Proverbs 3:12
“Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a dream fulfilled is a tree of life.”
“Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a dream fulfilled is a tree of life.”
Hope, what is hope? What does it look like? What does it feel like? And how can the lack of hope make the heart sick or depressed?
To begin to answer these questions, we must first look at the Hebrew meaning of the word for hope. In Hebrew the word for hope is tikvah, it can be translated as hope or as a cord, it first appears in the story of Rahab and the scarlet thread which saved the lives of the Israelite spies. The root word for tikvah is kavah which means to look for, to wait for, or to hope.
If we are honest with ourselves, we will admit that the world around us is a world filled with hopelessness, mankind is lost. Daily, the moral decay and senseless reality of life is reflected in newspaper articles and in magazines. Hopelessness is etched on the faces and in the hearts of the people; depression is at its all time high. Almost every person I meet out on the street is on an anti-depressant or a sleeping tablet; their lives are deformed by the form of hopelessness. There is no joy, no real happiness or true love. The heart of man is truly sick because their hope is not only deferred, it is completely lost. There is only one true Hope and Rabbi Shaul (Paul) was the one to proclaim it to us, this hope is the focus of this article.
To begin to answer these questions, we must first look at the Hebrew meaning of the word for hope. In Hebrew the word for hope is tikvah, it can be translated as hope or as a cord, it first appears in the story of Rahab and the scarlet thread which saved the lives of the Israelite spies. The root word for tikvah is kavah which means to look for, to wait for, or to hope.
If we are honest with ourselves, we will admit that the world around us is a world filled with hopelessness, mankind is lost. Daily, the moral decay and senseless reality of life is reflected in newspaper articles and in magazines. Hopelessness is etched on the faces and in the hearts of the people; depression is at its all time high. Almost every person I meet out on the street is on an anti-depressant or a sleeping tablet; their lives are deformed by the form of hopelessness. There is no joy, no real happiness or true love. The heart of man is truly sick because their hope is not only deferred, it is completely lost. There is only one true Hope and Rabbi Shaul (Paul) was the one to proclaim it to us, this hope is the focus of this article.
Acts 28:20
“I asked you to come here today so we could get acquainted and so I could explain to you that I am bound with this chain because I believe that the Hope of Israel–the Messiah–has already come.”
“I asked you to come here today so we could get acquainted and so I could explain to you that I am bound with this chain because I believe that the Hope of Israel–the Messiah–has already come.”
There is only one Hope, the Hope of Israel and all mankind and that hope is Messiah Yeshua. Hope is a cord with which we are to be bound to Him, though our situations get tough and our seas get rough, we do not see as the world sees, rather we have the hope and the trust that Messiah Yeshua is with us in every situation. We are tied to Him with a cord of Hope. That cord of hope is the cord of salvation, a cord of deliverance – for Father has promised us that “Though your sins are like scarlet, I will make them as white as snow. Though they are red like crimson, I will make them as white as wool” (Isaiah 1:18). The Talmud (Jewish oral tradition) states that after 30 CE (round the year Yeshua died) the scarlet thread that would turn white during the Yom Kippur service, never turned white again even until the temple was destroyed. This meant that the goat offered on Yom Kippur was never accepted by Yahweh, for the sins of Israel. This is because Yeshua was the only acceptable sacrifice that Yahweh required and He gave us the promise that through hope in Him, His life and His death – our scarlet sins and hearts, would be turned white representing purity. Through the Hope of Israel, all mankind was given a way back to the Father and through this Hope, we have hope. Hope that gets us through every tough test and every messy situation.
Not only do we have daily hope for our lives, but we also have eternal hope – for the coming age when we will be with the Father eternally! For now, Yeshua’s stake is our place of refuge and hope, when we are weary and feeling as though hope is lost within us, we can rest assured that we can go and sit under the stake of Yeshua and drink from Him – new Life and Hope. May the One who is the Hope of Israel become your reality today and every day.
Shalom in Yeshua….. Aliyah….
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.