Hope is alive.  John 16.25-33                                                         Click to read: http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John%2016:25-33&version=NIV&interface=print

“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”  John 16.33

Greetings, Friends. 

All around the cozy living room, teen-aged students were leaning on each other, squeezed in tight, loving the proximity of one another as they sang, “The sun comes up, it's a new day dawning … It's time to sing Your song again- Whatever may pass, and whatever lies before me, let me be singing when the evening comes.”  I wish you could see what I saw—more boys than girls actually—singing to God . . . I raised the question, ‘What do you think God is thinking right now, as he watches, as he listens to you?’  An 18-year-old young man said, ‘I think he’s smiling.’  No doubt.

When we broke into groups—guys in one room, gals in another, the students worked through several questions, sharing and learning from one another as they went.  One question asked, ‘When you think of God, what comes to your mind?’  A young woman said, ‘Hope … that everything will be okay one day.’  I had written about this young athlete some time ago; her mother took her own life the first day of finals’ week last spring.  And so, she shared, ‘when I think about God, I think about Hope—that everything will be okay one day.’ 

Jesus promised hope to this young lady who lost her mama; he promised hope  to you and me, when he said, “In me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”

I remember that David, a man after God’s own heart, wrote about hope:

“No one whose hope is in you will ever be put to shame,

Show me your ways, O Lord, teach me your paths;

 guide me in your truth and teach me, for you are God my Savior, and my hope is in you all day long.

   Remember, O Lord, your great mercy and love,

       for they are from of old.

 Remember not the sins of my youth and my rebellious ways;

according to your love remember me, for you are good, O Lord. Psalm 25   

Jesus knew his disciples would face trouble—the men he had loved and trained, also you and me.  But he extends peace and hope, because as my young friend said, in Jesus, ‘one day, everything will be okay.’  Take heart! I have overcome the world.  Thank you, Jesus.  Amen.