Hope not anguish

From Helen

One time when I was preaching I told a story about the time in college when the tutor asked us all to think of one word that began with the same letter as the first letter of our name. That letter had to describe us. There are a lot of great words beginning with H so I was pleased I had a choice, until I realised that there was also a Huw and a Howard there. This narrowed down the word choice and they were both going to be announcing their names before me. I was keen not to pick a word that would expect too much of me and so I waited as I heard a Hallelujah Huw and a Holy Howard. I hadn’t chosen either of those words as they expected too much and so I went for Happy Helen.

The story I was telling was only the smallest part of my sermon. At the end two members of the congregation told me that they had really enjoyed that naming game. They carried on working out the correct names for every member of the congregation. They enjoyed this, they said, they didn’t listen to my preaching as the game was too good. 

I decided to tell the story today knowing that you wouldn’t all spend the morning playing the game and would clearly be listening to my sermon !! To be fair to these women I preached the sermon and I can’t even remember what I preached about but still … it is strange but out of Hallelujah, holy and happy none of us thought of hope. 

This morning I am going to talk about that wonderful word Hope. In our readings we heard of anguish and torment but also hope. In our reading from the book of Daniel (12:1-3) we heard of how things would be at the end of time, it doesn’t sound very nice. It makes all the best horror stories sound like a childrens bed time story. 

The pictures of anguish that will be greater than ever before does not sound anything like hopeful. However, there is the promise that there is something better to come for those who are following God. I think when we read and hear of the end of time it is scary, we either hope to ignore what we’ve heard and move on or we hope that everything will carry on as we know it. 

I have to say that I am sure a lot of people with the situation this week over Brexit have been hoping for something more and something better or, for life just to continue. 

In our gospel reading (Mark 13:1-8) we heard of the destruction of the temple and again a time of anguish a time when people will be lead astray. A time when people will stop looking to God. Jesus tells the disciples not to be alarmed when they see these awful things happening. It is probably one of the biggest understatements ever. 

A bit like the time when as a child you go for an injection and you’re told it won’t hurt. To be honest it doesn’t hurt muchbut as a child you know that it will definitely hurt and so it does.

For the disciples when they heard Jesus telling them not to be alarmed they must have been confused, and maybe a little disbelieving. 

Jesus reassured them and that must have made a difference. When we see awful things happening around us we wonder where God is in all this. We naturally panic, we naturally get upset and we automatically begin to find it hard to trust that all will be well in the end.

When we think of the end of the world we are thinking of a time when people have separated themselves from God. A time when people have turned to their own ways and have completely lost belief in God. 

This to us would be the biggest mess ever, this would be worse than a horror film. Can you imagine a world where people constantly reject God, when people lose hope andwhen people are in anguish ?

In our reading from Hebrews (10:11-14, 19-25) we heard of the answer to all our anguish, the answer to all the problems of the world. That answer is that Jesus has made all things right for us both now and at the end of time. Jesus by His death has brought us into a relationship with God. A relationship that we choose to enter into, a relationship where we say yes to God. 

A relationship where we truly now what hope is. Hope is the knowledge that not only did Jesus die for us and rise again, but the world will get better. 

This doesn’t mean that hope is sitting still, waiting for everything to get better. Hope is knowing and believing in the One who has conquered death and who loves us. 

In Hebrews the readers were reminded that they needed to live like Jesus as they encouraged one another, as they provoked each other to do good deeds and to love.

I think that line sounds incredible. We often hear of how people were provoked to attack someone, or how people were provoked to commit a crime by others. With God that turns around as we provoke each other to love. This is the view of a better world, a world without anguish, a world where we live with hope and share that hope and love around. 

We don’t provoke to violence and hate we provoke to love and to hope. 

That is amazing. The world is a lot less scary when we think of it as the perfect place where we are loving one another. This is the hope we need to have, hope in God that all things will be put right in the end and a hope that we can help others enter into, as we share with them the love of God.

No longer separated from God but through Jesus’ death on the cross we have full access to Him. There is no divide as some of my favourite verses in the Bible say from the book of Romans 8:36-38

“For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” AMEN