Biblical Theology and Hope
A biblical theological approach to hope traces the theme through the redemptive historical storyline of Scripture. David Allan Hubbard argues that hope is woven through the fabric of the Old Testament, mere focus on the language of hope misses the breadth of the motif.[1] Hubbard states, “even their nomadic life – life on the move – influenced Israel’s march to the future.”[2] Hope was a dynamic reality for the Israelites “expressed through images and thematic models not through firm doctrines and fixed schemes.”[3] For Hubbard, the Old Testament is fundamentally a book about hope.
Others have articulated an Old Testament hope “boldly and plainly…rooted in God.”[4] Hope becomes a confident expectation because of its source. Hope for Israel was grounded in God’s character, his deeds of salvation and his covenant.[5] Certain scholars have argued that resurrection forms the foundation of the Old Testament hope.[6] Chase Mitchell suggests that the “roots of resurrection hope go deep, and the seeds were sown early.”[7] Another author asserts that “Easter faith” was present in the birth of Isaac, the Exodus and the return from exile as the Israelites trusted the God who does “marvelous deeds.”[8]
Other scholars locate a theology of hope in key biblical figures. Abraham sets the contours of “human hope…and the entirety of human flourishing within the framework of the promise made to this prototypical patriarch.”[9] The promises made to Abraham “appear to be in constant danger of coming to an abrupt end in the narratives surrounding Isaac.”[10] This sets the role of hope in stark relief in these narratives. “Hope against hope” is the appropriate summation of Abraham’s journey with God.
Building upon these insights, a biblical theology of hope would require further attention on certain Old Testament themes: the role of hope in worship, hope and wisdom, hope and the law, hope in the sacrificial system, hope and kingdom, the role of hopelessness, messianic expectations, hope and judgment, the temple and hope, promised land and hope, continuity and discontinuity of hope between the testaments and the language of hope.
If the Old Testament is hope expected, the New Testament is hope realized. The abundance of Old Testament references in the new covenant documents confirm this promise-fulfillment framework. The nature of promise-fulfillment between the testaments is complex. I.H. Marshall argues that the kingdom of God provides a helpful construct for understanding hope. The already-not yet nature of the kingdom explains the dynamic of hope fulfilled and hope awaiting.[11]
One scholar identifies five facets of a New Testament theology of hope. He suggests that hope is rooted in: 1) the nature of God; 2) the promises of God; 3) God’s saving work in Christ; 4) The work of the atonement, specifically in justification, reconciliation and redemption; 5) the resurrection of Christ.[12] God in Christ has been identified as the locus of hope.[13] That resurrection stands at the center of New Testament hope is undisputed.[14] The hope of creation’s renewal is tied to the empty tomb.[15] Israel’s long expected hope finds expression in Christ’s victory over death.[16]
New Testament eschatology is present and future, vertical and horizontal.[17] Hope therefore impacts life now as it reaches forward. Hope is described as an object and an attitude, which points to the experience of hoping and the content of hope itself.[18] The gospel of hope is universal, it reaches even to the Gentile.[19] Hope coupled with love and faith form the New Testament triad.[20] Hope by nature waits, which becomes the mark of the Christian vocation.[21]
Building upon these insights, formulation of a biblical theology of hope from the New Testament would need to give these further themes attention: old covenant hope vs. new covenant hope, the Trinity and hope, nature of hopelessness, hope and the Parousia, hope and the new earth, hope and the ordinances, hope and mission, hope and the church and the language of hope.
[1]David Allan Hubbard, “Hope in the Old Testament,” Tyndale Bulletin 34 (1983): 33-59.
[2]Ibid, 34.
[3]Ibid.
[4]D.R. Denton, “The Biblical Basis of Hope,” Themelios 5 (1980): 19.
[5]Ibid.
[6]Chase L. Mitchell, “The genesis of resurrection hope: exploring its early presence and deep roots,” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 57:3 (2014): 467-480
[7]Ibid, 467, 480.
[8]A.G. Hebert, “Hope looking forward: the Old Testament passages used by the New Testament writers as prophetic of the resurrection of Jesus Christ,” Interpretation 10:3 (1956): 261, 269.
[9]Nicholas Lash, “Hoping Against Hope or Abraham’s Dilemma,” Modern Theology 10:3 (1994): 240.
[10]Joel S. Kaminsky, “Humor and the theology of hope: Isaac as a humorous figure,” Interpretation 54:4 (2000): 374. “There are times when humans are expected to trust in God’s promises even when they seem unrealistic or even impossible. Inasmuch as God’s promises require the patriarchs to develop a hope that rejects a common-sense worldview, one should not be surprised to find humor in these narratives. There is a structural affinity, as well as a direct connection, between humor and hope. Each proclaims that the reality of everyday life does not necessarily have the final word.”
[11]I Howard Marshall, “The hope of a new age: the kingdom of God in the New Testament,” Themelios 11:1 (1985): 5-15.
[12]Denton, “The Biblical Basis of Hope,” 19-27.
[13]Chad E. Spellman, “When hope screams: learning how to suffer as sons from the book of Hebrews,” Southwestern Journal of Theology 53:2 (2011): 113-114. “Just as Christian hope is only found in Him, in a real sense, it ultimately is Him. Hope at the most profound level is not an abstract concept but a living person… Thus, holding on to hope involves clinging to the promises and person of Christ.”
[14]N.T. Wright, Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church (New York: HarperOne, 2008). Theodore Liefield, “The Christian Hope in the New Testament,” Lutheran Quarterly 6:1 (1954): 34. The “Christian idea of hope…centers in and derives from God’s redemptive acts in Christ—above all, the resurrection.” Donald G. Miller, “The Resurrection as the Source of Living Hope: AN Exposition of 1 Peter 1:3,” Horizons in Biblical Theology 17:2 (1995): 137. “Hope rose up with Christ from the dead.” A.M. Hunter, “Hope of glory: the relevance of the Pauline eschatology,” Interpretation 8:2 (1954): 140. “Plato’s hope was set on the immortality of the soul. Paul’s is set on the resurrection of the body.”
[15]James P. Ware, “Paul’s hope and ours: recovering Paul’s hope of the renewed creation,” Concordia Journal 35:2 (2009): 129-130, 132. “In Paul’s teaching, the hope which undergirds Christian faith and living is the hope of the resurrection of the dead and the renewal of all creation. For Paul, Christian hope simply is, by definition, the hope of the renewed creation…this is not marginal to the faith, but the central feature and content of Christian hope.”
[16]Robert J. Kepple, “Hope of Israel, the resurrection of the dead, and Jesus: a study of their relationship in Acts,” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 20:3 (1977): 233. “The hope of Israel as Paul saw it, was bound up with the resurrection of Christ.”
[17] Kepple, “Hope of Israel,” 136. “In reality, Paul’s language expresses a horizontal eschatology focused on creation and its renewal: that which in Paul’s thought is available only to faith and not sight is not the invisible heavenly realm above, but the as yet unseen very physical, tangible world to come.”
[18]Spellman, “When hope screams,” 113-114. “The concept of hope can define either the object of hope, namely Christ and all that his final coming implies, or the attitude of hoping.”
[19]D.W.B. Robinson, . “The Priesthood of Paul: The Gospel of Hope” in Reconciliation and Hope: New Testament Essays in Atonement and Eschatology presented to L.L. Morris on his 60th Birthday, ed.Robert Banks (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans, 1974), 232. “The gospel is the gospel of hope – not of judgement only- and the Gentiles are to embrace this hope.”
[20]Stephen Rockwell, “Faith, hope and love in the Colossian epistle,” The Reformed Theological Review 72:1 (2013): 39. The author demonstrates how the triad forms the foundation of Christian living. “The perichoretic nature of the triadic elements is evident. All three are essential to Christian living and all three are dependent on, and enriching for, each other.”
[21]Hubbard, “Hope in the Old Testament,” 58.
