I’ve never really been a fan of hope. People often used catch-all phrases like “have hope” or “don’t give up hope” or “hope springs eternal” to somehow wish away pain or suffering in my life. But hope never seemed to work that way. No matter how much I hoped, the pain seemed to stick around.
Hope never did anything for me, so why should I depend on it?
Turns out, after all those years of hating hope, I was gravely mistaken. It wasn’t hope that was the problem—it was that I only knew about worldly hope instead of Biblical hope. In 1 Peter 1:3, Peter refers to our lives as born again into a LIVING hope. Did you hear that? Living and active. Worldly hope wishes for something uncertain, but Biblical LIVING hope points to a resurrected Savior who is not dead, but alive!
That news affects us today, because the way we respond to things today ties directly to what we believe about the future. Do you have hope in something that will fail, or do you have hope that the Faithful One has gone before you, prepared a way, and given you the grace needed to face anything that comes your way? When we hope in something that will eventually fail, it’s not long before our days are filled with disappointment and discouragement. Hoping in a risen Savior reminds us each day that we are loved, we are chosen, and we are not alone.
Living hope means that we do not wait on God’s kingdom with fear or uncertainty, but with confidence and assurance of complete reconciliation one day.
Living hope isn’t throwing a coin in a fountain, but is instead throwing ourselves at the foot of the cross because we worship a Savior we can trust with our lives.
Living hope doesn’t remove the pain or the suffering or the grieving, but promises us that the worries and strivings and the things of this world will grow strangely dim in the light of his glory and grace.
Jesus came as an infant, as the hope of the world. After a gruesome death, he rose to life as the hope of the world. And he promises that one day, he will come again, as the hope of the world.
Believe me when I tell you, there’s nothing to hate about this living hope.