Choosing Hope When Everything Pushes You to Give Up

Introduction

Emma T., from Église Hillsong Paris, opens up about two years marked by successive waves of discouragement: a career change, prolonged hormonal imbalance, distance within her church family, an alternation of peaks and valleys in her spiritual life. From this journey, she draws a simple and urgent message for the Church: hope in Christ is not a feeling God forces on us; it is a choice we make. And because the enemy knows this, he targets that hope first. This message invites you to return to your hope, to understand how it works, and to receive practical keys for finding it again when it fades.

Message Outline

1. Hope Is a Choice, Not an Emotion

• It is defined as the supernatural virtue by which the child of God awaits from his Father, with confidence, his grace in this world and eternal glory in the next.
• It is founded on the Word of God, not on statistics or human probabilities.
• Hebrews 10:23 invites us to hold fast the confession of our hope: this implies that we can also choose not to hold it.
• Finding yourself without hope is therefore not an accident: it is the result of a choice, conscious or not, to let it go.

2. The Enemy's Strategy Targets Your Hope

• Since the enemy cannot destroy the Word of God, he comes to steal your hope to prevent the answer from coming.
• When facing a long wait, you can refuse hope from the start, because your human math has never seen this kind of breakthrough in your history.
• You can also give up along the way, because disappointment has repeated itself, and you prefer to protect yourself by no longer believing in that specific area.
• Two typical reactions follow: abandoning entirely, or trying to fulfill the promise yourself, as Sarai did by sending Hagar to Abraham in Genesis 16:1-2.

3. Lack of Hope Prepares the Ground for Unbelief

• What starts as caution on a single subject ends up contaminating other areas of life.
• Sarai, in giving up, comes to no longer believe that God is good, or that he is capable of giving her this child, or in his almighty power toward her.
• Hebrews 3:12 warns: it starts with a lack of hope; the possible end of the road is an evil, unbelieving heart that falls away from the living God.
• The consequences are not trivial: Ishmael, the son of despair, opposes the son of the promise; disobedience and sin; comparison, bitterness, and the inability to rejoice for those who receive before us.

4. Hope and Faith Work Together

• Hebrews 11:1: faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.
• Faith comes from Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith (Hebrews 12:2); it attests that the object of my hope is real.
• If I give up on my hope, my faith loses its object: I say I have faith, but it has nothing left to grasp.
• Romans 4:18 reminds us that Abraham, in hope, believed against hope, and that is why he received the answer and became the father of many nations.

5. The Fruit of Persevering Hope

• Romans 5:3-4: suffering produces endurance, endurance produces character, and character produces hope.
• Persevering through the wait is the condition for patience to bring victory in the trial.
• The true victory is not the answer itself first: it is the development of a proven character, which precedes the miracle and which, afterward, will know how to steward it.
• Hope is found at both the beginning and the end of the trial: at the end of the journey, it is greater, more fortified, more steadfast.

6. Four Keys to Recovering Hope

• Know Christ: dive into his Word and his nature to let go of the lies the enemy whispers about who God is.
• Recognize God's blessings in your life: keep a list, big or small, of what he has already done, as Psalm 103 does.
• Know and be known in your local church: accept that others pray and hope for you when you no longer have the strength, according to Psalm 25:3.
• Serve in your local church even in difficult seasons: Matthew 6:33, seek first the kingdom, and let God strengthen you through service.

Key Takeaways

• Hope is a decision, not an emotion: God invites you to hold it fast; he does not force it on you.
• The enemy cannot destroy God's promise, so he targets your hope to prevent the answer from coming.
• Giving up hope in a single area opens a breach that will gradually affect all the others.
• Your faith and your hope are linked: without hope, faith has no object left to grasp.
• Victory in the trial is first and foremost a proven character that prepares the way for the answer, never the other way around.

Personal Application

1. On what specific subject have you, consciously or not, stopped hoping in recent months?
2. What lies have you believed about God's identity or his love for you, that justified abandoning your hope?
3. Have you tried, like Sarai, to fulfill the promise yourself outside of God's timing? What consequences do you see today?
4. Who in your local church truly knows your battles well enough to pray and hope on your behalf when you no longer have the strength?
5. What concrete act of service can you commit to this week, not to distract yourself from your trial, but to let God strengthen you through others?

Referenced Verses

• Jeremiah 29:11
• Romans 4:18-21
• Genesis 16:1-2
• Hebrews 10:23
• Hebrews 3:12
• Hebrews 11:1
• Hebrews 12:2
• Romans 5:3-4
• Matthew 6:10
• Matthew 6:33
• Psalm 103
• Psalm 25:3
• Philippians 2:13

Further reading

• 20 Verses on Perseverance in Ministry
• 20 Verses to Pray for Your Church
• Bible Verses on Teamwork: 20 Texts

Frequently Asked Questions

Why does Emma T. say that hope is a choice and not a feeling?

Because Hebrews 10:23 invites us to hold fast the confession of our hope. If we must hold it fast, it means we can let it go. It is therefore not an emotional state imposed on us, but a decision to keep relying on God's Word when everything around us seems to contradict the promise.

Why is giving up hope on a single subject dangerous?

Because that surrender never stays isolated for long. What starts confined to one area — finances, health, family — ends up contaminating other areas of life and prepares the ground for unbelief. Hebrews 3:12 warns that a heart that abandons hope can, in time, fall away from the living God.

How can I find hope again when I'm too exhausted to believe?

Emma T. gives four keys: know Christ so you can let go of the lies about who he is, keep a list of blessings already received, let yourself be known and carried by your local church, and keep serving even in the difficult season. It is not we who produce faith in ourselves: it is Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith (Hebrews 12:2), who lifts us up when we choose to come back to him.