Paul explains why believers still wait and groan even though they are saved. Their salvation includes something not yet seen: "the redemption of our body" (Romans 8:23). His question makes the point with plain common sense: no one hopes for what he already has. Barnes puts it this way: "What a man actually possesses, how can he look forward to it with anticipation?" Gill, naming the resurrection of the dead as one thing believers hope for, calls it "unseen, and even incredible to carnal reason, and is to come."

Paul answers in the next sentence: "But if we hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it" (Romans 8:25). He adds that in this waiting "the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities" (Romans 8:26), and that "all things work together for good to them that love God" (Romans 8:28).

"We are saved" translates esothemen, an aorist passive verb, "we were saved." That is why the ESV reads "in this hope we were saved." Salvation has already happened, yet it points toward something still ahead. Barnes offers more than one reading of "saved by hope"; he suggests "saved" may mean here "we are kept, preserved, sustained in our trials, by hope."

The noun "hope" (elpis) and the verb "hope for" (elpizo) run through the verse. Paul is defining the word: real hope, by its nature, looks at what is not yet seen.

God has made the Christian life one of confident waiting. Matthew Henry writes, "Our happiness is not in present possession: We are saved by hope," and adds, "Those that will deal with God must deal upon trust." The promise is sure because it rests on God, even though it is not yet in hand.

This hope sits inside a passage about suffering. Paul counts "the sufferings of this present time" as "not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us" (Romans 8:18). The waiting is real, but so is the help: the Spirit intercedes (Romans 8:26), and Paul's argument builds to "If God be for us, who can be against us?" (Romans 8:31).