Steadfastness of Hope
This is a transcript. It may contain small inaccuracies.
After giving general greetings to the church there in Thessaloniki, reminding these people, these precious saints, that it was Paul and his companions who were sending this letter, sending the greetings to them in this general apostolic salutation, we have then in verse 2 through 10 what is basically an inscription of thanksgiving to God for particular characteristics which mark the people in the church there in that city at Thessaloniki. And in giving to us these characteristics which caused his own heart to rejoice, the Apostle is giving to us several very valuable things which are really the fruits of the grace of God. He says in verse 2, "We give thanks to God always for all of you, making mention of you in our prayers, remembering without ceasing." And then he mentions those things which caused his heart when he came into the presence of God to rejoice and to give thanks to God.
Now Paul did not rejoice as we saw together and give thanks primarily for those things which are common to all men in the common grace of God, but when he wrote to a church he was giving thanks to God for those particular things which were distinguishing marks of the special grace of God, in the saving power of God, operating in the lives of those precious people. And so we have those things in verses 2 through 10 which are in a peculiar way the fruits of grace, and in giving them to us we also have a standard by which we as a church can evaluate ourselves, a standard and a pattern to follow. We have a goal toward which we should press on by the grace of God to cultivate those fruits of grace in our lives individually and corporately.
Now at the very top of the list of the fruits of grace we have in verse 3 what we have called the three crown jewels in the diadem of Christian virtue. "Remembering without seizing your work of faith," that's the first one, and number two, "labor of love," and the third one, "steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ before our God and Father." And we've studied the first one already, the phrase "the work of faith," and the fact that Paul gave thanks to God that here you have people who had a faith that was not mere idle speculative faith, but it was an operative faith that really compelled them to work. And so whatever you find people who have faith that works, well, it is a fitting reason to give thanks to God for. And so, He thanks God that their work was in no way an attempt to earn the grace of God, but that it flowed out of a principle of faith.
And so wherever you find the people who have faith and works and they have them both in their proper relationship, then you have no doubt a wonderful indication that the grace of God is truly operative at work. For left to himself, you remember, man will either have a work that is not a work of faith, rather is a dead work hoping to commend himself to God by his own doing, on his own merit, which is always, always a catastrophe, or he will have a dead faith, a faith that is merely notional in the head, it resides in the head and it accepts certain facts, but it is not a living principle that produces works of holiness and obedience. But when you have both work, faith joined together, and they're always joined together whenever God does a work of grace, for "we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works," then you have a cause to give thanks to God.
We then looked at the phrase "labor of love." Paul was grateful to God that these people had a love to the triune God - Father, Son, and Holy Spirit - that was more than a love that caused them to sit in a rocking chair and think warm thoughts about some higher deity. They had a love for the triune God that made them put their shoulder to the yoke of Christian duty or responsibility and produced in them labor, and you remember this word labor, kopos, is the word that is connected with the English word really travail, wearisome effort. This word means sacrificial, arduous, and sometimes even painful work. Paul gives thanks to God that these people had a love to God that, again, was not merely an emotional thing, but it was one that captivated their whole being, the entirety of their whole being, and brought them under the yoke of Christian duty, which is a delight, a delightful duty, not duty out of obligation, kicking and screaming, but it's from the heart.
Well, tonight we come to the third of these virtues that is mentioned in verse 3 in the LSB, translated as steadfastness of hope. Other translation has it patience of hope. So Paul not only gave thanks for their work of faith and labor of love, but here he says also for their steadfastness of hope. Now, as we look at this and consider this, this evening, keep in mind the word steadfastness is not describing the hope, but rather He's speaking of the steadfastness which had its roots in hope. That's important.
Now, notice the parallel through all of these three phrases. They had a faith that produced works. They had a work that was rooted in faith. They had a love that produced labor. They had labor that was rooted in love. And now he says they had a steadfastness which was the fruit of hope and a hope that produced this steadfastness. Now, for us to understand why this should be a cause of rejoicing in the heart of the Apostle Paul, we must first of all understand what the words mean. That's a basic level. He said we give thanks for your steadfastness of hope.
Now, let's define the words. Well, first of all, what does this word hope mean? Hope. For steadfastness, whatever it is, was the baby, the child of hope. Hope was the mother. Steadfastness was the child. Hope was the tree. Steadfastness was the fruit. So let's begin with the mother. Let's begin with the tree. Let's begin with that which gives birth to the other.
Now, when we use the word hope in our everyday conversations and today's culture, we usually use it in the sense of a strong wish, a strong desire. We say, well, I hope to take my vacation, go to Europe, or I hope I will graduate from high school next year. It's shaky, but I hope - I hope it's not shaky for you if you're in high school. Now, when you say you hope, what you're really saying is I have a strong desire. I have an earnest wish that such and such will come to pass. I hope my favorite sports team wins. Strong desire.
Now, we usually use the word hope in terms of the strong wish and earnest desire, but that is not the way the word hope, elpis, the Greek word, is used in the biblical context. There are in few instances cases where this word is used in terms of a strong wish, but the overwhelming, overriding use of the word elpis in the scripture is poles apart from a mere wish or mere desire. This word hope, elpis, in the scripture means nothing less than, if you want to give it a definition, a good definition, it would be something like this: a joyful and confident expectation of a promised blessing. A joyful and a confident expectation of a promised blessing.
Now, there are many illustrations of its use in this sense in the scripture, but let me take a few that are representative this evening that might help us understand what Paul meant when he said steadfastness of hope. Turn with me to Romans 5, Romans 5, where we find the same word used. Look at verses 1 and 2: "Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have obtained our introduction by faith into this grace in which we stand," — now notice, — "and we boast in hope," —elpis,— "of the glory of God, in hope of the glory of God." Paul says not only do we have the present tense blessing of being justified and having peace with God and access to God, but He said we boast in hope of the glory of God.
Now, follow closely. Put the word in there, wishful desire. Take the word hope and put wishful desire. "We boast in the wishful desire of the glory of God." How does that sound? Foolish, right? That's the worst kind of torment in all the world. A man who knows that God is holy and knows that he himself is a wretched sinner, who has reason to believe that right now by the grace of God his sins are forgiven through the work of God, through the mighty work of God in justification, yet to think that all of those sins might yet rise up against him and condemn him and press him down to the deepest part of hell, who can only say, well, I wish, I sure hope that one day I'll be with Him and share His glory, that's the most intense kind of misery, isn't it?
But now define it this way, verse 2: "through whom also we have obtained our introduction by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we boast in the joyful and confident expectation of the glory of God." Right? Now, makes sense, and there's encouragement. He said we not only have this present blessing, that the condemnation of our sins is past, done away with, we have present access, yes, praise God, but above and beyond all of this we have, oh, we have a joyful and confident expectation that we shall gaze upon the glory of God as His redeemed, and we shall share that very glory. Amen.
Now the word hope makes sense. Since we're in Romans, turn to chapter 15 and verse 13. You'll find the same word used in another setting. Romans 15 verse 13: "Now may the God of” — elpis,— “hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you will abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit." Can you imagine Paul trying, praying that the church would be full of people who abounded in this kind of attitude? Well, I sure hope that I'll be saved. I really sure wish, desire, hope that I belong to the Lord. I don't know, I'm not sure, and you're living every day in torment, I'm sure. Can you imagine him praying that the church would be full of people like that?
What Paul is praying is this: that the believers may abound in hope, not just wishful desire, but in joyful, confident expectation through the power of the Holy Spirit. This joyful, confident expectation of promised blessing is something that the Holy Spirit Himself produces in the heart of the believer. You find a similar reference in Galatians 5:5, where Paul speaks of the hope of righteousness by faith, in Ephesians 1:18, where He prays that believers may know what is the hope of their calling, 1 Thessalonians he says, "as a helmet put on the hope of salvation," Titus 1:2, Paul speaks "in hope of eternal life," and then the classic usage, and I want you to look at this, this one with me please, 1 John chapter 3, this is incredible, 1 John chapter 3, where the word know, to know, and this is incredible, is used as a synonym of the word hope.
1 John 3 verse 1: "See how great a love the Father has given to us, that we would be called children of God; and we are. For this reason the world does not know us, because it did not know Him. Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not been manifested as yet what we will be. We know,”— “we know,” he says, we're assured, this is absolutely certain, airtight certain, no wiggle room. — “We know that when He is manifested, we will be like Him," — not we may be like Him,— "we will be like Him, because we will see Him just as He is. And everyone who has this,"— what,— “elpis, fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure." You get it? We know this hope. We know this hope.
So you see, the word hope is defined as a certain knowledge of future blessing promised by God Himself. There's no ifs and buts. So here you have a very simple and yet authoritative definition given by the Holy Spirit Himself, where John says that this knowledge that we will be like Him is called the hope of the believer. So whenever you come across this word in the New Testament, don't put the 21st century meaning on the word hope, but rather the biblical meaning on it: joyful, confident expectation of promised blessing. Faithful, He will be. Faithful He has been, and faithful He will be.
Now, since most of these blessings that are out there in the future will be realized at the coming of the Lord, it's no strange thing that His coming should be called what? Titus 2 verse 13: "the blessed hope and the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior." For you see, all that is future now, salvation, almost all of it, will become ours in experience when our Lord Jesus comes from the right hand of the Father to take us to Himself, that we might be with Him forever.
And so when Paul thinks of the people there, the believers there in that city, that the Thessaloniki, he rejoices that they demonstrated a steadfastness that was rooted in this joyful and confident expectation of promised blessing. I have to say I was surprised as I got studying this to see how much this matter of hope is an integral part of saving Christianity. In fact, Paul goes so far as to say in Romans 8 verse 24 and 25, "we are saved in hope." He said our very salvation is bound up in the concept of hope. And then he goes on to say, verse 24 and 25, he says, "but hope that is seen is not hope, for who hopes for what he already sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, with perseverance we eagerly wait for it."
Peter asserts essentially the same thing when he says, 1 Peter 1:3, "God, according to His great mercy, has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead." So much for the word hope, elpis. I hope you understand what the word hope means. You get the two different ways now I used it, right? When I say I hope you understand, I'm using in terms of our present use. I hope you understand what the word hope means: confident, joyful expectation.
Well, let's look at the word steadfastness. What does this word mean, steadfastness? We're familiar with this word, the Greek word, hypomonēs. We've come across this word, hypomonēs, right? We've encountered that word in our studies, particularly of James, and elsewhere in Scripture. I love this word, hypomonēs. It's that Greek word made up of two words, two Greek words, hypo, the front means under, and the other, monēs, to remain. So, simply put, to remain under. To remain under.
Literally, the word means, and in the case of the etymology, really, it doesn't lead us astray. It literally means to remain under, to bear up under, to endure. So, really, the translation, patience, is too soft, because it's passive. This word is much stronger. You see, patience is what you do when the person who's supposed to give you a ride to church is 15 minutes late or 20 minutes late. Perseverance is what you exercise as a soldier when you're injured and bleeding and waiting for rescue. And you persevere. Hypomonēs is a far stronger word than patience.
It is, you're familiar, is the word we encounter in the Philippines of an Olympic weightlifter. You know, those guys who weigh too much, eat too much, they sweat too much. They go down, they pick up this bar, and they pull it above their head to their, well, on their way up to their shoulders. And, you know, they're getting ready, and they thrust it above their head with all the energy that they can muster. You have this huge amount of weight, but there's a rule. And the rule says that for it to be valid, they must actually, when they lift it up, they must remain under it for a certain period of time.
And so they stand there, and you can see them, their bodies quivering, attempting to keep that weight above their heads until the alarm has sounded, and then they've held it for the appointed amount of time. That's hypomonēs. During that time that they are under that weight, they are doing what this Greek word describes. So it means something far stronger than sitting in a boat, marking time, waiting for something to happen as you're waiting to catch some fish. Basically means endurance, perseverance, to bear up under intense difficulty, stress.
It's the word used in Matthew 24, verse 13, when our Lord says in that context of the tribulation period, at the end of the age, He says, "The one who,” - this is the word, hypomonēs, - “endures to the end.” - Bear up under to the end. - “He will be saved." The one who endures, who perseveres, the one who's steadfast to the end, that one will be saved. It's used in 1 Corinthians 13:7, describing love. "Love endures,” - hypomonēs, in its verbal form, bears up under - “all things." 2 Timothy, chapter 2, verse 10, Paul says, "For this reason I,” - hypomonēs, in a verbal form, hypomenei, that's the verb. - “For this reason I endure all things for the sake of the elect, so that they may also obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory."
Now does that mean Paul sat in jail somewhere, twiddled his thumbs, played solitaire, waiting patiently? No, it meant a day and a night in the deep, scourging, starvation, thirsting, hungering. Read 2 Corinthians 11, we see what it meant. He said, I endure, I bear up under the most intense forms of difficulty, that they may be saved. It's the word used of our Lord Jesus Christ in Hebrews 12, verse 2, where it says of Him that He “endured the cross.” He endured the cross. Did it mean just patience? What did that mean? It meant an active submission to the will of God in the midst of the most intense suffering.
So you have the word hope, joyful, confident expectation of promised blessing. Steadfastness means endurance, bearing up under stress and difficulty.
Okay, now let's put them together, right? We're assembling now. Let's put them together. Paul says, "I give thanks to God when I remember your steadfastness of hope." In other words, your ability to bear up under stress and difficulty and affliction, which was rooted in a joyful and confident expectation of promised blessing. Now that tells us something, that these people in Thessaloniki were not living on easy street.
It's hard for us to interpret 1 Thessalonians against the backdrop of our North American Christianity. Here were people who were born in the midst of conflict spiritually. Remember Acts 17 when we looked at the birth of this church? Paul had been there about two weeks when there was a riot in the town. They ran him out of town, stormed the house of the young convert who was actually hosting Paul. And then when Paul writes back to them, he says, notice in chapter 2 in verse 14 of this letter, "For you brothers became imitators of the churches of God in Christ Jesus that are in Judea. For you also suffered the same things at the hands of your own kind. For you also suffered the same things at the hands of your own countrymen, even as they did from the Jews."
What is he referring to? He's referring to persecution. That persecution that arose and scattered the believers. He said, you're in with them. You belong in the same union of the suffering. In chapter 3 he says, I was so anxious when I knew of your sufferings and wondering if perhaps these tribulations have really turned you aside, notice verse 3, "So that no one would be shaken by these afflictions. For you yourselves know that we have been destined for this. For indeed, when we were with you, we kept telling you in advance that we were going to suffer affliction just as it happened. As you know."
Paul rejoices that these people are demonstrating epimony, endurance, endurance, perseverance, rooted in hope, because He recognized this. He recognized this principle that brings us now to the heart of the message. This is the crux of the whole phrase. Here it is. Paul realized that perhaps nothing more clearly revealed either the sham or the reality of Christian profession as did suffering, tribulation, difficulty, hardship, and affliction. This becomes the laboratory in which the genuineness of the product is either revealed or its ingenuineness, its sham, is exposed and uncovered.
So as Paul thought of those infant professors of Christ there in that city and the suffering that was already their portion before he left them, his heart was filled with deep concern. And he said, I wonder, as I was forced to leave you and thinking about you now, I wondered, do you have the real thing? Were my labors in vain? Is all of this to be wood and hay and stubble? Was your apparent faith a genuine faith? Was your apparent attachment to Christ vital, saving attachment to Christ? Suffering comes along, persecution comes along, and said, I'll tell you whether it is.
And now when Timothy brings back the report that they're continuing on with God, that the suffering has only served to drive their roots deeper into Christ, He says, oh how I give thanks, not only for your work of faith, your labor of love, but your endurance, your steadfastness that is rooted in this hope, this confident expectation of future blessing. He said, I'm so glad that the trial, the persecution, the difficulty simply acted as a laboratory in which your faith has been broken down into its component parts and it's been shown to be the real deal, the real thing, genuine, authentic, dokimos, has character, proven character.
Now that leads us to another principle that is vitally joined to this. Paul saw in these believers the truth that that confident expectation of future blessing was that which produced endurance in present difficult circumstances. What gave them that endurance to face persecution? I mean, just babes in Christ, new believers. What would happen to you, beloved, if after a month, after you professed to be joined to Jesus Christ, you began really to get some serious consequences because of your faith? What would happen? What would happen to us under pressure? Like some face severe consequences in certain parts of the world, serious consequences. It ranges from here to here, from mild to extreme.
I mean, boycotted economically, lose their job and nobody will hire them. They go to buy food, no one will sell food to them. You see your starving kids and your crying, wife, what would you do? I mean, all you need to do is renounce Christ and all will be well. You'll have your job back, you have your tummy full again, your children's tummies full, you'll have your wife smiling again. What would you do? What do they do? Persecuted, ill-treated. You know what they did. They said, well, things may not be good now, but man, oh man, are we going to have glory when He comes? He's going to come back and He's going to right all wrongs. And in the light of what we'll have when He comes, be still my soul. Be still my soul. Let men despise, deride, when our Lord comes back again, all that He's promised will be ours. And in the light of that day, what's a little suffering here? What's a little heartache here?
So their endurance, you see, was fed, sustained, maintained by that confident expectation of future blessings, sustained in the present trial by feeding their souls upon the expectation of future blessings. As we will see later on in the end of the chapter, they were a second coming people. They lived here in the light of there. They lived now in the light of then. They lived on the edge of the return of Jesus. This is one of the clearest contrasts between the Christian and the worldling. The worldling is governed by the now. The now. Here and now. You know this, right? This is called what? Really, this is called the now generation. The now generation. That's the whole pitch in all of the advertisement, social media, social platform. This is the now generation. You've got to live it up now. Everything is now. Everything is live streamed. Everything is like real time.
I mean, you go on vacation. You go. It's like you have to keep even living your life. You always have to update. I woke up this morning. I had cereal. You post the cereal with the bowl and the picture and everything. The now generation. That's the mark of the world. It's a whole concern. The whole concern is now. And now takes in everything involved in time. You see people in the now generation. They're concerned enough about the future to take out insurance and make out wills. But their whole concern is bounded by the little parenthesis of time. And that's all time is, right? But a little parenthesis in the great expanse of eternity.
There is an eloquent description of this in the 17th Psalm. Please turn with me there. Where the Psalm is speaking of the wicked. Notice how he describes the wicked. Verse 14. Psalm 17. He's asking God to deliver him from the oppression of the wicked. And in that prayer he describes the wicked. Now watch this. “From men with your hand, O Yahweh. From men of the world." —Now watch this.— "Whose portion is in this life. And whose belly you fill with your treasure. They are satisfied with children and leave their excess to their infants."
Now take that phrase and write it as the descriptive phrase of our own generation. "Whose portion is in this life." "Whose portion is in this life." We're the now generation. You can live your life by the standards of a God whom you've never seen in terms of values. That you've never seen in terms of a heaven. That you've never seen. You can have all of that. Go ahead, they tell you. But I've got my substance now. And I'm going to live it up now. I'm part of the here and now. The now generation. The Bible says "whose portion is in this life."
That's the worldling. He lives for this life. He will save his life. But by contrast, the Christian is one who in his present existence governs everything. Not by now, but by then. By then. Not by the world that is, but by the world that is to come.
Notice that contrast before we move away from Psalm 17. So you don't have to turn back to it. He says their portion is this life. That's what he's saying. That's all they live for. This life. Their portion is this life. Listen to his cry. “As for me,” verse 15. That's their portion. That's what they live for. “But as for me, I shall behold Your face in righteousness. I will be satisfied with Your likeness when I awake." Men of the world, their portion is now. Me, my portion is there.
See the marked contrast between the true child of God and the worldling? One has his portion now. Therefore, all of his values are determined by now. And here, all of his actions, reactions are determined by now. But by contrast, the Christian has everything now governed by the prospect of the world to come. Treasures in heaven. And that's what hypomonēs, endurance, is. Bearing up under pressure and inconveniences involved in being a child of God in the midst of a wicked and perverse generation.
The Apostle Paul describes this attitude of the Christian so beautifully, in 2 Corinthians chapter 4, I love this. When looking at all of those problems that he had. All of the difficulties that he endured. All of the challenges that he faced. And he had them. You read the extent of them in the verses prior to the one we want to mention. For example, in verse 8, afflicted, perplexed. Verse 9, persecuted, struck down. Verse 10, always carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus. And verse 11, constantly, not once, not twice. Constantly being delivered over to death for Jesus' sake.
And what does he call all of this? What does he call all of this? Verses 17 and 18: "For our momentary light affliction." What? How? He calls this momentary light affliction. Persecution, always going about like a criminal, condemned to die, troubled on every side, perplexed, buffeted, treated like the off-scouring of the world. And he says, light affliction? Light affliction? Why? Well, he tells us. He tells us why in the rest of verses 17 and 18. "It is working out for us an eternal weight of glory.” — Eternal weight of glory,— “far beyond all comparison.” — Not even a close comparison to all that I have been facing and enduring.— “While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen, for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal."
You see, Paul had the steadfastness, the endurance, the hypomonēs that was rooted in hope. And in light of the unseen world, everything Paul bore, everything he endured, he said, in the light of that is a momentary light affliction. Because in the light of that unseen world; weeping, wailing, gnashing of teeth, outer darkness, eternal hell, the torments of the damned, Paul was comparing his suffering to the sufferings of those who are strangers to the grace of God. And he says, in the light of that eternal world, the unseen world, anything that I have borne is a light affliction.
And then furthermore, in the light of what I shall know when I awake with His likeness and look upon my Savior and behold Him, this beaten, pain-inflicted body shall be released from all of the effects of sin. He said, it's just a light affliction, a drop in the ocean of the glory that is promised to me, that inheritance of the saints, that glorious inheritance of the saints.
He looks to that unseen world, and He looks at the glory that is to come. He looks at the world to come, and He looks at what He's been spared from. I've been spared from all of this: weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth, the torments of the damned forever and ever. I've been spared of this. And I know whatever I endure here is just nothing compared to the torments of the damned, but also I look forward to that glorious inheritance of the saints.
Light affliction. What sustained Him in those present trials? He said in verse 18, “while we look,” was the gaze of His soul upon the world to come? It was His hope, His joyful, confident expectation as a Christian that sustained Him in the present trial. In Hebrews 11, we have this testimony born to the heroes of faith, of the faith. Hebrews 11 verses 13 and 14, we read those wonderful words: "All these died in faith without receiving the promises, but having seen them and having welcomed them from a distance and having confessed that they were strangers and exiles on the earth, for those who say such thing make it clear that they are seeking a country of their own." What country? What country? The world to come. The world to come, the inheritance of the saints. That was their confidence and joyful expectation.
So what did they bear here and now? What did they bear? What did they endure here and now? Well, read the 11th chapter of Hebrews. Let me remind us of what they endured. Some experienced mockings and floggings. Yes, also chains and imprisonment. Verse 36, verse 37, they were stoned. Now watch this, they were sawn into. They were tempted. They were put to death with a sword. They went about in sheepskins and goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, mistreated.
What in the world will make a man do this when all he needs to do is simply take the edge off of his witness and say, well, you know, Jesus Christ is the Savior, but you know, maybe not the only Savior. That's all he needs to do. Just take the edge off of the exclusiveness of his faith and confession of faith in Jesus Christ. All the roads, you know, as long as you're sincere. Why would men endure this? Only one reason: a joyful and confident expectation of that which was to come. It is, to use Paul's words, "working out for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison."
Beloved, if you and I haven't learned to feed upon the hope, the joyful, confident expectation of promised blessings, we will deny Him in the hour of trial. Are we too distracted with the here and now, beloved? Are we so preoccupied with this life here on earth? Maybe that's why the world to come isn't too precious to us. Maybe that's why that we can sing songs about heaven with dry eyes. That's why perhaps we can go weeks and months and not think of the glorious world to come for the saints.
Do we think about heaven? We don't think about heaven much, do we? Let me ask you, this is between you and God, how much have you thought about heaven this past week? How much have you fed your mind upon those promised blessings that will be yours when the Lord comes back and when you go and be with Him? That's the hope that should mark the believer, and what delighted the heart of the Apostle Paul was this, that these people had that hope, that hope as a living, active principle that gave birth to their endurance in the midst of hardship.
May I conclude this evening with a word of direction, just very briefly. Maybe you're sitting here tonight and you're thinking, Habib, I have to admit I don't have that hope like they have it. I have to admit it. I have to acknowledge when you asked that question during this past week, if you thought about heaven. No, I haven't. No, I haven't. The glorious inheritance of the saints, beholding His face one day, but preoccupied with things here. Stuff, the stuff of this life now, the here and now, and you know, bills, and houses, and cars, and health, and snow. It's been kind of hard for me to think about heaven. How can I have this hope that will give birth to endurance that these settled Thessalonians had?
May I be very practical, suggest a couple of things. First of all, here's how. Number one, by earnest prayer. By earnest prayer, ask God that He may give you eyes to see and a heart to understand that hope. Pray, ask the Lord that He may give you eyes to see and a heart to understand that hope. That's what Paul did for the new Christians in Ephesus. You remember, for he says in Ephesians 1, 17 and 18, "that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory," — He says,— "I pray that He may give to you the spirit of wisdom and of revelation and the full knowledge of Him, so that, the eyes of your heart having been enlightened, will know what is the hope of His calling and what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints." Paul says, I plead with God that God by His Spirit would bring you, you people at Ephesus, to know experimentally the glorious hope of your calling.
If only you knew that to which God was calling you out there, if only you knew more and more, you will live so much better right here. Some may be thinking, well, but we've got to have social concern, right? Sure we have social concerns. A man's heart filled with love for Jesus and the love of Christ is concerned about the world that is now. But He who lives to the glory of God now is He who lives with the clearest vision and prospect of that which is to come. Biblical, true, vital, saving Christianity is vitally concerned with the world which is to come. And those who've served the present generation best have been those who've most lived with their eyes on the world to come.
But it's only as we pray that God opens our eyes that we know what is the hope of our calling that we should begin to understand. Will you pray this day that God may by His Spirit give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation that you may know the hope of your calling, that the truth of that to which He's called you may burn like fire within your breast. Secondly, not only we must pray, but by diligent searching out of our hope. Diligent searching out of our hope. God has given us something that even the people at Thessaloniki didn't fully have at that time. The Old Testament contains a very few beautiful rays of light breaking through once in a while about the world to come, immortality, but the scripture says Jesus Christ has brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.
Job saw a glimmer in Job 19: 25 and 26. "As for me, I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last He will rise up over the dust of this world. Even after my skin is destroyed, yet from my flesh I shall behold God." I know that my Redeemer lives. In latter days I'll be with Him. I will see Him. David said in Psalm 17:15, "As for me, I shall behold your face in righteousness. I will be satisfied with your likeness when I awake." But for the most part, death and the world to come was foggy, misty. There wasn't that clear revelation of the hope of the believer. We have it now with incredible clarity. Christ has brought it to light.
He said in John 14, verse 2 and 3, "In my Father's house are many dwelling places. If it were not so, I would have told you. For I go to prepare a place for you, and if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to myself, that where I am, there you may be also." And all those wonderful statements in the book of Revelation, where God Himself shall wipe away tears from our eyes. He shall be with us. He shall be our God. But how often do we feed our souls upon that? It's no wonder that we're so earthbound, for we don't even diligently search out what is our hope.
Let us be found this day, beloved, this Lord's day. That's one of the benefits of the Lord's day. We've been so earthbound during the week, and much of it, I understand, is necessary. Dishes are here on earth. Doing the 40 hours a week to collect a paycheck, to buy groceries, that's an earthly task, and it's a legitimate one. And it honors God.
Now God gives us the Lord's day to get out of that routine and really refocus on Him and on the world to come. So let's take time to pray that we'll understand our hope. Let's take time to diligently search out what is our hope. And thirdly, let us engage in frequent meditation upon this hope. Frequent meditation to ponder this hope, to meditate upon it.
Paul said, "while we look not on the things that are seen, but the things that are unseen." He said, "I fix the gaze of my soul upon the world to come, on what awaits me, what is there for me ahead. I meditate upon that which is to be my portion." It says that those faithful saints in Hebrews 11, oh they looked for that city which had foundations. The gaze of their souls was upon the world to come and longed for the world to come. May I encourage you this day to make this, beloved, your spiritual exercise. Refresh your heart and your mind with what is our hope.
Now is there a word to you here this evening who are not savingly joined to Christ? There is, for the scripture says in Ephesians 2:12, all who are joined to Jesus Christ, well actually it says the opposite. Those who are not joined to Jesus Christ are what? "Without hope." They are without God, without hope. Oh they have lots of wishful desires. They say, well I hope I'll make it. God says they're without hope in the biblical sense.
You may say this evening, well I hope I'll make it, I hope. No, no, that's not biblical hope. You have no joyful, no confident expectation that you will be with Him. And unless by the grace of God you've been awakened to see your lostness, to see that your only hope of mercy is bound up in the person of Jesus, and that you've fled in repentance and faith, laid hold of Him as your only hope of access to a holy God, then and only then you can have a hope, not a hope based upon wishful thinking, but a confident expectation based upon the promises of God, the word of God.
And so I ask you as we close this evening, do you demonstrate this virtue, this steadfastness of hope? Do you find it difficult to bear up under difficult circumstances where the pressure, the heat is on? Well, when you get weak in endurance, it is because somehow we've grown weak in our hope. So the way you strengthen endurance, the way you strengthen your hypomonēs, is not to come directly at endurance and try to pump new strength into endurance. Beloved, you need to enlarge your hope. Enlarge hope. It was the steadfastness, the endurance, that flowed out of hope. And as the strength of our hope is, so the measure of our steadfastness, our endurance will be.
If Paul were writing the letter about you, about me, will He say how I thank my God for your work of faith, for your labor of love, and for your steadfastness of hope? May God grant this virtue shall be wrought in us by the same Spirit who worked it in the hearts of these young believers there at Thessaloniki.
Now Paul did not rejoice as we saw together and give thanks primarily for those things which are common to all men in the common grace of God, but when he wrote to a church he was giving thanks to God for those particular things which were distinguishing marks of the special grace of God, in the saving power of God, operating in the lives of those precious people. And so we have those things in verses 2 through 10 which are in a peculiar way the fruits of grace, and in giving them to us we also have a standard by which we as a church can evaluate ourselves, a standard and a pattern to follow. We have a goal toward which we should press on by the grace of God to cultivate those fruits of grace in our lives individually and corporately.
Now at the very top of the list of the fruits of grace we have in verse 3 what we have called the three crown jewels in the diadem of Christian virtue. "Remembering without seizing your work of faith," that's the first one, and number two, "labor of love," and the third one, "steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ before our God and Father." And we've studied the first one already, the phrase "the work of faith," and the fact that Paul gave thanks to God that here you have people who had a faith that was not mere idle speculative faith, but it was an operative faith that really compelled them to work. And so whatever you find people who have faith that works, well, it is a fitting reason to give thanks to God for. And so, He thanks God that their work was in no way an attempt to earn the grace of God, but that it flowed out of a principle of faith.
And so wherever you find the people who have faith and works and they have them both in their proper relationship, then you have no doubt a wonderful indication that the grace of God is truly operative at work. For left to himself, you remember, man will either have a work that is not a work of faith, rather is a dead work hoping to commend himself to God by his own doing, on his own merit, which is always, always a catastrophe, or he will have a dead faith, a faith that is merely notional in the head, it resides in the head and it accepts certain facts, but it is not a living principle that produces works of holiness and obedience. But when you have both work, faith joined together, and they're always joined together whenever God does a work of grace, for "we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works," then you have a cause to give thanks to God.
We then looked at the phrase "labor of love." Paul was grateful to God that these people had a love to the triune God - Father, Son, and Holy Spirit - that was more than a love that caused them to sit in a rocking chair and think warm thoughts about some higher deity. They had a love for the triune God that made them put their shoulder to the yoke of Christian duty or responsibility and produced in them labor, and you remember this word labor, kopos, is the word that is connected with the English word really travail, wearisome effort. This word means sacrificial, arduous, and sometimes even painful work. Paul gives thanks to God that these people had a love to God that, again, was not merely an emotional thing, but it was one that captivated their whole being, the entirety of their whole being, and brought them under the yoke of Christian duty, which is a delight, a delightful duty, not duty out of obligation, kicking and screaming, but it's from the heart.
Well, tonight we come to the third of these virtues that is mentioned in verse 3 in the LSB, translated as steadfastness of hope. Other translation has it patience of hope. So Paul not only gave thanks for their work of faith and labor of love, but here he says also for their steadfastness of hope. Now, as we look at this and consider this, this evening, keep in mind the word steadfastness is not describing the hope, but rather He's speaking of the steadfastness which had its roots in hope. That's important.
Now, notice the parallel through all of these three phrases. They had a faith that produced works. They had a work that was rooted in faith. They had a love that produced labor. They had labor that was rooted in love. And now he says they had a steadfastness which was the fruit of hope and a hope that produced this steadfastness. Now, for us to understand why this should be a cause of rejoicing in the heart of the Apostle Paul, we must first of all understand what the words mean. That's a basic level. He said we give thanks for your steadfastness of hope.
Now, let's define the words. Well, first of all, what does this word hope mean? Hope. For steadfastness, whatever it is, was the baby, the child of hope. Hope was the mother. Steadfastness was the child. Hope was the tree. Steadfastness was the fruit. So let's begin with the mother. Let's begin with the tree. Let's begin with that which gives birth to the other.
Now, when we use the word hope in our everyday conversations and today's culture, we usually use it in the sense of a strong wish, a strong desire. We say, well, I hope to take my vacation, go to Europe, or I hope I will graduate from high school next year. It's shaky, but I hope - I hope it's not shaky for you if you're in high school. Now, when you say you hope, what you're really saying is I have a strong desire. I have an earnest wish that such and such will come to pass. I hope my favorite sports team wins. Strong desire.
Now, we usually use the word hope in terms of the strong wish and earnest desire, but that is not the way the word hope, elpis, the Greek word, is used in the biblical context. There are in few instances cases where this word is used in terms of a strong wish, but the overwhelming, overriding use of the word elpis in the scripture is poles apart from a mere wish or mere desire. This word hope, elpis, in the scripture means nothing less than, if you want to give it a definition, a good definition, it would be something like this: a joyful and confident expectation of a promised blessing. A joyful and a confident expectation of a promised blessing.
Now, there are many illustrations of its use in this sense in the scripture, but let me take a few that are representative this evening that might help us understand what Paul meant when he said steadfastness of hope. Turn with me to Romans 5, Romans 5, where we find the same word used. Look at verses 1 and 2: "Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have obtained our introduction by faith into this grace in which we stand," — now notice, — "and we boast in hope," —elpis,— "of the glory of God, in hope of the glory of God." Paul says not only do we have the present tense blessing of being justified and having peace with God and access to God, but He said we boast in hope of the glory of God.
Now, follow closely. Put the word in there, wishful desire. Take the word hope and put wishful desire. "We boast in the wishful desire of the glory of God." How does that sound? Foolish, right? That's the worst kind of torment in all the world. A man who knows that God is holy and knows that he himself is a wretched sinner, who has reason to believe that right now by the grace of God his sins are forgiven through the work of God, through the mighty work of God in justification, yet to think that all of those sins might yet rise up against him and condemn him and press him down to the deepest part of hell, who can only say, well, I wish, I sure hope that one day I'll be with Him and share His glory, that's the most intense kind of misery, isn't it?
But now define it this way, verse 2: "through whom also we have obtained our introduction by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we boast in the joyful and confident expectation of the glory of God." Right? Now, makes sense, and there's encouragement. He said we not only have this present blessing, that the condemnation of our sins is past, done away with, we have present access, yes, praise God, but above and beyond all of this we have, oh, we have a joyful and confident expectation that we shall gaze upon the glory of God as His redeemed, and we shall share that very glory. Amen.
Now the word hope makes sense. Since we're in Romans, turn to chapter 15 and verse 13. You'll find the same word used in another setting. Romans 15 verse 13: "Now may the God of” — elpis,— “hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you will abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit." Can you imagine Paul trying, praying that the church would be full of people who abounded in this kind of attitude? Well, I sure hope that I'll be saved. I really sure wish, desire, hope that I belong to the Lord. I don't know, I'm not sure, and you're living every day in torment, I'm sure. Can you imagine him praying that the church would be full of people like that?
What Paul is praying is this: that the believers may abound in hope, not just wishful desire, but in joyful, confident expectation through the power of the Holy Spirit. This joyful, confident expectation of promised blessing is something that the Holy Spirit Himself produces in the heart of the believer. You find a similar reference in Galatians 5:5, where Paul speaks of the hope of righteousness by faith, in Ephesians 1:18, where He prays that believers may know what is the hope of their calling, 1 Thessalonians he says, "as a helmet put on the hope of salvation," Titus 1:2, Paul speaks "in hope of eternal life," and then the classic usage, and I want you to look at this, this one with me please, 1 John chapter 3, this is incredible, 1 John chapter 3, where the word know, to know, and this is incredible, is used as a synonym of the word hope.
1 John 3 verse 1: "See how great a love the Father has given to us, that we would be called children of God; and we are. For this reason the world does not know us, because it did not know Him. Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not been manifested as yet what we will be. We know,”— “we know,” he says, we're assured, this is absolutely certain, airtight certain, no wiggle room. — “We know that when He is manifested, we will be like Him," — not we may be like Him,— "we will be like Him, because we will see Him just as He is. And everyone who has this,"— what,— “elpis, fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure." You get it? We know this hope. We know this hope.
So you see, the word hope is defined as a certain knowledge of future blessing promised by God Himself. There's no ifs and buts. So here you have a very simple and yet authoritative definition given by the Holy Spirit Himself, where John says that this knowledge that we will be like Him is called the hope of the believer. So whenever you come across this word in the New Testament, don't put the 21st century meaning on the word hope, but rather the biblical meaning on it: joyful, confident expectation of promised blessing. Faithful, He will be. Faithful He has been, and faithful He will be.
Now, since most of these blessings that are out there in the future will be realized at the coming of the Lord, it's no strange thing that His coming should be called what? Titus 2 verse 13: "the blessed hope and the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior." For you see, all that is future now, salvation, almost all of it, will become ours in experience when our Lord Jesus comes from the right hand of the Father to take us to Himself, that we might be with Him forever.
And so when Paul thinks of the people there, the believers there in that city, that the Thessaloniki, he rejoices that they demonstrated a steadfastness that was rooted in this joyful and confident expectation of promised blessing. I have to say I was surprised as I got studying this to see how much this matter of hope is an integral part of saving Christianity. In fact, Paul goes so far as to say in Romans 8 verse 24 and 25, "we are saved in hope." He said our very salvation is bound up in the concept of hope. And then he goes on to say, verse 24 and 25, he says, "but hope that is seen is not hope, for who hopes for what he already sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, with perseverance we eagerly wait for it."
Peter asserts essentially the same thing when he says, 1 Peter 1:3, "God, according to His great mercy, has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead." So much for the word hope, elpis. I hope you understand what the word hope means. You get the two different ways now I used it, right? When I say I hope you understand, I'm using in terms of our present use. I hope you understand what the word hope means: confident, joyful expectation.
Well, let's look at the word steadfastness. What does this word mean, steadfastness? We're familiar with this word, the Greek word, hypomonēs. We've come across this word, hypomonēs, right? We've encountered that word in our studies, particularly of James, and elsewhere in Scripture. I love this word, hypomonēs. It's that Greek word made up of two words, two Greek words, hypo, the front means under, and the other, monēs, to remain. So, simply put, to remain under. To remain under.
Literally, the word means, and in the case of the etymology, really, it doesn't lead us astray. It literally means to remain under, to bear up under, to endure. So, really, the translation, patience, is too soft, because it's passive. This word is much stronger. You see, patience is what you do when the person who's supposed to give you a ride to church is 15 minutes late or 20 minutes late. Perseverance is what you exercise as a soldier when you're injured and bleeding and waiting for rescue. And you persevere. Hypomonēs is a far stronger word than patience.
It is, you're familiar, is the word we encounter in the Philippines of an Olympic weightlifter. You know, those guys who weigh too much, eat too much, they sweat too much. They go down, they pick up this bar, and they pull it above their head to their, well, on their way up to their shoulders. And, you know, they're getting ready, and they thrust it above their head with all the energy that they can muster. You have this huge amount of weight, but there's a rule. And the rule says that for it to be valid, they must actually, when they lift it up, they must remain under it for a certain period of time.
And so they stand there, and you can see them, their bodies quivering, attempting to keep that weight above their heads until the alarm has sounded, and then they've held it for the appointed amount of time. That's hypomonēs. During that time that they are under that weight, they are doing what this Greek word describes. So it means something far stronger than sitting in a boat, marking time, waiting for something to happen as you're waiting to catch some fish. Basically means endurance, perseverance, to bear up under intense difficulty, stress.
It's the word used in Matthew 24, verse 13, when our Lord says in that context of the tribulation period, at the end of the age, He says, "The one who,” - this is the word, hypomonēs, - “endures to the end.” - Bear up under to the end. - “He will be saved." The one who endures, who perseveres, the one who's steadfast to the end, that one will be saved. It's used in 1 Corinthians 13:7, describing love. "Love endures,” - hypomonēs, in its verbal form, bears up under - “all things." 2 Timothy, chapter 2, verse 10, Paul says, "For this reason I,” - hypomonēs, in a verbal form, hypomenei, that's the verb. - “For this reason I endure all things for the sake of the elect, so that they may also obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory."
Now does that mean Paul sat in jail somewhere, twiddled his thumbs, played solitaire, waiting patiently? No, it meant a day and a night in the deep, scourging, starvation, thirsting, hungering. Read 2 Corinthians 11, we see what it meant. He said, I endure, I bear up under the most intense forms of difficulty, that they may be saved. It's the word used of our Lord Jesus Christ in Hebrews 12, verse 2, where it says of Him that He “endured the cross.” He endured the cross. Did it mean just patience? What did that mean? It meant an active submission to the will of God in the midst of the most intense suffering.
So you have the word hope, joyful, confident expectation of promised blessing. Steadfastness means endurance, bearing up under stress and difficulty.
Okay, now let's put them together, right? We're assembling now. Let's put them together. Paul says, "I give thanks to God when I remember your steadfastness of hope." In other words, your ability to bear up under stress and difficulty and affliction, which was rooted in a joyful and confident expectation of promised blessing. Now that tells us something, that these people in Thessaloniki were not living on easy street.
It's hard for us to interpret 1 Thessalonians against the backdrop of our North American Christianity. Here were people who were born in the midst of conflict spiritually. Remember Acts 17 when we looked at the birth of this church? Paul had been there about two weeks when there was a riot in the town. They ran him out of town, stormed the house of the young convert who was actually hosting Paul. And then when Paul writes back to them, he says, notice in chapter 2 in verse 14 of this letter, "For you brothers became imitators of the churches of God in Christ Jesus that are in Judea. For you also suffered the same things at the hands of your own kind. For you also suffered the same things at the hands of your own countrymen, even as they did from the Jews."
What is he referring to? He's referring to persecution. That persecution that arose and scattered the believers. He said, you're in with them. You belong in the same union of the suffering. In chapter 3 he says, I was so anxious when I knew of your sufferings and wondering if perhaps these tribulations have really turned you aside, notice verse 3, "So that no one would be shaken by these afflictions. For you yourselves know that we have been destined for this. For indeed, when we were with you, we kept telling you in advance that we were going to suffer affliction just as it happened. As you know."
Paul rejoices that these people are demonstrating epimony, endurance, endurance, perseverance, rooted in hope, because He recognized this. He recognized this principle that brings us now to the heart of the message. This is the crux of the whole phrase. Here it is. Paul realized that perhaps nothing more clearly revealed either the sham or the reality of Christian profession as did suffering, tribulation, difficulty, hardship, and affliction. This becomes the laboratory in which the genuineness of the product is either revealed or its ingenuineness, its sham, is exposed and uncovered.
So as Paul thought of those infant professors of Christ there in that city and the suffering that was already their portion before he left them, his heart was filled with deep concern. And he said, I wonder, as I was forced to leave you and thinking about you now, I wondered, do you have the real thing? Were my labors in vain? Is all of this to be wood and hay and stubble? Was your apparent faith a genuine faith? Was your apparent attachment to Christ vital, saving attachment to Christ? Suffering comes along, persecution comes along, and said, I'll tell you whether it is.
And now when Timothy brings back the report that they're continuing on with God, that the suffering has only served to drive their roots deeper into Christ, He says, oh how I give thanks, not only for your work of faith, your labor of love, but your endurance, your steadfastness that is rooted in this hope, this confident expectation of future blessing. He said, I'm so glad that the trial, the persecution, the difficulty simply acted as a laboratory in which your faith has been broken down into its component parts and it's been shown to be the real deal, the real thing, genuine, authentic, dokimos, has character, proven character.
Now that leads us to another principle that is vitally joined to this. Paul saw in these believers the truth that that confident expectation of future blessing was that which produced endurance in present difficult circumstances. What gave them that endurance to face persecution? I mean, just babes in Christ, new believers. What would happen to you, beloved, if after a month, after you professed to be joined to Jesus Christ, you began really to get some serious consequences because of your faith? What would happen? What would happen to us under pressure? Like some face severe consequences in certain parts of the world, serious consequences. It ranges from here to here, from mild to extreme.
I mean, boycotted economically, lose their job and nobody will hire them. They go to buy food, no one will sell food to them. You see your starving kids and your crying, wife, what would you do? I mean, all you need to do is renounce Christ and all will be well. You'll have your job back, you have your tummy full again, your children's tummies full, you'll have your wife smiling again. What would you do? What do they do? Persecuted, ill-treated. You know what they did. They said, well, things may not be good now, but man, oh man, are we going to have glory when He comes? He's going to come back and He's going to right all wrongs. And in the light of what we'll have when He comes, be still my soul. Be still my soul. Let men despise, deride, when our Lord comes back again, all that He's promised will be ours. And in the light of that day, what's a little suffering here? What's a little heartache here?
So their endurance, you see, was fed, sustained, maintained by that confident expectation of future blessings, sustained in the present trial by feeding their souls upon the expectation of future blessings. As we will see later on in the end of the chapter, they were a second coming people. They lived here in the light of there. They lived now in the light of then. They lived on the edge of the return of Jesus. This is one of the clearest contrasts between the Christian and the worldling. The worldling is governed by the now. The now. Here and now. You know this, right? This is called what? Really, this is called the now generation. The now generation. That's the whole pitch in all of the advertisement, social media, social platform. This is the now generation. You've got to live it up now. Everything is now. Everything is live streamed. Everything is like real time.
I mean, you go on vacation. You go. It's like you have to keep even living your life. You always have to update. I woke up this morning. I had cereal. You post the cereal with the bowl and the picture and everything. The now generation. That's the mark of the world. It's a whole concern. The whole concern is now. And now takes in everything involved in time. You see people in the now generation. They're concerned enough about the future to take out insurance and make out wills. But their whole concern is bounded by the little parenthesis of time. And that's all time is, right? But a little parenthesis in the great expanse of eternity.
There is an eloquent description of this in the 17th Psalm. Please turn with me there. Where the Psalm is speaking of the wicked. Notice how he describes the wicked. Verse 14. Psalm 17. He's asking God to deliver him from the oppression of the wicked. And in that prayer he describes the wicked. Now watch this. “From men with your hand, O Yahweh. From men of the world." —Now watch this.— "Whose portion is in this life. And whose belly you fill with your treasure. They are satisfied with children and leave their excess to their infants."
Now take that phrase and write it as the descriptive phrase of our own generation. "Whose portion is in this life." "Whose portion is in this life." We're the now generation. You can live your life by the standards of a God whom you've never seen in terms of values. That you've never seen in terms of a heaven. That you've never seen. You can have all of that. Go ahead, they tell you. But I've got my substance now. And I'm going to live it up now. I'm part of the here and now. The now generation. The Bible says "whose portion is in this life."
That's the worldling. He lives for this life. He will save his life. But by contrast, the Christian is one who in his present existence governs everything. Not by now, but by then. By then. Not by the world that is, but by the world that is to come.
Notice that contrast before we move away from Psalm 17. So you don't have to turn back to it. He says their portion is this life. That's what he's saying. That's all they live for. This life. Their portion is this life. Listen to his cry. “As for me,” verse 15. That's their portion. That's what they live for. “But as for me, I shall behold Your face in righteousness. I will be satisfied with Your likeness when I awake." Men of the world, their portion is now. Me, my portion is there.
See the marked contrast between the true child of God and the worldling? One has his portion now. Therefore, all of his values are determined by now. And here, all of his actions, reactions are determined by now. But by contrast, the Christian has everything now governed by the prospect of the world to come. Treasures in heaven. And that's what hypomonēs, endurance, is. Bearing up under pressure and inconveniences involved in being a child of God in the midst of a wicked and perverse generation.
The Apostle Paul describes this attitude of the Christian so beautifully, in 2 Corinthians chapter 4, I love this. When looking at all of those problems that he had. All of the difficulties that he endured. All of the challenges that he faced. And he had them. You read the extent of them in the verses prior to the one we want to mention. For example, in verse 8, afflicted, perplexed. Verse 9, persecuted, struck down. Verse 10, always carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus. And verse 11, constantly, not once, not twice. Constantly being delivered over to death for Jesus' sake.
And what does he call all of this? What does he call all of this? Verses 17 and 18: "For our momentary light affliction." What? How? He calls this momentary light affliction. Persecution, always going about like a criminal, condemned to die, troubled on every side, perplexed, buffeted, treated like the off-scouring of the world. And he says, light affliction? Light affliction? Why? Well, he tells us. He tells us why in the rest of verses 17 and 18. "It is working out for us an eternal weight of glory.” — Eternal weight of glory,— “far beyond all comparison.” — Not even a close comparison to all that I have been facing and enduring.— “While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen, for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal."
You see, Paul had the steadfastness, the endurance, the hypomonēs that was rooted in hope. And in light of the unseen world, everything Paul bore, everything he endured, he said, in the light of that is a momentary light affliction. Because in the light of that unseen world; weeping, wailing, gnashing of teeth, outer darkness, eternal hell, the torments of the damned, Paul was comparing his suffering to the sufferings of those who are strangers to the grace of God. And he says, in the light of that eternal world, the unseen world, anything that I have borne is a light affliction.
And then furthermore, in the light of what I shall know when I awake with His likeness and look upon my Savior and behold Him, this beaten, pain-inflicted body shall be released from all of the effects of sin. He said, it's just a light affliction, a drop in the ocean of the glory that is promised to me, that inheritance of the saints, that glorious inheritance of the saints.
He looks to that unseen world, and He looks at the glory that is to come. He looks at the world to come, and He looks at what He's been spared from. I've been spared from all of this: weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth, the torments of the damned forever and ever. I've been spared of this. And I know whatever I endure here is just nothing compared to the torments of the damned, but also I look forward to that glorious inheritance of the saints.
Light affliction. What sustained Him in those present trials? He said in verse 18, “while we look,” was the gaze of His soul upon the world to come? It was His hope, His joyful, confident expectation as a Christian that sustained Him in the present trial. In Hebrews 11, we have this testimony born to the heroes of faith, of the faith. Hebrews 11 verses 13 and 14, we read those wonderful words: "All these died in faith without receiving the promises, but having seen them and having welcomed them from a distance and having confessed that they were strangers and exiles on the earth, for those who say such thing make it clear that they are seeking a country of their own." What country? What country? The world to come. The world to come, the inheritance of the saints. That was their confidence and joyful expectation.
So what did they bear here and now? What did they bear? What did they endure here and now? Well, read the 11th chapter of Hebrews. Let me remind us of what they endured. Some experienced mockings and floggings. Yes, also chains and imprisonment. Verse 36, verse 37, they were stoned. Now watch this, they were sawn into. They were tempted. They were put to death with a sword. They went about in sheepskins and goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, mistreated.
What in the world will make a man do this when all he needs to do is simply take the edge off of his witness and say, well, you know, Jesus Christ is the Savior, but you know, maybe not the only Savior. That's all he needs to do. Just take the edge off of the exclusiveness of his faith and confession of faith in Jesus Christ. All the roads, you know, as long as you're sincere. Why would men endure this? Only one reason: a joyful and confident expectation of that which was to come. It is, to use Paul's words, "working out for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison."
Beloved, if you and I haven't learned to feed upon the hope, the joyful, confident expectation of promised blessings, we will deny Him in the hour of trial. Are we too distracted with the here and now, beloved? Are we so preoccupied with this life here on earth? Maybe that's why the world to come isn't too precious to us. Maybe that's why that we can sing songs about heaven with dry eyes. That's why perhaps we can go weeks and months and not think of the glorious world to come for the saints.
Do we think about heaven? We don't think about heaven much, do we? Let me ask you, this is between you and God, how much have you thought about heaven this past week? How much have you fed your mind upon those promised blessings that will be yours when the Lord comes back and when you go and be with Him? That's the hope that should mark the believer, and what delighted the heart of the Apostle Paul was this, that these people had that hope, that hope as a living, active principle that gave birth to their endurance in the midst of hardship.
May I conclude this evening with a word of direction, just very briefly. Maybe you're sitting here tonight and you're thinking, Habib, I have to admit I don't have that hope like they have it. I have to admit it. I have to acknowledge when you asked that question during this past week, if you thought about heaven. No, I haven't. No, I haven't. The glorious inheritance of the saints, beholding His face one day, but preoccupied with things here. Stuff, the stuff of this life now, the here and now, and you know, bills, and houses, and cars, and health, and snow. It's been kind of hard for me to think about heaven. How can I have this hope that will give birth to endurance that these settled Thessalonians had?
May I be very practical, suggest a couple of things. First of all, here's how. Number one, by earnest prayer. By earnest prayer, ask God that He may give you eyes to see and a heart to understand that hope. Pray, ask the Lord that He may give you eyes to see and a heart to understand that hope. That's what Paul did for the new Christians in Ephesus. You remember, for he says in Ephesians 1, 17 and 18, "that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory," — He says,— "I pray that He may give to you the spirit of wisdom and of revelation and the full knowledge of Him, so that, the eyes of your heart having been enlightened, will know what is the hope of His calling and what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints." Paul says, I plead with God that God by His Spirit would bring you, you people at Ephesus, to know experimentally the glorious hope of your calling.
If only you knew that to which God was calling you out there, if only you knew more and more, you will live so much better right here. Some may be thinking, well, but we've got to have social concern, right? Sure we have social concerns. A man's heart filled with love for Jesus and the love of Christ is concerned about the world that is now. But He who lives to the glory of God now is He who lives with the clearest vision and prospect of that which is to come. Biblical, true, vital, saving Christianity is vitally concerned with the world which is to come. And those who've served the present generation best have been those who've most lived with their eyes on the world to come.
But it's only as we pray that God opens our eyes that we know what is the hope of our calling that we should begin to understand. Will you pray this day that God may by His Spirit give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation that you may know the hope of your calling, that the truth of that to which He's called you may burn like fire within your breast. Secondly, not only we must pray, but by diligent searching out of our hope. Diligent searching out of our hope. God has given us something that even the people at Thessaloniki didn't fully have at that time. The Old Testament contains a very few beautiful rays of light breaking through once in a while about the world to come, immortality, but the scripture says Jesus Christ has brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.
Job saw a glimmer in Job 19: 25 and 26. "As for me, I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last He will rise up over the dust of this world. Even after my skin is destroyed, yet from my flesh I shall behold God." I know that my Redeemer lives. In latter days I'll be with Him. I will see Him. David said in Psalm 17:15, "As for me, I shall behold your face in righteousness. I will be satisfied with your likeness when I awake." But for the most part, death and the world to come was foggy, misty. There wasn't that clear revelation of the hope of the believer. We have it now with incredible clarity. Christ has brought it to light.
He said in John 14, verse 2 and 3, "In my Father's house are many dwelling places. If it were not so, I would have told you. For I go to prepare a place for you, and if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to myself, that where I am, there you may be also." And all those wonderful statements in the book of Revelation, where God Himself shall wipe away tears from our eyes. He shall be with us. He shall be our God. But how often do we feed our souls upon that? It's no wonder that we're so earthbound, for we don't even diligently search out what is our hope.
Let us be found this day, beloved, this Lord's day. That's one of the benefits of the Lord's day. We've been so earthbound during the week, and much of it, I understand, is necessary. Dishes are here on earth. Doing the 40 hours a week to collect a paycheck, to buy groceries, that's an earthly task, and it's a legitimate one. And it honors God.
Now God gives us the Lord's day to get out of that routine and really refocus on Him and on the world to come. So let's take time to pray that we'll understand our hope. Let's take time to diligently search out what is our hope. And thirdly, let us engage in frequent meditation upon this hope. Frequent meditation to ponder this hope, to meditate upon it.
Paul said, "while we look not on the things that are seen, but the things that are unseen." He said, "I fix the gaze of my soul upon the world to come, on what awaits me, what is there for me ahead. I meditate upon that which is to be my portion." It says that those faithful saints in Hebrews 11, oh they looked for that city which had foundations. The gaze of their souls was upon the world to come and longed for the world to come. May I encourage you this day to make this, beloved, your spiritual exercise. Refresh your heart and your mind with what is our hope.
Now is there a word to you here this evening who are not savingly joined to Christ? There is, for the scripture says in Ephesians 2:12, all who are joined to Jesus Christ, well actually it says the opposite. Those who are not joined to Jesus Christ are what? "Without hope." They are without God, without hope. Oh they have lots of wishful desires. They say, well I hope I'll make it. God says they're without hope in the biblical sense.
You may say this evening, well I hope I'll make it, I hope. No, no, that's not biblical hope. You have no joyful, no confident expectation that you will be with Him. And unless by the grace of God you've been awakened to see your lostness, to see that your only hope of mercy is bound up in the person of Jesus, and that you've fled in repentance and faith, laid hold of Him as your only hope of access to a holy God, then and only then you can have a hope, not a hope based upon wishful thinking, but a confident expectation based upon the promises of God, the word of God.
And so I ask you as we close this evening, do you demonstrate this virtue, this steadfastness of hope? Do you find it difficult to bear up under difficult circumstances where the pressure, the heat is on? Well, when you get weak in endurance, it is because somehow we've grown weak in our hope. So the way you strengthen endurance, the way you strengthen your hypomonēs, is not to come directly at endurance and try to pump new strength into endurance. Beloved, you need to enlarge your hope. Enlarge hope. It was the steadfastness, the endurance, that flowed out of hope. And as the strength of our hope is, so the measure of our steadfastness, our endurance will be.
If Paul were writing the letter about you, about me, will He say how I thank my God for your work of faith, for your labor of love, and for your steadfastness of hope? May God grant this virtue shall be wrought in us by the same Spirit who worked it in the hearts of these young believers there at Thessaloniki.
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