Hope

 February 18, 2021

Hope is the last thing you’d expect a prisoner to write home about. Prisons are among the most hopeless places on earth, but from a Roman prison, Paul begins his letter to the Christians at Colossae speaking about God’s call on his life, grace, peace, thanksgiving, and hope. He doesn’t write of hoping for charges to be dropped, for a reprieve from the deprivation and hardships of his cell; unlike many of us who hope for healing, relief from suffering, cold, or heat, Paul’s hope isn’t located in anything this world can offer. His hope is “laid up...in heaven.” Because the world didn’t give it, the world can’t take it away.

Every four years, people hope for their candidate to win the election for presidency of the United States. They hope to enact laws and set a direction for the country that mirrors their own values. Every four years, some are ecstatic and others are despairing. Placing one’s hope in something as ephemeral as an election means that hope continually teeters on the edge of disappointment. Elections are exercises in a hope tethered to this world. Only a hope firmly grounded in heaven is adequate to sustain us here on earth, but such hope is only possible if we abandon our aspirations for this world. Every remnant of hope in this world is another thread binding us to it and blinding us to what God wants to reveal to us about heaven. We are not easily dissuaded from hoping in this world, so God often has to take us through hardships to loosen our grasp on those things that will inevitably fail and piercer our souls if we continue to lean on them (Isaiah 36:6).

It’s a paradox; we work to build a better world, all the while realizing that it ultimately comes only through the establishment of the Kingdom of God, which is another world altogether. Our hope in what we can see only through eyes of faith keeps us going in this present world which is unable to sustain that faith, and frequently dashes the hopes of those who trust in it. The old gospel song says it well: “My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus’ blood and righteousness.” Nothing less, and nothing more.