today. And Colin, I'm glad that we're going to spend some time looking at where hope actually comes from because I think sometimes we do think that we ought to be able to earn it.

Colin Smith: Yeah, I think that's right. It's actually the default position of the human heart that we feel that if we do the things that God has commanded us to do, that that will be a basis on which we would have hope before him. And of course the problem is it never works. We never get to a place where we really do have lively hope or confidence before God on the basis of the lives that we've lived.

And Jesus speaks very clearly about this. He says in John 5 and verse 45, "Do not think that I will accuse you to the Father; there is one who accuses you: Moses, on whom you have set your hope." So here are people who are setting their hope on living a good enough life for God. And Jesus says, no, that's actually going to lead not to your vindication but actually to your condemnation. It's the law that's going to accuse you.

So here's the wonderful truth that we're heading to in the program today, that hope does not come through our fulfilling of the law. Hope comes to us through the grace that we find in the Lord Jesus Christ. And that is a wonderfully renewing truth.

Steve Hiller: Well, let's continue to look at that truth. We're in 2nd Thessalonians today, chapter 2, as we begin our message: "Hope by Grace." Here is Pastor Colin.

We're asking the question: "How can I grow in hope?" And we saw very simply first that hope comes from God. We looked at the experience of David at a low point in his life. He was dried out, he was downcast, he was in turmoil. But he challenged his darkest thoughts: "Why are you cast down, O my soul? Hope in God."

We saw that there is hope in God for every person and that you find that hope through a relationship with Him. David could speak about God as "my rock," "my salvation," "my God." So that led us to the question: "Well now, how do you come to such a relationship with God in which you find hope in Him?" And we saw the answer of the Bible to that question is through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

We looked last time at Colossians chapter 1 and verse 27: "Christ in you, the hope of glory." When you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, He Himself comes to dwell in you by the Holy Spirit. Jesus said to His disciples, "The Holy Spirit will dwell with you, and He will be in you." Christ in you. And it's the presence of Christ by the Holy Spirit in a person's life that makes a whole new life possible.

We saw that the Holy Spirit is more than a mentor coming alongside and telling you what you need to do. He actually works in you, renewing your mind, shaping your will, changing you from the inside out. And this is why there is hope for every person in Jesus Christ. Christ in you is what makes the Christian life possible. You're going to become everything that God created and redeemed you to be, and it's going to happen through Christ in you.

So we've learned that hope comes from God, it is through Christ, and now today I want us to see it is by grace. Look with me if you would at 2nd Thessalonians chapter 2 and verse 16: "Now may our Lord Jesus Christ Himself, and God our Father, who loved us and gave us eternal comfort and good hope through grace, may He comfort your hearts and establish them in every good work and word."

Now notice that the apostle is speaking here about hope. He speaks about eternal comfort and good hope. And he tells us what we've already seen: that hope comes from God and it comes through Christ. And notice the relationship: hope comes from "our Lord Jesus Christ" and "God our Father."

But there's something more here. The apostle tells us that this hope comes from God our Father through our Lord Jesus Christ and it comes to us by grace. Now, what is grace? Well, notice the word "gave" in this verse. Our Lord Jesus Christ and God our Father, who loved us, gave us good hope. So our hope is from God, it is through Christ, and this hope is given. It is not earned, and that is the meaning of this wonderful word grace.

Now, I want us to see today that hope does not come from the law. It's not earned by what we do. It does come through grace and in the light of that, we're going to look at some further strategies as to how we can grow in hope.

First then, hope does not come by the law. Now I'd like to look at one other verse of Scripture today and that's from John 5 and verse 45. Look at these words of the Lord Jesus: "Do not think," He says, "that I will accuse you to the Father. There is one who accuses you: Moses, on whom you have set your hope."

Now notice that Jesus is speaking here to people who have set their hope on Moses. Moses, of course, received the law from God. He was the one who gave God's laws to God's people. And so to set your hope on Moses, as these people to whom Jesus speaks here were doing, is to base your hope on obedience to God's law.

So here were people who had set their hope on a life of obedience. They believed that hope comes from God and they knew that God had given the commandments, and so they had concluded that they could have hope in God if they did what God said. "If I live a good life, well, God will see what I have done, and He will then welcome me into the joy of His presence." That was their hope.

Now notice what Jesus says here: "You have set your hope on Moses." But here's the problem: Moses is not your friend. Moses is your accuser. "There is one who accuses you: Moses, on whom you have set your hope." Now, why would Moses have been their accuser? Well, because none of these people and none of us have kept the law that Moses gave.

Take the tenth commandment as an example: "You shall not covet." There's part of the law given by God through Moses. And you see the good in this command: "You shall not covet." And so you try to keep it. You say, "Well, I must not covet." And what that means is that I must learn to be content, I must be grateful for what I have, I must live within my means.

It also means, of course, that I must find as much joy in what God gives to others as I would if God had given these same things to me. But now think about it: can any of us honestly say that when you see other people's gifts and opportunities and friends and looks and skills and homes and possessions, can any of us honestly say that we never covet, not even a tiny little bit?

No. If you set your hope on Moses, on obedience to the law of God, if that's your hope, you are in for a rude awakening. That's the point of what Jesus is saying. The law's not on your side. It's not your friend. It's your accuser. So hope does not come by the law.

Now, does anyone set their hope on Moses today? Yes, absolutely. Millions do. And the place you're most likely to find many of them is in church. You see, it is possible to believe that hope comes from God, and to believe that it comes through the Lord Jesus Christ, and then to set your hope on living a good enough Christian life.

And here's what you will experience if you set your hope on obedience to God's law. What you'll find is that when you're doing well, you'll think, "I'm really doing rather well," and you'll immediately be tempted to pride. And when you do badly, well, then immediately you're going to find that you're tempted to despair.

And you're going to find that you will live under the constant cloud of haunting questions that never go away: "Have I done enough? Have I prayed enough? Have I been a good enough mother or father or son or daughter or husband or wife or brother or sister? Have I been a good enough neighbor? Have I been a good enough friend? Have I been a really good witness? Have I been a good example? Is my faith good enough? Do I love God enough? Have I been a good enough Christian?"

And you know, to all of these haunting questions, your conscience will whisper the answer: "No. No. No." If you set your hope on fulfilling all that God has called you to do, you will not have any hope at all. Your conscience will tell you that there's more that you could have done, that there's more that you should have done. You will never feel that you have done enough. And in the end, the law on which you set your hope will condemn you. Hope does not come through the law.

But God gives hope by grace. That's the central point of the text that we're looking at today. And you remember at the beginning of John's Gospel, John says, "The law came through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ." And he says, "We have all received grace upon grace from His fullness."

Steve Hiller: You're listening to Open the Bible with Pastor Colin Smith and a message called "Hope by Grace." Spending much of our time looking at how hope does not come from the law. As we continue the message in just a moment, we'll see how hope does come by grace, so stay with us.

Our message is part of a larger series called "Grow in Hope." And if you've missed any of the broadcasts in our series, come and listen online at OpenTheBible.org. There you can stream the program, or you can download an MP3 for free.

You can also listen through the Open the Bible app, or you can order a copy of the entire series on CD. Ask about "Grow in Hope" when you call us at 1-877-OPEN-365. That's 1-877-673-6365. Or you'll find ordering information online at OpenTheBible.org. If you did join us late, we're in the book of 2nd Thessalonians, chapter 2, so grab your Bible, meet us there as we get back to the message. Here is Pastor Colin.

Colin Smith: So we're going to focus on grace in our text today. Let's look at it more closely together. Hope does not come from the law. Hope comes by grace. See this in 2nd Thessalonians in chapter 2 and verse 16: "Now may our Lord Jesus Christ Himself, and God our Father, who loved us and gave us eternal comfort and good hope through grace." Hope through grace.

And grace is God giving what we don't deserve. And hope comes through grace. Now, do you see that this cuts right through all these haunting questions about how well you've performed in the Christian life? "How much have you prayed? How well have you lived? How faithful have you been?" Grace simply sets all these questions aside because your hope is not based on you measuring up.

Hope comes through grace. That is, it is God giving you what you don't deserve. He gave us eternal comfort and good hope through grace. Hope comes from God, through Christ, and it's by grace.

Now, when I think about grace, the first thing that comes to my mind is that Jesus died for our sins. Our sins were laid on Jesus. He gave His life as a sacrifice so that our sins would not be charged against us. But you know, there are two parts to what God has done for us in Christ. Two dimensions, as it were, of God's grace.

God on the one side has taken away our sins and on the other He has credited to us Christ's righteousness. You can think about God's grace to you being like a robe that is draped around you. You might find it helpful actually if you put on a robe in the morning, when you put that robe on to think about how it represents the two sides of God's grace.

Two sides of the robe are folded over you. On the one side, God folds you in the forgiveness that is yours through the death of Jesus. And on the other side, God folds you in the righteousness that is yours through the life of Jesus. Jesus died the death that we should have died, and Jesus lived the life that we should have lived. In other words, Christ did what we have failed to do.

And He lived His life for us. So when our hearts condemn us in regards to what we have failed to do, we find hope not only in resting in the death of Jesus for us, but also resting in the life of Jesus for us. The death He died and the life He lived.

I've been reading a book by Andrew Bonar in which he shows how to apply the perfect life of Jesus to your conscience when you find yourself very troubled by a sense of your own failure. Now I'm putting this in my own words, but I'm drawing from Bonar's examples. Did you waste your youth? Jesus Christ grew in wisdom and in favor with God and man. See, He lived the perfect youth and childhood for you. He lived the youth and childhood that you didn't. So don't let your wasted youth or childhood lead you to despair.

Have you neglected prayer? Christ rose early in the morning to pray, and He prayed through the night. Bonar says, "This God will impute to me as if I had prayed every day and every night." See, God by His grace and mercy will regard you as if you had prayed as much as Jesus Himself did. Have you sought your own will rather than the will of God? Do you perhaps look back even years ago to a decision you made? You felt God was calling you to something costly and you weren't up for it, you pulled back.

And years later you look back on that decision and the different course that your life took and you have a profound feeling that you let Him down. You didn't have the courage to do what you sensed He was calling you to do, and you live with a great sense of regret. Have you sought your own will rather than the will of God?

Jesus said to the Father, "Not my will, but yours be done." He gave what you withheld, and God regards you in His grace and mercy in Jesus Christ as if you had been as willing to pursue that costly call as Jesus Himself was. Examples could be multiplied, and you can work this out for yourself. Have you been worldly? Jesus was not of this world. Have you been double-minded? Jesus was always single and resolute in His purpose. All these things He did.

He lived the life that we have failed to live and He lived that life for us. And then Bonar, because he was a pastor, makes this application: "Have I been a good enough pastor?" You see, the questions of whether we've been good enough at what God has called us to do go everywhere. And where is a pastor or a missionary or a Christian leader to go when we feel our own failings?

Well, we find hope not in what we are doing for Christ, but in what He has done for us. He is the Good Shepherd that no one else has ever managed to be. And what He did, He did for us. Bonar says, "His Shepherd's heart and work cover over ours." Do you see this beautiful truth? Jesus is everything that we have failed to be. He has done everything that we have failed to do. And God counts all that the Lord Jesus Christ has done for us as if it had been done by us.

Steve Hiller: A powerful look at hope today. We've seen how hope does not come by the law, how it does come by grace, and next time we're going to look at how to grow in hope. Make sure you join us. Of course, if you ever miss a program on the radio, you can always listen online. Our website is OpenTheBible.org. There you can stream the program or download an MP3 for free. Again, that's at OpenTheBible.org.

Another way to listen is through the Open the Bible app. You'll find the app for free at your app store and it's a great way to listen on demand whenever it fits your schedule. And speaking of listening as it fits your schedule, if you've not checked out the newest podcast from Open the Bible entitled "Hike Through the Bible," I'd encourage you to look for that wherever you get your podcasts.

You can join Pastor Colin and some of his friends as they take a journey all the way through the Bible story. We're looking at 50 chapters of the Bible and 50 key themes or topics of the Bible that will show you how the Bible is one story from Genesis to Revelation and how it all points to Jesus. So again, look for "Hike Through the Bible" wherever you get your podcasts, and you can find the video version at our YouTube channel. Simply look for "Hike Through the Bible."

Well, we're able to bring you Pastor Colin's teaching because of your financial generosity. We really are a listener-supported ministry, and as you give a gift of any amount this month, we'd love to send you a copy of Pastor Colin's brand new 30-day devotional. It's called "Grow in Hope." And Colin, why did you write this book?

Colin Smith: Well, "Grow in Hope" is the second of three books that we are putting out from Open the Bible this year: "Grow in Faith," "Grow in Hope," and "Grow in Love." And the reason for all three is that as Paul says in 1st Corinthians and chapter 13, everything else will pass away. I mean, that's quite a statement, isn't it? Everything else will pass away, but these things will remain: faith, hope, and love.

So these are things of supreme importance. I'm absolutely persuaded that our greatest need is to have a stronger faith, to have a more certain hope, and to be renewed in a resilient kind of love. You know, if that happens in the lives of Christian believers, some very, very good things will follow.

Steve Hiller: Well, we'd love to send you a copy of this book. Again, it's called "Grow in Hope," and it's our thank you for your financial support this month. You can give at our website, OpenTheBible.org, or when you call 1-877-OPEN-365. That's 1-877-673-6365. And again, the website is OpenTheBible.org. For Pastor Colin Smith, I'm Steve Hiller. Thanks for listening, and I hope you'll join us next time.

This program is a listener-supported production of Open the Bible.

A single conversation can change your life, and that happened to me at a conference many years ago. Over lunch, I sat next to a pioneer missionary. He told me the story of how he'd made contact with an unreached tribal group in Northern Thailand. How the tribal chief had invited him to make his home there.

How he built his own home and then learned the tribal language and began to serve these people. It was jaw-dropping stuff. At one point in the conversation, I asked him, "Where do you begin in explaining the gospel to people who don't even know who God is?" And he said, "We tell them the Bible story."

Now, I'm convinced that we need to learn from the approach of pioneer missionaries in reaching lost people today. And that's why I wrote "Fly Through the Bible." "Fly Through the Bible" is short, simple, and shareable. It's a place where someone in your life can begin. So who is there in your life who needs to know the God of the Bible and might be willing to open the Bible with you if you ask them? For more information, visit OpenTheBible.org/fly. That's OpenTheBible.org/fly.