Heirs Confined to Hope

The Trial

Sweat beads formed on his head as he folded his hands, listening intently to the doctor’s matter-of-fact statement: “You have cancer.” The rest of the appointment faded into background noise as the man contemplated his unsettling diagnosis. His head began to spin as his mind contemplated the implications.

As he walked out the doors of the clinic on that frigid winter morning, the icy tendrils of fear tempted to grip his heart. Although he was warmly wrapped in a thick coat, he had difficulty shaking the chilling uncertainty of the future.

Arriving home, he noticed his Bible sitting on the couch and felt the warm invitation to lay fear aside as he picked up God’s Word. A constant friend and comforter in the past, the man knew that although his circumstances seemed bleak, God had a plan. A sigh of relief accompanied this feeling of warmth as he remembered the story of Abraham and God’s promise to make him a blessing. “Lord, I don’t know what the future holds and what journey You desire to take me on, but please, make me a blessing,” prayed the man.

The Promise

“Now the Lord had said to Abram: ‘Get out of your country, from your family and from your father’s house, to a land that I will show you. I will make you a great nation; I will bless you and make your name great; and you shall be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse him who curses you; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed’ ” (Gen. 12:1-3).

How easy it can be to drift through life. Go to work, come back home, and the cycle repeats. The rat race continues as our days on earth march out. Abram was going about his daily, quite successful life when God called him. Strong and clear, God’s call echoed in Abram’s ears: “Get out and go.” God was inviting him on the faith journey of a lifetime. The reward—heaven. The cost—everything.

In a similar way, we see God’s hand in our lives today, interrupting our stories to call us up to higher ground, a deeper journey, to walk as prisoners of hope. While God isn’t the one who plagues our lives with hardships, “we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose” (Rom. 8:28). God does not waste the pains and struggles of life on this side of eternity, and if we trust Him, He will use our seemingly impossible situations to show forth His glory and bring honor to His name. With all of God’s calls comes the strength to complete the tasks before us, knowing that “all His biddings are enablings.”[1]

The Gift

The land that was promised to Abraham was a gift given to the people of God, not for their own righteousness’ sake, “for you are a stiff-necked people” (Deut. 9:6), but for God’s glory. It was solely through His grace and provision that they came to be possessors of this promise. The land was a gift from God and was intended to be a means of blessing all nations of the earth through His people.

As prisoners of hope, we continue to look forward.

The same is true for us today in the promise of salvation—it is a gift. By definition, a gift is not something possible for us to earn, but something that is freely given, not based on merit, but based on our need.

“The only way in which he can attain to righteousness is through faith. By faith he can bring to God the merits of Christ, and the Lord places the obedience of His Son to the sinner’s account. Christ’s righteousness is accepted in place of man’s failure, and God receives, pardons, justifies, the repentant, believing soul, treats him as though he were righteous, and loves him as He loves His Son. This is how faith is accounted righteousness; and the pardoned soul goes on from grace to grace, from light to a greater light. He can say with rejoicing, ‘Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost; which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Saviour; that being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life’” (Titus 3:5-7, KJV).[2]

There is no act we can proffer to buy the gift our Father selflessly offers through His Son. It is through His faith—the faith of Jesus—that we come into that promised experience. “The righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe: for there is no difference: For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus” (Rom. 3:22-24, KJV).

It is through Christ alone that our hope of eternal life in Jesus is recognized. What a gift! What love, as 1 John 3:1 says, “Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called children of God.”

Jubilee

Just as the cycle of jubilees served to remind the Israelites of the rest they were promised through the Messiah, so we look forward to the great rest that will come to the earth when Christ returns. Rest from our labors, diseases, heartaches, and pain.

It was seven faith-building months later that my dad’s year of jubilee came. “You’re in remission,” the doctor’s melodious voice sang out! After six rounds of chemotherapy, endless walks, daily sauna sessions, several fever baths, supplements, diet changes, a garden built with time away from his dental practice, and, most important, the unyielding prayers of friends and family, Dad reached his temporal Promised Land—remission.

“Ding, ding, ding” rang the bell in the cancer center. With a smile on his face, and an acknowledgment toward heaven, Dad waved goodbye to his many kind oncology nurses. Despite the odds against him, this prisoner of hope leaned on his Father through this dark, uncertain experience and came out on the other side a victor. A victor not only in health but in spiritual healing, rejuvenation, and a renewed purpose for mission. His experience has made me reflect on the greater promise we have in Christ.

The promise is: “ ‘Let him take hold of my strength, that he may make peace with me; and he shall make peace with me’ (Isa. 27:5, KJV). There is power in the blood of Christ to remove sin. Poor, trembling sinner, today you are the prisoner of hope. Jesus lives, and because He lives you may live also.”[3]

While not all stories end with a blessed realization of hope, my dad was granted a miracle. And while some hopes and dreams we have concerning the trials we face are realized in this life, we dare not forget the ones who “died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off were assured of them, embraced them and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth” (Heb. 11:13) This world is not our home, and though God brought Abraham’s descendants to the Promised Land on earth, this was but a shadow of the greater hope to come. As prisoners of hope, we continue to look forward.

“Long have we waited for our Savior’s return. But none the less sure is the promise. Soon we shall be in our promised home. There Jesus will lead us beside the living stream flowing from the throne of God and will explain to us the dark providences through which on this earth He brought us in order to perfect our characters. There we shall behold with undimmed vision the beauties of Eden restored. Casting at the feet of the Redeemer the crowns that He has placed on our heads and touching our golden harps, we shall fill all heaven with praise to Him that sitteth on the throne.”[4]

Jesus is coming soon. Let us hold on to that blessed hope in Him! The great jubilee has almost come!

[1] Ellen G. White, Christ’s Object Lessons (Washington, D.C.: Review and Herald Pub. Assn., 1900, 1941), p. 333.

[2] Ellen G. White, Faith and Works (Nashville: Southern Pub. Assn., 1979), p. 101.

[3] Ellen G. White, in Signs of the Times, Aug. 6, 1885.

[4] Ellen G. White, The Adventist Home (Nashville: Southern Pub. Assn., 1952), p. 544.