Where is the hope?
I hear that question often.
In a world where so much seems hopeless…in times where so many things seem to be far from perfect…in this life where we are constantly in turmoil, we want to hear something that promises us that things will be better “one day.”
We don’t want to deal with the present. We want to escape the present. We either want to live in the past or run to the future. Yet the present is all we have.
There’s no hope in the present
Or, at least that’s what we think…that’s how we act.
And so we struggle to remain present. You’ve heard about it. You, yourself, have probably been told that you need to be present.
We struggle to be present in our relationships. We struggle to remain present at work. I mean, you can certainly see this struggle in our addiction to smart phones and our social media lives. We can’t stay off…even to have a date with the one we are trying to impress. We are unavailable or distracted. We have no hope, so we become restless and anxious, unable to remain present.
Our hope is confined to the future
So we wait for the great by-and-by. “We shall overcome, someday…” Who knows when? No one. Yet, “keep hope alive!” One day…someday…we will make it there. And placing all hope in the future, the present becomes meaningless. The present gets in the way of our future. So we are eager to leave the present in the past.
This can’t be hope…
I want to spend some time giving you a fuller perspective of hope, because it is the reality of the greatest gift given to us. Hope is so much more than we allow it to be. And it is all we have.
What do you think of this take on hope?
