By Rachel Young
“This hope [this confident assurance] we have as an anchor of the soul [it cannot slip and it cannot break down under whatever pressure bears upon it]—a safe and steadfast hope that enters within the veil [of the heavenly temple, that most Holy Place in which
the very presence of God dwells],” (AMP, Heb. 6.19).
There is nothing quite like hope. Merriam-Webster defines it as, “a desire accompanied by expectation of or belief in fulfillment.” Poets have called it “the sunshine of the mind” (Exell). To have true hope is to have life! But to have false hope is another thing altogether. When I was a child, I was fascinated with outer space. The quiet, mysterious beauty intrigued me. I hoped to one day become an astronaut and travel far, far away from the chaos that surrounded me. This hope sustained me through many difficult days as a little girl. But, as I got older, doubt set it. What was once a hopeful aspiration was soon attributed to illogical childhood fantasy. Not long after my hope faded, I began using drugs as a more available way of escape. Eventually, childhood hopelessness
gave birth to despair.
But God! In an act of divine mercy, Christ breathed His life into my soul and flooded my heart with hope! To know that He loved me and gave His life for me demolished all despair and I was swallowed up in unspeakable joy!
Oh, what wonder that Christ has tethered His heart to ours! He alone is our hope “like a strong, unbreakable anchor holding our souls to God Himself” (TPT, Heb. 6.19). Check out how MacLaren describes this beautiful union: “The hope which we possess, and which, outside of us, we being fastened to it, makes us steadfast and secure, is, at bottom, Jesus Christ Himself. For He is not only the foundation, but He is the substance of our hope. He is the thing hoped for, and in the deepest interpretation, all our future is the personal Christ; and every blessed anticipation that can fill a human heart with gladness is summed up in this, ‘that I may be found in Him,’ and made partaker of that Saviour whom to possess is fruition and eternal life. He is the anchor of the soul, sure and steadfast, and entering within the veil. If we cleave to Jesus Christ, we have anchored ourselves in the fastnesses of the divine nature. We have struck the roots of our hopes deep into the very being of God; and all that is majestic, all that is omnipotent, all that is tender, all that is immutable in Him goes to confirm to my poor heart the astounding expectation that whatsoever Christ is I shall become, and that wheresoever Christ is there will also His servant be.”
Our hope has its substance, or lack thereof, in “what” or “Whom” it is anchored. To hope in anything other than Christ is to have no hope at all.