March 15, 2022

Acts 27:20; NASB
Since neither sun nor stars appeared for many days, and no small storm was assailing us, from then on all hope of our being saved was slowly abandoned.

Despair. It’s not a fun word. It’s a word that seems to bring you deeper and deeper into the abyss. Where the light slowly and slowly fades away into darkness. 
Despair is defined as “the complete loss or absence of hope.” It’s a place where no person wants to be, nor should we want any person to ever be there.

In this story in Acts 27, Paul is a prisoner being transported to Rome. He is on board a ship with 276 people on board. They are trapped in a devastating storm. (Click here to read all of Acts 27:13-44 for the whole story)

Before GPS, sailors used the sun and stars to navigate. But it had been stormy for many days. Meaning….no sun nor stars. Meaning….we have no idea where we are and we have no idea where we are going. They are completely lost.

They used cables to hold the ship together. They threw cargo and tackle overboard to lighten the load. They were desperate. They were scared. But the storm only intensified.

And ever so slowly they lost hope. “All hope of being saved……was………slowly ……..a……ban……doned.” Repeat that sentence again….only read it slower this time.

They were closing in on the bottom of the barrel. The only thing seemingly in front of them was destruction and death. In other words…..despair. No hope.

Maybe you are reading this right now and it hits too close to home. Maybe that's where you are. Hope is slowly being abandoned. The storm has been raging for too long. You can barely keep your head above water.

Would you believe the story of the shipwreck gets worse than that? Yeah, I know, that can’t be right. Yeah….they went another 14 days drifting at sea, not eating. From bad to worse. Out of the frying pan and into the oven.

If hope was slowly abandoning them on day one, I think it is completely out the window (maybe better to say it was thrown overboard) by day 14.

But one passenger on board did not lose hope: Paul. Paul had an angel visit him and tell him everything would be ok. He had to go stand before Caesar and share the Gospel.

Paul proclaims this: “Therefore, keep up your courage, men, for I believe God…”

For I believe God. If there is one person, one thing, one hope that does not let us down, it is God. He is always with us. He is lifting us up. He is providing for us. He is our everything.

We have no guarantee that the storms in our life will pass. Maybe they will. Maybe they will pass quickly. Maybe they will pass slowly. Maybe they will sink everything we have. And maybe the storm will be the end of life as we know it on earth.

God never promises that we won’t have storms. He never promises to deliver us from all the storms. But He does promise His presence with us always.

And more than that, He has promised to prepare a place for us. A hope where moth and rust cannot destroy. An eternal dwelling with a God who loves us wildly and beyond our imagination. All secured through the death and resurrection of Jesus. 

There is something amazingly, peacefully, joyfully hopeful in Jesus' words on the cross, “It is finished.’ Done. Paid for. Secured.

The storms in life may shake and throw you around. But those same storms can never, ever, throw God away from you. They can never dash your future with God to pieces. He is with you. Always. And there lies the hope of the Christian. The hope that is available to all who would believe.

I love how this daughter and father have summed up their hope in God:

“If God can bring blessing from the broken body of Jesus and glory from something that’s as obscene as the cross, He can bring blessings from my problems and my pain and my unanswered prayer. I just have to trust Him” — Anne Graham Lotz

“I’ve read the last page of the Bible. It’s all going to turn out all right.” — Billy Graham

Friends, may you live the confidence in God that Paul proclaimed in the midst of a wild storm: “I believe God.”

-Pastor Brian