December 5

It is hard to comprehend what the conditions must have been like on board the ship Paul was sailing to Rome on. For two full weeks the boat was constantly battered by the waves, both night and day. There was no sighting of the sun, moon, or the stars during that entire time (Acts 27:18-20,27). Few of us ever experience a storm like that in our lives. It was so bad, Luke writes, ‘All hope was gone” (27:20). It would be easy in a situation such as that, to just give up and quit, to cease trying to survive.
But, even in the midst of our hopeless situations, God always provides light. Jesus Christ is our ultimate reason for never giving up. “If God is for us, who can ever be against us? Since God did not spare even His own Son but gave him up for us all, won’t God, who gave us Christ, also give us everything else (we need)?” (Romans 8:31&32). Because Jesus Christ has conquered the grave, he is able to provide us with the inspiration, the example, and the power through His Spirit to help us overcome any obstacle we encounter in life (Rom.8:37).
And now that Jesus has given us light and hope, he commissions us to reflect his light and his hope to the rest of the world (Matthew 5:14-16; Ephesians 5:8&9; I Peter 2:9-12; II Corinthians 1:3-7). God wants to use us to bring light to people’s lives in the midst of what seems like hopeless situations to them, even as He used Paul to bring hope to the sailors and others on board his ship. And how do we do that? By knowing the promises of God’s Word. Paul shared with the sailors a promise he had received the night before, from God. Paul had been assured that not only would his life be spared, but so would all the lives of the others on board the ship with him (Acts 27:21-26). Imagine the credibility Paul had with them the rest of the trip after God fulfilled His promise to Paul and spared all their lives. For us, that means being grounded in the promises of God contained within His inspired, written Word. Peter reminds us, “worship Christ as Lord of your life. And if you are asked about your Christian hope, always be ready to explain it” (I Peter 3:15). If people asked us why we have so much hope in the midst of what would seem to be despair, are we prepared to explain why? Could we point to the promises of God we have found that bring us a solid foundation even in the midst of our storms (Matthew 7:24-27)? Standing on the promises of God requires knowing the promises of God. Do you?