What is hope?
Hope is knowing that God will keep His promises. Hope is trusting God with the Past, Present, and Future.
Hope is when we trust that what God has done in the past to redeem us is enough to help us in the present and that we can look forward to a future where we will experience the fullness of God’s goodness in a place called heaven.
Hope is our motivation. It’s what keeps us going in this life.
When the Apostle Paul was at the end of his life, looking back over all that he's been through for Jesus, he wrote a letter to Timothy. In this letter, we can find hope to help us through our difficulties. Paul
Paul was a man who lived a life rooted in hope. When we read his words, we can hear his heart breaking for a world far from God. He reminded Timothy to be on guard, to preach the truth, and to continue in faith no matter what comes his way. In verse 8, we see that Paul still had hope after everything. His hope was that he would stand in the presence of the Lord and be given the gift of righteousness. We can have that same hope in our lives too!
2 Timothy 4:1–8 (NKJV)
1 I charge you therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who will judge the living and the dead at His appearing and His kingdom:
2 Preach the word! Be ready in season and out of season. Convince, rebuke, exhort, with all longsuffering and teaching.
3 For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers;
4 and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables.
5 But you be watchful in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.
6 For I am already being poured out as a drink offering, and the time of my departure is at hand.
7 I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.
8 Finally, there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will give to me on that Day, and not to me only but also to all who have loved His appearing.