Mensa Otabil - Hope, Look up to God
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Life must be lived with hope and with an expectation of good things. Without hope, life becomes hopeless. Have you ever been in a situation where someone says there is no hope for you and all of a sudden your outlook changes? You cannot see how to confront a situation ahead of you. I want to talk to you this week about hope. Psalm 33:18 says, «Behold, the eye of the Lord is on those who fear Him, on those who hope in His mercy, to deliver their soul from death and to keep them alive in famine.» Our soul waits for the Lord; He is our help and our shield. Our heart shall rejoice in Him because we have trusted in His holy name. Let Your mercy, O Lord, be upon us just as we hope in You. Hope is a feeling of expectation; it is a desire, a looking forward to something happening for you.
There are two kinds of hope: positive hope and negative hope. Those who have negative hope live life by the maxim that whatever will happen will happen. That is what you call a fatalistic life. You have accepted that anything that must happen will happen. That is not the way God wants us to look at life. God wants us to know that things can happen differently from what must happen because God makes things happen. He wants us to have positive hope.
Positive hope is having a good outlook on life; it is looking at life from a very positive point of view. The passage we read from the Psalm says that God’s eyes are on those who hope in Him. Interestingly, God’s eyes are looking for something, and the Bible says that He is looking for people whose eyes are on Him. There has to be an eye connection between you and God. God’s eyes are looking for you, and your eyes must be looking for Him. In this space, there is an eye connection: the eye that looks to God is the eye that is hopeful, expectant, and desiring something positive to happen.
As we struggle and deal with the uncertainties of this season, one of the important things you need is hope. Your eyes must be fixed on something positive—hope in God’s mercy, hope in God’s goodness, and a desire to see life beyond what we are going through now. Maybe you are in a lockdown and you don’t like it; perhaps your business is going down, or maybe some bad news has come to you. How do you deal with it?
We start by hoping: looking with expectancy, desiring something good, and having a positive view about life. Our hope is not just a positive attitude; our hope is in the Lord. So I want to encourage you: look up, don’t look down; don’t look depressed, look up. Hope in the Lord; the Lord is your hope. The Lord is your shield, and He will make a connection with you. I pray for you this week that you and God will make a connection. He is looking for you; you look up to Him. He is your deliverer; He is your salvation. The psalmist says that He delivers our soul from death and keeps us alive in famine. He is our help and our shield. May the Lord keep you through this season; may He give you victory; may He cause your eyes to always look up to Him and never down on yourself. Have a great week. I’m Pastor Minnesota Bill. Shalom, peace, and life to you.