Facing Hope Deferred

None of us is lucky enough to avoid disappointment in this life. The question is, when we meet disappointment, will we let it through the door, listen to its mollifying words, invite it to stay? Or will we slam the door in its face?

It is so easy to listen to and agree with disappointment, because it seems to make sense. It appeals to our logic and tells us to judge life and others and even God by the fairness of our circumstances. But disappointment is ultimately a liar. It may make some good points, but its judgment is flawed. If we listen to it long enough, we end up in despair, joyless and sick in heart.

We end up like the dry bones in the prophet Ezekiel’s vision. The Israelites had lost hope and fallen into despair, but God gave Ezekiel a vision of a valley full of dry bones, and he told Ezekiel to prophesy life into them. As Ezekiel prophesied to the bones, they began to rattle and come together into skeletons. Muscles and sinews formed; skin grew. But the bodies still had no breath, no life in them. So God told Ezekiel to prophesy again, saying, “Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe on these slain, that they come to life” (Ezek. 37:9). When he did, the breath of God entered the bodies, and they “stood on their feet, an exceedingly great army” (Ezek. 37:10). God then explained the vision to Ezekiel, saying:

These bones are the whole house of Israel; behold, they say, “Our bones are dried up and our hope has perished. We are completely cut off.” Therefore prophesy and say to them, “Thus says the Lord God, ‘Behold, I will open your graves and cause you to come up out of your graves, My people…’” (Ezekiel 37:11–12).

What could be more hopeless than dry bones? But even dry, lifeless bones are not beyond hope in God’s eyes. In him, the dry bones of disappointment and loss in our lives can stand up and become an exceedingly great army.

Despair is no one’s destiny. Even when life looks like a valley of dry bones, God declares new life and new hope. He is not content to leave us in the graves of despair and disappointment. We were not made to live with sick hearts or broken hope. The potential of a mighty warrior still rattles in our bones. When we face disappointment, we have a choice.

Proverbs 13:12 says, “Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but desire fulfilled is a tree of life.” For a time, I believed this verse meant that desires fulfilled are the key to happiness. But after I had tasted a few disappointments, this verse started to feel like a prison sentence rather than a promise. What if my desires are never fulfilled? Am I relegated to the land of sick hearts? Of course, in light of the cross, such an idea doesn’t make much sense. In God’s economy, he provides for thriving hearts, no matter our circumstances. I began to understand that this verse is descriptive, not prescriptive. It describes how life often works, not how it should work.

This is good news. It means we don’t have to have sick hearts when things don’t work out how we wanted. It means we can walk out of our disappointments still believing in dreams-come-true, trusting in the God who can breathe life into dead bones, “who gives life to the dead and calls into being that which does not exist” (Rom. 4:17).

That is what Abraham, the father of faith, did—“in hope against hope, he believed, so that he might become a father of many nations according to that which had been spoken” (Rom. 4:18; see Gen. 15:1–6). Though all the signs pointed to his hope of a son being forever deferred, Abraham clung to the promise, and because of his unrelenting faith, he was counted as righteous (see Rom. 4:19–22). This story calls out to me in the seasons of hope deferred, reminding me that I don’t have to give up. I don’t have to stop believing. I don’t have to become sick in heart.

Abraham and Sarah’s story also comforts me, because their faith wasn’t perfect. Abraham isn’t called the father of faith because he never doubted. After all, the Bible tells us he had at least one season of doubt, when he thought he would help God out with his promise of a son by impregnating Sarah’s maid, Hagar (see Gen. 16:1–5). When God came to Abraham to renew his promise to him, even after the episode with Hagar, Abraham laughed and said, “Will a child be born to a man one hundred years old? And will Sarah, who is ninety years old, bear a child?... Oh that Ishmael [Hagar’s son] might live before You” (Gen. 17:17–18).

Here we find Abraham not only doubting the promise, but also wishing that God would just work the promise out in Abraham’s way. Sarah also laughed at God’s promise when the angels visited and declared that she would have a son within the next year (see Gen. 18:9–15). Abraham and Sarah were only one year away from the birth of their son Isaac, but neither one of them seemed to be exhibiting great faith. Abraham was still trying to fix up a solution for God. And both of them laughed at the possibility of pregnancy at their age.

Yet, when Hebrews 11—the great faith chapter—talks about Abraham and Sarah, we get a different story. “By faith, even Sarah herself received ability to conceive, even beyond the proper time of life, since she considered Him faithful who had promised” (Heb. 11:11). And the apostle Paul wrote about Abraham:

Without becoming weak in faith he contemplated his own body, now as good as dead since he was about a hundred years old, and the deadness of Sarah’s womb; yet, with respect to the promise of God, he did not waver in unbelief but grew strong in faith, giving glory to God, and being fully assured that what God had promised, He was able also to perform (Romans 4:19–21).

What this tells me is that God counted their faith as worthy even though it wasn’t perfect. Even when they struggled to believe in their hearts, they still chose to believe. They still pointed their lives toward God, saying yes to his plan and trusting in his promises even while they wrestled with the whispers of disappointment and doubt about how it could be possible.

I think many of us can relate to this picture of faith. I’m glad the father of faith had his moments of struggle and that God still counted him as righteous because of his faith.

This divergence in the biblical accounts of Abraham and Sarah shows us that God really does accept faith as small as a mustard seed (see Matt. 17:20)—and that when he looks back on our journey, he sees it through the lens of our successes, not our failures. God knows Abraham and Sarah laughed, but he remembers them as those who believed the unbelievable and did not give up.

Abraham and Sarah weren’t perfect, but against all odds, they didn’t listen to disappointment. They didn’t give up.

We don’t have to either.

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