The Culture of Hope Founded on Faith

In January 2006, my husband was diagnosed with a rare cancer called mantle cell lymphoma. At the time the prognosis was not good; the normal life expectancy for someone with this kind of cancer was between two and five years from the date of diagnosis, and that was with treatment. But an extant clinical study at Stanford was demonstrating a hopeful breakthrough in research for this cancer that was a game-changer for a type of cancer that had not had optimistic results before. During the course of my husband’s treatments with the new medical protocols from that study, we discovered a new level of faith in God and a brand-new understanding of the “great and precious promises” of God (2 Pet. 1:4).

Up to that point, neither of us remembers more than a handful of Christians we had known who, in the face of catastrophic circumstances, demonstrated the kind of peace and joy that the Bible talks about. In the midst of, humanly speaking, tragic events and terminal illness, even Christians expect to be prostrated with despair. But my Bible tells me of a different scenario, one in which hope is made possible by the presence of the Holy Spirit in us.

My husband and I both wanted to see biblical truth confirmed in practice. Knowing that God was about to test us in an enormous way, we prayed that He would, indeed, confirm His Word in us. We also prayed that we would honor God throughout this episode no matter what He would use to rock our world out of its recognizable orbit.

The primary focus of our journey into this aspect of Christianity was the faith required to believe God’s Word. Without faith in what God has promised, we would have missed the blessing of His peace and joy in the middle of the most difficult trial we had ever experienced. Those blessings included the experience of

• God’s uninterrupted presence,
• His “still small voice,”
• the guarding of our minds and hearts,
• perfect peace,
• refuge and strength in God’s presence,
• victory through our Lord Jesus Christ,
• the perfection of God’s timing. 

God brought my husband through the cancer treatments somewhat compromised physically, but the spiritual lessons God taught us over the course of that year turned that event in our lives into one we would not willingly give up. The spiritual blessings and growth of that time far outweigh the physical and emotional toll this hurdle exerted on us.

We are not the only ones who have experienced God’s blessing during cancer treatments. We have prayed for and rejoiced to see this same kind of peace, joy, and closer walk with God in our friends Dave and Pam as well as in Dan and Patty. These two couples are going through rare and life-threatening medical issues with the clear experience of God’s promises in action, just as we had.

God desires His people to go ever deeper into Him, and He uses every event in our lives to lead us in that inward journey. James 1:2–4 exhorts us to “Count it all joy when you fall into divers [trials]; knowing this, that the trying of your faith works patience. But let patience have her perfect work, that you may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing.”

There are no shortcuts to knowing God better or to becoming closer to the perfect conformity to Himself that Jesus requires of His disciples (Matt. 5:48). We, as His children, are called to simply know and apply the truths of Scripture (2 Tim. 2:15) in both the everyday commerce of human life as well as in the big events that disrupt all our preconceived notions of how our lives should unfold. All of us will, at some point in our lives, experience events that feel like the end of the world. Each of us needs to allow God to prepare our hearts for these times of devastation through study, memorization, and meditation on His Word. It is like training for a marathon. You don’t just get up off your couch without any prior physical fitness preparation and win a marathon.

Based on that premise, this book explores the role that the biblical promises of God have in the lives of Christians as we experience pain, trauma, and loss in this world. In addition, we will examine the function of faith as the basis of the hope that is inherent in biblical Christianity and the Christian walk.

Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope, through the power of the Holy Ghost. (Rom. 15:13)