Hoping

 

Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us.                                                                             Romans 5: 5

In yesterday’s post I was speaking about that deep, mysterious sense of longing that human beings have; a longing for... well, for what? And when it comes to interesting questions, another would be why do we have this sense of longing? And where and how does it find its fulfilment? And so on...

...but that was yesterday!

Today I have turned to hope.

But are longing and hoping not the same?

Well, it may seem that way if we use the word ‘hoping’ to mean a wistful (but far from certain) wish that something ‘nice’ will occur. And if that is also how we use the word ‘longing’, then the confusion is obvious!

But surely that is not what it means to hope? Well, at least, not in the context of the Christian faith, where hope is to do with God’s promises... God’s as yet unfulfilled promises.

Advent is often (and rightly) regarded as a Season of Hope. Yes indeed. But this ‘hoping’ is different from the inner longing of which I wrote yesterday and different too from the wistful wishing that is commonly confused with hoping.

Our hoping is an act of faith, founded on God’s promises. These promises may remain – for the time being- unfulfilled. But still we hope.

Someone once said ‘hope is faith in the future tense’.

‘Hoping’ is active; we choose it; we do it.