“We have access by faith into this grace in which we stand through him, and we boast in the hope of God’s glory. 3 But not only that! We even take pride in our problems, because we know that trouble produces endurance, 4 endurance produces character, and character produces hope. 5 This hope doesn’t put us to shame, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.”
– Romans 5:2-5
Last Sunday, as we were worshipping at church, the word “hope” came to mind for me. As I did a quick Google search for common phrases about hope in the Bible, I landed on the passage from Romans 5:2-5. There are so many gems and insights from this passage that connect well with the theme of patient endurance we’ve been focusing on this year.
Verse 2 talks about being able to stand through Jesus, and boasting in the hope of God’s glory. Being able to stand tall and keep our composure during a season of patient endurance can be one of the most challenging things. But this verse reminds us that we’re not called to stand alone during the storms of our lives. We’re to stand through Jesus. And what allows us to stand strong is grace, given to us. We are able to stand because we are not using our own human strength and abilities. We’re standing because of the grace of God in our lives, that we access by faith and by believing in God. We can stand tall because of the grace God gives us to do so.
Verse 3 goes even further. It says that not only can we stand strong, but we can stand so strong that we can pretty much take pride in our problems. One of the words that came up during our time of worship on Sunday was the idea of the upside-down kingdom. The kingdom of God is upside down – the master (Jesus) has become the servant of all, and the least becomes the greatest. In this upside-down kingdom, we don’t lament about our problems. We don’t even just endure through them. We somehow even take pride in them!
What an unusual response to problems! But we’re able to take such an unusual approach because we know that God can take even our problems and make them into something valuable. God can use our problems to produce endurance, character, and hope in us. What an amazing God, who can take problems in our lives and bring something good out of them.
It’s because of this hope that we can stand tall and without shame. Even in our problems and trials, we can keep our composure and be unashamed. But again, it’s not because of our human abilities. It’s because of God’s love for us. When God’s love is poured into our hearts, we are never put to shame, like verse 5 says. We are filled with the Holy Spirit and the grace of God, which allows us to stand firm during our problems, as God even uses them to produce amazing things within us.
God, I pray that during the storms in our lives, we would stand firm through you. I pray that you would give us the faith and grace daily to stand in you. I pray that during difficult circumstances, that we would not only endure, but we would put our hope in you. We take heart knowing that you are producing endurance, character, and hope through our situation. And I pray that your love would be poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, and by your Spirit may we stand tall through it all. Amen.