What is Hope?

What does "hope" mean? "I hope I get a raise next year", "I hope my parents don't find out", "I hope that movie is good". What does all of this mean... hope? What all three of these phrases have in common is that they use the word hope in the way that we typically hear and say it today. That is, it is an anticipation of something desired though it is altogether uncertain. Maybe you don't get the raise, maybe your parents do find out, maybe the movie is terrible. When we say that we hope for something we aren't saying it certainly will happen.

Hope in the witness of Scripture, however, is different. Hope, as Scripture presents for and commands of the Christian, is not so uncertain.

There is in the biblical witness a verbal form of hope (ἐλπίζω) and a noun form (ελπις). The verbal act of hoping is a setting of the heart (Psalm 62:10) on future realities (Rom 8:24, 1 Tim 6:17, Heb 11:1) in expectation that they will come to pass (Prov 11:7, Heb 11:1). The biblical witness also knows of the sense in which we typically use “hope” today as an uncertain thing (“I hope I get a raise next year”) as can be seen in various Pauline passages (Rom 15:24, 2 Cor 1:13, 2 Cor 5:11, 2 Cor 13:16) As a setting of the heart, hope is necessarily a desire (Psalm 33:17, Acts 16:19). One does not hope in something they wish would not come to pass. And in the act of hoping in something/someone, one thus boasts in it/glorifies it (Isa 20:5, Heb 3:6). One cannot help but hope in something or someone yet they can either hope rightly or wrongly. The distinction between the two has to do with the object of the hoping act which is properly called the hope. That is, one hopes in a hope. The object of hope determines whether the hoping act is rightly or wrongly performed.

True hope has, at its center, God himself (Psalm 42:5; 42:11; 43:5; 65:5; 69:6; 71:5; 78:7; 131:3, 146:5, Jer 14:22, Lam 3:24 Acts 24:15) in and through the person of Jesus Christ (Rom 15:12, Eph 1:12, Phil 2:19, 1 Thess 1:3, 1 Tim 1:1, Titus 2:13, Heb 6:19; 7:19, 1 John 3:3). Thus, Paul can say that to be without God is to be without hope in the truest sense of the word (Eph 2:12, cf. 2 Thess 2:16). Being God-centered, it is substantially set in the eschaton when God’s redeemed are finally brought to himself (Rom 8:25, 1 Cor 15:19, Gal 5:5, Col 1:5). It is a gift of grace (Rom 8:24, 1 Cor 13:13, 2 Thess 2:16) and is increasingly the result of sanctification (Rom 5:4) and is exercised by the Spirit of God (Rom 15:13). Hope itself leads to other sanctifying results such as endurance and perseverance (Rom 15:13, Heb 6:11-12; 10:36-39). It is oriented towards God’s attributes. Commonly, his attributes of grace (1 Pet 1:13) and power (2 Chron 32:8, cf. Psalm 20:7).

The instrument through which this God-centered hope is exercised are the divine promises (Psalm 119:116, Acts 26:6, Eph 2:12, Heb 6:17-18, cf. Rom 4:20-21). They are the outstretched fatherly hand of God onto which we grasp in the act of hope. The promises, then, are a means to an end of God’s being glorified in our hoping in him. Thus said, the cultivation of proper God-centered hope is of utmost importance for the Christian whose chief end is to glorify God and enjoy him forever.

The Christian hopes not in vain but on the rock-solid promises of God and thus in faithful and never-changing God himself. This puts all false hopes to shame.