Hope is not just wishful thinking like the ancient magic phoenix whose legend gives hope to foolish idolaters. True hope is like a door that leads to life. Real hope can actually make us live – as many near death experiences can testify. When you choose to hope and dream you have reason to live. But be careful not to rely on skill and ability to receive and keep a reason for hope.
Easter hope is your redemption drawing near. And as such Easter hope is the greatest of all hope. The word of hope in Jesus Christ sounds in our lives from the God of all hope.
Hope returns to us with renewed purpose and understanding even when we think or believe that we have lost all hope. Withered gardens respond with water as our hope responds to God’s inbreathing of the Holy Spirit in spite of our dry and hollow condition.
A future with hope means that we live with hope in the present regardless of the hopeless failures, sin and rejection of the past.
We sometimes refer to a ray of hope as if hope comes to us in illuminating light. The Christmas story comes to many as a ray of hope. It gives us faith in tomorrow and even in the world’s conceited mock victory over Christ on the cross. Easter is the fulfillment of Christmas. Christmas is the remembered hope of Easter when God has come to redeem you from eternal damnation. God’s trail of hope and safety shall bring you to reconciled compassion, hope and community in His Kingdom better than any Santa Claus winding through the sky with temporal and short lived presents of earthly pleasures.
You are not hopeless seekers for you seek the kingdom of God in hope and confidence. As sunflowers of summer grow to full stature, then fall to release seeds for food and next year’s planting, we are called to grow and distribute our seeds of hope to others for nurture and further planting of Christian lives in this world.
You can also find hope by giving up your grief and regret. No sinner is beyond hope. There is hope for all. Noah’s rainbow after the great flood speaks hope each time you look to the heavens and see another rainbow and realize that all creation is protected from God using water as a totally destructive force ever again. Baptism seals us with water and spirit so that our redemption becomes a life long romance story with God. Even amid Ash Wednesday ashes we find the promise of hope, where we need only to wait for a season, stay on the path, pass through the darkness of our individual good Fridays and our caskets become hope chests instead of hopeless cases.
Unlike some presents or earthly relations we celebrate in this season of mirth and frivolity, there are no pieces missing in hope through Jesus Christ. We discovered last Sunday that Jesus owns the window of the unknown and that is our hope. We are firmly anchored in Him and His righteousness, so we are not bound BY “what is”, but we are bound TO “what can be.” Our faith is renewed each time we recall our hope. Staying aloft or afloat in hope is a means of grace from God that teaches us God’s faith in us to receive His reconciliation and love.
Learn to practice hope like you practice your faith and love in God and others. When you feel it is impossible to pray draw from the well of hope that never runs dry. Hope springs from the smallest of expectations in God’s goodness. Hope is fishing without knowing if there are fish to catch or going to the mailbox without knowing whether a letter has come. God’s plan includes hope that gets you ready, that prepares you for new beginnings – for resurrection and eternal life.
Let us individually pray together: Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for telling me where I am as I hope for your presence with me. This generation and future generations will praise You as Mary prophesied when receiving the hope and promise of Emmanuel coming from her womb. You are the God of hope who whispers the hope and promise of happy faith from Your unseen light. Oh Lord, be our hope and our salvation, world without end, in the hope of Jesus Christ, Amen.
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