In an effort to emphasize the season of Thanksgiving, I’m celebrating it all through the month of November. Earlier I explained my 21 Days of Giving Thanks challenge (which you can read about here). Today let’s give thanks for hope.

Day 15 – Give Thanks for Eternal Hope

Life is hard, incredibly hard. It can be laden with sorrow, discouragement, and despair. Ironically, in a culture that is increasingly liberalized and focused on “casting off the shackles,” dystopian stories abound in both print and media. According to the modern narrative, we should end up happy. But we are not. We are a society that is hopeless and sin-sick. We are bent on pleasing ourselves, and we have reaped the consequences of shaking our fist in the face of God. Then, after living life “my way,” all we have is death.

But in the midst of the despairing attitude of our current age God breathes life and hope. Romans 15:13 says,

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

Our God is not the God of despair, but of hope. He promises eternal life to all those who lay down their arms of opposition to him, repent of their sin, and cast their souls entirely on the finished work of Jesus Christ on the cross for salvation. While Christ paid for our sins on the cross, he also verified the authenticity of his sacrfice by rising from the dead. Our hope is not a dead hope, but a living hope, centered on the crucified and risen Lord.

You can give thanks this Thanksgiving because of this eternal hope in Jesus Christ. All who trust him have “an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you.” (1 Peter 1:4) This world will never fully satisfy you because it is not meant to satisfy you. Some day believers who see Christ face-to-face will experience hope fulfilled.

Challenge: Thank God for the eternal hope available to all in Christ Jesus. If you do not have this hope in Christ, turn from your sin to the Savior and make him your true hope.

CP