The Certainty of Hope

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There’s been this really weird transition that’s taken place just in my lifetime. By the time I got to college, it was being taught as if figures like George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Christopher Columbus, Abraham Lincoln, that all of these men were close to the literal devil of hell. Now, when I was in kindergarten, they were still being taught as though they were, I mean, here’s God and here’s them just right underneath.

And so this weird transition has taken place. And I think both of those, we’ve overcorrected, both of those kind of oversimplify things. And one of those figures that it was really drilled into us when I was little, that he was just almost next to God, was George Washington.

Many of you grew up hearing the story of George Washington and the cherry tree. If you didn’t grow up hearing that story, the short version of it is that Washington was out as a little boy playing with his new hatchet that he’d gotten and he decided to hack down a cherry tree in his father’s garden and it just happened to be his father’s favorite cherry tree. So his father sees the cherry tree and is distraught over it and begins to ask, who was it?

Who did this? If it had been at my house, choruses of not me would of rung out through the building. But the story goes that George Washington told his father, I cannot tell a lie, I did it with my little hatchet.

And that his father was so overjoyed that he had an honest son that he didn’t even care about the cherry tree. We were raised to believe George Washington, it was just not in his nature to tell a lie. That’s not true.

I mean, I still look at George Washington as a great figure in history. But this idea that he was almost just next to God is not true. Now that story was made up after he died, but that’s the way he was viewed early on in our country, and that was important because people at that time said that their confidence, when they started the whole country, their confidence in the government and the country and the direction of things was really based on their confidence in Washington.

They needed to have confidence that he was an honest person. They needed to have confidence that he was a strong leader. They needed to have confidence that he was just a wonderful man for them to have confidence in the direction that this new country was going to head.

Credibility is important. The credibility of who you’re listening to, who you’re putting your trust in is important. It’s important to know that they’re credible.

That’s why so many of us have turned off different media sources and quit reading Facebook because there’s a whole lot of no credibility in lots of corners of our society. But the truth is, George Washington, being a human being, couldn’t say, well, it’s not in my nature to lie at all. We try to be honest, but still, it’s in our nature that that’s who we are.

There’s somebody whose credibility is stronger than Washington’s, whose credibility is real, whose credibility is undoubtable that when he says something though, we can put our complete confidence in it. There is somebody, the Bible says, who does not share our same nature. And so we don’t have to wonder, well, is he a balance of good and bad?

Does he try to keep his word, but sometimes he falls short? That’s probably how my kids will remember me. He did his best to do what he told us he’d do, but sometimes he fell short.

There’s somebody the Bible says we don’t have to worry about that with, like we do with all these other people, and that’s the Lord Himself. This morning we’re going to look at a passage in Titus. Titus chapter 1.

It’s one that if you were here several weeks back, when Jonathan gave a message on Sunday night, he talked about this passage. I’m going to go a little bit different direction with it. Not that either one of us are wrong.

A passage can have one interpretation and many applications, and we’re going to apply part of the passage in a different direction this morning where it deals with the Lord’s credibility. The Apostle Paul wrote about God’s credibility in this passage. And he said the picture we get here of God’s credibility is that it’s greater than George Washington.

It’s greater than every one of those historical figures who were lionized in our childhoods. God’s credibility exceeds all of them. And because of His credibility, we can have hope.

That’s what we’re going to look at this morning as we continue this series on hope. That was kind of a windy road to get there, but here we are. Titus chapter 1, if you’ll turn there with me if you haven’t already.

If you’re using a device, there’s a link in our bulletin to get you to Titus chapter 1, or it’ll be on our screen. If you’ll stand with me, if you are able to, without too much difficulty, as we read together from God’s Word this morning. Titus chapter 1, starting in verse 1, and we’re just going to read the first three verses this morning.

It says, Paul, a bondservant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ, according to the faith of God’s elect, with the acknowledgement of the truth which accords with godliness, in hope of eternal life which God, who cannot lie, promised before time began, but has in due time manifested His word through preaching, which was committed to me according to the commandment of God our Savior. And you may be seated. Now, I know this is a brief passage.

It’s really just the introductory greeting. Because in a day before you would lick a stamp and put it on there and mail it off somewhere, they would write in their letters, instead of addressing the envelope, they would write in their letters that it’s from so-and-so, and they would introduce themselves, or they would sometimes, if they were writing to somebody they knew, they would still give this long introduction reminding them of something. That’s what Paul did here.

And then they would say who they were writing to. That’s why he says in verse 4 to Titus. He continues on with it.

This is the introduction to his letter, and Paul uses this greeting to remind Titus of something that they have in common. He uses this greeting to remind Titus that what they have in common is their call to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ. Paul, as an apostle, was called to do this. Titus, as an elder of the church on the island of Crete, as a missionary to Crete, really, was called to do this.

They were called to tell people the good news about Jesus Christ. And it’s a message of hope because it’s a message that leads to eternal life. When we talk about our message as Christians, a lot of people think that what we’re talking about is a message of rules, a message of do’s and don’ts, that you have to do this, you have to jump this high, you have to go through these hoops, you have to check all these boxes, and then maybe God will love you. And to them, it doesn’t sound like a message of good news.

It doesn’t sound like a message of hope. It sounds like a message of judgment that you live up to our standards or you’re not getting in. And if that’s the case, either they have misunderstood or we have miscommunicated the gospel.

The gospel is a message of hope. It’s a message that God has provided eternal life in spite of the fact that we don’t deserve it. He has given eternal life.

He’s done all the work. He’s provided it so that we can spend eternity with Him in His presence. Eternal life means hope because we can be reconciled to God.

And those of us, when we go through days when we feel like God is distant, We have to know that there’s reconciliation, that God doesn’t have to be distant. And also, eternal life is a message of hope. The gospel is a message of hope because this life isn’t all there is.

The Apostle Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 15 that if Christ was not raised, our faith is vain. He goes on to say that if that was true, then we of all men would be most miserable. He said, if Jesus Christ hadn’t died for our sins and risen again from the dead, There would be no point to any of this.

And how miserable would we be to realize and to think that this life right here is all we have to look forward to. But the gospel is a message of hope because baked right into it is the realization that there is something better than this. Something for us to hold on to in days where we think it just can’t get any worse.

There is something better than this. And we have hope in this message of eternal life because God has promised eternal life. It’s based on his promise.

That’s why I started out talking about credibility. Because a lot of people put their hope in Washington early on in this country because they thought he was just about perfect. But Washington had his flaws too.

People put their hope in Jefferson. People put their hope in Abraham Lincoln. These men had flaws too.

Don’t you dare put your hope in me as your pastor because I’ve got plenty of flaws. And if my wife were here this morning, she’d be glad to tell you about them probably. Jimmy Ann can fill you in on some of them.

We put our hope in people and it’s a mistake because people can let us down. But we have hope for eternal life because God has promised it. And let me back up for just a second and remind you, in case some of you weren’t here last Sunday, that when I introduced this series on hope, I wanted to make sure you understand how the Bible uses the word hope.

because many times we will confuse that with the way we use the word hope, which is just sort of wishful thinking. I hope my kids will get a move on when it’s time to go out to the truck and we don’t have to stand out in the cold waiting all day. I have no reason to think that’s going to happen, right?

They’re just going to drag their feet anytime we try. I hope, but it’s little more than wishful thinking. When the Bible uses the word hope, it expresses a confidence, an assurance.

There’s an expectation. When the Bible says we have hope that God will do X, Y, or Z, it’s talking about we are on the edge of our seats expecting God to do X, Y, or Z. And that is rooted in the fact that God has promised it.

God has promised eternal life. It says in verse 2 that eternal life, which God promised before time began, it describes this that He promised before time began. The hope of eternal life, we need to understand, was central to His plan from eternity past. Us having eternal life was not an afterthought.

It’s not something that God woke up one morning and thought, you know what sounds fun today? Let’s try to throw together a plan for them to have eternal life. That sounds like a good idea.

That’s not how this worked. It’s not like a promise that we sometimes blurt out so fast we don’t have time to think about it or how we’re going to follow through with it. Do any of you ever do that?

I’ve done that. Oh yeah, this is what I. .

. Nobody else, it’s just me and one other voice over. Was that you, Benjamin?

Okay. And my son acknowledges it because he knows I’ve done it. I have to be very careful with my kids about this.

Don’t promise something if you haven’t planned out how you’re going to do it and when. Because they won’t forget. Wash your hands, they forget, but I promised we’re going to have ice cream on the third Sunday after.

Then, yeah, they’ll remember that. We have a tendency sometimes to just blurt things out without even saying I promise. It doesn’t even have to be as formal as saying I pinky promised this.

We will just say, I’m going to do this without thinking how we’re going to get it done, without having any kind of plan. And then we’re stuck later on going, I don’t know how I’m going to do that. God doesn’t work that way.

It says that this was His plan from eternity past. It’s something that He promised. It’s something that’s been on His mind from before time began, before the foundation of the world, before God ever created us. He knew that He was going to have to step in and save us.

Think about that for a moment. God knew what a handful we were going to be, and He created us and loved us anyway. So this wasn’t just an afterthought.

I read one commentator this week, Newt Larson, who explained it this way. He said, Whatever God says must happen, since He designs reality. His spoken word cannot be contradicted in actuality.

If it could, He would be dethroned. But that is impossible. God, by His very nature, remains reliable and trustworthy.

What He says must be. And all of this fits in together to remind us that when it says He promised eternal life before time began, we need to have the confidence of knowing that our salvation isn’t dependent on the whims of God as though one day He decided to do it and maybe He will follow through and maybe He won’t. Because He’s God, if He said it, that’s it.

That’s the plan. He promised it. And His promises are a lot more secure than ours.

This has been His plan, and it’s just as sure as the creation of the world or anything else He determined to do. When God spoke it, it had to happen. At creation, God said, let there be all these things, and there were all these things.

God spoke to nothing, and nothing had to become something because God’s authority is that strong. And so when God, with that kind of authority, promises eternal life and has promised it from eternity past, it should be something we expect Him to follow through on. And His plans, He’s been.

. . Again, Paul wants us to understand this has been his plan all along.

This has been his program. This has been what he’s doing. And if you look back at the Old Testament, you can see that’s part of what we’re doing on Wednesday nights is headed toward the cross through these stories of the Old Testament where you can see bit by bit God carrying out his plans.

And it started in the Garden of Eden when he promised that the seed of the woman would crush the head of the serpent who would bruise his heel. He foretold this showdown between Christ and Satan, which took place at the cross. We see His promises of deliverance.

We see in the blood sacrifices, pictures of Jesus and what He was going to do for us. And when you begin to look for it through the Old Testament, somebody pointed one out Wednesday night that I’d not thought of, the scarlet thread in Rahab’s window. If you’re unfamiliar with that story, it’s in the very beginning of the book of Joshua.

That there was one way of escape from the destruction of Jericho for this woman and her family. And it was just like at the first Passover when they had to put the blood over the door. I’m sorry, I could get sidetracked all morning talking about these examples from the Old Testament.

But when you begin looking for them, they’re just right there. They’re standing out in bold neon colors in the Old Testament where God is pointing toward the cross. This is not.

. . You need to understand.

Your salvation, what God has promised you is not something that God just woke up this morning and decided to do as though God wakes up in the morning. It’s not something he just woke up this morning and decided to do. It’s been his plan all along to provide a way of salvation.

God promised it and God’s been taking the steps to fulfill it. But it’s not only a promise that’s been there all along. This hope of eternal life is a key part of the gospel message today.

He says in verse 3 that God has in due time manifested his word through preaching, which was committed to me according to the commandment of God our Savior. So when he talks to Titus about what they have in common, this proclamation of the gospel, this telling of the good news, he’s reminding them that they both share this responsibility of making sure others know that they can have hope in Jesus Christ. The message that they preached was not simply the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus. I think that it is immensely important that we understand the crucifixion and resurrection are not just fairy tales.

They are not just myths. Insofar as ancient history is concerned, there is good evidence to indicate that these things actually happened in history. But if all we were preaching was the fact that Jesus Christ died on the cross and then rose again three days later, there wouldn’t necessarily be a ton of hope in that message apart from the promises that God has made because of it.

See, it’s not just that Jesus died and rose again. It’s that God promised that He would die for our sins and that He would rise again to prove it. And now there’s a message that God can and will forgive our sins, not because we’ve earned it or deserved it, but because Jesus Christ paid for them.

That’s why this is a message of hope. You and I can be saved because those events took place. Because 2,000 years ago, Jesus Christ took responsibility for sins that He had never committed.

Jesus Christ took responsibility for everything that I had ever done and everything you’ve ever done, sometimes we get tripped up on that word sin. It’s anything we think, say, do, or don’t do that displeases God. Jesus Christ took responsibility for every bit of that for me and for you, and He died on the cross in our place.

He was nailed to the cross and shed His blood, and He died. Telling us in advance that He was doing that so that our sins could be forgiven. And then three days later, He rose from the dead to prove it.

The person who did that promises us eternal life. There’s a radio host I like to listen to who says, I don’t know about you, but I think I’m going to listen to the guy who came back from the dead. I think he kind of deserves to be listened to.

That’s the guy who promised us eternal life. And so the reason why we tell this good news, the reason why we talk about the crucifixion and the resurrection, the reason why we talk about Jesus is so people can find the hope of eternal life with Him. He cared enough about our eternal destiny that He didn’t just provide the hope, He provided a way for us to hear about it and receive it.

As Paul tells Titus, it’s our job to go out and share that news. God didn’t just provide the hope in Jesus Christ and say, well, go find it. Go seek it out for yourself.

No, God also cared enough that He enlisted people to go and talk about it. By the way, He enlisted each of us. If you’re a believer in Jesus Christ, this is your responsibility too.

He enlisted each of us to go and make sure that as many people as possible hear this message of hope, that they can have eternal life because of what Jesus Christ did for us. And that message is very simple this morning. We’ve all sinned.

Each of us has thought, said, done, or not done something that displeased God. And our sin separates us from Him because He’s holy. Now words like holy are confusing in our culture, but I like to try to understand it this way, Because some people say, well, why can’t God just let our sin go?

If you’ve just been, if somebody has just brought you a plate of food at a restaurant, and on the way to your table, they stopped by the garbage cans and grabbed a handful of whatever they could find in there, whatever delightful surprise lurked in there, how much of that are you going to be okay with on your plate? None, right? But it’s mostly still the good food, right?

Isn’t that enough? No, no, no, no. We want that garbage as far away from our plate as possible. And God in His holiness is kind of like that.

Sin to Him is offensive. More offensive than the garbage out of the garbage can would be to us. So our sin separates us from Him.

And you and I are destined to remain separated from Him, not only in this life, but in the life to come. Separated from Him in the place that He created as a quarantine for Satan and his fallen angels. We are destined to spend eternity separated from God in a place called hell.

And yet God loved us enough in spite of our sin, in spite of how offensive we are, God loved us enough that when we could not pay for our sins, when we could not do enough good to get the garbage off the plate, He sent His Son to take responsibility for all of it, to be punished in our place so our slate could be wiped clean, so you and I could be forgiven. Jesus Christ suffered, bled, and died for you, so your sins could be forgiven. And He rose again three days later to prove it.

and now God offers forgiveness. He offers a clean slate with Him. He offers peace with Him.

He offers eternal life. He offers all of this simply because Jesus Christ paid for it. And all we have to do is believe what He said about it.

Believe that Jesus died to pay for our sins and ask God’s forgiveness on that basis. That’s hard for people to accept sometimes. The message may be hard to accept, but God made it simple to understand.

And here’s where it comes back to the concept of credibility. we have this gospel in front of us we have this message of salvation in front of us either we believe it or we don’t you have a choice in this either you believe his promises or you don’t and it really is that simple the bible makes it clear here and elsewhere that god has promised us eternal life and we have a choice whether we want to believe him and believe his promises or not that’s why it matters so much that god is credible that god is more credible than any human who’s ever promised us anything. He says here, Paul says here in verse 2 that God cannot lie.

God who cannot lie promised these things before time began. Why should we believe that? Why should we believe God?

Why should we believe His promises? Because eternal life sounds eternal life that we don’t have to earn by checking all these religious boxes that almost sounds too good to be true. So why should we believe God?

There’s some reasons why we should believe His promises. He has a long track record, and we look first of all at who He is. It says here that He is incapable of deceiving us.

He is incapable of breaking His promises to us. God cannot lie. It is not in God’s nature to lie.

There are some things that God cannot do, and that’s at the top of the list. We’ve probably all heard that God can do anything. I was shocked as I got older and realized there are some things God cannot do. I like to say it this way.

God can do anything that God would do. Anything that’s in His nature to do. But lying is right at the top of the list of things that He cannot do.

And if He can’t lie, that means He can’t lie to you. That means when He has promised you eternal life in His Word, He cannot break that promise. It’s not in who He is.

And if someone has a long track record of never lying to us, it’s usually a good indication that they’re not lying. with humans, I want to emphasize usually. There can be a first time for everything.

But every once in a while, my wife will tell me something that just, I’m thinking, no way. There’s no way. But to my knowledge, my wife has never lied to me, not even once.

We had trouble explaining to the kids there’s a difference between a lie and a surprise. With a surprise, she intends me to find out at some point. To my knowledge, my wife has never lied to me.

And so in those moments where I’m thinking, there’s no way. I give her the benefit of the doubt because of that track record. And every time it’s turned out to be, okay, well, I’m glad I gave her the benefit of the doubt because sure enough, she was telling the truth.

It’s even more of an indication that we ought to believe them when not only have they never lied to us, but they’re incapable of lying to us. Your hope this morning is based on the promise of a God who cannot lie to you. It’s not just that He’s not a liar.

It’s not just that He doesn’t lie. It’s not just that he tries to be honest. Your hope is based on the promise of a God who cannot lie to you when he says your sins will be forgiven and that you’ll receive eternal life by putting your faith in his son. When he tells you that, it’s important to remember that your hope is rooted in the promise of a God who cannot lie to you.

But our reasons for believing him are more than just the promise that he’s spoken. It’s what he’s done to fulfill the promise. We can believe God this morning because of what he’s done.

In verse 2, Paul calls God our Savior. I’m sorry, verse 3. He doesn’t say that He’s our would-be Savior.

He doesn’t say that He’s our potential Savior. He doesn’t say He’s going to try really hard to be our Savior. He says He is our Savior.

He’s already done it. He’s already done everything that’s necessary. And the reason we know this is that He has already fulfilled the promises that He’s given of eternal life.

When God said He was going to provide a way of eternal life, He’s already done that. He’s already done all the work. He’s already done everything that’s necessary.

When it says He’s fulfilled His promises, that is what verse 1 calls the faith of God’s elect. That is what verse 1 calls the truth that accords with godliness. When He talks about the faith and the truth here, He’s talking about that knowledge and that certainty, that belief that Jesus Christ came and died on the cross for our sins and rose again.

He’s talking about that certainty. It was something that had already happened. So your hope this morning is not only based on the promise of a God who cannot lie Your hope is also based on the promise of a God who’s already done everything necessary to provide what he promised The promise has been fulfilled.

The work’s been done. It’s just sitting there waiting for you to believe You don’t have to wonder if he could save you. You don’t have to wonder if he would You don’t have to wonder if it’s too good to be true He’s already taken care of it by sending jesus.

I can’t think of a better reason for hope this morning than to realize what God has promised and what God has already done. And I know, I know that sometimes we sit there and we hear messages like this and we think, but you don’t know what I’ve done. You don’t know what dark place I’m in right now.

It’s true, I don’t know what you’ve done unless you’ve told me. But God knew when He promised eternal life before time. So to sit there and say, well, with what I’ve done and where I am right now and where I’ve been, God couldn’t possibly save me.

is to call into question the credibility of God. Did God mean what He said or didn’t He? Can God do what He promised or can’t He?

God’s promised to give us eternal life. He’s promised it to us because of Jesus. And through Jesus, He’s already done everything that’s necessary for it.

The question this morning is simply whether we believe it or not. Whether or not we’re willing to take God at His word and trust that when He promised it and when He said He’d fulfill it and when He showed us the fulfillment, whether we believe He’s credible or not. And if you believe God is credible, then it simply comes down to a matter of He’s promised it no matter where you are, no matter where you’ve been or what you’ve done.

Jesus Christ died to pay for all of it.