The anchor of hope

"The use of hope is to keep us from fainting, so that we be not confounded through any assaults of our enemies. Hope is the anchor that sees believers through storms and tempests, keeping the ship safe and sure… Hope empowers endurance, and patience, waiting for the fulfillment of God’s promises… The purpose of hope is to enable us to wait, and still to wait, and do it patiently… It is the function of hope to make us look so much the more steadfastly upon God, especially since we are prone by nature to suppose that God forgets us and remembers not his promise to us."
—William Gouge (The Whole Armour of God, 1627)