Keeping Hope Alive

Keeping Hope Alive

Hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us.

Romans 5:5, NIV

The word disappointment has French origins going back to the days when a monarch would appoint or “dis-appoint” an officer—it originally meant “to remove from office.” Though to be disappointed once meant to lose one’s post, these days it means to lose one’s hope.

We’re familiar with that definition. Disappointments range from getting a dire diagnosis to getting stuck in traffic, but big or small, they are a common part of life. We cannot altogether avoid disappointments, but as long as hope is alive we can learn to rise above them. Given the inevitability of disappointment, how can there possibly be a hope that “does not disappoint,” as today’s verse says? This is possible when that hope is sustained by faith in what is promised—that is, in the love God pours into our hearts. It is faith that changes everything.

In the words of the apostle Paul, “Faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen” (Hebrews 11:1). It moves worry backstage and hope to center stage. Faith emboldens our beliefs and expectations with confidence. Faith can make us fearless. “Hope is hearing the melody of the future,” said Brazilian philosopher Rubem Alves. “Faith is to dance to it.”

How does faith do this mystical work? By giving us an eternal perspective. People of faith look at life differently because we know it is not the only one we will have. Hope is more than just optimism about our future; when bolstered by faith, hope moderates our anxiety about the present. We look at life through a bigger lens. Viewing life’s problems through the big lens of the ultimate future helps put in perspective today’s aggravations—car troubles, family quarrels, delayed flights. So many things that rile us up can be seen in the context of eternity for what they are: temporary irritants.

But faith goes deeper than helping us cope with trivialities. The true power of faith is seen most clearly in pain. Faith turns hope into a certainty that suffering will make sense even when our earthly perspective can only see it as senseless. In other words, when pain cuts you to the core and hardships punch you in the solar plexus, faith is responsible for keeping your hope alive.

As a couple, you have the privilege of bolstering each other’s faith. Are you using it? Can you identify one or two specific ways you’ve done this for each other in the past—or perhaps how you will in the future?

The antidote to frustration is a calm faith, not in your own cleverness, or in hard toil, but in God’s guidance.

—Norman Vincent Peale