Hope is an essential ingredient in a joy-filled life. Without hope, our life can turn into a depressing experience that we want to escape from.
Furthermore, our hope needs to be in God, as that is the only type of hope that will endure every storm in life.
Living with hope
St. John Paul II spoke about hope in a teleconference with youth during his visit to the United States in 1987. He explained how hope is essential to life:
We cannot live without hope. We have to have some purpose in life, some meaning to our existence. We have to aspire to something. Without hope, we begin to die.
He then further expanded on this comment, providing two examples of people who either lived with hope or without it:
Why does it sometimes happen that a seemingly healthy person, successful in the eyes of the world, takes an overdose of sleeping pills and commits suicide? Why, on the other hand, do we see a seriously disabled person filled with great zest for life? Is it not because of hope? The one has lost all hope; in the other, hope is alive and overflowing. Clearly, then, hope does not stem from talents and gifts, or from physical health and success! It comes from something else. To be more precise, hope comes from someone else, someone beyond ourselves.
St. John Paul II believed that the key to living with hope is an ardent faith and trust in God:
Hope comes from God, from our belief in God. People of hope are those who believe God created them for a purpose and that he will provide for their needs. They believe that God loves them as a faithful Father. Do you remember the advice that Jesus gave his disciples when they seemed to be fearful of the future? He said: "Do not be concerned for your life, what you are to eat, or for your body, what you are to wear. Life is more important than food and the body more than clothing. Consider the ravens: they do no sow, they do not reap, they have neither cellar nor barn - yet God feeds them. How much more important you are than the birds!" (Luc. 12, 22-24). Yes, God knows all our needs. He is the foundation for our hope.
Without hope in a loving and merciful God, we will have very little to live for in this life.
When a trial comes our way, we will want to avoid it at all costs and run away from it, not knowing the reason for it.
However, when we place our hope firmly in God, we will trust that he will provide and will help us overcome whatever suffering occurs in our life.
We need hope to keep our eyes fixed on the love that God wants to pour out upon us.
