“Hope Deferred Makes the Heart Sick”: Hope and the Heart

In Hebrew thought the “heart” is the whole inner person: mind, will, and feeling together. Proverbs 13:12 says that a long-delayed hope wears a person down, and that fulfilled desire is a “tree of life,” the image of Eden’s restored life (Gen. 2:9; Prov. 3:18). Paul’s prayer in Romans 15 sets hope on God, not on circumstances. Christian hope is not the same as cheerful expectation. It rests on a promise, and it is meant to hold even when the hoped-for thing is long deferred (Rom. 8:24–25).

Optimism and the physical heart. Researchers usually measure optimism as a general expectation that good things will happen. Rozanski, Bavishi, Kubzansky, and Cohen (2019) pooled 15 cohort studies with 229,391 participants followed for an average of 13.8 years. Optimism was associated with a 35% lower risk of cardiovascular events (relative risk 0.65) and a lower risk of death from any cause (relative risk 0.86). The results held across subgroups and after adjusting for depression, though the studies differed considerably from one another.

Optimism and long life. Lee and colleagues (2019) followed women in the Nurses’ Health Study for 10 years and men in the Veterans Affairs Normative Aging Study for 30 years. Higher optimism was associated with longer life in a dose-dependent way. Women in the most optimistic quarter lived about 15% longer than those in the least optimistic quarter, and the findings were similar in men. The most optimistic men and women were 1.5 to 1.7 times more likely to live to 85, even after accounting for health behaviors.

What the studies cannot tell us. These are observational studies. Healthier people may be more optimistic to begin with, though the researchers adjusted for many health conditions. Optimism as measured is a personality tendency, not hope in God. A man can hold firm hope in Christ while being, by temperament, a realist. The convergence is in the proverb’s own terms: chronic hopelessness appears to wear on the body, and a forward-looking expectation of good appears to protect it.

Practice

Living it out

Five practices drawn from this passage. Each says how strong the research behind it is. What the labels mean.

1. 1

   Anchor hope in a promise, not an outcome

   Choose one promise of God that speaks to your deferred hope, write it on a card, and read it each morning for a month.

   ObedienceObedience. Commended by Scripture (Rom. 15:13). Optimism is linked to health (Rozanski et al., 2019), but hope in God’s promises has not been studied this way.
2. 2

   Practice the “best possible” next step

   When a hope is deferred, write the most realistic good outcome you can imagine and one step toward it.

   EarlyOptimism appears to be modifiable, as the study authors note (Lee et al., 2019), but specific exercises were not tested in these cohorts.
3. 3

   Watch for hopelessness that won’t lift

   Persistent hopelessness is a warning sign of depression. If it lasts more than two weeks, talk to a doctor, counselor, or pastor.

   StrongStrong that optimism and pessimism are associated with cardiovascular and mortality risk across large cohorts (Rozanski et al., 2019).
4. 4

   Tell each other what you’re hoping for

   In your group, name one thing you are waiting on God for, and pray for one another’s by name.

   ObedienceObedience. Commended by Scripture (Gal. 6:2). The paper’s research on social support applies (see Section 7).
5. 5

   Celebrate fulfilled desire

   When a long hope is answered, mark it: a meal, a written thanks, a story told to your children. “Desire fulfilled is a tree of life.”

   EarlyEarly, by inference. Fits the paper’s gratitude research (Section 3). Untested as a specific practice.

Studies cited on this page2

1. ↗ Lee, L. O., James, P., Zevon, E. S., Kim, E. S., Trudel-Fitzgerald, C., Spiro, A., Grodstein, F., & Kubzansky, L. D. (2019). Optimism is associated with exceptional longevity in 2 epidemiologic cohorts of men and women. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 116(37), 18357–18362. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1900712116
2. ↗ Rozanski, A., Bavishi, C., Kubzansky, L. D., & Cohen, R. (2019). Association of optimism with cardiovascular events and all-cause mortality: A systematic review and meta-analysis. JAMA Network Open, 2(9), e1912200. https://doi.org/10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2019.12200