The God of Hope

“May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope”—Romans 15:13

Hope. What is hope? Hope is the realization of faith. It is the confident expectation that something will happen. Faith is the “assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen”—Hebrews 11:1. Hope is the desire for something, while faith is the assurance in that desire happening. We all need hope. We all need the thought that there is something more than what is, that life has more to offer, that we were made for a greater purpose and that death is not all there is. There are different types of hope in the world, but there is only one biblical view of hope. Some Christians are taught to have different kinds of hope, but any hope that does not come from the Word of God is no hope at all and is a false hope. There is a view of hope going around that encourages believers to have hope in themselves and what they can do. But that is not the biblical hope. It’s a false hope that is sent from the father of lies masquerading as an angel of light, sent in the hope of shipwrecking your faith by having you turn from Christ to self as Savior (cf. 2 Corinthians 8:14).

The biblical hope is in who God is and what He can do. The first type of hope, that I will call selfish hope, makes God the servant of man to the point where man has authority over God and will direct God’s actions. But that is not biblical hope, nor is that who God is. God gives us hope not in ourselves, but in Him. And how does this hope influence our daily lives? Just as the Apostle Paul wrote in our passage for today. He asks that the God of hope fill us. But fill us with what? Answer: “All joy and peace in believing.” The God of hope gives us “all joy.” Not just some joy, but ALL joy. God gives joy. It is not a conjured up happiness that sports a giant grin with a continual “It’s a great day!” attitude, but a deep abiding joy, much like embers in a fireplace. The deeper the embers, the hotter the fire, with the embers providing a deep abiding heat. And we don’t only get joy from this God of hope, but we also get peace. Peace in the Old Testament carried the idea of wholeness of being. It’s not simply an external peace, but an internal abiding peace of soul and spirit that faces the day with a truth, conviction, and abiding sense of the presence and sovereignty of God in life’s situations.

But how does this God of hope fill us? Or better yet, what is the instrument through which we receive this abiding joy and peace? Answer: our belief in Him. As Paul wrote, “fill you with all joy and peace in believing.” As we exercise our daily belief in Him (otherwise known as trust or faith in Him) God, by His Holy Spirit (which we received the moment we trusted in Christ), fills us with joy and peace, and then enables us to abound in hope. I love that. God is not a God of death. He is not a fatalistic God who leaves us in our misery, but He is the God and source of hope, joy and peace. He continually points us to a better life in and through His Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. It is only through Him that we have hope; real, tangible, live-giving and life-inspiring hope. And it’s not a vain hope, but a hope that is living and certain (cf. 1 Peter 1:3). We have hope that our past has been forgiven, that our life can be changed in the present, and that our future is secure. That’s hope. Our hope is not what we can do, but what He has done, what He desires to do in and through us. He conquered sin and death, cut the chains to the sin that binds us, and gave us a future that we could not have by ourselves.

My brother or sister, I pray that you may abound in hope by daily trusting in the God of hope. He wants to forgive your past, transform your present, and secure your future. Hope in Him. Trust in Him, and may your life resonate with the living hope made available by His resurrection from the dead. The only hope that will never disappoint or fail—life with Him forevermore. Amen.