I once went to a Dairy Queen where they told me that they were out of ice cream for the day. Then, they asked me what I wanted to order. I didn’t know what to say. To me, DQ is all about the cool treats. (Sorry, I’m not into their hot eats.) They were missing the essential ingredient upon which all of their best products were made.
If you want God to move in your life, there is one essential ingredient that you must have before anything can happen. I know that most folks would guess that it’s faith and that would be good guess but that’s not it. It’s true that faith is vitally important but even faith is at a loss without the most needed ingredient of all.
What is this all-important ingredient? It’s hope. The Bible says…
Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. Hebrews 11:1 (NIV)
Again, faith is very important but for your faith to activate you must have a hope, a vision of the future.
The first step in seeing God move in your life is to cling to His promises because they are the source of hope. You may be tempted to give up on a situation or a person, or even yourself, but His promises are true and as you read, study and meditate on them you will find hope flowing into you.
Our greatest hope is Jesus himself. The scripture says that because of Him we have a living hope.
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 (NIV)
Did you get that? No matter what it going on in your life you can be sure that your hope is living and alive because of the resurrection of Jesus! Why? Because the resurrection proves that nothing is impossible for God. If He can resurrect a dead body then He can resurrect a dead career or a dead marriage or anything else!
When Jesus is invited into something there is automatically hope again. If we will allow Him and His hope into our lives then faith can start to do its thing and things will start to happen that you wouldn’t believe. Remember…
We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure. Hebrews 6:19a (NIV)
Got to Him right now, dig into His Word, and refuse to let go until you find the hope you need.
RT @tmack2 The Essential Ingredient http://bit.ly/2a0gmh
This comment was originally posted on Twitter
I had a similar experience at an Arby’s drive through once. They told me they were out of roast beef, I asked them why they were still open.
This is sooo crazy. First. I have been to the KFC in Buford on aleast two occasions where they were out of chicken…that struck me as hilarious!
Second, in my daily quiet time recently I jotted down the question (thinking I’d research it later…which often doesn’t happen) what’s the difference between faith and hope? And then viola, let than a month later here is your awesome blog outlining it so clearly. I sensed there was a difference, but you just ‘splained it so beautifully. thanks!