Old guy that used to go to church here, Warren Livingston. Bless his heart. He's gone on to be with the Lord now. And he had a classical music record collection. I went over to his house one day and he just let me play records. Classical music. That was the kind of weirdo I was as a teenager growing up. Anyway, I have a lot of those records to this day. It's good to be in God's house this morning. Can I hear you say amen? Amen. I'd like for you to take your Bibles this morning and turn to Job chapter 14. Job 14 and Proverbs 13. Turn there this morning. Amen. I want you to think about some things in your life. I want you to think about where your life is headed. Think about what you thought, how life was going to turn out for you. I want you to consider all of those things. I'm going to preach a message this morning, and would it be okay if I turn the air down just a little bit? It's a little stuffy to me. If anybody wants to borrow my jacket, you're more than welcome to, but you may not like the The book of Job and the book of Proverbs this morning. Let's see here. They're not even turned on. It was so nice and cool this morning, we forgot to turn the air conditioner on this morning. Thank you, Lindsay. Job chapter 14, verse 7. I want you to look at what the Bible says. You believe the Bible this morning? Believe what it says. It's the Word of God. And it's the only thing that'll keep us going. Job chapter 14, verse 7, the Bible says, For there is what? Hope of a tree. Hope of a tree. If it be cut down, that it will sprout again. I want you to think this morning of some things in life that have been cut down. I want you to think of yesterday when Courtney and Steve was up here. I was back there in the back with Courtney and she kept saying, I feel like I'm going to throw up. It's okay, hang on to me good daddy. That's why the daddy walks her down. He's holding her up, amen. They stood up here yesterday And they looked at each other with hope. Not disdain, not what am I doing here? They looked at each other with hope. Dreams of what could be. Dreams of a home together. Dreams of one day having a family. Dreams of God doing things with God. God finally giving them something that we all crave and that is companionship. The desire in us, not just the physical desires of marriage. That kind of fades away after time. It's the desire to be a companion to and with somebody. And we have hopes that those things will never go away. But you and I know that sometimes, and I would even say in the year that we live in now, a lot of times, that tree gets cut down. How many people have joined together in marriage only to find themselves five years, ten years, even now there's a trend there's a trend right now of older people upper forties fifties even into their sixties that are abandoning their spouses in search of something better the divorce rate uh... it's a growing trend the divorce rate of those of my age and older they're they're busting up they're getting divorced to find something else Probably, in a lot of cases, one of the spouses has decided, she just don't cut it for me anymore. I'm gonna find something younger or something better. There's even a website that, and I saw this advertised on TV, I haven't been to it, but I saw this advertised on TV. It's a website that's designed to reunite high school lovers. After 20, 15, 20, 30 years of marriage with somebody else, they'll reunite these people that they looked at each other in high school, never got the chance, and now they're going to have the chance. And so what does that do to the other spouse? The tree, the hope that they had, the dream that they had, at that point, the day of their marriage, that tree's been cut down. and it is no more. And I want you to think, I'm not just going to deal with that issue this morning, but I want you to think of issues of life, that things that at one time you had a dream, you had a hope, you had something that you desired and it got cut down. And I don't normally title my messages, but if you want to just think about it this way, We're saved by hope. Saved by hope. Let's go to the Lord in prayer. Father, Lord, help me get through this message. And Lord, Father, just give me strength. Help me to preach, dear God, what you'd have me to preach. And Lord, Father, just fill our minds and our hearts, Lord, with the goodness and the stability of your word in us this morning. We pray this in the name of Jesus, our Lord and our Savior. And all of God's people said, Amen. I want you to think of this now. I want to continue reading here, Job chapter 14, verse 7. For there is hope of a tree, if it be cut down, that it will sprout again. Would you think about that? There is always hope. And I want us to just kind of ponder this this morning on what hope is and what hope is not. And I'm not talking about the world's idea of hope. We went all summer, this summer, saying, well, I hope it rains. Hope it rains. Boy, I hope we get some rain. Farmers around in this area, we're going, boy, I tell you what, it's bad. Cattle ain't got nothing to eat, and we're going to have to buy hay, and we didn't have money set aside for that. Boy, we just hope it rains. A lot of people will hope that their presidential candidate will get in office and that theyíll alter the course of the country. Both sides are running on that same idea right now. Letís change direction. Letís change course. They have hopes and dreams that a political candidate will solve the problems of America. They have hopes and dreams or they have wishes now. that if we just had more money we could do this or if we had a bigger house we'd be happier some people have the idea that they have a new car that'll bring them happiness the smell of a new car and the show and the feel of a new car or a new house or anything like that that's new we have hopes and ideas we have wishes that that will make things in life better for us and let me tell you what God's version of hope and I want you to think about this idea when I'm making mention of the idea of being saved by hope. Hope is not wishing. Hope is not wishing. We can wish a lot of things. How many of you make a wish on your birthday? Blow out the candles and... And we play these silly little games like, well, what'd you wish for? Oh no, I'm not supposed to tell because if I tell, Right? Yeah, or if you don't blow out all the candles. Good grief. We had a birthday party for Sterling one time, talking about candles. He wanted to blow them out and the heat kept driving him back. I made that up. Yeah. But we throw money in a well and make a wish. And the only people who benefit from that is the guy that owns the well. By the way, I looked at it. Believe it or not, and this is me, I did research on that thing, because I know where the beast is coming from. I know where he's coming from. And that idea goes all the way back to the pagan idea that we are giving an oblation to a God in order that he will bless us in some way. That, just thought I'd throw that in there. I'm not saying you're going to hell now because you threw a quarter or said, here Johnny, want to make a wish now. I'm not saying you're going to hell. You're going to hell for a lot of other things other than that. Amen. Thank God for the mercy of God. Somebody say amen. But hope, real biblical hope is not wishing. It's not that. The hope, we don't just say, when I say saved by hope, we don't have it in our minds, I wish I could go to heaven. I wish I could have eternal life. Boy, I like that, but I just know that I probably never will. When we have worldly kind of hope, it's nothing but a wish, it's not based upon anything, we're just drawing something that maybe we'd like to have, but we've already decided in our mind that more than likely we're not going to get it. And it should not ever be said of someone who claims the name of Christ, claims the faith of Jesus Christ, claims the promises that are in this book, it ought not ever be said of us that our testimony is that we just wish we could go to heaven. We have hope. And according to the Bible, and I'm gonna show you this, according to the scriptures, Biblical hope is Knowing and believing That if God said this is what I'm going to do That's what he's going to do Paul talked about in first Corinthians chapter 13 that beautiful beautiful chapter in the Bible that we call the charity chapter and By the way, don't let anybody mess you up the word charity. You can't you cannot fathom what that word means and Just go look it up instead of just, well, charity is when you give money to poor people. It's way beyond that. Did you know that you could give money to poor people and not care about how they turn out? You know what real charity is? Giving to them and hoping and caring about that. The word care and charity and caress, they're all related to the same thing. This is God kind of love. But he talks about in 1 Corinthians 13 that they said, Now there abideth these three. And I like that because I have a father and he has a son and they speak to us by way of his Holy Spirit. How many of y'all believe that? Say amen. So even in this earth, there abides, which means dwells with us and lives with us, these three. Faith, and hope, and charity. By the way, they are intertwined and interconnected with one another. And if you don't have faith, you have no hope. Amen. If you have no faith, you have no hope. And if you cannot have faith and hope, you cannot even possibly grasp the kind of charity that God has for us as His people. Cannot even fathom that. It just will not make any sense to you. But He said, there is hope of a tree, if it be cut down, that it will sprout again, and that the tender branch thereof will not cease. Though the root thereof wax old in the earth, and the stalk thereof die in the ground. Look at verse 9. Yet through the scent of water, it will bud and bring forth bowls like a plant. God teaches us through the things that are out here in this world. He said take a look at it and you all know that there is hope even if a tree's been cut down. And what happens is that once that tree's cut down all that root wad starts rotting and decaying in the ground. What's above the ground will eventually rot and decay and there'll be nothing left. God said but there's hope. There's hope that even when we look and see the decayed rottenness and the corruption that is in this world, when it looks like that there is no hope, that's when there's hope. When it looks like in the world that it's too far gone, that's when it's hope. Now let me tell you something. You probably have prayed for somebody in your family or somebody that you know, somebody that you care about to be saved. But really in your mind, you sort of had it the idea that, well, they're too far gone. Well, they're too sinful. Maybe there's too much there. They can't be saved. They'll never go to heaven, even though you say you want to. You know what you're doing? You're just wishing they'll get saved. You're just wishing they'll want to go to heaven. But you, in your mind, you've already said they're too rotten, they're too corrupt, that it's too far dead. There can be no resolution here. But I'm telling you, I believe in a God, through this Bible, that says there's hope! If that tree's cut down, that that thing will come back up again. There's hope! If there is. And now I want you to look at Proverbs chapter 13, verse 12. The Bible says, hope deferred maketh the heart sick. Hope deferred. That means that you were hoping that joy would come in the morning, or that, well God I prayed, now I'm just kinda waiting for you to do something, and it doesn't happen in our time frame, and it makes us sad, it makes us depressed, it makes our hearts sick. How many of you ever had your heart sick? Say amen. You prayed to God, God didn't answer the prayer right then, and He's making you hope and still believe that you can trust Him, because if you ask for it, God will deliver it. Or have we decided that we don't believe that anymore in Christianity? Have we decided, because of the rampant false doctrine of the charismatic movement and the word faith idea, well you just name it, claim it and it's yours and this and that and the other. Have we now decided that what God said really isn't true, it might be true for somebody but it's probably not going to be true for me. Do we really believe that if we ask anything in His name, He'll give it to us? Do we really believe that? Or if we just made our theological arguments and set it aside and say, well, that doesn't really mean that. Do we really still believe that where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them? Do we really believe that? Do we really believe, and I'm just asking you this, but do we really believe that if any two of you agree is touching anything in heaven and earth, it shall be done? Do we really, do we really still believe that? Or have we put the hulks and the cut down trees? Have we put the trees that have been cut down in our life and all we see is a rotten stump left? Have we just decided that, well, and we get real spiritual about it, Gary, well, let God's will be done. And I'm not trying to encourage you into some fast-talking, weird Christianity. They name it, claim it, crowd. I'm not trying to talk you into that. But what I'm telling you is that there is still hope even if hope is deferred. Even if hope is deferred. And I want you to listen to this preacher this morning because there may be a situation in your life right now. So we come to church, we've got our nice clothes on, we look, everything's fine, how you doing? I'm doing pretty good. But deep down inside there's something that's making your heart sick. And it's making you very sad. And you just almost, you just almost quit believing. Because let me tell you something, let me tell you what's worse than not having any hope at all. Is to have a hope in something and it, get your hope, you know how we say, you're gonna get your, you're getting, I'm afraid he's gonna get his hopes built up. And then nothing happens. Let me tell you something about all these lost people going up and down American Legion Drive here. Let me tell you that in some cases, not all, but in some cases, those people have had an introduction to biblical Christianity and have had their hopes dashed either by their own sinfulness or somebody else's. And it's not that they don't believe. It's not that they just would rather sin. They probably have had a situation in life, maybe even in a church, where, well, they said that all this stuff would happen and it never happened. And this is one of my big slams against the idea that if you get saved, then you're going to be healthy and wealthy and prosperous and everything's going to be fine and you can have your best life now. I'm against that. If I have my best life now, what have I got to wait for after the trees cut down? And you're wondering why you're having such a hard time. You're wondering why your heart is sick. You're wondering why that is God punishing you. to make you, because of some things you did and you're going through something right now, God's just punishing you, you've got it coming, and so you say, well, God will just take my punishment. But really, you almost quit believing. And I don't know who this message is for this morning. Maybe it's not for anybody here, maybe it's for somebody, I don't know. I do know one thing, that I've had to have this message preached into me many times. Because I've seen a lot of trees got cut down. blown away. I, like my daughter yesterday, stood, Lisa and I stood right here, same as yesterday, we stood right here and we looked at each other's eyes and we had hopes. I had hope of a wife that would do everything I told her to do. She had hope of a husband that would do everything she told him to do. But we had hopes. We've had times like everybody else. We've had those hopes seem like they've just cut down. But there's hope of a tree. That it will rise up again. And it will be fruitful. And I want you to notice, here in Proverbs, when he's talking about this hope, there's hope deferred, make of the heart sick. I want you to look at the end result of that, what happens there. Hope deferred maketh the heart sick, but when the desire... Notice, now I want you to look at the word hope and the word desire. That's how the Bible's defining words for you. You don't have to look them up in every other dictionary, nor do you have to go back and... Well, the ancient Hebrews understood it this way. Really? Who cares? You know what the Bible says hope is? It's desire. Hope deferred maketh the heart sick, but when the desire cometh, what is it? It's a tree of life. You know what a tree of life is? It's always a picture of salvation, eternal life, heaven. Okay? And I was, I was, well, let me, let me just, let me, let me just preach that, what, what God laid out for me last night, so I don't get off track here. Let me talk about false hope for a minute. There's false hope. I mentioned a while ago, you can put your hope in political candidates, they're not going to save the country, they're not going to fix it. I'm not impressed with either one of them. I'll be honest with you. And some people are saying, well, you know, we've got to get Obama out of the wall, we've got to do this, we've got to do that. And I'm just going to tell you, my vote is my conscience. My vote is my conscience. If such and such political party wants my vote, they better not try to entice me to sear my conscience to get it, because I won't. I won't do it. By the way, I'm going to throw this in there, and you can just be mad at me if you want to, but I'll tell you this, and I'm not for the Republican candidate this year for president. I'm not for him in any way. But I want to tell you something. That godless Democratic Party, and I'm only using the terms that's been in the news this week, three times they've had to remove God, the word God, out of their party's platform to appease the liberals that are in that group. that all it was was an idea that they had the phrase god-given talent or god-given something like that and the people who run the show bucked up against that said we want that taken out of that and i want to say i don't care if your grandpa voted that way i don't care if your grandma voted that way i don't care if FDR saved the country i don't care what you think you cannot vote for a godless man or woman and put them in office and think that everything's going to be okay You say, well, my social security or my pension or my wages, the other party's going to ruin that. I heard it on the news. Don't fall for that nonsense. Did you know that righteousness exalts a nation? Did you know when we start getting God back in our churches, then God will start being back in our political spheres? And did you know that God will bless this nation? Hey, go read the book of Judges if you want a good rundown of how this country's going. And I'm just saying to you this morning that we cannot put our hope in political candidates. We cannot put our hope in political ideologies. We cannot put our hope that hopefully Iran will change its mind and not build a nuclear weapon to destroy Jerusalem with. We cannot put our hope in things of this world. Now I want you to listen to a few verses this morning about false hope. Job 27 verse 8, for what is the hope of the hypocrite? You know what a hypocrite is? The hypocrite is, I say one thing and believe another. Alright? Believe one thing and do another. That's a hypocrite. For what is the hope of the hypocrite, though he hath gained, when God taketh away his soul? What good is it? Will God hear his cry when trouble cometh upon him? Will he delight himself in the Almighty? Will he always call upon God? No, you hypocrite. You're sitting in church house and you're calling yourself a Christian and you've got your hope in everything else in the world but Almighty God. You ain't got no hope if that's where your hope is. Did you know the riches of this world and this country are going to vanish away? Did you know that everything that we have depended on and counted on in this life are going to be burnt up in a great fire one of these days? Did you know that that's when it's going to happen? And if that's where your hope is, you don't have any hope. You've got false hope. Job 31, 24. If I have made gold my hope. Listen to that! Pastor, we think it's going to get bad. You think we ought to start buying gold? No. You know what I think you ought to do? Hey, we're just looking for an investment now for our money. Because when things get bad now, we're going to have to eat and have to do this and do that. You want a good investment for your money? Go buy you about a thousand Bibles, King James Bibles, and send them to Kenya. Send them to Nairobi. Send them to the Philippines. Well, what's that going to do? God will take care of you. You feed them, God will feed you. If I have made gold my hope, or have said to the fine gold, Thou art my confidence, if I rejoice because my wealth was great, and because mine hand had gotten much, if I beheld the sun when it shined, or the moon walking in brightness, and my heart hath been secretly enticed, or my mouth hath kissed my hand, this also were an iniquity to be punished by the judge, for I should have denied the God that is above." When you put your hope and your wishing and everything else, but Almighty God. Proverbs 1028, the hope of the righteous shall be gladness. But the expectation of the wicked shall perish. You know why that godless democratic party, you know what they're wanting? Hey, you listen to me. You know what they really want out of America? That godless, wicked, liberal party in this country wants to have a situation where their sins are being able to be paraded out publicly and no one will ever say anything against them for it. Where sodomites can sodomize one another publicly! Publicly! And no, they wanted America, well nothing will ever be said about them. That's the hope of the wicked. Proverbs 11, 7. When a wicked man dieth, his expectation shall perish, and the hope of unjust men perisheth. It's gone. Jeremiah 18, 12. And they said, there's no hope! But we will walk after our own devices, and we will, everyone, do the imagination of his evil heart. And I want to tell you something, you who have been done dirty by somebody, you who have been wronged by somebody, you who somebody has treated evil, you've got it in your mind, I'm going to get, I'm going to get justice on them. I'm going to get revenge. I'm going to, my only hope is that I can see somebody suffer for what they did to me. You ain't got no hope. You have no hope. Your hope will perish with your rotten, corrupt soul is what'll happen. You put your hope in God, God'll fix it, God'll take care of it. Do we really believe that? Or do we believe that, well, I gotta make my own way, I gotta do my own thing, I gotta take care of my own stuff, I gotta this, I gotta that. You have no hope in God and you call yourself a Bible Christian. Who do you think you're fooling? Who do you think you're fooling? That's false hope. Do not have self-reliance. Do not count on self-discipline, by the way. Did you know the phrase self-discipline is not in the King James Bible? It's in these others, Jim. Self-discipline. It's not in the Bible. You know every place where they have self-discipline in the end of Eden, you know what it says in the King James? Huh? Temperance. That means God's pulled you through the fire and tempered you. God did it. You didn't. That's good, isn't it? Your self-reliance, self-confidence, self-achievement, self-satisfaction, self, self, self, self, self. You have hope in yourself. And I want to tell you something. When the ball comes down on your soul, crashing into you, destroying everything that you've built, and you look at yourself in a crumpled heap of the mess that you have made out of your life, there's all your hope right there. All your hope's gone. How is it that a man's born again? How is it that he's saved? Well, the Bible says he's saved by hope. Now, I want you to look at Romans chapter 4 verse 18 with me very quickly this morning. Romans chapter 4 verse 18. I want you to look at this idea of what biblical hope is. And it actually defines it here in this passage. I'd heard a sermon on this years ago. Pastor Kelly preached this. First time I ever heard him preach. And he preached on biblical hope. And he defined it as the well-founded knowing that what God said he'll do, he'll do. And that's been a phrase that's been in my heart. And my spirit agreed with it, but I didn't have the scripture to back it up. And lo and behold, I just look in the scripture and I see it's right there. And I want you to look at this. Abraham, now I want you to think about Abraham. Abraham's tree has been cut down. Let me tell you, let me tell you before we get into Romans chapter 4, let me tell you what Abraham did. Abraham had received a promise from God that he was going to have an heir. That he was going to have many children. And that he would be a nation and nations would come out of him and all the world would be blessed because of what issued forth from him. So let me tell you where Abraham's hope originally was. His hope, and this is while he was still Abram. His hope was, and Sarai's hope was, well maybe God meant it this way. Maybe God, and this is where we always run into problems, C.J., when we start trying to tell God what He thinks. Maybe God meant it this way. Maybe, Abram, since my body's no good, maybe you're to take my slave, my servant, Hagar, an Egyptian girl, and you're to go in unto her, And she'll bring forth a child in your name. Maybe that's how it's going to be. And that didn't work. Because all that happened was, now Hagar hates Sarah. And there's enmity between the two. By the way, there's always enmity between the law and between God's promise. Always warfare. And that's what those two represent in the book of Galatians chapter 4. And this issue was that here's Abram now and he thinks now that Ishmael is going to be the fulfillment of God's word and God's promise and he finds out it's not. His tree's been cut down. He has no tree now. Now he has no offspring. He has no son. And he's upwards of 99 years old. Even in Abram's day, Abraham's day, that's old. Old. And the tree's been cut down. And I want to tell you something, reality, let's just get honest. We try to act spiritual in times like this. But let's get honest, all of us have laughed at God. God, no, you didn't mean that. So sure enough, the Lord himself came around to the tent of Abraham and Sarah. And God said, I'm telling you, this time next year, there's going to be a little boy running around this place. He's going to be the child of promise. And Sarah heard that, and what did she do? And even when the Lord confronted her, you laughed. No, I didn't laugh. Now she's lying. But God said, the tree is going to rise again. And there's an expression here in Romans chapter 4 verse 18. The Bible says, who against hope believed in hope. There's an expression that we have even, and this comes from the Bible. We hoped against all hope. And what that means is, is that we still hoped even though all of the circumstances and situations that were surrounding us, when everything in life was telling us that it was not going to happen. We hoped against hope. We still believed. We still believed. I laid my daddy in the ground. And this month will be the one year anniversary of that. And a year ago, I laid my daddy down on the ground, closed the casket lid on him, and said my last goodbye. And I did it in hope. I missed my dad. I've got a picture of him there at my office desk at home. Every now and then, I look at him and talk to him a little bit. Yesterday, I was wearing the watch during the wedding that my dad was wearing when he died, just to have dad here. He would have been so proud. I miss my dad. I miss my little baby. I miss my brother-in-law. I miss my Meemaw and Peepaw. I miss them. I miss them bad. My grandma, mom's mom. But I've buried those people in hope. What I have in me, and what I believe, not just what I believe, what I know, is that those trees are going to rise again. Now don't you listen to me. Everybody in this room has had a tree cut down, one way or the other. You would put all your hope in that tree. That was going to be the shade tree. It was going to have a little swing in it. Maybe it was a little apple tree and you were just going to get something out of it. Maybe it was a vine of grapes. And those things are all cut down. Speaking of that, let me talk to you for a minute. My Meemaw. Don't you laugh at me when I say Meemaw. I'll punch you in the eye. That's Meemaw. I just worship the ground she walked on. She's the one that made them big old biscuits, Jared, about like that. I mean, every morning she'd be up five o'clock. We'd wake up at six with bacon and sausage frying. And that little house that her and people all lived in, that was just, to me, just sacred ground. I can see it in my mind, but what's More particular to me is that to this day, I can still smell the house. Y'all know what that means, don't you? You can still... And Memaw had a little grapevine out the backyard. And she would go out and tend to that every year, and she would pull grapes off of that. She was not a wine drinker, so don't worry about that. But she made homemade jelly. out of that. That's what grapes are good for, by the way. As far as I'm concerned, that's the only thing they're good for. Amen. Some good homemade jelly. She would make that. Beyond that, my dad, when he was about 9 or 10, 11 years old, went out and planted three rows of little bitty pine seedlings. He must have put probably, I don't know, probably 30 or 40 pine trees out in the backyard, just one after another. By the time I'm a boy growing up, those things are 40, 50 feet high and they're huge. And when Meemaw died, Peepaw died back in 1990, 91, 90 I think. Mom and dad and my aunt sold the house. The guy that bought the house cut down the vine and hired a lumber company to come in and timber all that pine out, cut them down. Boy, that hurt. I just mourned over that, wept over that. That was my place. And it cut it down. Where my dad is, right now, and where my Meemaw is right now, that's where my hope is. That's where my hope is. I don't want the old vine and the old trees no more. We think we do, but we don't. I want the new ones. I want the new vine and the new tree of life. That's what I want. That's what I'm preaching to you this morning. That's what I'm getting at. That's where my hope is. At one time, I thought, boy, if I had the money, I would buy that house, and I would leave it exactly the way it is. I had it in my mind I wanted to do that. Let me read the scriptures to you. Romans chapter 4 verse 18. Abraham passed on his hope to his children and then to their children and that hope is how you and I live right now. We live in the same desire and hope as Abraham lived in. We are the children of Abraham if we have hope. Somebody say amen. And being not weak in faith, but even though, listen to me, he was weak in body. He's a hundred years old. expected to produce a child, Sarah, 90 years old. And the Bible tells us that she had already gone past after the manner of women. Her body was unproductive and unfruitful. No way it could happen this way. Maybe God meant something else. See, that's what we do. We play these little games in our mind. Maybe God meant something else. Maybe it's going to be done this way. And we put our hope in something that is not what God said. But God said, no, I know what I said, and I know what I meant. Abraham, you and Sarah, you're going to come together, and you're going to have a child, Sarah. Because with God, all things are possible. Don't you ever forget that. So shall thy seed be. See, that's the promise. If you're born again, born of Christ, Born of God, you're born of hope. And being not weak in faith, he considered out his own body now dead. When he was about a hundred years old, neither yet the deadness of Sarah's womb, he staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief. He just believed what God said, but was strong in faith. Hey, and by the way, that belief carried him through to allow him to lay Isaac upon the altar. It was same faith, same faith. that allowed him to fulfill what God had told him to do by offering up his own son and he offered him up and once the terms and conditions were met then God provided himself a lamb! I want to shout that out. Staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strong in faith giving glory to God and being fully persuaded This is where it is right here the well-founded knowing that if God said he's gonna do something He's gonna do so there it is being fully persuaded fully Persuaded that what he had promised he was able also to perform Amen, and therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness. Did you get that I? What was the physical condition of Abraham's body and Sarah's body? It was old, corrupt, and gone past their ability. And yet God imputed his righteousness upon Abraham because he had hope. He believed that if God said he was going to do it, then God is going to do it. Can I get an amen out of God's people? Romans chapter 8, verse 20. For the creature was made subject to vanity. That's why you lost your keys one day. That's why your car broke down. That's why you had to go to the hospital. You were made subject to vanity. That's why you ladies don't look the same as you did when you was 19 years old. You're subject to vanity. Men are subject to vanity. When you're a subject to something, it rules over you. And who made it rule over you? God did. God made a rule over you. Hey, those of you been married 10, 15, 20, 30, 40 years, you don't look the same as you did when you first got married. You're subject to vanity, but you've got hope that even when the looks go downhill, the love continues to grow and God will continue to bless. Can I hear you say amen? Because the creature, excuse me, made subject to vanity not willingly, but by reason of him who had subjected the same in hope. Because the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves, grown within ourselves, waiting for the adoption to wit, the redemption of our body. When you, hey, when you've sat there in the crumpled heap of your own disobedience to God, when you've sat there and said, I'll never do that, I'll never commit that sin, I'll never, I'll be better than everybody else, And you're sitting there in the crumpled ruins of your own iniquity. And you can look up to heaven and say, God, I no longer believe in myself anymore. I believe in you. That's hope. That's hope. And you've grown. You've grown within yourself. God, I want a better body. God, I want a better mind. God, I want your ways. God, I want things to be better. And you've grown! And your hope and belief is not in you anymore, it's in God. It's where it's supposed to be. you believe the tree's gonna rise up again through the scent of water. Verse 24, there it is right there, for we are saved by what? We're saved by hope. But hope that is seen is not hope. I curse Joel Osteen's book, Your Best Life Now, I curse that. In fact, it's already cursed. He's telling you that you can have everything God wants for you right here and right now. Did you know what? That's not salvation because there's no hope. If you already have it, you don't need it again. And so God did something for us, Brian. He painted a picture in the book of Revelation of heaven and told us everything that it was going to be. And we look at heaven and we see no more dying. We see no more curse. We see no more death. We see no more sickness. We see no more pain. We see no more sinfulness. We see none of that stuff up there. And I want to tell you something. I want that so bad in me. I've grown over those things. I'll get them one of these days. I have hope. I have hope. What a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for? But if we hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it? Romans 15, 4. For whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning, that we through patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope. Your hope's gonna come from the King James Bible, by the way. In fact, go back and read Psalm 119. You know what you're gonna see about four or five times in there? I hope in thy word. I've hoped in thy word. I hope in thy word. I hope in thy word. Romans 15 13 now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace and believing that you may abound in hope through the power of the Holy Ghost you know what a bound is you know what to bound is you ever seen a deer jump a four strand five strand barbed wire fence okay he abounds over that he don't just go he don't do like me try to wonder how I'm going to get through that without having them barbed stick me in my thigh or my backside I don't know how to jump an eight-strand barbed wire fence, but I've seen them buck deer just go boom like that. They bound over that. They leap over that. That's high. In fact, the whole word, I looked up the etymology of hope and down deep in its roots somewhere has this idea of jumping up to receive an expectation of something. Let me tell you why the Bible calls Jesus our blessed hope. Because one of these days, the trumpet's gonna sound, he's gonna call, and we're gonna bound up, amen! Bound up and go meet and have our expectations and our true desires given to us by our Lord Jesus Christ when we are one with Him! Somebody say amen. And by the way, at that time, hope will be done away with. You know why? No need for it. Amen. Galatians 5.5, for we through the Spirit wait for the hope of righteousness by faith. I may not have it yet, I may not be much good now, but I believe I will be. Colossians 121, and you that were sometime alienated enemies in your mind by wicked works, how many of you ever had those say amen? Yet now, hey, wicked works, remember? You want me to start listing them for you? Yet now hath he reconciled in the body of his flesh through death to present you holy and unblameable and unreprovable in his sight. If you continue in faith grounded and settled and be not moved away from the hope of the gospel." Again, you put your hope in any place outside of this Bible and outside of the gospel, you have no hope. Don't let anybody take you away from this Bible. Once you've got it, you hang on to it. You keep it, amen. You hold on to it. I don't care if every rascal in the world turns away from this Bible. I don't care, CJ, if every preacher and every theologian and everybody in the whole world steps away from this Bible. Listen, you can have it when you pry it from my cold, dead fingers. Somebody say amen. Amen! Everybody's saying that about guns. Amen, you can have my guns. Hey, you can have my guns. I'm hanging on to my Bible. Amen Hebrews chapter 3 verse 5 and Moses barely was Faithful in all his house as a servant for a testimony of those things were to be spoken after but Christ as the son of his own house whose house are we if we hold fast Go ahead and try to take it out of my hands It's not leaving by the way, it's not just in my hands it's in my heart and you can't steal it away out of my heart and if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm into the end. Colossians 127, to whom God would make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. 1 Thessalonians 5, 8, but let us who are of the day be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love and for an helmet, what? The hope of salvation. Salvation, listen, when you get saved, you've got hope. Amen? God gives you hope. The hope of salvation. Titus 2, chapter 2, verse 11. For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, teaching us that denying ungodliness and worldliness, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world, looking for that blessed hope. And I want to tell you something. There's enough religious people out there who are tying themselves up in religious duties and religious practices and moral things like this. Hey, the Muslims don't have playboys on their newsstand over in those Muslim countries. Did you know that? The Muslims do not sell and promote pornography. They don't do that stuff. They seem like they have a morality, even though they have a right to shoot and kill their wives. Not good. Okay? If I ever shot and killed my wife, she would shoot and kill me back, I guarantee you. Amen. They have a sense of morality, and everybody thinks, oh, well, look how they live. We look at the Amish, oh, look how they live. Oh, they've got this and that. Did you know that, by and large, most Amish communities are lost? They're lost. They're without Christ. Do you know why? Because they put their hope in their separation. They put their hope in their self-righteousness. They put their hope in their morality. And when you break one of the rules of the community, the bishop will cast you out. And if you're cast out of the Amish community, by and large, you're not saved anymore. They declare you lost, and they declare you without hope. And I want to tell you something, I believe in morality, I believe you ought to live right, I believe you ought to do, hey, the grace of God will teach you how to live right, the Bible says. But if you live all the rules, and follow all the rules and regulations, and you have no hope, you're lost! Lost as a goose. He said, looking for the blessed hope, Glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ Hebrews 611 we desire that every one of you do show the same diligence to the full assurance of hope and to the end Hebrews 618 that by two immutable things in which it was impossible for God to lie you write that down in your heart We might have a strong consolation who have fled to refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us Which hey, I want you to listen to this now. We're saved by hope We are anchored by hope. What does an anchor do? Somebody tell me. You know what it does? It holds the ship steady when the waves would drive it off. You listen, hey, you write that down in your heart and think about that for a while. When the waves of everything around you are driving you away, the hope, I want to read it, you just, here it is right here. We have a strong consolation who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us, which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sheer and steadfast, and which entereth into that within the veil." Hope anchors. You keep hope, hope keeps you. And even, and I will say this to you, and I'm going to close. I ain't quite done with it, but I'm done. I've said enough. Now, don't you listen to me. people every week. They'll write in or they'll call. Pass the mic. I don't know. I'm afraid I'm afraid I'm going to hell. I'm afraid this and I'm afraid that. It's always good every now and then to just get honest with yourself. And I want to tell you something. When your emotions tell you you're not saved, And by the way, do emotions come in waves? I was amazed. See, I mean, it started when my dad died. It didn't hit me all at once. On the day of his funeral. I had to go run into an office somewhere down at mom's church. Had to go run and hide somewhere because, I mean, it was such a wave of emotion and grief coming over me. I just, I could not contain it. And it just came in and just exploded in me. And I wept and I wept and I wept and I cried and I screamed and hollered, kicked and got mad and everything else in the world. Then it went away for a while, Jared. Remember that? Then it came back. Not as strong. Then it went away. Then it came back. And then there was another one after that. And another one after that. We went down to the cemetery after camp this summer. Here comes the wave again. Because there's my dad, six feet under dirt. It's kind of funny because we wanted to make a nice headstone for him and there was already like a little stick in the ground with a piece of cardboard cut out that said Milton Hoggart on it. And I told mom, I said, that looks like what dad would make. Why don't we just keep that one? Dad grew up post-depression. They didn't spend a lot of money on stuff like that, amen? I said, you know, that just kind of looks like what Dad would like. We went ahead and put a nice marble one there. And a wave came and hit me. And I walked by the refrigerator often. And still hanging on our refrigerator is a picture of a granddaughter that I tried not to love, but couldn't help it. And a wave comes. And I tell you, if my soul had not been anchored by hope, I would not be here today. But my hope is steadfast. And it's sure. And when the waves of grief or the waves of iniquity or the waves of my own failures would have driven me away, it was my hope that anchored my soul and said, Mike, you're not going anywhere. If the stars fall and the world blows up, I'm not giving up. i'll tell you what they got planned i'm just a little speculation here i think at some point there's going to be an announcement that they found something in this earth that proves that there's you know life out here and that the bible's not true they're they're working on that agenda do y'all believe that i mean this i know it sounds conspiracy theory but i'm telling you they're they're working on a plan right now to make everybody believe that that bible's wrong and i don't care what they come up with i don't care what they dream up i don't care what evidence they have i don't care anything about that That's not shaking my faith, buddy. Because I got an anchor dropped all the way to the floor, and this ship is going nowhere. You know what I'm telling you to do? Since my ship is anchored, why don't you get on board? You know what ship that is? It's the old ship of Zion. It's the old ship of Zion, people. Hope. When you've lost everything. You still have hope. Would you stand to your feet? Hello folks, Pastor Mike here and sometimes you'll hear me talk about during a sermon or a teaching about being saved or salvation and some people just don't know what that is and I just want to share with you from the Bible what it means to be saved. The Bible tells us in Romans 323 that all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. I'm not here as a pastor or here as part of this church because I'm better than anybody. I'm here because I'm a sinner. I have done things that have violated the laws of God and uh... i need to be sorry for those the bible says in romans six twenty three for the wages of sin is death we all have what's coming to us as a result of our sinfulness and as a result of us breaking god's law and some people say well you know it says death yeah we're all gonna die but that doesn't necessarily mean held the bible also says the wicked shall be turned into hell and all the nations that forget God. See the Bible teaches and we teach here in a literal place called hell. We believe in a literal place of joy and peace and eternal life that is in heaven that God gives to those that are saved. But we also believe in an eternal hell, a place of everlasting torment to those who reject God's gift of salvation. So we know that we have sinned. We know that the wages of that sin is death. but the bible says in the same verse from a six twenty three but the gift of god is eternal life through jesus christ our lord john three sixteen says for god so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever including me including you would believe in him should not perish but have everlasting life for god said not his son into the world to condemn the world but that the world through him might be saved being saved means being born again and being saved from the wrath of God's judgment upon us what we deserve what we have coming as a result of our sinfulness so the Bible says in first john one nine that if we confess our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive us of our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. And I don't know about you, but one of the greatest things, in fact, the greatest thing that has ever happened to Mike Hoggard is the fact that I confessed my sins to God. and God forgave and still does forgive every one of my sins. Romans 10 says it this way. It says, if we confess with our mouth the Lord Jesus Christ and believe in our heart that God raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. What it means to be saved is that God has cornered you with the result and the things the effects of your sin in your life the Holy Spirit is bearing down on your soul right now and you feel the guilt of Almighty God upon you and God is trying to make you so that you just like our parents used to do God used to is trying to make you sorry for your sins we confess those sins to God we repent of them which means that we don't want sin to be a part of our life any longer and we simply ask god god you take over the reins in my life and you be the lord of my life and you give me the promise of your holy spirit in me so that i know that when i die i'm going to heaven now and i want you to understand that god offer salvation to you today if you will accept his free gift trust in the lord repent of your sins the bible says whosoever shall call on the name of the lord shall be saved If you watch any of our videos or at some point and God is just dealing with you, you bow your head and you call upon the name of the Lord and ask God to forgive you and ask God to save you. And God promised in his word and God has never broken his word. God promised in his word that he would forgive you and that he would save you and heaven would be your eternal home. I hope and pray that one of these days I see you in heaven and you get to see me in heaven. God bless you. Bye bye.