Word of Encouragement (4/14/2021)
The next prayer we want to learn from is in Rom. 15:13: “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.”
You should be familiar with this prayer because I sometimes use this verse for the benediction at the end of the service. In this petition, Paul addresses God as “the God of hope.” This doesn’t mean that God hopes. Hope is something God does not, and cannot, do. Hope is something only a finite creature, who doesn’t have control over his life and his future, does. God, who is omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent, who sovereignly ordains all things according to the counsel of His will so that nothing happens apart from His will, cannot hope (as God cannot sin or lie). But because He is absolutely sovereign over all things, He can be the ground and object of our hope. And the hope that is anchored in God does not disappoint. “The God of hope”—what a wonderful name and how privileged we are to know Him and trust Him as our God!
What does Paul pray for? He prays that the God of hope will fill us with all joy and peace in believing. What does hope have to do with joy and peace? When you have something wonderful to hope for and you have the assurance that it will happen without fail, wouldn’t you have joy in your heart? And even if you happen to be going through a terrible time at the moment, wouldn’t you have a deep sense of peace in your soul? Matthew Henry says,
“How desirable this joy and peace are: they are filling. Carnal joy puffs up the soul, but cannot fill it; therefore in laughter the heart is sad. True, heavenly, spiritual joy is filling to the soul; it has a satisfaction in it, answerable to the soul’s vast and just desires. Thus does God satiate and replenish the weary soul. Nothing more than this joy, only more of it, even the perfection of it in glory, is the desire of the soul that hath it....”
Such joy and peace are not something we can manufacture with our effort and creativity. As Matthew Henry points out, they can be obtained only by prayer (Paul is praying for them) and believing (Paul says so). This is so because they are God’s gracious gifts for His people. But this also means that we do not get to enjoy these gifts apart from prayer and faith: we must ask for them in prayer and pray for them in faith. Notice how I said “enjoy,” not “have”. Objectively speaking, we already possess joy and peace from God as soon as we put our faith in Jesus Christ. Paul says, “Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Rom. 5:1). And can we have forgiveness of sin and salvation without joy? “My lips will shout for joy, when I sing praises to you; my soul also, which you have redeemed” (Ps. 71:23). But we may not experience this joy and peace for various reasons, just as two persons can be married and not have a loving, fulfilling marriage.
To enjoy the joy and peace that come from the Lord, we must pray and pray believing—believing in God’s promises and His faithfulness to fulfill them without fail. Let us not forget, too, that the Holy Spirit is working in us to help us do just that, nudging us to read God’s Word to teach and remind us of God’s wonderful promises, urging and encouraging us to believe in them, so that we may abound with hope!!