Christianity is founded on Hope

Hope not Optimism

Is your glass half full or half empty?  An optimist will, of course, say “half-full”.  In so doing, they are employing the same thought processes as the pessimist, who will see that glass as “half empty”.  Optimism can depend a great deal on luck, the way things have worked out for us.  We would like to have positive outcomes, but they are in no way guaranteed. 

Experience of the ways life has unfolded in the past may lead us to be more optimistic about the future, but eventually, no matter how hard we might work, we can never be sure of the outcome for our efforts.  Hope, on the other hand, involves a conviction that, even in the face of uncertainty, a better, brighter and more glorious world is already there for us.  The reality of a new world is not dependent on its acknowledgement by men and women.  It is a reality brought into existence and sustained by God.

Why Hope Is Different From Optimism

Hope is not a positive expectation.  Hope is made visible by a moral commitment to a way of living, to a way of viewing the world and other people.  Hope speaks of the ultimate destination for human beings, a destination that impacts on the way we live in the present.  This is why Hope empowers people to find joy in the harshest of persecutions. 

This is why “hope” and “optimism” cannot be used as synonyms.  The latter, “optimism”, refers to the way some people are so committed to expecting the best.  But optimism can rely on a sense of luck over action. They encourage us to seek out the best-case scenario or the best possible self I can project onto the world.  If we can just “believe in ourselves”, the world will be seen to be a better place.  But that is now the way reality works out. 

I cannot find a lasting peace, or joy or satisfaction by simply searching for the bright side of things as is put forward so humorously in Monty Python’s song: always look on the bright side of life.   Hope gives a guarantee of there being an end goal for human existence and provides us with what is necessary to achieve that goal. Hope is more of a mindset enabling believers to persevere amid challenges, to tackle them head-on without ever losing sight of our God given destiny, which is eternal life in the presence of God.

Hope is about “Us” and not  just “Me”

Hope is not an alternative self-improvement tool, just one more of those self-help promises that we find lauded on the Oprah Winfrey show.   The reason for this is that Hope is a virtue that extends beyond the benefit of the self.   It always includes a concern about the common good.  Hope is often honed by hardship and strengthened through relationships. It leads us out of a focus on personal needs and advancement to a different life that is directed towards the building of a community based on the demands of Gospel love.  For this reason alone, Hope looks to change the world, lifting us beyond the limited notion of wishing things would be better but not being sure of what that might mean.

Do not be fooled by the Myth of Time

History is replete with examples of people hanging on because of their belief that things will change, eventually, that relief is on the way. One example of this comes from the world in which Dr. Martin Luther King struggled. He would often lament what he called the “optimism of moderate white America” who, whilst expressing support for his goals, would not be actively engaged with his struggles to achieve those goals. He observed how this group held on to the irrational notion that there is something in the passing of time that will inevitably cure all ills. Speaking to the 1966 convocation at Illinois Wesleyan University's Student Senate he further clarified that time itself is neutral; it can be used either destructively or constructively. Sitting back thinking that time will eventually lead to a healing of all social ills is not a viable or adequately Christian response. The passing of time could just as well make matters worse.

 The passage of time is in no way a guarantee that a better world is on its way.  The followers of Jesus Christ need to collaborate with the ongoing work of Jesus Christ in creation, placing their Hope in the abiding Truth that what began in Christ, will, by the Holy Spirit, come to fruition. 

What makes Hope a virtue is not its ability to promote happiness and success but rather its commitment to a greater good beyond the self.  It is founded on a vision of a new world, a renewed creation, the restoration of Israel to its God-given shape in the Body of Christ, the Church.  It goes beyond personal well-being.

Dr King chastised society for believing that improvement would happen on its own.  He reminded people that they cannot expect greener pastures if they are not already working to look after the garden today.

Hope is Forged in Adversity

Hope could not be expected to bring about quick improvement but it can ward off paralysis. Dr King often quoted St Paul and one text he used speaks of the call to persevere, persevering even amid dire circumstances and persecution.  In such environments, Suffering produces endurance, endurance produces character, and character produces hope. Now this hope does not disappoint us Romans 5:3-4.

Hope, in other words, has a longer game in mind.  It has its focus on God’s timing, the establishment of the Kingdom of God on earth.  In such an environment, Christians endure suffering with integrity. It finds itself thriving in hardship and refined in adversity.  It is thus Hope that encourages the faithful to work for a better world, to march, to make representation to national leaders, to head off to other nations and cultures to sacrifice their human comforts that others may know health, peace and wellbeing.

Behind King’s teaching and preaching, there is an understanding of a biblical eschatology – the study of the End Times.  He believed the teachings of the Bible about standing ready, keeping the oil in our lamps filled to the top and being prepared for the return of the Son of Man on the clouds.  In his words, Hope knows it may take another generation to reach the Promised Land, but it acts today to bend the moral arc toward justice, but we are not baptised to simply sit back and wait for that to unfold.  We are a people called by God, men and women with a vocation emanating from God’s throne.

Hope finds itself preaching and living God’s Word,

prayerfully exploring the meaning of the return of Christ,

Judgment for all souls on the day of the Lord,

hell as the default destination for those who reject God and his Son Jesus Christ,

and heaven’s bliss awaits the redeemed in Christ.

The Old Testament does not establish for us a clear theological perspective on heaven. Or Hell.  For the most part the writings are silent about what happens beyond the grave, where it is, who live there and who do not. The spiritual understanding of life beyond the grave is late in terms of biblical theology.  What we find are some rare, though beautiful, glimpses into what eternal life may or may not be.  These promises about a believer’s security beyond earthly life are rare and generally set against a gloomy backdrop of suffering.

Job 19:25–26: I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last he will stand upon the earth. And after my skin has been thus destroyed, yet in my flesh I shall see God.”

Psalm 16:11 You make known to me the path of life; in your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.”

The Christian perspective is clear in the New Testament: no evil or suffering will ever have the last word. There is someone greater, and that someone is God.   It is presently impossible for us to conceive of what it is like to be a soul without a fleshly body. In 2 Corinthians 5:1, Paul insists that our soul is a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.

 Biblical Hope provides believers with life-transforming beliefs that all those who are converted by grace through faith in Jesus as Lord come alive in Him beyond the grave. Today we are “in” Christ; at death we shall be “with” Christ.

This is but the first part of Christian hope. The second aspect is tied to the return of Jesus on the cloud.  That is the moment when we encounter the reality of the final heaven.   Christ will appear, bringing with Him departed souls of believers…

1 Thessalonians 4:13-18   Brothers and sisters, we do not want you to be uninformed about those who sleep in death, so that you do not grieve like the rest of mankind, who have no hope. 14 For we believe that Jesus died and rose again, and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him. 15 According to the Lord’s word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep. 16 For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. 18 Therefore encourage one another with these words.

All those who have persevered in faithfulness will be endowed with resurrection bodies…1 Cor. 15:51–57).

 51 Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed— 52 in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. 53 For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality. 54 When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.”

55 “Where, O death, is your victory?    Where, O death, is your sting?”

56 The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. 57 But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Further cosmic events will then take place, including Christ’s great judgment throne, where unbelief is condemned and those who have rejected Jesus as Lord and Saviour are shut out from God’s presence forever (Matt. 25:31–46).  Creation itself is renewed into a new heaven and new earth…Rom. 8:20–21; 

20 For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope 21 that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God.

2 Peter 3:10–13:  10 But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything done in it will be laid bare.

11 Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what kind of people ought you to be? You ought to live holy and godly lives 12 as you look forward to the day of God and speed its coming. That day will bring about the destruction of the heavens by fire, and the elements will melt in the heat. 13 But in keeping with his promise we are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth, where righteousness dwells.

The pinnacle of the believer’s future experience is set forth fittingly in the Bible’s last two chapters:  Revelation 21:3 

3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.

This is the ultimate, perfected existence, and in this resurrected life, all traces of evil, sin, death, and weeping are banished.  That is when they will come face to face with God.  Then they will see his face…They will need no light of lamp or sun, for the Lord God will be their light, and they will reign forever and ever…Revelation 22:4–5.

In Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis wrote:

Hope means looking forward to the future world. . . . It does not require us to leave the world as it is. And if you read history, you will find that the Christians who did the most for this present world were those who thought the most of the next.

Conclusion:

The Church and her scriptures celebrate and highlight the way Hope grows from a Christ-centred faith that reaches out into the future.  Beyond the grave.  We believe all that God reveals to us in the Scriptures, accepting them are sure promises on which we can rely.  It is here that the roots of Hope can be found.

An example Paul uses is that of Abraham.   According to  Romans 4,   Abraham well understood that he was elderly and impotent, that his body was beyond the possibility of fathering children. On top of this, his wife Sarah was barren. In the face of all of this, he continued to trust in God's promises. He refused to accept that human limitations restrict the plans of God. The Almighty had promised him a son, and nothing would render that impossible. Therefore, in hope he believed against hope, that he should become the father of many nations (Rom. 4:18). Paul declared, Abraham was fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised (v. 21). This is why Abraham is called “our father in faith” and it is his faith that sets the example for the blessings that abound for those who live in Hope. 

I am not sure just where Puritan spirituality might fit into our contemporary spiritual mindset but the Puritan writer Thomas Adam (1583-1652), sometimes called the Shakespeare of the Puritans, expressed his broad understanding of Christian Hope in beautiful and poetic language and his words offer us a perfect way to end this reflection:  

Hope is a fair lady of clear countenance; her proper seat is upon the earth; her proper object is in heaven . . . faith is her attorney general, prayer her solicitor, patience her physician . . . thankfulness her treasurer, confidence her vice-admiral, the promises of God her anchor . . . and eternal glory her crown.

Bishop Michael Hough                                                                                                           May 2025