Romans 8:24-25

Romans 8:24-25. For we are saved by hope: but hope that is seen is not hope: for what a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for? But if we hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it.

Ah! brethren, if we could be all we should like to be, there would then be no room for the exercise of hope. If we had all that we are to have, then hope, which is one of the sweetest of the graces, would have no room in which to exercise herself. It is a blessed thing to have hope. Though I have heard that faith and hope are not to be found in heaven, I very much question it. I do not think they will ever die. "Now abide these three -faith, hope, and love"; for in heaven there will be room, surely, for trust in the ever blessed God that he will never cast us out from our blessedness -room for the expectation of the second advent - room for the expectation of the conquest of the world - room for the fulfilled promise of bringing all the elect to glory; still something to be hoped for; still something to be believed. Yet here is the main sphere of hope, and therefore let us give it full scope; and when other graces seem to be at a non-plus, let us still hope. I believe the New Zealand word for hope is "swimming thought," because that will swim when everything else is drowned. Oh! happy is that man who has a hope that swims on the crest of the stormiest billow.