Paul continued his theme of hope by breaking into prayer. This daily devotional looks at the connection among faith, joy, peace, and hope.
Nuggets
- True joy and peace are blessings of believing in Sovereign God.
- God is the author of abundant hope.
- Joy, peace, and hope can only come from God.
To read devotions in the Redo for Godliness series, click the appropriate button below.
Devotions in the Transformed to Perfection series
Paul was all about glorifying and worshiping God. He could break into a prayer at a moment’s notice.
That is what Paul did here. It had a lot of the elements that he had been talking about it the previous verses.
“May the God of endurance and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ” (Rom. 15: 5-6 ESV).
Let’s see what Paul had to add here about hope.
Let's Put It into Context
Here is a running list of what we’ve discussed previously.
The God of Hope
“Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you believe so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit” (Rom. 15: 13 CSB)
True joy and peace are blessings of believing in Sovereign God.
Paul has been telling us for several verses now about joy, peace, and hope. Lyth called this the privileges of believing. That puts a little different spin on them.
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Blessings are, according to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, “a thing conducive to happiness or welfare.” Privileges, on the other hand, are “a right or immunity granted as a peculiar benefit, advantage, or favor.”
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Because we have the hope, joy, and peace, we have freedom from the stain of sin.
The good news, as Spurgeon points out, is that hope, joy, and peace can be attained. There is one way to do that — prayer.
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Spurgeon said that means we can bag the doubt. We can throttle straight through the comfort to the joy.
That We May Abound
“Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you believe so that you may overflow …” (Rom. 15: 13 CSB)
God is the author of abundant hope.
Paul isn’t praying for just a little bit of joy and peace for a little bit of time. He is wanting a flood of every kind of peace and joy all the time.
I just absolutely loved how Spurgeon equated peace and joy. He wrote, “Peace is joy resting, and joy is peace dancing.
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Isn’t that a wonderful visual!
Spurgeon went on to say the hope comes out of the joy. Now, we just talked a couple of devotions back where joy came before peace. So, the progression is joy, peace, and hope.
To read a related devotion, click the button below.
I had put hope before peace based on what Spurgeon said. Pope, however, said that peace releases hope.
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Jowett had a good sermon on how these blessings are communicated. It is through faith. Faith is the conviction that the doctrines revealed in God’s Word are true, even if we do not understand all aspects of them, a belief which impacts our lives. Only faith brings us to salvation.
- Salvation is the gift of life through the deliverance from condemnation and sin to acceptance and holiness and changes us from being spiritually dead to spiritually alive.
- Sins are actions by humans that disobey God and break one of His reasonable, holy, and righteous laws and commandments, goes against a purpose He has for us, or follows Satan’s promptings.
- Holiness is the transcendent excellence of His nature that includes elements of purity, dedication, and commitment that lead to being set apart. Purity means possessing God’s moral character, having eliminated the stain of sin.
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Glossary
The Power of the Holy Spirit
“… so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit” (Rom. 15: 13 CSB)
Joy, peace, and hope can only come from God.
From where is the joy, peace, and hope coming? It is all God. It is done by His power through His Hope.
Go all the way back to verse 4. “For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope” (Rom. 15: 4 ESV).
God gives us hope when we read His Word. Yeah, sometimes it comes through the patience and endurance — not an immediate gift — but He gives it to us.
Think of it this way. Reading God’s Word is one of the ways we seek Him. Seeking Him is one of the things we do on the Sanctification Road. That is a progress — we are in it for the long hall — the bumpy long hall.
Searching for and Seeking God
Hearing His Word (Rom. 10: 17).
Reading His Word (Rev. 1: 3).
Praying to Him (Heb. 4: 16).
Studying His Word (Ac. 17: 11).
Meditating on His Word (Ps. 1: 1-2).
Memorizing His Word (Ps. 119: 11).
- Sanctification is the transformation of mind, body, and soul, which begins with regeneration, gradually changes our nature through the promptings of the Holy Spirit, and ends with perfected state of spiritual wholeness or completeness.
- Regeneration is being changed from spiritually dead to spiritually alive and the internal requickening in us that God brings about through the work of the Holy Spirit to give us new character.
- Spiritual death is the separation from God that occurred as a consequence of Adam and Eve’s original sin. The spiritually alive are those who have ABCDed, so they are no longer separated from God.
- The perfected state indicates the combination of the spiritual graces which, when all are present, form spiritual wholeness or completeness.
- Spiritual graces are worldly morals that have been submitted to God to further His kingdom instead of enhancing this world.
The ABCDs of Salvation
If you have not become a believer in Christ, please read through the
Plan of Salvation and prayerfully consider what God is asking you to do.
A – admit our sins
B – believe His Son Jesus is our Redeemer
C – confess God as Sovereign Lord
D – demonstrate that commitment by making any changes needed in our lives to
live the way in which God has called us
The Disciple’s Job Description
Glossary
It is part of the Holy Spirit trying to transform the inward us. He is working on our hearts.
Pope also told us about the part we play. He wrote, “Faith is the root of hope; the peace and joy which are the fruits of faith are the nourishment of hope; and the abundance of hope is made the perfection of the Christian life as a state of probation.”
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Worldview people think they can get hope, joy, and peace on their own. They can’t.
Spurgeon explained what they actually get. He wrote, “Peace without God is stupefaction, joy madness, and hope presumption.”
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I thought stupefaction was an interesting word to describe peace. I used the define function on Word and got a synonym of numbness.
I can relate to that. This medicine I am on is causing a lot of numbness, especially in the bottom of my foot.
The best way I can describe it is — remember stirrup pants? They are the kind that have that strip of fabric that go under the foot — like you are putting your foot in a stirrup of a saddle for a horse.
Well, you are an 11- or 12- year old kid who has outgrown your very favorite pair of stirrup pants. You can’t stand it, so you wear them anyway.
The pants are just too short, so it cuts off circulation to your foot. Your heel goes numb.
That’s what I am feeling — without the stirrup pants — and I am way past being 12.
Anyway. Sometimes, it is just a (sing songy) “Na-na-na-na this isn’t right” feeling. Sometimes, it is tingly.
It hasn’t really hurt, but I wonder if it might in the future. It hasn’t messed up walking, but this is my foot we are talking about, and I don’t know how long I will be on this medicine.
But it isn’t fun. I wouldn’t characterize it as a nice feeling.
I definitely wouldn’t say it is peaceful.
We can’t have the hope, joy, and peace without God because we can’t be that without God. Those are part of perfection, and perfection is about being. Being is about God.
Thomas prompted us to remember that Paul previously characterized God as the God of patience and the God of peace. Here, He is the God of Hope.
We’ve said that hope is a future expectation, called a living hope, based on the confidence that our names will be found in the book of life. But it is more than that.
Thomas equated hope to a relationship with God. He wrote, “Hope is the expectation of the desirable — God — His favour, society, friendship.”
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It really isn’t just future. It is present, too. So, let’s try this again.
Hope is the expectation, also called a living hope, based on the confidence that, because of our relationship with God, our names will be found in the book of life.
Making the Connections
Hanson said that Paul was reminding the Romans not to forget about God’s grace. This is all possible because of God’s grace. Grace is a free and unmerited gift from Heavenly Father given through His Son, Jesus Christ that enables salvation and spiritual healing to believers by the work of the Holy Spirit.
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How Do We Apply This?
McChesney brought up an interesting point. Some worldview people might think that disciples’ hope is a selfish emotion. He said no.
We are reflecting Jesus with this hope. He had a large heart. We cannot be selfish when we truly imitate Him.
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Maybe some of problem is worldview people just don’t understand because they don’t know God. If they knew God, they would know about His joy, peace, and hope. To do that, they need to ABCD.
Father God. We all need to ABCD. We need Your joy, peace, and hope. We need You as our Father. Amen.
What do you think?
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