"Hope" Series Day 4: What promises come with hope in God?
by Jamie Steach
Read Isaiah 40:27-31
How does God feel when we complain? Why does He feel this way? What is it that He reminds Israel of in their complaining? What do you think God wants us to remember about Him when times are hard?
What promises can you identify about who God is in this passage? What about Himself does God seem to call us to trust in? Do you believe and trust that these qualities are true, or do you wrestle with doubts?
What promises does God give to us/His people in this passage? What do we gain from placing our hope, our expectation, in God? Is God’s strength reliable? How do you know?
Read 1 Corinthians 15:12-19
Why is the gospel useless if Jesus has not been raised from the dead? Why is it useless to spread the teachings of Jesus if His resurrection isn’t true? Why is it useless to have faith?
What happens if, all things up to this point in our lives being the same, we are still in our sins? What does that mean about us? What does that mean about God’s plan?
Why is this issue of resurrection so important as it pertains to hope and faith? Why must we be convinced that Jesus did in fact come back from the dead? What does this argument tell us about the true nature of our hope? What is it that we are really expecting and trusting in?
Read Romans 5:1-5
What do you think it means to hope in the glory of God? What does that mean about your expectation? What allows us to hope in the glory of God?
What things/ what progression must happen in order to build hope? Why do you think hope comes from this order of experience? What kind of hope is the result? If you don’t have this kind of hope, where do you think you currently are on this roadmap?
What is the promise of hope in this passage? What is the evidence that this promise is true? Do you trust and believe this promise, or do your circumstances make you doubt it? Why?
Wrap up:
Why is it important to remember the promises God gives us about Himself, and not just the promises He gives that are directed at us? What does it look like to have hope that lasts and is unshaken by circumstances? What is the truest and most important nature of our hope?
About this series
Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life. (Proverbs 13:12)
Yachal = hope: to wait, expect; waiting with expectation (OT)
Elpizō = hope: to wait with joy and full confidence, to trust in (NT)
Elpis = hope: expectation of good; the thing hoped for (NT)
Hope is a common topic in the Bible, and while many references speak of placing hope in God, we have a few other examples, as well. But what do all of these various references have in common?
Acts 16:19 - hope of making money=expectation of making money
Luke 24:21 - expectation that Jesus was going to redeem Israel (like David)
Jeremiah 23:16 - false expectations
These 3 examples capture the specific nature of hope that echoes through the Bible: to have hope is to have expectation, and usually it involves waiting on that expectation. So what exactly does expectation have to do with God? As it turns out, a lot.