To non-believers??

Question

What is your definition of hope?
For example: Have you ever said
"I hope" my children will be ok
"I hope" my children grow up happy and healthy
"I hope" I get this job or "I hope" I get that job
"I hope" I get there on time
"I hope" I have enough money
"I hope" I bought enough food
"I hope"
"I hope"
"I hope"

If you're honest, you know you have said the words "I hope"
If you can get the things on your own or make these things happen on your own, why say the words "I hope"
Who are you hoping to?
I know what hope is....hoping is a form of pray whether you realize it or not. So why say "I hope" if you don't believe?

I don't want any rude and nasty comments. If you're going to be rude and nasty, don't answer.

TENTMKR: Did you even bother to read the question????

What about "no rude and nasty comments" did you not understand???

Spiritual Gunslinger:: You are the ONLY one that gets the question!! Thanks for the great answer!!!

Answer 1

In Greek, "Hope" is both a noun (elpis) and verb (elpizo).

the noun..."favorable and confident expectation". This has to do with the unseen and the future. As in Rom 8:24, "Hope" describes the happy anticipation of good. Titus 1:2 and 1 peter 1:21 explains the ground upon which this "hope" is based.

As the verb, it means "to trust". As in Rom 15:12..."On Him shall the Gentiles hope."

I do believe quite a few folks may have missed the actual question..."if you can get the things on your own, why say the word hope?"

If I was to ask it again, I would ask the ones who reject God, then what do you have a "favorable and confident expectation" in? one's self? - if so, no wonder life is a constant struggle for survival. The randomness of nature? Then why make any plans, if all of this is beyond your control?

Yes...hope is the spare tank to our internal drive... some have small tanks courtesy of Darwin, some of us have God sized tanks, courtesy of the one who went to the cross!

Answer 2

Hope is the knowledge that things can turn out well. We also think a cheerful and hopeful outlook will influence positive results. It is very simple pyschology, and there is some truth that positive people have positive results, or notice them more. Negative people don't.

Hope is good. Without it we risk being pessimists or nihilists.

I have hope that one day, humanism will naturally, consensually, rationally, outmode 'Faith' in supernatural and superstition, and we will then not persecute each other for having different faiths or or genders than are proscribed by primitive superstitions or vengeful, punishing, jealous 'deities'.

In a nutshell , I hope the human ego evolves to a point where it takes the passenger seat, and sense and compassion takes the wheel.

Answer 3

Non-believers in what exactly?

My definition of hope is looking at the future and seeing a bright side. No god required.

"I hope" is an expression of emotions... just like 'I love', 'I hate', 'I want', etc. You look at the possible outcomes to any given situation, and you see the one that you would most like to happen. Then you express that feeling by saying, "I hope".

We can't keep a random idiot driver from hitting our child in a car accident. We can't guarantee that our child will never catch a disease. We can't mind-control the interviewer into giving us a job. And so on and so forth. It's ridiculous to propose that we would think we can.

So your premise that we think we can, "get the things on our own," or "make these things happen on our own", is false. We are at the mercy of nature, each other, and our own mistakes... just like everyone else.

Just because someone does not agree with you or tell you what you want to hear doesn't mean that person "doesn't get" the question. Open your mind.

Answer 4

Hope and prayer kept me distracted while I was younger. It wasn't until I finally lost this comfort that I was forced to look everywhere for help for chronic health problems.

Fortunately, I lived near an acupunturist who was able to make a real difference.

If I hadn't had the comfort and hope of prayer, I would have made that exhausting search a decade or so earlier.

And I wouldn't have deteriorated so much in the meantime. I can say with reasonable certainty that the false hope of prayer that I held for many years still adversely affects my life today.

Answer 5

From the dictionary:

To wish for something with expectation of its fulfillment.
To look forward to with confidence or expectation.
To expect and desire.

I hope my husband and I will go away this weekend. I am hoping on him that he can gets what he needs to done and that he doesn't have to work.

I hope I get a raise.
I am hoping that my boss recognizes my job performance and that the company budget is able accomodate it.

I hope my kids will be happy and healthy.
I hope I do a good job raising them and that bad things such as accidents and disease won't happen to come their way. Not that a deity will watch out that it doesn't.

Don't see any belief in supernatural or deities here.

Answer 6

I'm not rude nor nasty, just impatient.
You talk to unbelievers as if they have less of something than you do.
You're trying to convince them that they believe in something even though they claim not to.
Of course they speak to the Divine within themselves, the breath of life is the Holy Spirit. To blaspheme it is to not forgive yourself.
They will not agree and why should they.
They didn't come here to find answers any more than you did.
You both came to fight the silliest fight in history.
The perpetual argument for no other reason than the pure joy of fighting.
Gnostic was so right about this place.
I'm amazed.

((((hugGs))))

Answer 7

Hope is merely optimism in the face of uncertainty. I am responsible for my actions. Hope is a way to say "I am optimistic that things will turn out as I wish."

Answer 8

you could have at least looked the word hope up in the dictionary before posting this question. Hope has NOTHING to do with god or a higher power

hope: to look forward to with desire and reasonable confidence

Answer 9

'Who are you hoping to'?

I'm not sure that question makes any sense at all. It's not like people are saying 'please god give me more money' or please god keep my family safe - you'd have to be a pretty ignorant theist of the daily miracles variety to believe in such a thing... which I guess is where you're coming from.

Who are you hoping to? Nobody. Maybe a sniper says 'I hope my first bullet rips his head off' do you think all such statements are prayers?

Hope is not a form of prayer, this is just rubbish. Hope is a way of expressing how we would like the laws of probability to repeal themselves to our benefit.

As an argument in defence of your mythical sky-pixie this is spectacularly weak.

Answer 10

There are people who don't believe in gods, and all the convoluted parsing and irrelevant, nonsensical analogizing isn't going to change that. When setting a trap use attractive bait, otherwise no rabbit fur coat when the weather turns cold.