thoughts on hope
I feel like hope is a word rarely used in its fullest sense in today’s conversation. We hope that some guy might like us back. We hope that we might get that promising job offer. We hope that we will get an A on that last test we took. We always hope for things that remain in the realm of possibility. If it does not seem likely, we prefer not to hope. Instead of hoping and risking disappointing, we resign ourselves to accepting that it cannot happen, and settle for something less.
Perhaps this accords better with the dictionary definition: to cherish a desire with anticipation; to desire with expectation of obtainment; to expect with confidence: TRUST.
But is it really hope to eagerly expect something that we can see? To await something that we’re pretty sure that we can achieve?
At the very least, I know that as Christians, we can actually hope (in fact, we must hope) for more than what seems attainable by human means, because our hope is based in a God who can do immeasurably more than what we ask for or even imagine. When we do not hope, or hope for little, it is not that we are being realistic, but that we lack faith.
Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in our own lifetime, therefore we must be saved by hope. Nothing which is true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history, therefore we must be saved by faith. Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone, therefore we must be saved by love.
Cowardice keeps us ‘double minded’ – hesitating between the world and God. In this hesitation, there is no true faith – faith remains an opinion. We are never certain, because we never quite give in to the authority of an invisible God. This hesitation is the death of hope. We never let go of those visible supports which, we well know, must one day surely fail us. And this hesitation makes true prayer impossible – it never quite dares to ask for anything, or if it asks, it is so uncertain of being heard that in the very act of asking, it surreptitiously seeks by human prudence to construct a make-shift answer.
What is the use of praying if at the very moment of prayer, we have so little confidence in God that we are busy planning our own kind of answer to prayer?
Hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he already has? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.
Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.
4 comments:
hi ma'am. i've actually been thinking about these things recently quite a bit, so thank you for the post. i guess, part of what i sometimes find myself in limbo with is the difference between "dreaming" of something and "hoping" in something. let me clarify, sometimes it can be easier to verbally acknowledge things that are "beyond our reach"...perhaps because we subconsciously believe that they never will become reality...rather than being able to hope within the context of what is actually in front of us. let me give an example, it can be easier for me sometimes to sit and "dream" for changes that are grand and for a "worthy" cause [an escapism of sorts]...yet much harder for me to see God in the daily little things that I have to do everyday. Yet, to do the daily little things require as much "hope" in the fact that God can and is working through just life in general. I guess, just wanting to kinda bring to light that mundane within reach things sometimes do require as much faith b/c of our inabilty to see God in them. Oh rooting in Christ...
-cindy
Scripture + Merton = AUTHORITY (not in a bad way).
It actually makes total sense... how could we ever expect to see what God is capable of when we only think in terms of what is actual, instead of what is possible, much less what is "impossible"?
this is all related to something i've thought about the last few years a lot: fear.
about two years ago a friend challenged me to think about the fear that i was struggling with and how that relates to control and trust. what a doozie. our fear is a lack of hope and trust (similar though different) as well as a strong desire for control.
and with what matt says about the impossible... we restrain our grandest dreams out of a fear that the might indeed be impossible... or even more twisted yet, the fear that maybe our dreams ARE possible...
... so much easier to think about than to live...
hey that other post in which you may or may not be a cliche had a question of love at the end, and this post just reminded me of my all-time favorite quote from madeleine l'engle: "To love someone is to hope in him always." that also ties back nicely with the comment i left.
yay!
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