DONT GIVE UP HOPE (2)

 

Supernatural Expectancy
Before you can understand how important hope is, you have to realize that real, Bible hope is not "wishing." That's worldly hope. People in the world say, "I sure wish I would get a raise at work," when what they mean is, "I want a raise. I don't think I will get it...but it would be nice if I did."


The kind of hope the Word of God talks about is much stronger than that because it's not based on wishing or wanting. It is based on your covenant with God and the anointing God has provided to carry out that covenant in your life.


In fact, Ephesians 2:12 says before you knew Jesus, you were "...without Christ [or without the anointing], being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world."


"But Brother Copeland," you say, "I'm a believer. I know God's promises. Doesn't that mean I have all the hope I need?"



Not necessarily. You see, hope comes when you take those promises, keep them before your eyes and in your ears until they begin to build an image inside you. Hope comes when you begin to see yourself with what God has promised you - instead of seeing yourself without it.


When you have hope, you have a supernatural expectancy that what God has promised will come to pass in your life.


The Apostle Paul talks about that kind of supernatural expectancy in Philippians 1:19-20 where he says, "I know that this shall turn to my salvation through your prayer, and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ, According to my earnest expectation and my hope, that in nothing I shall be ashamed...."


In that scripture, Paul uses two different words from the Greek language, each of which can be translated hope. One of them means the happy anticipation of good. The other can be defined as eager longing, strained expectancy, watching with an outstretched head, and abstraction from anything else that might engage the attention.


When divine hope comes alive in you, you're so locked in on the Word of God, you can't be distracted from it. I know what that's like. There have been times in my life when I was so focused on something God had called me to do, and I was so tuned in to what the Word said about it, I couldn't think about anything else.


People would try to have a conversation with me and I'd always end up talking about my hope. It would come up so big inside me that at those times, I was bigger on the inside than I was on the outside.

When your hope gets that strong, it doesn't matter what kind of unbelief the devil tries to throw your way, it just bounces off you. You're so one-track-minded, you can't be drawn off course.


Back when Gloria and I first found out about faith, I was like that all the time. If someone walked up to me and said something that sounded like unbelief, I would just explode all over them! (I'm still like that, actually, I've just learned to be a little more gentle about it.)


One night I was in a bookstore in a church where I was preaching when such an explosion took place. I had stepped up to the cash register to buy my book and when I reached in my pocket to get my money, I sniffed.


I just sniffed! I don't know why I did it. I guess I just felt like sniffing. When I did, the lady running the bookstore said to me, "Is it a cold or hay fever?"


Almost before I knew what I was doing, I had opened my mouth and started spurting the Word as fast as I could talk.

"THE WORD OF THE LIVING GOD SAYS IN Galatians 3:13, I'M REDEEMED FROM THE CURSE OF THE LAW. Deuteronomy 28:61 SAYS ALL SICKNESS AND DISEASE ARE UNDER THE CURSE AND I AM REDEEMED FROM THE CURSE OF HAY FEVER. I DON'T HAVE COLDS, IN JESUS' NAME! I'VE BEEN WASHED IN THE BLOOD OF JESUS! AND BY JESUS' STRIPES I AM HEALED! HE BORE MY SICKNESSES AND CARRIED MY DISEASES...."

I nearly pinned that lady to the wall with the Word of God. Finally, she exclaimed, "Forgive me, Brother Copeland. I knew I was in trouble when I said that! But I finally understand what you've been preaching about. I've had migraine headaches all my life. I have one right now, but if you'll lay your hand on me, I'll be healed."
 I did - and she was!
 What happened to her? That explosion of the Word went into her heart and suddenly she could see herself healed. Her hope came to a crisp sharpness. She saw an inner image of who she is in Christ Jesus and that no migraine could stay on her body. The minute she did, the force of faith went to work and brought that image to pass!
 That's what the Bible means when it says "faith is the substance of things hoped for!"

Stick Your Neck Out
 How do you develop that kind of hope? You stay in the Word until your neck stretches out. I particularly like that part of the definition of hope because I know what it means to have your neck stretched.
 When I was a little boy, my grandfather was my hero. He was a full-blooded Cherokee Indian and I wanted to act like him, look like him, curse like him, chew tobacco like him and spit like him - much to my mother's chagrin. When my mother would tell me that he and my grandmother were coming to see us, I would get so excited I could hardly wait.
 Every minute or two, I'd run to the window to see if they had arrived. Every noise sent me running for the door. I tell you, my neck was stretched out in anticipation. My Pawpaw was coming and I expected him any moment.
 That may sound like a silly example, but the Lord once told me if people would just expect Him to move as much as a child expects his grandparents to arrive, He could move on their situation and change things drastically by the power of His Spirit.
 That's what happened in Acts 3 to the crippled man at the gate Beautiful. He had been sitting by that gate begging, his head down and his eyes to the ground. But when Peter and John walked by and said, "Look on us!" that man lifted his head and began to expect.
 Hope rose up in him because he was "...expecting to receive something of them" (verse 5).
 Of course, he received a lot more than he was expecting - he expected alms, but he got legs! That's because his expectancy hooked into their expectancy - and, believe me, their expectancy was running high!