Grab hope!

"...so that through two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, 

we who have fled for refuge 

might have strong encouragement to 

seize the hope set before us.”

Hebrews 6:17-18

We live as children of the promise.  

God says here that His promises are unchangeable.  We who flee for refuge ...

Who flees for refuge?  Hurricane victims.  Why because they feel they're in danger and they could die!  So they flee for refuge!  In a bomb shelter or behind a strong stone wall or maybe in just the next safe looking place they can desperately find!  Here's what they don't do: nothing.  If a hurricane happened right now, you would want your family and yourself to survive.  It's our human instinct to survive.  To live.  Because we were made to have Life.  

So this verse is for the children of the promise of God, that eternal life would be ours, that we would have Life.  And we flee to God for refuge when things look threatening, when our image is at stake, our money is running low, our addictions rage in us, we feel the anxiety the worry the doubt and the fear because it doesn't look good for us- it's like a hurricane and we will do something, either we will flee to God for refuge or away from Him (towards death).  

So what happens when we flee to God?  Does it mean we are perfect law keepers?  Does it mean we become morally perfect?  Do we become absolutely perfect and saintly?  No, it says we seize or grab the hope set before us!  Like a hurricane victim might grab onto a pole or a person to keep from losing it!  We grab onto hope not so much to be perfect but to keep from losing it!  We can lose hope, but we grab it when the threats happen and we seize it with everything we got!  Whether that's before, during, or after a fall into sin.  The hope that Jesus really did save us, He really does love us, and He really is a good God who has Life for us.  

Hope means...even though things look bad, I have this hope as an anchor for my soul that Jesus will carry me through to the end somehow.  When we believe in Jesus we believe that He is our hope.  This Jesus is the only One who can save morally corrupt people like you and me.  

By faith.  

How? I'm not good.  

By faith.

But....I sin and I like it.

By faith. 

But I keep sinning and I feel like I will never stop.

By faith.

I don't think I can change.

By faith. 

I'm not good, but Jesus has made me good when He wiped out my sins and gave me His life of perfect obedience to God.

I still find that my desire to sin is so great, but I know that God can change my desires, so what is God doing now as I continue to sin?  

If I never stop this sin I desire so much, what might God be showing me through it for all the times I go back to it?  

If I never change in this regard to sin, where is the actual change happening?

By faith we live to believe that Jesus finished it, and when the hurricanes hit us we fight the fight of faith by running to God for refuge not away from Him.

He promised His heirs Life, and nobody can break God's promise.  Nobody and no hurricane, nothing can separate us from God.  We are coheirs with Christ.  When the Hurricane hits, anger, addiction, greed, self-pity, pride, bitterness, depression, loneliness, or doubt/worry/ and fear....my brother and sister we must run as fast as we can toward God and seize hope with everything we have!  Seize it because we will lose it if we don't!  Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a fulfilled desire is a tree of life! (Proverbs 13:12).  Grab hope in God!  And your desires at the deepest level will be fulfilled, the desire for a perfect life, (not the perfect life from your little brain but the greater perfect life from God's brain, the desire that you don't know you have until you experience it and then are amazed at how awesome it is!).  Otherwise you will grab something else.  

Because God wanted to show His unchangeable purpose even more clearly to the heirs of the promise, 

He guaranteed it with an oath, 

so that through two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to seize the hope set before us.”

Hebrews 6:17-18

Run.  To God.  Grab that hope, and hang on.  

Fellow heir of God's promises,

Jmegrey