Hope is Contagious

Dear Friends in Christ,

National studies show that social discontent is at an all-time high. We live in a highly dissatisfied society. The anger and frustration we see on the daily news networks is alarming. People are jumping to the negative at an all time high. 

As a follower of Jesus Christ, I am convinced that the frustrations of our society are directly related to a growing departure from Christ. The farther we get from Christ, the greater the chance we miss the blessings all around us. 

What shall we do? Great question! God does God’s best work when the night is darkest – that is when Hope is Born. This Sunday, we continue the sermon series “Songs of Hope”. The sermon is from the book of Acts, chapter 27. It is the story of Paul’s shipwreck on Malta where the entire crew survived the impossible. I am calling this sermon “Contagious Hope”. 

My son, John, coaches youth baseball and softball. A few years ago he had a group of 13 year olds from west Fort Worth make it to the 14 year-old and under AAU state finals. It was a mismatch. They played a team from Tyler (all 14 year-olds). John’s biggest player was barely as tall as the smallest player on the Tyler team. 

Before the game, you could see the look of defeat on the faces of the Fort Worth team. One kid says to my son, “These guys are huge, we are going to get killed.” At that point, John took them to the outfield. I could see him talking to them, but no one could hear what he was saying. Suddenly, the team began to jump around and scream like banshees. When they returned to the dugout, they continued their crazy, laughable behavior. Later he shared with me, “I told them to make the Tyler team think we are crazy. If they think we are crazy, they won’t know how to deal with us.” 

It worked. The Fort Worth kids relaxed. You could see the Tyler team lose their edge. The first Fort Worth hitter walked, then a hit, and another and another… before the Tyler team could recover Fort Worth had scored five runs. Now Fort Worth believed they could win, and Tyler was wondering what had happened. The impossible happened… Fort Worth won 8-5. 

Hope is contagious. I know… life is not a kid’s baseball game. We are dealing with more serious issues than being undersized. But… we have the creator of the universe on our side. We have the King of kings as our redeemer. Believing that anything is possible in God’s hands is the first step to making everything in God’s hands possible. 

As the Church, let us step forward in every place we go to find the blessings and positives around us. Let us meet hatred with love; discontent with joy; and despair with hope. Let us pour out a double measure of the peace of Christ in this reactionary society. Like no other time, it is our time to be a Church that makes a difference. 

Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus. (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18)

See you Sunday. It’s going to be a glorious day to be in worship at Stonebridge UMC! 

Pastor John