One dictionary definition of “hope” is “what one expects”. Today’s usually-understood definition of the word, however, is not as certain as this definition, which should be the expectation of Christians.There are more than 350 seniors in New Peninsula – around 40% of our Church Directory numbers – and a substantial proportion of these are 80plus years of age. So we have plenty of experience, in our Church, individually and collectively, of dealing with the vicissitudes that we experience in the later years of life. In this reflection I’d like to focus on hope, one of those certain expectations that will give us a good and hopeful perspective, as Christians, as we move inexorably towards the end of this earthly life.
In April 1948 I attended a church service in Oakleigh Methodist Church, one of a class taken there by a wonderful Sunday School teacher, Bert Bache. An American Evangelist, Hyman Appleman, was the preacher. That day I made a personal commitment to Christ. A week after I made that commitment, Bert took his Sunday School class to a Sunday evening church service at Brunswick Street Methodist Mission, where Pastor Walter Betts was the Missioner. An evangelistic organization called Open Air Campaigners (now OAC (standing for Outreach and Church Ministries), formed in NSW in 1890, was commencing its work in Victoria. There was a call for volunteers to become part of the new outreach ministry. As a young Christian, I decided it was a good opportunity to get involved, and express my new-found faith in service. So I became a voluntary worker in OAC.
One of the early activities of OAC was to conduct a a three-hour open air meeting, every Sunday evening, on the corner of Bourke and Russell Streets, in Melbourne. During those meetings we often sang a chorus, the words of which I still remember:
Some think so, some hope so, some trust so, some guess so,
But I know, I know, I am saved.
Some think they’ll reach heaven, reach heaven at last,
But I know, I know, I am saved.
For I’ve opened my heart’s door and Christ has come in,
And I know that He saves me and keeps me from sin,
And the Spirit Himself beareth witness within,
For I know, I know I am saved.
The regular singing of this chorus imbued in me, in the early days of learning my new-found faith, a deep sense of the hope that should be the expectation of every Christian, as we are told by the writer to the Hebrews when he said: “This certain hope of being saved is a strong and trustworthy anchor for our souls, connecting us with God Himself, behind the sacred curtain of heaven” (Living Bible). The Apostle Peter also speaks to us of hope, when he says, in 1 Peter 3:15: “Sanctify the Lord in your hearts, and always be ready to give an answer, to every person that asks you, a reason for the hope that is in you, with meekness and fear” (KJV). When he was President of World Vision, Tom Houston had this to say: “The worth of the Bible will be startlingly evident when those who speak about it are the most hopeful people in the eyes of the world”.
May that old saying “hope springs eternal” encourage and motivate us, as seniors, for whatever time we have left in life on earth, as we look forward, with hope, to life in the presence of God, in eternity.
Blessings & shalom
Brian
