You're Not a Fool to Keep Hoping, Part 2

What God has Done

The second part of hope is reorienting our minds around what God has already done. The narrative of Scripture is powerful enough to instill hope in even the most seemingly hopeless situations. Think of it this way: God’s children rebelled, even though he had created a perfect world for them to enjoy. And they went from one rebellious decision to such debauched living that he almost wanted to wash his hands of them.

Instead, he preserved a family through Noah, and then set in motion thousands of years of reclaiming his children to himself. Thousands of years before it happened, he foretold his plan to offer a Messiah so that he and his people, his children, could be reunited and reconciled.

The way he did it was beyond human imagination: the spiritual God who runs the universe became a physical baby needing to be fed and changed. It made no sense, but it’s true: “For in Christ, all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form” (Colossians 2:9).

We lose so much wonder if we reduce Jesus to a wise teacher or prophet and deny that he was literally God in the flesh. Even the person most directly impacted by God’s entry into the world didn’t see how it could happen, but the angel assured Mary, “For nothing will be impossible with God^” (Luke 1:37). God gave a woman who had never lain with a man, a son.

What’s impossible with God?