But I will hope continually
and will praise you yet more and more. Psalm 71.14
I’d like to focus your attention on two words here, hope and praise. First, some definitions. Hope is waiting for Jesus to keep a promise that He has made. Praise is the joyous response of gratitude for some good that He has done. If you can think of hope and praise in those terms then certain things follow.
To hope is an act of the will. It is to decide to expect Jesus to keep some promise and so to wait patiently for Him to do that. To decide to hope is to decide to be optimistic. You might be optimistic while in pain or through tears, but you can still be optimistic.
Before you can praise there are some things that you need to do. You will need to stop and consider this question. What has Jesus been doing? The range of time for you to consider might be centuries or the last five minutes. How can you respond with gratitude if you aren't aware of what He has done? So, to praise is also tied to a decision. It is a decision, first, to stop and consider the good that He has sent your way, to become aware of it. Then, in light of what you've seen, you respond. And grasping the extent of His goodness, you respond not just with gratitude but with joyous gratitude.
To hope or to praise is not automatic. Neither of these can happen without a conscious decision to look to what Jesus will do or has been doing.