There Is Hope, Pastor Wendell Williams

There Is Hope                                                                    Pastor Wendell Williams

Ruth 1:1-13

God can prosper you in the middle of your mess!

You have a choice to make… a decision to make… relating to the Master or the mess.

My prosperity is in His presence… that which He has given to us.

God’s promise[s]:

“I will never leave you or forsake you”

Psalm 22 [Not Forsaken… Pastor Don’s book…see link above]

Ruth 1:12 “If I should say I have hope…”

Naomi has no hope. There was famine in the land… she left the country with her husband and sons… her sons marry… all three men die… the famine was over in her country thus she can return.

Naomi tells her daughters-in-law to go back where they came from.

Ruth 1:13 “The Lord is gone out against me!”

Ruth 1:14-22  “For the Almighty has dealt bitterly with me” [verse 20]

Hope is defined as a confident expectation for favor. [Webster’s dictionary] defines hope as: reaching forward, a desire of some good [obtainable]; implies some expectation.

A change is expected in my favor! It is obtainable and can be possessed!!!

Hope is normally accompanied with pain and anxiety [as we turn from the pain and anxiety].

“Invest your talents, don’t bury them”; don’t cover them with dirt.

Hope is a confidence in a future event.

1 Peter: Be sober and hope to the end.

Hebrew → hope →gathered

Genesis 1:9  “qavah”… to bind together, to expect- gather together, look, patiently, tarry, wait [for, on, upon]

Stay with the one thing that makes sense…[Ruth] had a knowledge of the God of Israel and stays with Naomi.

Stay with the ‘crumbs’ of knowledge that make up the Bread of Life.

“Follow the crumbs”… the testimony of God’s favor over time.

Isaiah 30:18-19 Therefore will the Lord wait… blessed are they that wait for Him.

Ruth ‘clung’ to Naomi… we need to ‘cling’ to Jesus!

Jesus was pierced for you… An awl in the ear; give yourself to your master.

Isaiah 40:28-31

Fainteth not, neither is weary

Isaiah 40:41 Those who wait upon the Lord mount up [soar] with wings as eagles, they shall run and not be weary.

“Run into your future I identity!”

2 Samuel 22  Thou are my lamp… the lamp will light your darkness.

I have leaped over a wall!

Opposition → run thru → leap over

If God is for you then who can be against you?

Romans 4: 13-21

Always about faith

• V 13 For you it will be about faith [ultimately]
• V16 It is of faith
• V17 Those things that do not exist [are called to be] as though they were
• V19 Abraham was old
• V20 Did not waver thru unbelief… was strong in faith
• V21 Being fully persuaded that what He had promised He was able to perform.

“My hope is connected to God who has promised to perform His word!”

[Growing] faith → strength → sense of Him

Hebrews 13:5-8

I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee

I will not fear

The same yesterday, today & forever!

Ruth 1:22

They came to Bethlehem

Our ‘Hope’ was born in Bethlehem. The genealogy of Jesus is found in Luke 3:23-38

Ruth married Boaz… the father of Obed… the father of Jesse… the father of David

Hebrews 6:9-20

V11 Make your hope sure

V14 Bless you

God cannot be beat, He cannot lose!

God will win- your hope is connected to this God.