4 - Hope and Fear toward Divine Self-Sacrifice

Summary

To motivate the gospel of divine self-sacrifice, Paul proposes a basis for hope in God. This ground is in divine righteous agapē toward humans in their experience, and it anchors, as supporting evidence, not only human hope in God but also divine promises for humans. In Paul’s view, divine epiphany and divine promise belong together as constituents of grounded human hope in God. His view provides a corrective to Jürgen Moltmann’s unduly sharp contrast, in Theology of Hope and elsewhere, between a God of epiphany and a God of promise. The chapter clarifies Paul’s position on an important kind of experience-grounded hope in God neglected by Moltmann and many others. In doing so, it identifies a key role for divine self-sacrifice in grounding human hope in God. The chapter also explains how a kind of fear toward divine self-sacrifice yields an obstacle to hope in God. It distinguishes two kinds of fear of God in order to clarify a command from Paul to fear God. The chapter illuminates why one kind of fear, even when combined with felt abandonment by God, need not yield despair about God’s reality or goodness.