How Hope Works | Hope and Fear | Judah Smith

Well, it is the end of April. Here we are. Thank you for joining us for Easter last week. If you didn't get a chance to do that, it is available as we speak. It's pretty cool setting. Kind of old vintage chapel. I think you'll like it. We talked about 8 days after Easter and how that day really affects me and how I relate more to that day.

So, check that out if you get the chance. Uh to conclude the month of April, I want to talk about fear. I want to talk about fear. Everybody has fear of some kind. But how do hope and fear interact? Um if you feel like your life is led more by fear than led by hope, this message is dedicated to you.

If you've ever felt like fear is leading more than hope is leading or more than faith is leading, this sermon is dedicated to you. If you feel more fearful than you have ever been in your whole life, then I dedicate this message to you. Fear is a real thing and yet it is a fickle thing.

What are you afraid of right now? What are you most afraid of right now? What is keeping you up at night? As I said a couple of weeks ago, I had a friend ask me how I was sleeping, which is of course what older people do. And that's how they ask.

Those are the questions they ask each other. And I I hadn't been sleeping very good. I've been sleeping better now, but I haven't I wasn't sleeping very good. And to be honest, I think it was because I was scared over a couple of things. Fear's wild. It morphs in your life.

At 46 years old, I'm not afraid of some of the things that used to keep me up at night. But as you get older, you find new things to keep you up at night. We use words like stress and anxiety, but oftentimes what we mean is fear. We say words like concern, but oftentimes what we mean is scared.

I know it's not fun. I'm not saying this is enjoyable, but are you scared right now? I was talking to one of my best friends and he said it's he said it's just nice to know that you get scared too because I am scared right now. It's funny as a parent, um, thinking and speaking of being scared, as a parent, um, I just convinced myself that once I got my kids through adolescence, once I kept them alive and they got into their late teens and early 20s, all fear would subside or all scarediness or all concern and trepidation.

And yet, as most parents do, you just find other ways to be concerned or anxious or afraid. Fear is wild. Um, it's like you never outgrow it. It's like you never outarn it. You never outwit it. Fear is oftenimes illogical. And and here it is. Now though fear seems to be ever present e either upon us or around us or within us let's not make a friend of fear but let's acknowledge our fears.

So how is it how is it that hope and fear interact? How does this work? And that brings us back to our story again in John chapter 20 and verse 19. This verse shouldn't be encouraging, but it definitely is for me. It says, "That evening, the disciples gathered together because they were afraid.

They were afraid of the reprisals from the Jewish leaders. They had locked the doors to the place where they met. But suddenly Jesus appeared among them and said, "Peace to you." So, a little backstory. It's been three days since Jesus has died on the cross for the sins of humanity.

It's been three days since Jesus hung on the cross and said, "Father, forgive them. They don't know what they're doing." It's been three days since they buried him in a rich man's tomb and assigned guards on the outside to watch over and keep him for fear that people would steal away his body and concoct and make up a story that he had rose from the dead like he claimed he would.

That evening, the evening of the third day, the powerful, strong, incredible disciples who had followed Jesus around for some three and a half years in his public ministry. Where are they? They are afraid. They are scared. and they have locked themselves in a room for a lot of reasons, I'm sure, but specifically John 19 says because they fear that the Jewish leaders would do to them what they had done to Jesus.

So I'm going to ask you again, are you afraid? I think sometimes when people ask us that, what what we think they're saying is, are you weak? Are you a fraud? Are you fake? Are you authentic? Are you real? Because if you have fear, you must be a fraud.

If you have fear, you must be fake. How can you say you're a person of faith or hope or love if you're afraid? Well, I'll tell you how. It's called real life. I can believe with all of my heart that Jesus saved me from my sins and loves me and is near to me and is present with me right now and is going to be with me tomorrow.

Faith says right now. Hope says tomorrow. Love says who he is. I can believe all those things and yet still be afraid. You ever have those random fearful thoughts? Um I watched a commercial last night. And I was watching the Golf Channel getting ready for a golf tournament and I'm watching the kind of the sports center of golf channel called live from and they're discussing the golf tournament and I'm watching it and and it cuts to a commercial of this incredible aid to someone who had lost a limb and out of nowhere I get these repetitive thoughts.

What if I lost a leg? It's not hard to do. It's easy to do. And as odd as it might sound, last night watching the Golf Channel, fear started to seep in almost like ink in water and start just to kind of dilute. And now I'm like, I tell you what I did.

I quickly turned it into gratitude. And I literally just started. I sound so noble for doing this, but it was just my way of fending off fear. I started to thank God for my limbs. I started to thank God for my healthy body. I started to actually thank God that I can golf and how fun golf is for me.

But fear is so sneaky and it'll sneak in and seep in when you're watching Golf Channel at 11:00 p.m. at night on your couch. Oh yeah. The disciples, they had been with Jesus. They walked with Jesus. They saw miracles. They saw Jesus do all kinds of miracles and yet on Easter Sunday, where are they?

They locked themselves in a room. So if you feel afraid right now, you're in good company. The disciples felt the same way. I want to make three observations and I hope that these three observations um incite meaningful conversation with those that you're watching this content with. Now, if you're watching this content alone, that is no problem at all.

But maybe if you get a chance, interact with us on pastor chat. By interacting with how content like this affects you, absolutely proven, creates more growth and traction in your soul and certainly more more meaning. Here's my three observations. Hope and fear. Observation number one, hopelessness needs control.

Hopelessness assumes. Hopelessness jumps to conclusions. I said a couple of weeks ago, but hopelessness, it it it needs control. It's very interesting. Hopelessness, like fear, says that we need to we we've got to control the situation. We've got to control. Hopelessness is so sneaky and diabolical and how it feeds on fear.

Hopelessness, um, again, it it tells you like this is going to happen. Um, these disciples lock the door, guys. They lock the door. They they feel that a I don't know if it was dead bolts back then, but they feel a deadbolt is, I think, a metaphor, probably more than a metaphor, it's literal.

I It's this picture of hopelessness needs to control the situation. Hopelessness is one of the ways we tell ourselves it's going to happen. And so in some way we hope our hopelessness will insulate us or lessen the pain or uh uh uh uh diminish the agony that is the pending doom that is on its way.

And so hopelessness gives us this feeling like we already knew it was wasn't going to work out. So it didn't work out. It's not going to work out. You ever had that conversation with someone like yeah it probably not going to work out. It's not going to work out.

And you know what they're doing? They're setting themselves up so they're not disappointed. They're setting themselves up so their hopes are not dashed. So hopelessness is a form of controlling the pain. Controlling minimizing further agony. Well, it's just Yeah, it's not going to happen. It's not going to happen.

It happened. Oh, wow. Yeah, I'm surprised. Won't happen again. I mean, it happened once. Probably won't happen again. And there is this cycle, but hopelessness needs control. Hope doesn't hope doesn't you'll know when hope is working in your life. I'm not saying that you won't lock the doors at night.

That's probably wisdom, but you won't need. Hopelessness is actually a controlling mechanism. It's a controlling device. Hope doesn't do that. Hope yields control. Hopelessness takes control. Notice they're afraid. They feel hopeless. Jesus is dead. What do they do? Why does John say this? They locked the doors. Listen, there are other stories in the Bible where doors were locked, but they weren't mentioned.

For some reason, John wants us to know they were afraid. They're afraid they're going to get crucified, too. So, they locked the doors. That's how hopelessness works. We're going to take control. I'm in charge. I have the knowledge. I understand. I know the truth. I know what's going on.

Look how hopelessness works. Jesus is dead. He's not coming back. It's over. Lock the door. They crucified him. They're going to crucify you. Look at all the conclusions it jumps to. Look at all the assumptions it makes. Look at all the stories it's telling these disciples. And so, they're locking the doors, hoping nothing bad happens. and fear has well and truly taken root in their life.

Suddenly Jesus shows up. Before I jump to my third observation, let me say my second observation. Number one, hopelessness needs control. Number two, fear feeds itself. You ever notice that? It'll feed itself. It'll feed itself. They're all afraid together. They're all afraid together and they feed each other the fear.

Now, do I think all of them locked the doors at the same time? Maybe one of them locked the doors, but they were all in agreement to lock the doors. There's a lot said here that they're all like, "Let's lock the doors. Everybody to the room. Everybody's afraid.

Aren't you afraid? Aren't you hopeless? This is bad. This hurts." Have you ever noticed fear feeds itself and it will find company? As they say, misery loves company. Fear loves company. Fear wants company. Fear feeds on company. That's how fear works. Fear is is is insidious in that way that it wants to.

And this obviously brings us to an observation and and and that is if fear feeds itself like man how do I starve my fears. One of the ways you starve your fears is being around people that won't feed it. Being around people that won't feed it. Community is dynamic.

Community is essential. Community is important. Do the people in your life feed your fear or do they starve it? Think about that. I'm going to ask an even more probing question. You as a friend, do you feed your friends fears or do you starve them? Right? I I want to be people of hope.

Now, now here's my third observation and here's how you actually can starve your friends fears. My third observation is hope often shows up in the middle of fear like joy. Hope often shows up right in the middle of your fear and it shows up like joy. Look what it says.

John 20 19. Suddenly Jesus appeared among them and said peace to you. Then he showed them the wounds of his hands and his side. And they were overjoyed to see the Lord with their own eyes. And here comes this bubbling up of joy. Here comes this sense of excitement, anticipation of good.

Joy does good like a medicine. Laughter does good like a medicine. If you're in the middle of fear, don't underestimate laughter. Don't underestimate joy. Don't underestimate where you're Sometimes we overwhelm ourselves with the concept, I need to be a person of hope. I'm going to walk and I'll be a person of faith and I'm going to be a person of hope.

Faith. I'm going to believe that God's with me right now. Hope. I'm going to believe that God's going to be with me tomorrow. I'm going to walk in love. We get so intense about these things and we take ourselves so seriously and we get myopic and we get obsessive and we get compulsive around being a person of hope.

But I'm going to tell you sometimes we've got to turn off all the intro specive merciless probing of our inner souls. And we got to laugh at ourselves and laugh with ourselves and laugh with good friends. Oftent times hope shows up in the middle of our terror, in the middle of our anxiety, in the middle of our fear, and it shows up like joy.

I just think it's interesting. They're so afraid they lock the door. Jesus shows up and what's the emotion that surfaces? joy and joy. They're just like, "Ah, it's gonna work out." Like, it's gonna work out. You're like, "Dude, of course they're joyful. Of course they're joyful. He was dead.

Now they realize he's alive." But wait a second, there's a lot of other emotions in the proverbial closet they can choose from. There could be embarrassment. There could be regret. There could be repentance. There could be all kind like, "Oh, we're so so sorry. We the doors are locked.

Our bad. We shouldn't have locked the doors." I mean, by the way, there's no mention of the locked doors. There's no mention. Jesus isn't like, "All right, unlock the doors for crying out loud. Somebody open a window in here. It's stuffy." No, he just he appears and they start rejoicing, please.

I don't know who I'm talking to right now, but perhaps like me, you have underestimated joy and the role it plays in your journey. Don't underestimate joy. Don't underestimate laughter. Don't underestimate not taking yourself too seriously. I know the fear is crippling. I know the terror is real.

I know the sleepless nights have been hard. I can only imagine. I say that I know, but in truth, I can only imagine what it must like to be you and the fear that you're facing. And I know that you want to stay up all night and pray.

And I know that you want to recite scripture and read the whole of the Bible tonight. And that's noble, and that's wonderful. But please let me in. Let me let you in on a very unheralded aspect of the journey and it's called joy. Laughter in the middle of your pain.

The ability to go now that's funny. That's ironic. That's hilarious. And that's wild. I think that's I think that's my prayer for you this week. I really do. I think hopelessness run rampid runs rampid right now in the culture. I think we all have assumed hopelessness is jumped to conclusions and it seeks control.

You can see it everywhere you turn in our culture. Everyone is assuming they know because they're hopeless. Everyone has just allowed hopelessness to jump to these ironclad conclusions. This is just the way. It's going to get worse. And hopelessness assumes control. And so fear seems to be feeding itself and growing by the day in our culture.

What are we going to do? Well, I think Jesus is going to show up. And I think when he shows up, we're going to experience joy. And perhaps they'll see our love, but also perhaps they'll see our joy. And they say, "How is it in the middle of all this pain, you have joy?"

Well, it's because I got hope. I got hope that it's going to work out. Some will say it's the old polyiana perspective, the old polyiana mentality. If you don't know polyiana, you don't know. And that's fine. But it's just being positive for being positive. I mean, not a bad deduction and not a bad option, but I think it's more than that.

This idea of hope is not just being positive. It's being persuaded by a person. That he's in the room, that he's real, that he rose from the dead, that he's in control of my life. And though I will still face fear, I have hope. And that hope grows even more so perhaps than the fear grows.

And that hope, how do you know I have it? Sometimes I'm just illogically joyful. Sometimes I'm just happy. And maybe I got a lot of reasons not to be, but I'm just happy because I believe that he's with me now and he'll be with me tomorrow. That's hope.

I hope in some small way you have been able to see how hope works in the middle of our fears. How hope works in the middle of our grief. How hope works in the middle of all of the different pains, the pains of doubt questions we have. Hope works.

Ultimately, what I've been trying to say all of April is hope works because Jesus works. And so, I must tell you, I'm a man of hope. I got hope. I got hope for you. I got hope for your family. I got hope for your future. I got hope for your body.

I got hope for your brain. I got hope for your soul. I got hope. Who are we? We're We're people who got hope because we have Jesus. And that ((music playing)) um that honestly makes life worth living. Let me pray for you. God, I thank you for the time spent this whole month and even specifically these last few minutes.

You know the fears we face. In fact, you know them before we face them. So, if you can walk through walls and show up for these individuals 2,000 years ago, you can walk through the proverbial walls we set up to control the outcome and you can show up and give us joy.

We ask for that. I ask that. I pray specifically for anyone watching who'd like to give their life, the rest of their days to follow Jesus. If you're watching this and that's you, you're like, "Man, I I want to spend the rest of my life following Jesus." Say that right now.

Just say it right out loud wherever you are. So, the journey begins and you'll never be the same again. We love you. Um, hey, if there's anything we can do for you, please let us know on Pastor Chat. That's why it is there. And uh cannot wait for May.

May is going to be great. So I'll see you uh see you next ((music playing)) week. ((music playing)) Hallelujah. You have won the victory. And ((music playing)) hallelu, you have won it all for me. And death could not hold you down. You are the ris king and you're seated in ((music playing)) majesty. You are the ris king.

So by his stripes we are healed and by his nail and pierced hands we're free. By his blood we are washed clean. And now we have the ((music playing)) victory. And the power of sin is broken. Jesus overcame it all. Yes, you did, Jesus. And he has won our freedom.

Jesus has won it all. Worcing. So ((music playing)) hallelujah. You have won the victory. We're great. Hallelujah. ((music playing)) You have won it all for me. And death could not hold you down. And you are the ris king. And you're seated in mesty. Oh God, and you are the ris. So hallelu, you have won the victory.

((music playing)) Hallelu. You have one it all for me. ((music playing)) ((music playing)) ((music playing))