The Force Of Expectation

Imagine a farmer with his plough, and hour after hour he is ploughing in the field. He is doing this work in expectation that there will be a harvest. If he was convinced that those seeds would not grow do you think he would take the time to go out and plough? Perhaps just so that the other farmers could see that he knew how to plough? No, he would not waste his time. But if he believes that the seeds will grow, he ploughs in expectation; he ploughs with the distinct understanding that that is the necessary and logical thing to do, because there is going to be a harvest. The same agricultural illustration is brought to our notice in I Corinthians 9:10:
“…he that ploughs ought to be ploughing in expectation; and he that threshes should be partaker of his expectation.”
You will notice that in place of the word “hope,” in the King James version I have used the word “expectation.” Baseless hope is rather an unfortunate word to use in this context, because non Biblical hope is something which has no certainty of fulfilment. There is no guarantee. Well, I just hope so, if it doesn’t come about, well, it will not really matter, but I hope it does.” That is what the word “hope” means in today’s language, and it is far too weak to express what God is saying to us here in the original text.
Biblical hope and worldly or ordinary hope are not the same. Biblical hope is the force of expectation. The word hope and expectation is the same in the biblical sense.
There is a lot of difference between expectation and ordinary hope. Suppose I am expecting a visitor to arrive by plane tomorrow morning, I am not just hoping that he will come, I am expecting him to come and because of my expectation, I have made certain arrangements regarding his visit. To expect something means that there is a strong possibility, even a certainty that the event is going to happen. Just to hope so has no feeling of certainty at all, it is only a pie-in-the-sky dream. Now I want you to keep these two words sharply separated in your mind, for it affects the principle of believing and your enjoyment of all that God has made available.
The farmer in I Corinthians 9:10 who was ploughing his field, putting his energy into it, was not just hoping, he was really expecting a harvest. This becomes an interesting study because the action most people take between the moment of believing and the manifestation of the answer, is not to express their expectation but to make preparation for the non-arrival of the answer. It seems as if they mostly spend their time as if the answer was not coming. The ploughing in hope is a real ploughing in expectation of the harvest. You are really expecting, you are putting all your effort into it, you are expecting the supply of your needs. Yet the reverse is true in most Christians that I counsel while a pastor. Even people who say they are walking on the Word, when they have a need, seem to spend as much time, if not more time, trying to find some way around the problem, as if the answer is not coming, than they do in an attitude of expectation.
The most vital key in the period between believing and manifesting the answer is this matter of expectation. Are we really expecting God to supply that particular need? Oh yes, we expect it the moment we first believe. Yes, that day and maybe a day or two after, but if there is any length of time between the believing and the manifestation, we halt the attitude of expectancy. Too often we get into a hope situation, It sure would be nice; you know, it would be great if we got the answer to that need; wouldn’t it be terrific? We are no longer expecting it and Satan has tricked us on that one little point. I am sure that to some persons there is only a hairline distinction between expectation and hope, but it is there and Satan is very anxious to give you a nudge over from the side of expectation into hope, because he knows that by so doing, he can cancel the whole project.
You must therefore, be on your guard all the time and keep your mind geared to the fact that you are standing on the greatness of God’s Word.
Different Analogies Of Expectation
The truth of expectation is so important that I want to take you deeper into its understanding by sharing some of the usages of the word expectation in the New Testament. In the vast majority of cases in the Bible as well as in classical Greek literature, it is used for expecting the best. In the New Testament there are only a few times when there is any indication in its usage of expecting the worst.
In contrast, most usages in the Church Epistles deal with expecting the best. But what do we find most Christians doing? Expecting the worst to happen. I’ve heard it time and time again from various people; most people seem to spend their lives thinking: ‘What is the worst thing that could happen to me?’
They fill their mind with this and it influences their whole life. Now, what can possibly go wrong today? This has gone wrong, that has gone wrong; there must be a third disaster somewhere! And they usually get what they are expecting — the worst. And what does the Word indicate? The Bible teaches that we should be expecting the best. Now, here again is an area where we must adjust our thinking to agree with God’s Word. If we are going to get the result that is promised, it will not be by expecting the worst that can happen, it will be by expecting the best.
Always Expect The Best!
There is an example in the Word that I want to share with you on expecting the worst. In Acts chapter 27 there is the record of the shipwreck during Paul’s enforced journey to Rome. After describing the fury of the hurricane that was battering the ship, verses 18-20 state: “And we being exceedingly tossed with a tempest, the next day they lightened the ship; And on the third day we cast out with our hands the tackling of the ship. And when neither sun nor stars in many days appeared, and no small tempest lay on us, all expectation that we should be saved was then taken away.”
Now why did they lose all expectation? They took their eyes off the goal. (Paul was the only one believing at the time.) The people on board had their eyes on the sense-knowledge circumstances around them: no sun or stars to guide them, just the tempest blowing day after day after day. When they looked at this situation, the record states,“all expectation that we should be saved was then taken away.” Who took it away? They did — they took it out of their minds.
Read through to the end of the chapter, and you will notice that not one person on board lost his life. They were all saved because of a believer on board who knew how to believe God, and a great part of believing is expectation. Look at verse 25 (this is Paul speaking): “Wherefore, sirs, be of good cheer: For I believe God…” There is expectation, “I believe God,” and God had told him by revelation that everyone on the ship would be saved because he (Paul) was there, but that they would lose the ship. And they lost the ship but every person on board was saved. In this example, all expectation was taken away, they took it out of their mind, they gave in to sense-knowledge evidence, but when a believer stood on the greatness of God’s Word, success was assured.
Nearly every other usage of this wonderful word expectation is in a positive sense. Romans 12:12 gives a vital key to an understanding of the subject of expectation. The first clause of this verse is packed with truth: “Rejoice in expectation.” Rejoicing is a repeated experience of joy. Here it is obvious it can also refer to being so excited about what you are about to receive, so joyful and excited that you are on tiptoe waiting for it to arrive. This enthusiasm is generated not by outside circumstances but by the renewing of our mind to the greatness of God’s Word. It is not a case of sitting there with a straight face and a sour look, and saying, “Yes, I’m expecting the answer.” There is a rejoicing in expectation, there is a thrill about it, because you are seeing the Word coming alive. God has said that He blesses you with all spiritual blessings, you have believed – now you are expecting the manifestation of the answer, and you are getting excited about it. There is a rejoicing in expectation.
In Romans 15:13 God is declared to be “the God of expectation”. God is characterized as having this attitude of expectation. His ultimate purpose in creating this universe and in placing man upon the earth, is to have somebody with whom he could fellowship. This will come to pass, therefore, He is called the God of expectation.
Let me show you the rest of the verse: “Now the God of expectation fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in expectation…”
To abound means to be over above in number or measure. Expectation is not just saying every morning, “Today is the day”, and then forgetting it for the rest of the day. This verse teaches a rejoicing, an abounding, an enthusiasm — it becomes a real expectation. Perhaps you are waiting for your girl-friend to call you on the telephone and you are sitting there just waiting for that phone to ring; or perhaps you are waiting for your boy-friend to visit you, and every time a car drives down the street, you look out the window and see if it is him.
Expectation – it is certainly not a dull, straight-faced thing! Why should it be dull when it comes to spiritual realities? Rejoicing in expectation, abounding in expectation; there is some emotion involved. You supply the excitement, the expectation.
The Sure Foundation
You Have a Sure Foundation!
“For whatever was written before, was written for our learning, that we, through the endurance and comfort of the scriptures might have expectation” – Romans 15:4
On what is our expectation based? On what God says in His Word. And when God says in His Word, Luke 6:38, “Give, and it shall be given unto you…” then our expectation is, “Lord, I have given and now I am expecting the pressed-down, shaken-together, and running-over solution.” Our expectation comes from the Scriptures. I think this is an important point, important because if you find yourself losing the enthusiasm, the rejoicing, the abounding in expectation, there is only one thing to do: get back to the Scriptures. Get back to the Word and see what God promised.
In other words, go back to the contract, the document, read the fine print, and see if the guarantee is good. See if there is a seal on it, see who signed it — God Himself! Check the truth out and reassure your mind that the result is sure. Then get back to this enthusiasm, this expectation, this excitement about the Word.
There is another verse I particularly want to share at this time. When God says to remember something, He means for you to remember it; and when God says to forget something, He means for you to forget it. However, I want to bring to your notice something that I have learned from the Word: when God says to remember something that is past, He is only bringing it to my notice because He wants to compare it with something glorious about the present. He is not asking me to dwell upon it, to re-live the past again. I want you to notice Ephesians 2:11-13 in this light:
“Wherefore remember, that you being in time past Gentiles in the flesh… That at that time you were apart from Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no expectation, and without God in the world.”
That is a record of what you were, not how you are now. There is now no need to be in the state of having no expectation for you can have all the expectation in the world. But at that time you were without expectation because you had no certainty — you were living in a baseless hope situation.
The first word in verse 13 is, “But”, a conjunction that indicates a contrast. You were without expectation, “But now in Christ Jesus, you who were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ.” You were without expectation but in Colossians 1:27 it declares, “To whom God would make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles; which is, Christ in you, the expectation of glory.” It is because you have Christ in you that you have an expectation.
Now you can go ahead, you can walk in the light of “Christ in you”, you can walk poised and balanced in Christ because you have an expectation, a certainty that you will always get what you are believing for, since believing equals receiving. This is a tremendous truth: Christ in you, the expectation of glory.
Acts 16:16-19 gives an example that will show that if you have your expectation on anything but the Word, then there is no guarantee of results. Now by saying this, I do not mean that you will not get results from expectation in material fields but I am saying that there is no guarantee unless you are believing God’s Word.
“And it came to pass, as we [that is, Paul and Silas] went to prayer, a certain damsel possessed with a spirit of divination met us, which brought her masters much gain by soothsaying [that is, fortune-telling, precognition, E.S.P., and so forth]. The same followed Paul and us, and cried, saying, ‘These men are the servants of the most High God, which show unto you the way of salvation’. And this she did many days. But Paul being grieved, turned and said to the spirit, I command thee in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her. And it came out the same hour. And when her masters saw that the expectation of their gain was gone, they caught Paul and Silas, and drew them into the market place unto the rulers.”
Her masters were naturally upset when they saw their source of income disappear. They had an expectation of making a gain out of this young lady, who was operating devil spirits to give fortune-telling to people. And so long as they could keep her going in that state, they made a gain from it. But the moment Paul dealt with the situation by casting out the devil spirit, then they lost all expectation of gain. Now, if their expectation of prosperity had been based upon the greatness of God’s Word, in some other situation, they would have become prosperous but their expectation was based upon the devil spirit in this woman and so they lost. We must remember that if our expectation is based upon material things, our job, the prosperity of the country, the word of a good friend, it may or may not come to pass. But if it is based upon what God says in His Word, it is guaranteed, for His Word is truth.