Hope For The New Year

Today is the finale of A Season Of Hope
This Holiday Season Sermon Series has made a difference
I’ve decided to dedicate Hope For The New Year
to a necessary review of all that we have learned...

1. Help for the Stressed

Remember, Obedience is the key to relieving stress

Deuteronomy 28:1,13…If you will listen diligently to the voice of the LORD your God, being watchful to do all His commandments which I command you this day, the LORD your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth…And the Lord shall make you the head, and not the tail; and you shall be above only, and you shall not be beneath…

God created us…
Don’t you think obedience to His word and listening to the Spirit’s promptings will alleviate the stress of life!
Obeying the LORD usually involves some minor thing that will make a major difference!

God’s anointing or blessing is on obedience.
If we are doing something He has not approved, He is under no obligation to give us the energy to do it.

I’m telling you, family of God, God cares deeply about THE LITTLE THINGS…

Can you hear Him saying? Psalm 46:10…Let be and be still, and know (recognize and understand) that I am God. I will be exalted among the nations! I will be exalted in the earth!

IF we will but EXALT Jesus we won’t be EXHAUSTED

Isaiah 40:28-31…Have you not known? Have you not heartd? The everlasting God, the LORD, the Creator of the ends of the earth, does not fain or grow weary; there is no searching of His understanding. He gives power to the faint and weary, and to him who has not might He increases strength (causing it to multiply and making it to abound). Even youths shall faint and be weary, and (selected) young men shall feebly stumble and fall exhausted; But those who wait for the LORD (who expect, look for, and hope in Him) shall change and renew their strength and power; they shall lift their wings and mount up (close to God) as eagles (mount up to the sun); they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint or become tired.

2. Help for the Lonely

Remember God Is Always With You
Hebrews 13:5…He (God) Himself has said, I will not in any way fail you nor give you up nor leave you without support. (I will) not, (I will) not, (I will) not in any degree leave you helpless nor forsake nor let (you) down (relax My hold on you)! (Assuredly not!)…

You Cannot Be Separated from God’s Love
Romans 8:38-39…For I am persuaded beyond doubt (am sure) that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities, not things impending and threatening nor things to come, nor powers, Nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our LORD…

The LORD Will Take Care of You
Psalm 27:10…Although my father and my mother have forsaken me, yet the LORD will take me up (adopt me as His child)…

God will do a NEW Thing
Isaiah 43:18,19…Do not (earnestly) remember the former things: neither consider the things of old. Behold, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs forth; do you not perceive and know it and will you not give heed to it? I will even make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert…

I need to give honor where honor is due: Joyce Meyer’s teaching on Emotional Healing has aided greatly to this sermon series…

3. Help for the Fearful

2 Timothy 1:7…For God did not give us a spirit of timidity (of cowardice, of craven and cringing and fawning fear), but (He has given us a spirit) of power and of love and of calm and well-balanced mind and discipline and self-control…

Deuteronomy 31:6…Be strong, courageous, and firm; fear not nor be in terror before them, for it is the LORD your God Who goes with you; He will not fail you or forsake you…

Romans 10:17…So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God…

We need to learn and confess aloud Scriptures like these, even drink them in like a glass of water when we are thirsty. When we open our mouth and confess what the Lord says to us and about us, God’s Word will give us the power to overcome the fears that torment and prevent…

Isaiah 41:10,13…Fear not (there is nothing to fear), for I am with you; do not look around you in terror and be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen and harden you to difficulties, yes, I will help you; yes, I will hold you up and retain you with My (victorious) right hand of rightness and justice…For I the LORD your God hold your right hand; I am the LORD, Who says to you, Fear not; I will help you!...

Help for any situation is found in the inerrant uncompromising awe-inspiring life-changing uncontainable indescribable incomparable Word of God!

4. Help for the Depressed

Remember, There is Much Power in Rejoicing

Philippians 4:4…Rejoice in the LORD always (delight, gladden yourselves in Him); again I say, REJOICE!...

expressing joy will change your circumstances

Psalm 32:11…Be glad in the LORD and rejoice, you (uncompromisingly) righteous (you who are upright and in right standing with Him); shout for joy, all you upright in heart!...

Psalm 42:5…Why are you cast down, O my inner self? And why should you moan over me and be disquieted within me? Hope in God and wait expectantly for Him, for I shall yet praise Him, my Help and my God…

Resisting Satan at his onset will stop extended bouts of depression!

1Peter 5:8,9…Be well balanced (temperate, sober of mind), be vigilant and cautious at all times; for that enemy of yours, the devil, roams around like a lion roaring (in fierce hunger), seeking someone to seize upon and devour. Withstand him; be firm in faith (against his onset – rooted, established, strong, immovable, and determined), knowing that the same (identical) sufferings are appointed to your brotherhood (the whole body of Christians) throughout the world…

5. Help for the Discouraged

Hebrews 12:1-3…Let us run with patient endurance and steady and active persistence the appointed course of the race that is set before us, Looking away (from all that will detract) to Jesus, Who is the Leader and the Source of our faith (giving the first incentive for our belief) and is also its Finisher (bringing it to maturity and perfection). He, for the joy (of obtaining the prize) that was set before Him, endured from sinners such grievous opposition and bitter hostility against Himself (reckon up and consider it all in comparison with your trials), so that you may not grow weary or exhausted, losing heart and relaxing and fainting in your minds…

Remember the poem: I Refuse To Be Discouraged, by B.J. George

6. Help for the Insecure

Please remember, our worth is not based on anything we do but in what God has already done.

1 John 4:19…We love Him, because He first loved us…

Believe in Yourself – in what God Can Do Through you
God needs you. But if you don’t believe in yourself, if you don’t believe in the ability God has placed on the inside of you, you will discount yourself. You will sit on the sidelines and watch other people be used by God in your place.

1 Corinthians 12:7…Now to each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good…

Psalm 139…For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well…

As believers, our sense of worth has to be rooted and grounded not in the opinions of men but in the love of God!

Discover the True Source of Confidence
Philippians 3:3…For we (Christians) are the true circumcision, who worship God in spirit and by the Spirit of God and exult and glory and pride ourselves in Jesus Christ, and put no confidence or dependence (on what we are) in the flesh and on outward privileges and physical advantages and external appearances…

7. Help for the Worried

Psalm 91:1,2…He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High shall remain stable and fixed under the shadow of the Almighty (Whose power no foe can withstand). I will say of the LORD. He is my Refuge and my Fortress, my God; on Him I lean and rely, and in Him I (confidently) trust!

Joyce Meyer said it best…It is so important to “hang in there” with God. Don’t quit and give up, because you gain experience and spiritual strength every round you go through. Each time you become a little stronger than you were the last time. Sooner or later, if you don’t give up, you will be more than the devil can handle!

This next scripture pretty much sums up the entire series…
Isaiah 26:3…You will guard him and keep him in perfect and constant peace whose mind (both its inclination and its character) is stayed on You, because he commits himself to You, leans on You, and HOPES confidently in You…

2008 doesn’t have to be filled with stress, loneliness, fear, depression, discouragement, insecurity, worry!
NO, in Jesus Name, find HELP in God's Word...

Remember the greatest Hope: maybe Jesus will come in 2008