Preached at Markham Baptist Church, December 30, 2001

Christianity is a religion of hope. Peter defines our faith in his first letter, "We have been born anew to a life of hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead." (I Peter 1:3) (NIV).

"Now our Christian hope has a peculiar and distinctive quality. It is a hope which not only looks forward - it also looks backward. Christian hope is not wishful thinking. It is founded on something that has already happened."¹

Wishful thinking can be disappointed, but not Christian hope. For Christian hope is based on what has already taken place in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. Because of what has already occurred in Christ, the future can be trusted.

So on that first Easter morning, the day of resurrection, hope burst into the world. Of course the first disciples felt that when Jesus died, hope died. "We had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel." said one disciple to another after Jesus' death (Luke 24:21). Peter said he was going fishing! It was all over for them but then came the great transformation. The tomb was empty! Jesus was seen alive! Hope - strong, abiding, indestructible - was born. Christianity is a religion of hope.

And everyone knows that as we stand on the ledge that divides 2001 from 2002, hope is in rather short supply. The level of hatred and anxiety in our world has reached new highs in these last months. All indications for our economy continue to waiver between bleak to not so bleak, job opportunities seem distant for many, and on the whole the future does not look so bright for our world.

And on a personal level, I have never experienced such a time pastorally when cancer seems to be affecting so many, so quickly and so completely. If it's not cancer, then many are facing marital difficulties or parenting challenges, or stress to such a level that it is affecting people physically and emotionally.

The mass of trouble, and lack of hope in any community, in any church, is past believing and the greater part - we are adept at keeping it hidden, keeping it out of sight so that many who worship with us in the same sanctuary, even in the same pew have no idea of the trouble and stress that we are facing.

Hope, Christian hope, based on the transforming power of God, is desperately needed in our world and in our personal lives.

If you agree with that, if you are looking for hope then this sermon is for you. And if you say, "Well I'm not in the valley of trouble, life is going along well for me", then I'd ask that you not fade out during this sermon but listen carefully and take it in, for you will need it, if not for today then for tomorrow or the next day. For life is sure to take you through the valley of trouble.

Our text comes to us from the Old Testament book of Hosea. Now, Hosea is a man of God, a prophet who speaks the very words of God. He lives at a time when the people of Israel have turned their back on God. This passage which we are about to read points out that they are ignoring God and in fact worshipping other gods, the god of materialism, the gods of wood and stone which are called "baals". This passage also speaks of God's hatred of sin, his promise to judge it, and his steadfast love to restore the relationship that has been broken by Israel's unfaithfulness. Our passage begins with God lamenting the fact that his people (spoken of in the feminine gender) have not acknowledged Him as the one who blessed them with all they have.

"She did not know that it was I who gave her the grain, the wine, and the oil, and who lavished upon her silver and gold that they used for Baal. Therefore I will take back my grain in its time, and my wine in its season; and I will take away my wool and my flax, which were to cover her nakedness. Now I will uncover her shame in the sight of her lovers, and no one shall rescue her out of my hand. I will put an end to all her mirth, her festivals, her new moons, her sabbaths, and all her appointed festivals. I will lay waste her vines and her fig trees, of which she said, "These are my pay, which my lovers have given me." I will make them a forest, and the wild animals shall devour them. I will punish her for the festival days of the Baals, when she offered incense to them and decked herself with her ring and jewelry, and went after her lovers, and forgot me, says the LORD. Therefore, I will now allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak tenderly to her. From there I will give her her vineyards, and make the Valley of Achor a door of hope. There she shall respond as in the days of her youth, as at the time when she came out of the land of Egypt. On that day, says the LORD, you will call me, "My husband," and no longer will you call me, "My Baal." For I will remove the names of the Baals from her mouth, and they shall be mentioned by name no more. I will make for you a covenant on that day with the wild animals, the birds of the air, and the creeping things of the ground; and I will abolish the bow, the sword, and war from the land; and I will make you lie down in safety. And I will take you for my wife forever; I will take you for my wife in righteousness and in justice, in steadfast love, and in mercy. I will take you for my wife in faithfulness; and you shall know the LORD. (Hosea 2:8-20) (NRSV)

In the midst of this passage is a promise on which I want us to focus this morning. Verse 15 says: "I will make the valley of Achor a door of hope." What is not clear in our translation but is clear in others is that Achor means trouble. So the verse can read, "I will make the valley of trouble a door of hope."

Now what does that mean? What is the valley of Achor? To discover its significance we need to turn to the seventh chapter of the book of Joshua. And there we read the terrible story of a man by the name of Achan who could be called a war profiteer. He was a man who tried to make money from a war victory that his nation had just experienced. He was found to be stealing from his people and his God. As a result his people suffered at the hand of God until he was found and pronounced guilty. He was then condemned to suffer a terrible punishment - he and his family were to be stoned to death.

And so it happened - Achan was found guilty and stoned death. And the place where all this occurred was called the valley of Achor, the valley of trouble. It was the name the valley earned and kept right up to the time of Hosea. The valley of Achor was the valley of trouble.

Now Hosea is a master communicator and like all good communicators he uses images that people can understand so that they can grasp his message. So Hosea says to his countrymen - remember that valley of trouble, remember that time of national and personal distress in our history? Well this is what God has to say: "You are again going to pass through a time of trouble but I am now going to make you this promise - I am going to make the valley of trouble a door of hope. The very disasters, the very calamities that you've got to face will prove to be a door of hope opening up to new possibilities and new discoveries. I will make the valley of trouble, a door of hope.

As we sit on the eve of a new year, let's consider this for a moment.

Consider first how this passage speaks of God's ability to transform the valley of trouble into a door of hope.

Our God is able. He is able to transform lives. Each one of us who is in Christ is a living testimony to this fact. This is the Scriptural truth,

"So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new!" (2 Corinthians 5:17) (NRSV).

We know God is able to transform, we know it personally and we've witnessed it in the lives of others.

I remember a man by the name of David. It was about 8 years ago now that he called me in the middle of the night. As we met over coffee in his dining room he told me of how that morning his wife had left him and taken the kids. He was on the verge of losing his job. His life was collapsing all around him all because of that demon called alcohol. We talked into the morning hours as I told him of Christ's love for him and how God has not abandoned him. His story is a long one - but I will never forget five years later meeting David again, this time at an ecumenical service. His handshake was strong, his smile was broad - all of this spoke to me of the goodness of God. David had given his life to Christ and in return Christ had made David's life new. His wife and children had come back, and he was serving wholeheartedly in a local church. God is able to transform lives.

Sometimes it is not as dramatic as in the case of David, but God transforms lives nonetheless. Sometimes I feel like a stone that is laying on a beach, being constantly brushed by the waves, the rough edges becoming more and more smooth. So it is with God's changing of me and you. As we give our lives to Him in obedience, as we seek to live for Him and have the Holy Spirit fill us - He makes us into new creations.

This passage speaks also of the value of trouble. Our passage reads, "I will make the valley of trouble a door of hope." God doesn't say that He will keep his people from the valley of trouble. There is nowhere in Scripture that says that as Christ's followers we will live out our days in a padded cell where nothing can touch us or harm us or give us trouble.

What God does say is that in the midst of the trouble, He will work His transforming power. It is while we are in the valley of trouble that we will see the door of hope.

Now here is an insight about trouble at which we should look in depth. Our instinctive reaction whenever we think about trouble is a negative reaction. When we see trouble coming our way we want to run the other way - we want to avoid it, step around it - do anything but go through it.

But suppose that instinct is wrong. Suppose we thought of trouble not in a negative way but in a positive way? Suppose we saw trouble not as something to be avoided but something which could become a door of hope? How can that be?

There are two truths here. First, trouble can be a door of hope if it produces in us a godly character.

This is the attitude that Paul had as he wrote to the Romans,

"We also boast in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope." (Romans 5:3,4) (NRSV)

George Truett once said, "Suffering is educational." Trouble is a part of our training for the battles of experience of human life. The reformer, Martin Luther, said that he remembered that his most poignant sufferings as the best teachers of his whole life.² Why? Because it is when we are in the valley of trouble that we develop a life of gentleness, generousity, and kindness and compassion and humility.

Where will you find a life of gentleness? Will you find it in the life lived in the sunshine of health and prosperity and advantage? No. You will find it growing in a life that has known tears and trouble. It is a truth that "there is no touch so tenderly gentle as the touch of a wounded hand. There is no speech so sympathetic as the speech of those who have traveled through the valley of trouble."³

We can ask a similar question about generousity, and kindness and compassion and humility - of all the fruit of the Spirit, of all the attributes we revere and long for in our lives - is any one of them to be completely gained on the mountaintops of life? No. If they are to be had completely and fully, they are to obtained not on the mountaintop experiences of life but in the valley of trouble.

"Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ," writes Paul, in his second letter to the Corinthians, "the father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God." (2 Corinthians 1:3-4) (NIV).

The valley of trouble can be a door of hope when it produces in us a Godly character.

Secondly, trouble can be a door of hope if it causes us to trust in the power of our loving God.

Listen carefully - sunshine, hours of happiness, prosperity, good health they are wonderful gifts from God. He did not create life to be dull, grey and sombre. No, he filled life with joy and wants us to find well-being and happiness in our living. God and success and happiness are not enemies.

But there is a danger to prosperity. There is a danger to material comfort and living life always on the mountaintop and that is we begin to trust in ourselves. This is a danger that God warns the Israelites about as they enter into the promised land. God says,

"When you have eaten your fill and have built fine houses and live in them, and when your herds and flocks have multiplied, and your silver and gold is multiplied, and all that you have is multiplied, then do not exalt yourself, forgetting the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, who led you through the great and terrible wilderness, an arid wasteland with poisonous snakes and scorpions. He made water flow for you from flint rock, and fed you in the wilderness with manna that your ancestors did not know, to humble you and to test you, and in the end to do you good. Do not say to yourself, "My power and the might of my own hand have gotten me this wealth." But remember the LORD your God, for it is He who gives you power to get wealth." (Deuteronomy 8:12-18).

We can fool ourselves, can't we? The very gifts that God gives to us and for which we long can come between us and Him. We may say in our selfish pride, "My hand and my might have won these successes." We lull ourselves into forgetting God who has given us everything.

The mountaintop experiences are sweet, but we need the valleys of trouble because that is where we most often depend on God. It is there in the valley of sorrow that our strong hands aren't that strong to defeat death. It is there in the valley of suffering that we realize that we cannot carry on living in our own might. It is there in the valley of trouble that we are made to turn to God and depend on His strength, to depend on His guidance, to depend on His love to see us through. And when that happens, the valley of trouble becomes a door of hope for we have discovered our need for God, and discovered God's ability to meet our needs. The valley of trouble becomes a door of hope because there we meet God face to face.

For you see, my friends, that is where God is.

We are reminded of this fact every Christmas. God is not remote or distant, but He has stepped into our world in the person of Jesus Christ. Because Christ has come, we know that God has something to say about our trouble. He is not beaten when trouble comes to us; rather He transforms our trouble and gives victory over it.

And we, of all people, know it to be true, for God took the cross of Christ and transformed it so that we do not speak of the "tragedy of Calvary" but the "triumph of Calvary". We do not call the day on which it occurred "Bad Friday" but "Good Friday". The cross is not a symbol of despair but a sign of hope.

"I will make the valley of trouble a door of hope."

I know that many of you find yourselves in the valley today. Hear the good news! God is able - continue to trust Him, continue to follow His voice, continue to allow Him to mold your character, and there in that valley He will open a door of hope.

Footnotes:

1. J. Alan Walker, God is Where you Are. Grand Rapids Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1962, p. 111.

2. George W. Truett, The Salt Of the Earth Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker, Book House, 1949, p. 71.

3. J.H. Jowett, The Silver Lining London: Grosset and Dunlap, 1907, p. 209.