“For we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and your love for all of God’s people, which come from your confident hope of what God has reserved for you in heaven. You have had this expectation ever since you first heard the truth of the Good News” (Colossians 1:4–5 NLT).
Did you know that you were prewired for hope? There is a restlessness in the human heart for something more than this world can offer.
As Augustine said, “You made us for Yourself, O God, and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in You.”
As believers, our hope is built on a sure foundation, and that is the hope of Heaven. The apostle Paul spoke of faith that springs from this hope: “For we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and your love for all of God’s people, which come from your confident hope of what God has reserved for you in heaven” (Colossians 1:4).
It is a bit like the Golden Plovers. Native to Hawaii, these little birds migrate during the summer to the Aleutian Isles, some 1,200 miles away. There, they mate and lay their eggs. Then, after their little fledglings are born, they return to Hawaii. Even more amazing is that their little fledglings, which are too young to return with their parents, fly to Hawaii once they have grown a little. God has given them a homing instinct that makes this possible.
In the same way, God has given us a homing instinct for a place we have never been. We have never been to Heaven, but we long for it, because Heaven is our home. C. S. Lewis calls it the inconsolable longing. This is what the Bible means when it says that God has set eternity in our hearts (see Ecclesiastes 3:11). Like the Golden Plovers, we have a heavenly GPS.
