BIBLE NOTES | Hope Deferred

Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a dream fulfilled is a tree of life.

Proverbs ch13:12 (NLT)

As I was spending time reading my allotted Scripture for the day I came across a proverb that did not exactly fill me with much enthusiasm. The part that really got to me was where the writer says "Hope deferred makes the heart sick". The first thing to disturb me was the fact that the name of this site is "Ultimate Hope" - was I going to have to rethink the whole title and motivation for what we want to do here or how do I manage to square the circle? After I had dealt with the momentary panic that gripped me I came to realise that the whole phrase hung on the word "deferred". I needed to understand this word that seemed to have the power of turning hope into something unpleasant.

 

In my quest to understand this word I found Thesaurus.com the most helpful.  A few of the synonyms that grabbed my attention were as follows: 

 

• Postponed

• Delayed 

• Adjourned 

• Pigeonholed 

• Scrubbed

• On the shelf

 

The problem with deferment is that there is uncertainty about it. The Christian definition of the object of hope is one of certainty. Things like the forgiveness of sins through Christ and eternal life for those that acknowledge Christ as Saviour  fall into the category where we can have certainty about them. They are the "substance of things hoped for…"  Our hope is therefore founded on the Character of God. The objects of Christian hope like those above cannot be manipulated by the above list of synonyms. For instance,  God does not postpone or pigeonhole His promises. They are secure and delivered on time. We have good reason to make them objects of our hope.

 

Sickness of heart is a very real experience that many of us, from time to time, go through. If our hearts lack the joy and confidence that should be part of our lives and we are assailed by an unexplained sadness then, perhaps  a good place to start our self diagnosis is to ask the question,  what am I really putting my hope in? The hopes that form the bedrock of Christian life can, all too easily, be relegated to a lower priority. This allows for some of the vain promises of the World  to creep in. Things like: a pending wage rise or promotion or even a relationship that seems  to be going  nowhere. In these cases and many  others like them, our hopes have degenerated into forlorn longing that can rock the stability of our lives. 

 

So what, perhaps, is the point we can take away from all of this where heart wellness is concerned? Try this, examine what promises you presently place your hope in. If you diagnose anything else other than the promises of God then, perhaps, now is the time to refocus and reaffirm God as the highest priority. There is a helpful second part to the verse we have considered "a dream fulfilled is a tree of life". It does give a real and worth while reason for this refocusing procedure.

 

As I close here I can breathe a sigh of relief knowing that the title of this site is secure and that I have again discovered that there is such  a thing  as "Ultimate Hope"

Roger Manchester UK