“I have hope.”

What does that mean?

I’ve found it means a variety of things to different people. Sometimes people see hope as wishes, dreams, or preferences. Their hope is what they want to see happen.

Divine hope is different. It’s wanting what God wants. It’s trusting how God guides and provides. Divine hope requires and is rooted in faith.

We can struggle when we take our own preferences into our understanding of the hope God spurs and promises. We can easily get discouraged and disoriented because we believe God cares and is for us but then we experience pain and chaos. But God doesn’t want us to have a short-sighted hope. In Him, hope is eternal, which includes our yesterdays, todays, and tomorrows.

Hope anchors us. It stabilizes us long enough to let us take a breath when the storm rages around us so that when we have the strength to look around, we are not disoriented. We can find familiarity in our surroundings and take the next step.