You want
to experience hope, don't you?
I know
there is an innate desire in all of us to see, pursue, and discover hope.
Whether it is that we hope to accomplish marvelous things, or that we
just hope to make it through the carpool, we all rise and fall because of hope.
Maybe
it's a coping mechanism within us, only there to fire off neurons that will
interact with the chemicals of the brain to signal to our body that we should
keep fighting, keep striving, keep chasing after whatever, simply as a means of
survival.
Maybe
it's an illusion. A cruel trick of a heartless, cold, meaningless world,
to create within us a desire for more, a passion for greater things, and a
drive to see them come to fruition despite the odds. A mere leftover from
a previous evolution of the natural order, outdated and overestimated.
But I
think we all know differently. I believe hope to be in the top 5 in all
of God's purposeful, awe inspiring creation. Right up there with the
cross & empty grave of Jesus Christ, the love of God that put Him there, my
gorgeous wife Jamie and a steak Medium Rare.
Hope is
God's way of saying to us "Don't Give Up!" "Don't Give In!"
"There is more to be tasted, more to be seen, more to be enjoyed".
Hope is God crying out in the loudest of voices, through the human
experiences of pain & pleasure, suffering & joy.
Hope is wired into our souls. The Scriptures tell us in Ecclesiastes that God has placed eternity in the heart of man, so that we would seek him out. This simply means that we will all face crisis, and we will all need hope, because our hearts our born knowing that there is more to life than what we taste, touch, smell, hear & see. Our hearts know that in this world all too often identified by pain, frustration, shame and regret, that this isn't the way the world is supposed to be, and somebody, somewhere has to fix it.
Hope is wired into our souls. The Scriptures tell us in Ecclesiastes that God has placed eternity in the heart of man, so that we would seek him out. This simply means that we will all face crisis, and we will all need hope, because our hearts our born knowing that there is more to life than what we taste, touch, smell, hear & see. Our hearts know that in this world all too often identified by pain, frustration, shame and regret, that this isn't the way the world is supposed to be, and somebody, somewhere has to fix it.
But not all that glitters is gold, nor is all that promises hope, able to follow through. This is where we frequently fall. Our drive for hope is so overwhelmingly strong at times that we will grasp at whatever straw is in front of us to fix us. And herein hope becomes a double edged sword that can either drive us into the arms of our all-powerful, all-loving, all-problem solving God through Jesus, or can turn our hearts into what John Calvin called "idol factories". This is where we run from the true God, and as Romans 1 says, we exchange the truth of God for the lie that something created can hold our hope better than the one who created it. We run from sports teams, to shopping malls, from politicians to rock stars, from legislation of law in government to legislation of the soul in religion, all with a life driving desire to find in them a hope that can sustain us, motivate us, and fix us if we just click our heals and repeat a mantra. The sad part in it all, is that there really is "No Place Like Home", but we oft fail to see that the Home of the Soul is with God, and that the front door has been busted wide open for us to walk through, by Jesus' death, burial and resurrection as the one and only way for us to find rest, forgiveness for our idol worship, and true hope that can not only sustain, motivate, and fix but can also deliver everything that it promises us.
And so I ask you to join me in celebrating hope. I pray this blog will be a place where the economy of hope, or HOPEnomics as I call it, can help us all pursue Jesus as our one and only true hope.
