The Hope of Israel

The hope of Israel is a title for God that rose out of a drought. It means the One His people wait for and lean on when nothing else is left. The prophet Jeremiah records it in a prayer, O the hope of Israel, the saviour thereof in time of trouble (Jeremiah 14:8), and he uses it again in Jeremiah 17:13. It is a name people spoke while holding empty water jars.

A drought in Judah and a desperate prayer

Jeremiah 14 begins with one plain line: The word of the LORD that came to Jeremiah concerning the dearth. Dearth is an old word for a shortage, here a drought. What follows is one of the most vivid scenes in the prophets.

The rich sent their servants out for water. They came to the pits, and found no water; they returned with their vessels empty. The ground was chapt, an old spelling of chapped, which means cracked open. Farmers covered their heads in shame. A mother deer gave birth in the field and then left her fawn because there was no grass to eat (Jeremiah 14:5). Wild donkeys stood on the hills gasping for air with failing eyes (Jeremiah 14:6).

Out of that dust comes a prayer. It does not pretend things are fine. It starts with confession, which means admitting sin out loud: O LORD, though our iniquities testify against us, do thou it for thy name's sake. Then it calls God by this name, and right away it asks a bold question:

O the hope of Israel, the saviour thereof in time of trouble, why shouldest thou be as a stranger in the land, and as a wayfaring man that turneth aside to tarry for a night?

Jeremiah 14:8

A wayfaring man is a traveler. To tarry is to stay. The people are saying, "You are supposed to be our Hope, so why are You acting like a passing guest who stays one night at an inn and leaves in the morning?" The next verse ends with three short words that sum up the whole prayer: leave us not.

God's answer in that chapter is hard. He says the people have loved to wander away from Him and that judgment is still coming (Jeremiah 14:10 to 12). Yet the prayer was kept in the Bible, name and all. It shows that people with nothing in their hands could still call God their hope.

What the Hebrew word for hope means

The phrase in Hebrew is miqveh Yisrael. Yisrael is Israel, the name of God's people. Miqveh is the word translated "hope."

Strong's dictionary, a standard word list for the King James Bible, explains miqveh as "something waited for," a confidence. It comes from the verb qavah, which means to wait for, look for, or hope. Strong's says the root idea of that verb is to bind together, perhaps by twisting, the way strands are twisted into a cord. It is the same verb found in the famous promise they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength (Isaiah 40:31).

There is something more. Strong's lists a second meaning under the same spelling: a collection, especially a gathering of water, like a pond or pool. The word is used in Genesis 1:10, where God names the gathering together of the waters the Seas. Some language experts treat "hope" and "pool" as two separate words that just look alike. Either way, they sound the same.

Now think about where the people are standing. Every pit is dry. And they cry out, "O miqveh of Israel." A Hebrew listener could hardly miss the echo. They are calling God the water they are waiting for in a drought.

This tells us something about Bible hope. When we say "I hope it doesn't rain," we mean a wish that may or may not happen. The hope in this verse is different. It is a confident waiting on Someone who is really there.

Key King James verses about the hope of Israel

Jeremiah used the title again a few chapters later, and he set it right beside the name before it on our list:

O LORD, the hope of Israel, all that forsake thee shall be ashamed, and they that depart from me shall be written in the earth, because they have forsaken the LORD, the fountain of living waters.

Jeremiah 17:13

In one verse God is both the Hope and the Spring. The people waiting for water were really waiting for Him.

Even the enemies of Israel seemed to know who Israel's hope was. Jeremiah reports them saying that Israel had sinned against the LORD:

All that found them have devoured them: and their adversaries said, We offend not, because they have sinned against the LORD, the habitation of justice, even the LORD, the hope of their fathers.

Jeremiah 50:7

A psalm turns the same idea into a call to the whole nation:

Let Israel hope in the LORD: for with the LORD there is mercy, and with him is plenteous redemption.

Psalm 130:7

Plenteous means more than enough. Redemption means being bought back and set free. Israel's hope was not in good weather or good luck but in a God with mercy to spare.

Another psalm makes it personal for one person's life:

For thou art my hope, O Lord GOD: thou art my trust from my youth.

Psalm 71:5

And centuries after Jeremiah, the apostle Paul, under guard in Rome, used the same phrase about himself: for the hope of Israel I am bound with this chain (Acts 28:20). The hope had not gone away.

Holding on in your own dry season

You may know what it is like to go to the places you always go for comfort and come back with an empty jar. Maybe it is a family that is falling apart, a dream that died, a diagnosis, or a long stretch where prayer feels like talking to the ceiling. The people in Jeremiah 14 felt that too. They even told God He seemed like a stranger.

Their prayer gives you a pattern you can use:

• Be honest about yourself. They began by admitting their own wrongs, not by blaming others.
• Be honest with God. They told Him how distant He felt. The Bible keeps that kind of prayer on record, so you can pray it too.
• Call Him by name. Saying "You are my hope" out loud on a bad day is an act of faith, not a feeling.
• Ask Him to stay. "Leave us not" is a short prayer anyone can remember.

There is a difference between hoping for one certain outcome and hoping in God. Outcomes can let us down. A person can pray for rain and still wait a long time. But a hope that rests on God Himself is like the tree in Jeremiah 17 with roots by the river. It does not depend on the forecast.

If you are young and the news makes the future look dark, you are not the first to feel that way. Bible hope was never built on headlines. It was built on who God is.

The Hope of Israel is name 68 of the 70 in the book. It pairs naturally with the name just before it, the Fountain of Living Waters, and the next name, the First and the Last, shows why this hope will still be standing at the end. For the full list, visit the names of God in the Bible page.