Hope describes a person… Jesus is our hope. “Christ Jesus our hope!” (1 Timothy 1:1).
Let’s define hope. Biblical hope isn’t wishful thinking. “I hope I win the lottery.” Biblical hope is a confident expectation that God is big enough and good enough to keep His promises.
The Christian doesn’t wonder if he will be ushered into Heaven one day, but Christians have a “living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead” (1 Peter 1:3). We have a confident expectation that God will keep His promise.
Can you remember when you were seven? Did you ever do a swan-dive off the front porch into your father’s waiting arms? “Daddy, catch me!” You hoped your daddy would catch you. This hope was much more than wishful thinking, it was confident expectation.
The inspired Word of God directs us to hope in His promises. “Be strong, and let your heart be courageous, all you who put your hope in the Lord” (Psalm 31:24). “We have put our hope in Christ!” (1 Corinthians 15:19)
Before His death, burial, and resurrection, Jesus promised His faithful followers that He would prepare our heavenly home and then return (John 14:1-3). We can have a confident expectation that He will fulfil His promise. Our hope is firmly founded in Him and His promise. “For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, instructing us to deny godlessness and worldly lusts and to live in a sensible, righteous, and godly way in the present age, while we wait for the blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ” (Titus 2:11–13).
Jesus is our “blessed hope.”
“… think on these things” (Philippians 4:8, KJV).
Comments