Hope Floats

A Sandra Bullock movie was released more than ten years ago called “Hope Floats.” Whether or not you’ve seen it, don’t you think just the title itself is compelling? You don’t need to know the storyline to resonate with the joyful buoyancy of hope.

Hope is a chest and chin lifter. It is a burst of fresh air when you’ve been trapped in a dark and stale basement. It is a lifesaver when you are floundering in the deep ocean sea.

Hope is simple … it’s not showy, it’s not dramatic. But it floats. And when you are about to be pulled under the water’s surface, it’s all you need to keep from drowning.

The Bible has much to say about hope. One passage I’ve always found interesting is 1 Corinthians 13:13: “And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.”

Because I am such a fan of hope, I used to be discouraged that it wasn’t “the greatest of these.” But then I realized that perhaps love is greatest because it is the only one that will be present with us through eternity in heaven (“for if you already have something, you don’t need to hope for it” (Romans 8:24, NLT)).

In heaven, where believers in Jesus Christ will spend eternity, faith and hope will not be present. Faith will not be necessary because we will be living in the presence of the One in whom faith is currently required. And hope will not be there because we will lack nothing; we will have no reason to grasp for the buoyancy of hope … we ourselves will be buoyant!

But for now, while we are here on earth, I love what 1 Peter 1: 3-5 has to say about our living hope, and what we have to look forward to in heaven: “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade. This inheritance is kept in heaven for you, who through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time.”

Are you downtrodden today? Take a firm grip on hope in Jesus Christ! This is hope that floats.