When we first came to Naas and looked at staring a church here we were looking at advertising, logos, and publicity. We wanted people to know our basic philosophy right up front. At the very beginning we called ourselves the Naas Baptist Bible Centre to emphasis our foundation on the Word of God. It was during that time that we decided to apply the phase, “That through patience and comfort of the Scriptures you might have hope.”
No, obviously, when Paul wrote these words he was writing about the Old Testament scriptures. He was saying that we can’t abandon the Old Testament. It is there that the foundation is laid and we learn about God. It is there that we have the Law to point out our own inadequacy. It is there that we see God’s holiness, His justice, His mercy, His righteousness, His grace, and His love. Yet, at the same time Paul lays down a principle. If the things in the Old Testament were written for our learning, would that not include the New Testament when it was completed?
The principle is this, that we find hope, true hope, a perfect and assured hope, only though the patience and comfort of the Scriptures. I find it interesting that the word patience is used here. It seems to imply that there is not a quick fix, that the hope will only one day be realised. In the meantime we find the comfort we need to carry on in the Word of God.
How do we find hope in troublesome days? We find that hope through patience, we find it through the day to day comfort of the Scriptures. We must never take our eyes off these things that we written before, the precious word of God.
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