Hope as the Anchor of our Souls

I was thinking the other day about the hope and how people hope for many things. They may hope their kids go to college. They may hope to buy a new car or that their husband remembers their birthday. If the things we hope for do not come to pass, it can be even more disheartening than if they are just put off for awhile. Proverbs 13:12: Hope deferred maketh the heart sick: but when the desire cometh, it is a tree of life. There is a record in the book of Acts of some men whose ship was caught up in a great storm like a hurricane. They had lowered the sails, cast overboard all of the ship’s cargo, cast out all the furnishings and had let the storm drive the ship in the hope that they might survive. This went on for days with no end of the storm in sight. Finally, it says in Acts 27:20: Acts 27:20 And when neither sun nor stars in many days appeared, and no small tempest lay on us, all hope that we should be saved was then taken away. We as born again believers should never be in the position that we have no hope. We may not see our immediate desires come to pass, but if we keep our mind’s eye on the hope of Jesus Christ’s soon return, that can bring joy and peace in the midst of less than perfect situations. Job was a man like that. He had lost all of his wealth: his cattle and his sheep and his camels. He had lost all his sons and daughters, he had lost the affection and respect of his wife and sores wracked his body. That was not all. Job also declares in chapter 19 that his relatives had failed him, his intimate friends had forgotten him, those that lived in his house and his maids considered him a stranger, his breath was offensive to his wife and children despised him. Yet in Job 19:25-27a, Job declares: Job 19:25-27a: And as for me, I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last He will take His stand on the earth. Even after my skin is destroyed, yet from my flesh I shall see God; Whom I myself shall behold (on my side, another translation says as a friend) And whom my eyes shall see and not another… (NASV) Through all these trials, the anchor of Job’s soul was, that even though all the hopes he may have had of this life on earth were gone, there was still another day coming when his Redeemer was coming to stand on the earth and Job would see him as a friend. What a hope in the midst of trials, what an anchor for a person’s life! Heb 6:19: Which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and stedfast, and which entereth into that within the veil; Hebrews 11:1 also tells us that believing is the title deed of things hoped for. And in Romans 15:13: Rom 15:13: Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit (NASV) It is God’s desire to fill us with joy and peace in believing that we may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. The hope of Christ’s soon return becomes an anchor to our souls, as it was to Job’s, as we believe it in the depths of our hearts. Then the God of hope can fill each of us with joy and peace so that we can abound more in hope even in the midst of less than perfect circumstances.