Chapter 3: An Anchor of Hope
God offers a solid hope that goes beyond anything we humans can discover on our own. Don’t wait to take hold of these sure promises from our all-powerful, loving God.
Even when every human effort fails, even when circumstances seem hopeless, there is a powerful reason to hope. There is a lifeline from our Creator. The Bible compares the lasting, stabilizing effects of spiritual hope to an anchor.
God’s promises are so sure, “we might have strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before us. This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast” (Hebrews 6:18-19).
In the tempests of life, God’s promises and His help can serve to ground us and preserve us. Spiritual hope can also give real meaning and purpose to our lives.
God cares
When we are adrift and battered by the troubles of life, it can seem like no one cares. But our Creator invested greatly in you and cares deeply for you. He meticulously designed every cell of your body and every part of your DNA. He has just as carefully planned your future hope. And to make that hope possible, He has given what was most precious to Him. Jesus Christ came to give His life that we may have an abundant life and endless hope.
After investing so much, there’s no way He would ever give up on you. Paul asked, “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?” (Romans 8:35). He answered his own question: “I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (verses 38-39)!
Hope of biblical proportions
The hope the Bible describes is not a mere wish or vague dream. Rooted in faith in God’s promises, biblical hope is sure and unwavering. God Himself guarantees this hope. It’s one of the big three: faith, hope and love (1 Corinthians 13:13; see the sidebar “Faith, Hope and Love” at the end of this chapter).
Faith and hope are inextricably tied together in the Bible and reflect a reality more sure and stable than anything in our physical universe. “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen” (Hebrews 11:1).
Seeing the unseen
Faith and hope provide a portal into the spiritual realm where God lives. They help us to see the truth that is unchanging and the promises that are unbreakable. They help us remember what God has done and rely on what He has promised to do.
The heroes of faith embodied a hope in God’s promises that gave them eyes to see the unseen future. “These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off were assured of them, embraced them and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth …
“But now they desire a better, that is, a heavenly country. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for He has prepared a city for them” (Hebrews 11:13, 16).
You can read a mind-boggling description of that city coming down from heaven to the earth, as seen in a vision by the apostle John in Revelation 21 and 22 (see our online article “New Jerusalem”).
Human eyes cannot see the amazing, awesome “things which God has prepared for those who love Him” (1 Corinthians 2:9). But they are real and much more permanent than the atoms and molecules we are made of. God gives this spiritual vision to give us sure hope and powerful encouragement even in trials.
“Therefore we do not lose heart. Even though our outward man is perishing, yet the inward man is being renewed day by day. For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, while we do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal” (2 Corinthians 4:16-18).
The apostle Paul noted, “But if we hope for what we do not see, we eagerly wait for it with perseverance” (Romans 8:25).
Hope through the patience and comfort of the Scriptures
God gave the examples and the prophecies of the Bible as a foundation for our hope. “For whatever things were written before were written for our learning, that we through the patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope” (Romans 15:4).
“Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD, and whose hope is the LORD. For he shall be like a tree planted by the waters, which spreads out its roots by the river, and will not fear when heat comes, but its leaf will be green, and will not be anxious in the year of drought, nor will cease from yielding fruit” (Jeremiah 17:7-8).
God can be our hope even “in the day of doom” (verse 17). This age is full of trouble and sorrow, and humanity is bringing a day of doom on itself. But the Bible reveals that God’s plan looks far beyond all this to an eternity of peace and joy.
Even now God is a God of rescue and deliverance. As God told the captives in Babylon, “For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the LORD, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. And You will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart” (Jeremiah 29:11-13).
Still nagging questions
The Bible overflows with unshakable hope for those going through hard times. But all this raises the question, why do we have to suffer such trials now? Can’t we just fast-forward past this time of trouble? And, since God is love, why does He allow such suffering in this world of hopelessness?
Chapter 4 will delve into these nagging questions.
A Door of Hope
The prophet Hosea was given a powerful and poignant message for those who were unfaithful to God. But God also held out hope for those who repented and returned to Him. He would bring them back from exile as He had brought them into the Promised Land the first time.
“I will give her her vineyards from there, and the Valley of Achor as a door of hope; she shall sing there, as in the days of her youth, as in the day when she came up from the land of Egypt” (Hosea 2:15).
The Keil and Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament explains the background of this verse:
“The valley of Achor … [is] an evident allusion to the occurrence described in Joshua 7, from which it obtained its name of Akhōr, Troubling. This is obvious from the declaration that this valley shall become a door of hope. Through the sin of Achan, who took some of the spoil of Jericho which had been devoted by the ban to the Lord, Israel had fallen under the ban [“become doomed for destruction,” New King James Version], so that the Lord withdrew His help, and the army that marched against Ai was defeated. But in answer to the prayer of Joshua and the elders, God showed to Joshua not only the cause of the calamity which had befallen the whole nation, but the means of escaping from the ban and recovering the lost favour of God.”
Learn more about repentance and reconciling with God in our article “How to Repent” and its related articles.
Faith, Hope and Love
The Bible connects faith, hope and love many times (1 Thessalonians 1:3; 5:8; Galatians 5:5-6; 1 Corinthians 13:13; Hebrews 6:10-12; 1 Peter 1:21-22).
These three godly characteristics all produce fruit. In 1 Thessalonians 1:3 Paul praised the members for their “work of faith, labor of love, and patience of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Faith—belief in God and His promises—motivates us to strive to live as Jesus lived, walk as He walked. This includes obeying God and doing His works (John 14:12, 15).
Love—outgoing concern that is the essential characteristic of God (1 John 4:16)—labors to serve others (Hebrews 6:10).
Hope is not a fleeting or feeble thing, but a “desire of some good with expectation of obtaining it” (The Complete Word Study Dictionary, New Testament, p. 570). Hope provides “full assurance,” thus it can motivate us to patient endurance (Hebrews 6:11-12). Godly hope is faith projected into the future.
Faith and hope work together hand in hand. It takes faith in God to have real hope, and it takes godly hope to have real, lasting faith.
Love elevates faith and hope above any selfishness, producing a desire for God’s plan to provide His blessings for everyone.
William Barclay puts it this way in his Daily Study Bible: “Faith without love is cold, and hope without love is grim. Love is the fire which kindles faith and it is the light which turns hope into certainty.”
Love’s outgoing nature and eternal qualities makes it the “greatest of these” (1 Corinthians 13:13).
Study more about these big three in our online articles “What Is Faith?” “Our Future Hope” and “God Is Love.”