I now come to consider the relationship between faith and the two comforting virtues hope and love. To understand this relationship the essential nature of faith itself must be known. In simple terms it is a secure trust in the promises of God. Hope is similar. It anticipates the promises of God. For Calvin hope and faith were focused on the Person and reward of God’s grace…Jesus.
1. From Hebrews 11:1, Calvin explains the essential nature of faith four ways.
a. Substance of faith is a sort of “support upon which the godly mind may lean and rest. It is as if he were to say that faith itself is a sure and secure possession of those things which God has promised us, unless someone prefers to understand ‘hypostasis’ as confidence!” (Pg., 588).
b. These promises are not perceived by our immediate senses, therefore we do not group these promises “any other way than if we transcend all the limits of our senses and direct our perception beyond all things of this world and, in short, surpass ourselves. Therefore he adds that this assurance of possession is on those things which lie in hope, and are therefore not seen” (Pg., 588).
c. Hence faith is “an evidence of things not appearing, a seeing of things not seen, a clearness of things obscure, a presence of things absent, a showing forth of things hidden.”
d. Therefore faith understands, knows, trusts, and rests upon the real promises of God, which cannot be seen by the naked eye, but are tangible, alive, and already done to the eye of saving faith.
2. Obviously, those who see and believe the promises of God are aroused to hope and love for God.
3. Hope in God and what he has promised in Scripture, “is nothing else than the expectation of those things which faith has believed to have been truly promised by God” (Pg., 590).
4. How do faith and hope work together? “Faith knows God to be true, hope waits for the time this truth will be manifest; faith believes that he is our Father, hope anticipates that he will ever show himself to be a Father toward us; faith believes that eternal life has been given to us, hope anticipates that it will some time be revealed; faith is the foundation upon which hope rests, hope nourishes and sustains faith…(This is because, ‘Faith must be sustained and nourished by patient hope and expectation, lest it fail and grow faint.’) Hope restrains faith that it may not fail headlong from to much hast...Hope strengthens faith that it may not waver in God’s promises…Hope refreshes faith, that it may not become weary. In short, by unremitting renewing and restoring, it (hope) invigorates faith again and again with perseverance” (Pg., 590).
5. Hope also supports faith through periods of testing and waiting. [Hab. 2:3; Isa. 8:7; 2 Peter 3:3,4; Ps. 90:4; 2 Peter 3:8]
6. Faith and Hope are inseparably linked together. “Because, embracing the testimony of the gospel concerning freely given love, we look for the time when God will openly show that which is now hidden under hope” (Pg., 591).
7. The believer has faith and hope in God, for the express purpose to embrace his mercy. The Spirit gives faith and hope for this reason. As Calvin writes, “The single goal of faith is the mercy of God” (Pg., 592). Faith and hope are like Siamese twins.
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