This is not trying to steal the spotlight but is meant in a complimentary manner to the recent excellent thread on what is faith.
How can we distinguish faith from hope? What is the main difference?
Faith is in the Heart
The main difference is that faith is in the heart, while hope is in the mind. In Romans 10:10 Paul says, "For with the heart man believes unto righteousness," True biblical faith originates in the heart. Expressed by the verb to "believe," it is followed by the preposition "unto," indicating the result which it produces - "unto righteousnes." "Unto" implies motion or transition of some kind. Faith is never static. It always expresses itself in motion, change, activity. A person who truly believes will be changed by what he believes.
On the other hand, a person who merely accepts truth with his intellect can remain unchanged by it. Mental acceptance of truth is not faith. To produce faith, trust must penetrate beyond the conscious mind into the inner center and source of life which is called the heart. Truth received intellectually by the mind may be sterile and ineffective, but truth received by faith into the heart is always dynamic and life-changing in its outworking.
In Proverbs 4:23 Solomon warns us, "Watch over your heart with all diligence, for from it flow the springs of life." Everything that finally decides the course of our life proceeds from the heart and determines the way we live. It is not a mere intellectual concept, entertained by the mind; it is a real, active force at work in the heart.
However, God does not leave our mind without its proper provision. Faith at work in the heart produces hope in the mind. This follows from the definition of faith that that we have already examined in Hebrews 11:1: "Faith is the substance of things hoped for..." Faith in the heart is the substance - the underlying reality. This provides a valid, scriptural basis for the hope that we entertain in the mind.
In I Thessalonians 5:8 Paul mentions the different areas inn our personality affected respectively by faith and by hope. "But since we are of the day, let us be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love, and as a helmet, the hope of salvation." Faith and love are the breastplate, and the breatplate protects the heart. Hope is the helmet and it protects the head, or the mind.
In distinguishing faith from hope, we do not mean to belittle hopee. Hope, in the biblical sense, is a confident expectation of good - a steady, persistent optimism. It is this which protects our minds. Every Christian should wear this helmet of hope 24 hours a day. If we lay aside the helmet andbegin to dwell on negative thoughts and gloomy forebodings, our minds are vulnerable to Satan's subtle attacks.
Christian optimism of this kind is not fanciful or unrealistic. It is not mere wishful thinking. It must be based firmly and exclusively on the statements and promises of Scripture. For example, in Romans 8:28 we are told, "And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose." If so, then God is working all things - every event, every situation - together - for our good. This leaves only one attitude of mind that we can logically adopt: optimism. In the light of this, for a Christian to be a pessimist is, in fact, a denial of his faith.
This example confirms what has already been said: FAITH IS THE ONLY SOLID BASIS FOR HOPE (emphasis docs). We must first truly believe what Romans 8:28 tells us - that all things are working together for our good. If we believe this, we have no alternative but to hope. But if we don't believe it, then our hope has no solid basis.
It follows from what has been said that there are two forms of hope, outwardly similar but different in one vital respect. The first form of hope is based on genuine faith in the heart and it is therefore valid. Its expectation will, in due, time, be fulfilled. The second form of hope is in the mind alone, lacking any basis of genuine faith in the heart, and therefore has no scriptural validity. More likely than not, its expectation is doomed to disappointment. Until we have learned to distinguish bewteen these two forms of hope, we will aways be in danger of entertaining hopes which will go unfulfilled.
(From "Faith to Live By" - Derek Prince - 1977 - ch 2 - "Faith vs Hope", 17-20)
This verse just came to my mind as I was closing - Romans 15:13,
13 May the God of your hope so fill you will all joy and peace in believing [through the experience of your faith] that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound and be overflowing (bubbling over) with hope." (Romans 15:13 - AMP)
That's true faith first ("in believing") that leads to true hope. Amen!