Faith Hope Assurance

I was reminded the other day of the correlation between hope, faith, and assurance. It's a thought that has stuck with me throughout my religious classes and I find myself consistently coming back to it.

Define:
Hope: to look forward to with desire and reasonable confidence. To believe, desire, or trust.

     Ether 12:4 "Whoso believeth in God might with a surety hope for a better world, yea even a place at the right hand of God, which hope cometh of faith."
     Ether 12:32 "Wherefore man must hope or he cannot receive an inheritance in the place which thou hast prepared."

Define:
Faith: To hope for things which are not seen, but which are true. To have faith is to have confidence in something or someone.

To me, hope is a level of faith. You cannot have one without the other. Moroni 7:40-42 says, "How is it that ye can attain unto faith, save ye shall have hope? And what is it that ye shall hope for? Behold I say unto you that ye shall have hope through the atonement of Christ and the power of his resurrection, to be raised unto life eternal, and this because of your faith in him according to the promise. Wherefore, if a man have faith he must needs have hope; for without faith there cannot be any hope."
Hope is a level of faith which then leads to action.
You should have hope (desire and look forward with reasonable confidence) in the atonement of Christ, in the power of the resurrection. By first desiring and looking forward with confidence you gain the level of faith that will lead to action.
Helaman had faith in the Lord during the war period, which led to hope of deliverance through Christ. Once he had this faith he took courage and it led to action.
Faith = Hope = Assurance.

Romans 15:13 "Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope through the power of the Holy Ghost."
Faith and hope will enable us to act and to be filled with the Holy Ghost giving us assurances. Acting is a present thing which leads to assurance in what the future holds. As we look to the past we see evidence of the Lords blessings which will give us faith and hope in what we are doing in the present, leading us to act.
Action = present.
Assurance = future.
Evidence = past.

Faith
Hope
Assurance

(I think one of my favorites things of the gospel are the correlations between everything. It reminds me of this post.)