We all know that The Da Vinci Code movie is being released this month, and of course, everyone's doing some kind of promotion - including Google. Yes, to get it's slice of the hype-pie, Google came up with this contest which consisted of a series of puzzles - one a day for 24 days. If you were among the first 10,000 people to work all the puzzles correctly and submit your entry, you would be sent a special package that would allow you access to the final challenge. The final challenge was a series of timed puzzles. Whoever worked them the fastest got a spectacular prize.
But I didn't care about the prize - I just wanted access to the puzzles. You see, I love puzzles. I'm a sudoku fiend. I've loved logic problems since 6th grade. My high school friends and I invented our own code of symbols and wrote pages and pages of notes in it. When asked if I'd rather a crocodile eat me or an alligator, I proudly say, "an alligator."
So I worked my puzzles through the first 23 days, and on day 24, I worked that puzzle too and submitted it within an hour of it being posted. I thought I was a shoe-in to be among the first 10,000. I smugly shut my account that day certain that on fateful Monday the 15th, I'd be notified that my access package was in the mail.
Well, the 15th came and went with no word from Google by 4:30 in the afternoon. I checked my email once again before bed - nothing. I crawled down off the stood I was sitting on after closing my email account and slunk to the bedroom. "What could have gone wrong?" I thought as I very uncheerfully brushed my teeth. "There's no way 10,000 people could have beat me in an hour's time...Not 10,000..."
Morning rose on the 16th and I went to work and checked my email, like I always do. But that day, one email stood out from the others, the one with NOT A FINALIST written very boldly and uncompassionately in the subject line. I didn't even open it. I just stared at it with my had on the mouse, in the glazed way my brother used to stare at his video games after 6 hours of game play. "Not a finalist?" I whispered, completely bewildered. No access to the last puzzles? I couldn't play the last puzzles? If I hadn't been at work I probably would have cried on the spot.
You're probably thinking I'm embellishing just a little for sake of drama. Well, I'm not really. I was pretty crushed when I got that email. I was totally convinced that I would be among that first 10,000. I had put hope in it.
...And that's why I was so disappointed. I had put hope in being among the 10,000, and when the object of my hope failed me, well...
This reminded me of something though: I can put hope in nothing but God and his gospel. Nothing. I can't put hope in myself, I can't put hope in my plans for the future or my ability to accomplish, I can't put hope in my friends, I can't put hope in my husband. I can name specific instances where all of these things have failed me, good though their intentions had been. These things are limited, and thus incapable of coming through for me 100% of the time. There is no unlimited person in all of finite creation (excepting Christ during his time here). The only unlimited person, by his nature, is not part of finite creation at all, and that's God. And that God established a source of hope for me, a sinner - my savior Jesus and his atoning death and ratifying resurrection.
"And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied." -- 1 Corinthians 15:17-19
Ah, my good friend Paul. This is a snippet from his first letter to the church in Corinth. This is a profound thing he's saying here. If Christ had died and stayed dead, then there's nothing special about him. But his resurrection proves that, being sinless, he had died a death he didn't deserve. Think about it: if Christ had deserved his death, that would mean he would have sinned at some point during his stay on earth. If he had sinned even once, he would have been taking the punishment for his own sins. If he was taking the punishment for his own sins, who would there be to take the punishment for ours? Yep, us. That's what Paul is saying above: "your faith is futile and you are still in your sins." Your faith in the sinless sacrifice of Christ has no foundation and therefore no one has washed your sins away and you're still in them. Oh, and all the folks who have already died who believed in Christ's atoning death - they're just gone, because their faith in Christ had no foundation either. Indeed, the hope of heaven and eternity with God that the Gospel gave us are all a farce, so you have hoped in Christ in vain and you are a person to be pitied. And not just a person to be pitied - you are of all people, most to be pitied. Others may have had disappointments, but you had hope for eternal life and reconciliation with God! You're hope was the highest, so your loss is the greatest. You're hope ends at death pal, and when that's the case, you indeed deserve pity more than any other person on the planet.
A person most to be pitied...That was me when I'd put my hope in winning the next level from the puzzle contest. I was put to shame because I'd hoped in something that didn't happen. I cringe to think of all the other times I've put my hope in a person, or a plan, or an event that didn't come through for me.
But here's good news:
"But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep." -- 1 Corinthians 15:20
Christ is special - he did rise from the dead. And not only that, he's the "firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep" - meaning he's just the first to do it. Because of his atoning death, those who believe in him after his resurrection will also 'rise from the dead' - join him in heaven when they die in the body.
Believers in Christ don't hope in him for this life only - we hope in him clear through this life and into the next, and he will never disappoint us in this. The gospel is the only thing we can put our hope in. Anything else is misplaced hope. Anything else will eventually disappoint us. But if our hope is grounded in the solid unshakable gospel, everything around us can fall to pieces but our hope will not be disappointed. Like the hymn says:
My hope is built on nothing less
Than Jesus blood and righteousness
I dare not trust the sweetest frame
But wholly lean on Jesus name
When darkness veils his lovely face
I rest on his unchanging grace
In every high and stormy gail
My anchor holds within the veil
His oath, his covenant, his blood
Support me in the whelming flood
When all around my soul gives way
He then is all my hope and stay
When he shall come with trumpet sound
Oh may I then in him be found!
Dressed in his righteousness alone
Faultless to stand before the throne
On Christ the solid rock I stand!
All other ground is sinking sand
All other ground is sinking sand!
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