Message from Wesley DeVries on November 17, 2019

Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.

In these verses, Paul shows us how to love people who we may consider strange or difficult. He reminds the Jews that Jesus came as a servant to make solid on the promises. And he reminds the Gentiles that their inclusion in the family of God is sheer mercy. Truth for the Jews and mercy for the Gentiles. It is important to remember that when we live in harmony, God is glorified.

Christian hope is not cheap, nor is it the delusional expectation of the impossible. Christian hope is not an immature hope that is optimistic because it does not see the difficulties or obstacles. Rather Christian hope looks trials and difficulties full in the face, and yet it does not despair because it believes in God. In this passage, Paul tells us how we can have this hope, an anchor for the soul.

In these three verses, Paul summarizes his teaching regarding the practice or the suppression of our Christian liberties for the sake of our fellow believers. He sets before us Jesus, who is both the model and motive in foregoing our liberties for the Glory of God and the growth of His church. Keeping Jesus before us will result in a lifestyle of gratitude, humility and self-sacrifice.

The Kingdom of God (God’s sphere of salvation) is righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit. The watching world should be taking notice of the evidence of God’s grace in our lives. Spending your life on minor issues is akin to rearranging the deck furniture on the titanic. Instead, we should be pursuing the things that make for peace and build the church.

When our preferences have become more important to us than the people for whom Christ died, we have made idols out of our opinions. In these verses, Paul shows us that you can be strong and wrong. If practising our Christian liberty places a roadblock in the path of another believer, we need to realise that we are tripping up someone for whom Christ died. However, laying down our Christian liberties for their benefit is a small sacrifice in light of the sacrifice that Jesus made on their behalf.

Paul has told us that we are not to judge each other on non-essentials. But how do we stop trying to "fix each other"? Paul shows us that we accomplish this as we acknowledge the Lordship of Jesus through his death and resurrection.

“Part of the reason we don’t grow deeper is because it’s easier to let someone else do it for us.” In this message Mark Vanderwier warns us not to get stuck with a secondhand faith, rather to build a relationship with the Lord that goes deeper. Mark further explores how we can do this together. Have you grown spiritually lately?

The favourite pastime of Christians is changing each other. Paul teaches us how to avoid the urge to fix our fellow Jesus followers by minding our own walk.