Hope for the Future

 What is hope for?

As we continue to read Paul's writing about hope in Romans, we move into one of my favourite chapters in Scripture. I regularly go back to Romans 8 to be reminded of the incredible truths in this chapter. 

But there is a section of this chapter that I have spent less time on. They're the verses not highlighted or underlined - or, they were before I really took the time to understand the hope they talk about.

Romans 8:22-25 says:

"We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit,, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes  for what they already have? But if we hope  for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently."

Paul writes that the hope we're holding onto has a future focus - an eternal focus. That's what gets us through when life gets hard. We know there's something coming that's worth the struggle now.

The challenge is how easily we forget this. We get caught up in our earthly circumstances and that's all we see. And we lost our hope.

We have to remember to lift our eyes off our circumstances. To set them on what is coming. To set them on eternity with Jesus.

When I think about this challenge, I remember another conversation I had with my Grandma. This one didn't come on the golf course. It came in a few short minutes before church on a Sunday morning.

I don't remember when we had this conversation - I'd actually forgotten about it until I was studying what Scripture had to say about hope. I know this conversation was a few years before she ended up in long term care, but well after Parkinson's disease had made her require a wheelchair for much of life. She was waiting for the service to start and for my Grandpa to be finished greeting people and come to sit with her.

She told me quite honestly how frustrating it was to her to be stuck wherever her wheelchair got parked and have to wait for people to come over to her. How frustrating the limited mobility, even at home, was. But, then she began to talk about her hope for eternity. That she knew a time was coming when she would no longer be limited.

I missed the significance of those words at the time, but they hit me as I was studying this passage. My Grandma was groaning as she struggled on this earth and waited for what she knew was coming. She was hoping for what was to come in the midst of a challenging disease that was slowly stealing her independence. And, although she would tell you she wasn't always good at waiting patiently, there was a grace to how she waited and held onto the hope of eternity.

It challenges me about where I'm looking. 2021 was a hard one for me and I struggled to hold onto hope. I see now, just how important it is to lift our eyes if we're going to hold onto hope.

Where are you looking for hope?

Where are you placing your hope?

Does the place you're looking for it need to change?