God created everything and then blessed Adam and Eve by giving dominion rights and they were to multiply and subdue the earth while living on it. Adam was supposed to live with this hope that he had the wisdom and strength to do that and fulfill his task. Everyday a new day in our life brings new hope of something good happening and one who does not have this hope neither succeeds in anything nor is encouraged to try. We must fill ourselves with the light of hope and live fully in that to receive great success and blessing in our sojourn on the earth.
Steps we must take to walk in victory – The first words heard in that dark and empty space on the earth were from God, ‘Let there be light’; and there was light’ (Genesis 1:3 & 31). And that was the onset of hope on the earth that there will be light and things will change for the better. God checked all of His creation and found it all good and as per His expectations. But when God placed man in His garden to tend and keep it, He realized the loneliness of man and decided to make a ‘helper suitable to him’ (Genesis 2:15-20). But giving least importance to this visible loneliness of Adam, God started the process of naming all animals and birds by Adam. But was God expecting Adam to choose a partner for himself from the animals or birds? Adam, in hope for a better ‘helpmeet’ for himself, waited patiently for the right companion that the God who created him will provide. This wait in hope resulted in the blessing of Eve being created to be joined together to ‘become one flesh’ with him and jointly work for fulfillment of the assigned task by God.
This was before sin entered their lives, but after they were expelled from the Garden of Eden and faced the forces of darkness in the world, the meaning of hope changed. In our fallen nature hope does not mean assurance of something but an expectation of it coming to pass. God promised Abraham a land, descendents as numerous as the stars and to be the source of blessings for the rest of the world (Genesis 12:1-3). Abraham fought four kings and their armies to rescue Lot, his nephew, and defeated them. But when God tried to encourage him by promising to be his ‘shield and his exceedingly great reward;’ he replied, ‘LORD God, what will you give me, seeing I go childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus’, his chief servant? (Genesis 15:2).
When sin so prevailed that God was grieved for having created man on the earth, He found ‘Noah, a just man, perfect in his generations. Noah walked with God’ (Genesis 6:9 & 14). So God commanded him to make an Ark to save a seed for the future generations. To walk with God is to follow His commands and His ways without giving up and Noah did this through his obedience to make the Ark, that took 120 years to make, when no rain had ever fallen on the earth and his location was more than a hundred miles away from the sea-shore, for he believed God and hoped for the future. Jacob while fleeing from Eau, his brother was shown in a dream a ladder reaching up to heavens, with the LORD standing above that and the angels of God ‘ascending and descending on it’ (Genesis 28:20-21). God promised to bring him back safely and hoping for fulfillment of this, Jacob vowed, ‘If God will be with me in this way that I am going, and give me bread to eat and clothing to put on, so that I come back to my father’s house in peace, then the LORD shall be my God’ (Genesis 28:20-21). A long and a great demand from God to fulfill before surrendering to His control and God did.
It is believed that King David, when he had to flee from Jerusalem to escape from his son Absalom’s rebellion, wrote this psalm to say, ‘Why are you cast down, O my soul? And why are you disquieted within me? Hope in God, for I shall yet praise Him for the help of His countenance’ (Psalm 42:5). Jacob and David both preached to self during their time of trouble and this is what we fail to do. Hope in God does not come naturally and we must speak to ourselves or we will be drowned by the sorrowful spirit. Hope as explained in the Bible, not only desires that good will happen but eagerly expects it to happen. The pattern of prayer given by our Lord to us is filled with hope in God’s bounties of daily needs being met, forgiveness and protection from evil forces of darkness while declaring all powers being vested in Him alone (Matthew 6:9-13).
Zadok and Abiathar, along with the Levites bearing the Ark of the Covenant of God, also went with David and others when they fled from Jerusalem to escape Absalom (2 Samuel 15:25-26). David, filled with faith in the goodness of God told them to return saying, ‘Carry the Ark of God back into the city. If I find favour in the eyes of the LORD, He will bring me back and show me both it and His dwelling place. But if He says thus, ‘I have no delight in you’, here I am, let Him do to me as seems good to Him’. This is surrender, in the hope of receiving the best only, from a loving God and He will always honour such hope and faith.
Hope in tribulations – Apostle Paul suffered opposition and attacks from the Jewish people opposing the Gospel and he was destined to suffer as per the Lord’s plan (Acts 9:16). Yet he has encouraged all believers, ‘no temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it’ (1 Corinthians 10:13-14). God in His love for His creation made His own Son suffer crucifiction and rejection by His chosen people and will not desire us, His children to suffer unduly. In the very next verse, Apostle Paul has said, ‘therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry’ and not so focus on your circumstances only that your focus may shift from the goodness and love of God.
King David, despite the threat to his life from his enemies, could say, ‘when You said, ‘seek My face,’ my heart said to You, Your face, LORD I will seek’ (Psalm 27:8). Is there a difference between seeking God’s face and His hand? Seeking His face is to look for His wholeness of being, His truth and His very presence or His glory as Moses sought. Seeking His hand is about His provisions, answers to our prayers and strength, to overcome our fears, doubts, desires and struggles. David in his troubles sought God in His glory, for with His invisible presence there is nothing that we cannot face that is of this world and visible, as also the real reasons behind that which may be spiritual and not seen by the naked eye. God who discerns the deep hidden things of the heart seeks us to cry out to Him even from the end of the earth ‘when my heart is overwhelmed; lead me to the rock that is higher than I’ (Psalm 61:2-3). He wants to look into our hearts to help and guide us but answers or lack of that to our prayers cannot be taken as indication of His love, goodness and faithfulness towards us.
Apostle Paul then identifies the aim of prayers and the result of that for a believer, ‘ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding; that you may walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing Him, being fruitful in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God; strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power, for all patience and longsuffering with joy’ (Colossians 1:9-11). First, we are to seek His face for wisdom and understanding to be able to walk worthy of the Lord. Second, our works are an expression of His love towards His creation that we may please Him. Third, we must strive to keep increasing in His knowledge. Four, then we must hope and expect to be strengthened by Him for patience and joy. Apostle James, Lord Jesus’ brother and head of the first Church in Jerusalem urges us to ‘draw near to God and He will draw near to you’ (James 4:8).
The LORD God visibly descended on Mount Sinai to give His law to Israel amid smoke and fire, lightning and thundering. But ‘when the people saw it, they trembled and stood afar off’ and they said to Moses, ‘you speak with us, and we will hear; but let not God speak with us, lest we die’ (Exodus 20:19-2). God desires a close relationship of mutual love, faithfulness and joy with each of His children but we, in our fears and “busyness” want mediators. We want someone to be our spokesperson before God whom we call ‘our God’, without having a close personal link with Him.
King David is known as ‘man of God’s heart’ for he was a shepherd, a worshipper of God through his songs and hymns, a king and a committed servant of God. His life is summed up as, ‘David did what was right in the eyes of the LORD, and had not turned aside from anything, that He commanded him all the days of his life, except in the matter of Uria the Hittite’ (1 Kings 15:5). The spotless life of David was tarnished by that one incident of immorality with Bathsheba and eventually the killing of Uria, her husband and David was denied the permission to build the House of God in Jerusalem. David praised God for His promise to let his son build the Temple and before he died, he called the leaders of Israel to ensure their support for this project for his son, Solomon.
While explaining the plans of the Temple, David told the way of having received the design from God, ‘All this the LORD made me understand in writing, by His hand upon me, all the works of these plans’ (1 Chronicles 28:19). This was like God holding his hand and guiding the pen on the paper to draw the entire layout and David collected much material for that. He had great hope in building the Temple himself but could envisage its completion by his son. David recounted all that the LORD had done in his life and could then be strong in faith that the Temple will be built. God had conveyed through Prophet Nathan to David about His unending mercy on his son who will be treated by God as His own son (2 Samuel 7:14-16). God further promised to establish his kingdom forever and that ‘your throne will be established forever’. The promise made by God to Abraham about the nations being blessed through his seed was further extended to David to be fulfilled by his Great Son, Lord Jesus. The blessings followed the walk of hope and faith in the LORD God and like Abraham, David could rejoice that this will come to pass, though not during their lifetime.
Hope becomes the deep storehouse of strength that enables us to face the wrongs done by others without going into self-pity. Hope, therefore, is the expectation of something good in the future, unseen evidence of that good thing and the reason for its fulfillment. Hope for a believer is not only a desire of good things in the future but a confident expectation of that coming through. Lord Jesus’ promise of preparing a place for us in heaven and then coming to take us there fills us with absolute certainty that it will be so. Since the whole of Scripture is ‘God breathed’ and written with His urging and guidance, we are filled with confidence in its fulfillment. That hope is what God desires to see in the hearts of all His children.
Linking faith, hope and blessings – The first is to ‘draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith’ and the very next verse is a command to ‘hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful’ (Hebrews 10:22-23). Hope must not waver for it is linked to the faithfulness of God which is absolutely certain. The clear and concise definition of faith in the Scripture links the two together for ‘faith is the substance of things hoped for’ (Hebrews 11:1). What one hopes for is in the future and not visible but faith itself leads one to this and the Greek word ‘hupostasis’ translated as ‘substance’ means ‘to stand under a guaranteed agreement’. Faith itself is a gift of the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 12:9) who works to bring about its fulfillment. As per Apostle Paul, ‘whatever is not from faith is sin’ (Romans 15:23). Since hope is based on faith in God, what is hoped for is guaranteed by God but brought to light by faith in His truthfulness. But faith can also gaze backwards, for ‘by faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God’ (Hebrews 11:3).
Thus hope is faith in the future and doubt is its enemy and faith is full of confidence in the expectation and not some positive or wishful thinking. Also hope is an essential element of faith, for without that neither have any meaning for our salvation is by grace through faith or by grace through hope. What is hoped for in faith is the blessing of God, for that is what we desire or pray for. As per Apostle Paul, Abraham hoped against hope, for he was almost a hundred years old and Sarah, his wife, was barren and past child-bearing age (Romans 4:18-19). This hope or faith of Abraham in the future work of God was counted to him as righteousness. Abraham’s ‘hope against hope’ is not about what is possible with man but looked to God and His promise, for with Him all things are possible. So through faith in God we look to the future and it becomes hope and hope based on the Word of God is true faith. Our God is a God of hope who fills the believers with joy and peace in their hearts through believing in Him and His Word (Romans 15:13).
King David in his old age, after having been tested by and testing God could confidently declare, linking faith, hope and blessings all together, ‘commit your way to the LORD, trust also in Him, and He shall bring it to pass’ (Psalm 37:5). Our surrender to God in faith fills us with hope in success for us in all our ways and resultant blessings. The woman suffering from blood flow for the past twelve years was filled with faith that a touch of the Lord Jesus could heal her (Matthew 9:20-22). She started in hope that, since she was ceremonially unclean, even if she could reach and touch ‘the hem of His garment’, His Talith, the prayer shawl that every Jew wears even today, she would get the desired blessing of healing. Her faith in the Lord filled her with hope, to stir her into action in hope that she will be able to reach and touch to get healed. Even though Lord Jesus connected her faith to her wellness, her hope that resulted from her faith provided the healing. Faith without hope will not benefit in any way for then one would not even pray to God for seeking blessings to tide over a situation.
While Lord Jesus was praying on the mountain alone, the disciples faced a severe storm (Matthew 14:28-31). The Lord walked on water to help them sail to the other side and Apostle Peter called out to the Lord on the water, ‘Lord, if it is You, command me to come to You on the water’. On receiving the call, he stepped out of the boat and walked on the water to go to the Lord. When he started sinking due to the shifting of his focus on the storm away from the Lord, he cried out, ‘Lord, save me’ and was pulled back up on the water. His strong faith led him out of the boat in hope that He who has called him out will enable him to walk on water. When drowning, again his hope was answered in his being rescued by the Lord.
Faith comes by hearing the Word of God and the more we read and meditate on that, the stronger our faith grows (Romans 10:17). When we read the past acts of blessings poured out by God on ordinary people we are filled with hope that He will definitely answer our call also to pull us out of the pit of our difficulties. That hope, then results in our active prayers that deliver the blessings.
Hope fills us with the blessing of a ray of light to lead us out of the darkness of our troubles and then faith in the source of the Light assures us of its fulfillment. Faith focused on the right place and in the right God does not disappoint and if on wrong things leads us deep into sin. It is not only to have faith in the True God and His Son, but remain focused on Him alone for answer to our hope in Him!
