Advent: Hope
Are you a hopeful person? Or a pessimist? A friend of mine says he is a ‘hopeful pessimist’ – meaning he hopes for the best but expects the worst. In general I am an optimist, though tiredness and stress reduce me to grumpiness far more often than I would like! Especially the Monday after a long Sunday, with Christmas Eve and Christmas Day coming – writing about hope definitely doesn’t fit my mood this morning! Perhaps I’ll have another cup of coffee…
But that’s the point really: like joy and peace Christian hope is not an emotion. It doesn’t depend on my feelings but on the promises of God.
Yesterday we finished our sermon series ‘Covenant and Kingdom’ – a whistle-stop tour of the Old Testament, from the creation of the world in Genesis 1 to the return from Exile in Ezra and Nehemiah. We saw how God’s people were stuck in a cycle of sin. Some of them looked ahead to a time when this cycle of sin would be broken. God would send a ruler like David, who would be called God’s son, whose reign would bring perfect justice. God would send his Spirit to soften his people’s hearts so they might love him as he loves them. Some of them recognised God’s people were stuck and couldn’t break out – they needed someone to break in and set them free.
So when the New Testament says that Jesus is the fulfilment of the Old Testament, it isn’t really about him fulfilling individual prophecies – though he did: well over 300 in fact. Jesus is the fulfilment of the Old Testament – of the people’s hopes, dreams, and greatest need – so much so that the whole thing is like a giant arrow pointing to Jesus.
Jesus is the one who broke in from outside to set God’s people free and fulfil their mission to bless the nations. Jesus is the perfect priest, the righteous ruler: he is the fulfilment of all the hopes and promises in the Old Testament. Jesus told his disciples (Luke 10.23-24, NIV): ‘Blessed are the eyes that see what you see.  For I tell you that many prophets and kings wanted to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.’
Since then God has been growing his family. As I said at our Carols by Candlelight service, Christmas is all about family – only not in the way we might expect. Not everyone has a loving family. Not everyone has a family. But we are all invited to join God’s family: God’s plan is that Jesus might be the ‘firstborn among many brothers and sisters’ (Romans 8.29, NIV).
That is why we can have hope – not a vague wish or a positive emotion – but confidence and trust in the God who fulfils all his promises, in the God who has not let his family fail but stepped in to redeem and renew it and grow it in all the world. The God who sent Jesus then to redeem us from sin and adopt us into his family, the God who sends his Spirit now to pour out his love into our hearts (see Romans 5.5) – that same God will one day send Jesus back to bring his perfect peace, and extend his rule over all the earth. What a day that will be!
May the grace of the Lord Jesus be with you this Christmas. And, as the Bible concludes (Revelation 22.21): ‘He who testifies to these things says, Yes, I am coming soon.’ Amen. Come, Lord Jesus.