confidence and hope

Confidence and hope seem to be dissimilar to me. Confidence suggests certainty. Hope connotes a level of uncertainty; we want some thing, we hope it comes to pass, but we’re just not sure. 

The author of Hebrews sees a close link, though, as expressed in Hebrews 11:1-2: “Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. This is what the ancients were commended for.”

Faith and hope are closely linked because faith at it’s core is an expression of belief in something we can’t prove. It doesn’t take faith to believe something that we can support with facts and evidence. It would take faith to believe in unicorns, but it doesn’t take any to believe horses exist. 

But, Hebrews says, faith makes us confident in what we hope for. Our hope isn’t a fervent wish, it’s a vision of a good future that we can know with certainty is coming. It’s assurance that even though we can’t see heaven, or God, they are as real as the homes we live in and the people we talk to every day.

That’s because at it’s root we don’t have faith in the thing, but in the God who promises the thing. He’s the guarantee of all our hopes. That’s why hope is the right word to describe how Christians live; confidence and assurance are good words to describe our hope.