From the Pastor's Study
From the Pastor’s Study
Sacrifice to Hope
Dec 29, 2021
“They sacrificed possessions to hope.” This sentence could be understood in at least two ways.
First, it could mean that some people sacrificed their possessions in order to gain hope. We can think of it in this way: most of us have lots of possessions, far more than we need, and those possessions keep us contented and satisfied. As a parallel example, the Christmas season is nearing an end, and, if your Christmas was the same as mine, there was an abundance of food. Our family ate an excellent Christmas meal just after noon, and I felt full for the rest of the day. When supper time came around, I was not interested in eating, and I was not looking forward to the evening meal. I could have refrained from eating the noon meal, and if I had, I am sure that I would have been looking forward to supper. After all, I would have been hungry and even a slice of toast would have seemed attractive. But, because my stomach was still full, I didn’t even think of the evening meal.
Our possessions take away some of the joy of anticipation, and when we don’t anticipate, chances are we don’t experience much hope because there is no reason to have anything to hope for. When we have enough in our lives, we might not look forward to what is coming. Some Christians over the centuries, in recognizing this, have decided to sacrifice their possessions. They have given most of their possessions away and have decided to live with as little as possible, often times experiencing want. Sometimes, of course, people don’t make that decision, for they live in poverty that has been imposed on them. We can understand how the promise of God’s provision of the fullness and bounty of eternal life really strikes a chord with them. Some have decided to practice the spiritual discipline of living very simply so that they have something to look forward to.
A second way of understanding the sentence, “they sacrificed everything to hope,” is this: some people are willing to sacrifice their possessions because they have hope. Thus, a person eating a meal might not gorge himself because he knows that the evening meal will come and there will be abundant food then, and they want to look forward to that meal by being a little hungry. Such a person is willing to minimize the accumulation of possessions because of what lies ahead. They choose to live simply, forgoing a lot of things they might be able to have because they know that eternal life will be abundant. This kind of person is often generous, giving away much of what they have to help others.
Both of these options are rather counter-cultural. We live in a time and place where we are told that we should be able to enjoy everything we want right now. Anticipation has been replaced by immediate gratification, and hope has all but disappeared. After all, if we have it, we don’t hope for it. Thus, by making the decision to rid ourselves of our possessions or by deciding not to accumulate them in the first place, we find ourselves in a position of hoping for the greater thing that God provides, the abundance given to us in eternal life.
Both ridding oneself of possessions or deciding not to accumulate them are a kind of spiritual discipline that we can decide to practice. By and large, of course, we are not forced to make these kinds of decisions. We can keep our possessions and by keeping things in perspective (not allowing them to blind us to what God will provide for us), we can still hope for what God will one day provide.
But what if we find ourselves in a situation where keeping our possessions would mean a compromise? For example, what if Christians could no longer receive old age security if they were members of a church? Or what if churches no longer received charitable status unless they promoted a non-biblical lifestyle? These things would cost us, and they might cost us dearly. In the past (and in some places in this world) Christians were forced to make that decision: either they compromise their faith and life, or they suffer the loss of worldly possessions. Would we be willing to forgo many of the things because of the hope that we have from being followers of Jesus Christ? Would the hope of eternal life outweigh the sacrifices we might have to make today? Would we be able to give up everything to remain faithful to our God because our hope for the future is so strong that it overshadows the sacrifices?
Would we be able to give up our possessions to hope? Fortunately, I have not been forced to make that kind of decision. But I do wonder if I found myself in a possession where I had to give up my home, my bank accounts, my source of income, my car, everything but the clothes on my back, I could do that with the sure hope that God would provide me with what I needed both in this life and in the life to come? Would my hope enable me to sacrifice willingly everything to be faithful to Jesus Christ? Is my hope strong enough, or have I stopped hoping because I feel I already have what I need?
Pastor Gary
