![\"Sign\"](\"\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/04\/6a00d83524c19a69e2015431fc17f0970c-300wi.jpg\" "\\"Sign\\"")
“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead” (1 Peter 1:3-5 NIV).<\/p>\n “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead” (1 Peter 1:3-5 NIV).<\/p>\n
“I hope so.” I said.<\/p>\n
I often respond that way when I wish something would happen, but actually have very little confidence that it will. In these instances I’m not really hoping, I’m really just wishing. But hope is more than a wish.<\/p>\n
The real meaning of hope is much stronger than the way we often use it. The dictionary defines hope as follows:<\/p>\n
Hope, noun<\/em> h\u014dp –\u00a01.\u00a0archaic<\/em> : trust, reliance;\u00a02. a: desire accompanied by expectation of or belief in fulfillment <came in hopes<\/em> of seeing you>; also<\/em> : expectation of fulfillment or success <no hope<\/em> of a cure>;\u00a0b: someone or something on which hopes\u00a0are centered <our only hope<\/em> for victory>;\u00a0c: something hoped\u00a0for.<\/span><\/p>\n Notice the three ways hope is manifest: 1) as the expectation itself, 2) as the basis on which it is centered, as in something or someone, 3) as its object.<\/p>\n When the apostle Peter wrote about the “living hope” we have in Christ. All three of the implied meanings of hope are in view. First, our hope is “living” and not dead. It is filled with faith and belief. Second, the basis of our hope is in Christ and in His resurrection. Finally, our hope is focused on the future fulfillment of being co-heirs with Christ.\u00a0Learning to really place all our hope in Christ is the key to having a living hope.<\/p>\n Now, it’s more than a wish. Praise the Lord! We’re cutting the ribbon this Saturday at 10:00 A.M. and then, our first worship services will be on this Sunday, May 1, 2011!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead” (1 Peter 1:3-5 NIV). “I hope so.” I said. I often respond that way when I wish something would happen,<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1018,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2061,1,2062],"tags":[],"location":[],"class_list":["post-88","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-religion","category-uncategorized","category-weblogs"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.garycombs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.garycombs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.garycombs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.garycombs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.garycombs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=88"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.garycombs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.garycombs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.garycombs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=88"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.garycombs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=88"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.garycombs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=88"},{"taxonomy":"location","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.garycombs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/location?post=88"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Photo-9\"](\"\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/04\/6a00d83524c19a69e2015431fc267e970c-200wi.jpg\" "\\"Photo-9\\"")
There’s one area that our hopes are finally being fulfilled. After 19 years of existing as a church that met in rental facilities, we’re finally moving into a home of our own. I have to admit that when people have asked whether we would ever see this day, I have usually responded, “I hope so.”<\/p>\n