Advent: Hope
Advent is a four-week season in the Church calendar dedicated to the arrival or “advent” of Jesus of Nazareth, as the long-awaited, promised Messiah and King.
What Is Advent?
Welcome to the first week of Advent. Right now, you might be thinking…
"Oh no, I remember this from my childhood.”
“Cool, I remember this from my childhood.”
What in the world is Advent?
How many of you fall into that third category? That was me. I didn’t grow up celebrating Advent. So, the next few minutes are for all of us newbies.
Advent is a four-week season in the Church calendar dedicated to the arrival or “advent” of Jesus of Nazareth, as the long-awaited, promised Messiah and King.
Advent is, at its core, a season of waiting.
The Israelites waited for a promised Messiah.
We wait for Christmas morning to celebrate our Savior.
We all wait for Jesus’ return when he will make all things news.
During this season, we focus on four topics to help you wait well and nurture your appreciation of the Christ-child. These topics are hope, peace, joy, and love.
Hope is Essential
Today, we’ll begin by talking about hope.
Hope is essential to human existence. We can endure incredible hardship, immense pain, and life-altering change—some of you are living proof of this—but if we lose hope, the results can be catastrophic.
Hope drives resilience. Without it, we give up and give in.
Hope promotes good mental health. Without it, we sink into anxiety and depression.
Hope builds relationships. Without it, we will judge, criticize, withdraw, and attack.
Hope shapes our identity. Without it, we’ll jump on anything or anyone that helps us feel significant.
Hope is essential to your thriving as a human being.
But hope can easily be overshadowed by fear, especially in seasons of waiting. Waiting naturally brings anticipation, but anticipation can take us in two directions. While hope envisions a bright and promising future, fear paints a picture of uncertainty and despair.
Passage
We can see this tension between hope and fear in the Christmas story as we’re introduced to Mary in Luke 1. We also learn a valuable lesson from Mary: Let your hopes, not your fears, shape your future.
Let’s read Luke 1:26-38 together.
26 In the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, 27 to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. 28 The angel went to her and said, “Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you.”
29 Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. 30 But the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favor with God. 31 You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. 32 He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David,33 and he will reign over Jacob’s descendants forever; his kingdom will never end.”
34 “How will this be,” Mary asked the angel, “since I am a virgin?”
35 The angel answered, “The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called[a] the Son of God. 36 Even Elizabeth your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be unable to conceive is in her sixth month. 37 For no word from God will ever fail.”
38 “I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered. “May your word to me be fulfilled.” Then the angel left her.
From this passage, I want to tell you about hope declared, hope rooted, and hope received. And if you listen carefully to the Holy Spirit, he’ll tell you which one of these you need most today.
Hope Declared
This story begins in Nazareth, a regular small town, with Mary, an ordinary girl engaged to a boy named Joseph. This reminds us that hope often arises in the most unexpected places and circumstances. We want to look to the rich, successful, and proven. But God often uses the humble, lowly, and unknown.
The angel Gabriel appears and gives Mary the strangest greeting – “Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you.”
Can I just pause here to say something that some of you need to hear right now – the Lord is with you. No, really – the Lord is with you.
I had a moment this week where I needed to hear that. I’ve had a difficult two weeks:
I have an uncle on hospice care.
I made an emergency trip to California, losing 4 days of work.
We hosted a big Thanksgiving.
And I prepped for the biggest Hmong New Year in the country.
I was feeling stressed and angry… and I realized why. I felt like God had abandoned me and that I was on my own. And that is a terrifying feeling.
Mary reacted with fear and confusion—two things that rob us of hope.
I reacted with anger.
How do you react with I tell you – the Lord is with you?
The Lord is with you. That is the foundation of all our hope. Do you really believe the Lord is with you? Or do you feel abandoned? Or that you have to do it all on your own?
I had a week and a half where I believed he wasn’t. What about you? A week and a half? A year and a half?
The hope of the Christmas story declares that you are not alone. The Lord is with you.
Hope Rooted
The next section of the passage talks about where hope is rooted, for Mary and for us. Start to think: What is your hope rooted in? I’ll come back to that in a few minutes.
The angel Gabriel tells Mary six unbelievable things about her baby:
His name will be Jesus. That means “The Lord Saves.”
He will be great.
He will be called the Son of the Most High.
God will give him the throne of David.
He will reign over the descendants of David, i.e., the Jewish people, forever.
And his kingdom will never end.
Those are all names and references to the Old Testament promises of the coming Messiah.
First, Mary’s hope is rooted in who Jesus is, not in who she is.
Second, Mary’s hope is rooted in God’s power, not her own.
The angel describes how her whole pregnancy will be by God’s power, and then sums it up with, “No word from God will ever fail.”
The hope of the Christmas story is rooted in God’s power, not your own.
Now, let’s go back to the question I asked you: What is your hope rooted in?
Not sure? When do you get the most angry, hurt, or depressed? It’s usually when your hope disappoints you.
Does your hope come from…
Relationships
Career or accomplishments
Wealth and possessions?
Personal strength?
The government?
Science?
Personal strength or effort?
Luck, fate, fortune?
This week, I was confronted with the troubling reality that I was placing my hope in my own autonomy—my ability to control my energy, output, and schedule. And when outside circumstances threaten those, I lost it!
Hope tied to transient, finite, or unreliable sources (like wealth or circumstances) can fail when those things change or disappear. All of those tend to overpromise and underdeliver.
The hope of the Christmas story is rooted in God’s power, not your own. Let go of that burden. You weren’t made to carry such a heavy weight.
Hope Received
The final part of this passage shows us hope received. It’s the beautiful gift of trusting fully in God’s power and presence.
For Mary, in a matter of minutes, she went from “greatly troubled” to “I am the Lord’s servant.” And she remained faithful for the rest of her and Jesus’ life. Receiving hope always involved surrendering to God and his will.
For me, it happened with a hymn and a hug. I was listening to a Christian playlist, and an old hymn came on—“His Eye Is on the Sparrow.” Do you even get leveled by a lyric? “His eye is on the sparrow, and I know He watches me.”
I started tearing up. That’s when I realized I didn’t think God was watching me anymore. But if God is watching a little bird, I can know he’s watching me.
Then, a few minutes later, I spill something in the kitchen. It goes everywhere and makes a huge mess, and I almost lose it. Like throw a chair through the window, lose it.
Pang Foua comes over to hug me, and I stiffen up. And so quickly, my anger turns to tears, and I just melt into her arms. I release two weeks of sorrow disguised as anger. That’s the feeling of anger released and hope received.
Advent Application
Advent is a story of hope breaking into the darkness, not just for Israel but for each of us. It’s about the God who keeps His promises, even when it feels like He doesn’t.
This Advent season, where are you along Mary’s hope journey in Luke 1?
1. Hope Declared: Do you need to hear a promise of hope?
The angel’s words to Mary echo through the ages: “The Lord is with you.” This isn’t just a greeting; it’s a promise—a declaration that God’s presence does not depend on your circumstances.
No matter what feels overwhelming right now, no matter how far you feel from God or how broken your situation may seem, the Lord is with you. The same God who showed up to a young girl in Nazareth is showing up for you today.
2. Hope Rooted: Has your hope let you down?
If we’re honest, so much of what we put out hope in is fragile—relationships, careers, achievement, hard work. But Advent calls us to a hope rooted in something deeper, something eternal.
When Mary heard the angel’s message, her hope shifted from the impossibility of her situation to the faithfulness of God’s promises.
Is your hope anchored in God today, or has it drifted toward things that can’t sustain you? Advent is an invitation to uproot false hopes and replant them in the unshakable soil of God’s presence and power.
3. Hope Received: Do you need to replace your anger, sorrow, or despair with some hope from God?
Life wounds us. Loss, disappointment, and unanswered prayers can leave us clinging to hurt instead of hope. Mary’s response to the angel wasn’t instant celebration. It was a journey of faith that began with a question: “How can this be?”
If your heart feels too heavy or your theology too wounded to embrace hope, God isn’t afraid of your questions. This Advent, God invites you to trade your burdens for His promises.
Hope isn’t about pretending everything is fine—it’s about trusting that God is still working, even when it doesn’t make sense. Will you open your heart to receive the hope only He can give?
Closing
This Advent season, let’s allow hope to shape us. Whether you need hope declared over you, rooted in God’s faithfulness, or received in the midst of your pain, the promise of Advent is that hope is here—because Jesus is here.
