Accepting Hope

Trinity Sunday; June 3, 2007

Romans 5:1-5

People who follow Jesus Christ in a difficult environment need hope. The people Paul was writing to needed hope, because they lived in a culture that actively persecuted followers of Jesus. When he writes about suffering, he’s not describing the ordinary misery that comes from being alive: loss of loved ones, disappointment in relationships, sickness and pain. He describes the experience of being arrested, imprisoned, tortured and exiled for being a follower of Christ.

Well, actually, there is a modern equivalent to that suffering, although it is not life-threatening nor as painful as what Paul’s correspondents in Rome faced. The modern equivalent is the result of making difficult choices because of your loyalty to Christ. It is the struggle of the teenager who refuses to become sexually active out of a Christian commitment to the importance of marriage. It is the struggle of parents who do not let their children participate in activities that conflict with their religious life. Milan told me about a time he was coaching football and the father of two of his players spoke to him. The father said, “Will you have practice on Wednesdays?” Milan said they would. “Well, my boys go to confirmation class on Wednesdays, so if you’re having practice on Wednesdays, then my boys won’t be on the team.” Milan decided the team didn’t need to practice on Wednesdays. Those parents who would make the decision that father made know what Paul is talking about.

Christians who choose to live more simply in order to have enough disposable income to give to the Church, to artistic and educational purposes, and to direct services to the poor – and therefore sacrifice some of their pleasures – know what Paul is talking about. Christians who struggle to forgive, rather than demanding recompense, who pray for their enemies, who actively practice peace-making: they all know what Paul is talking about. They need to know that their testing means something, that their sacrifice is worth it, that suffering will lead to something good.

And so Paul tells us that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope. Suffering for the sake of Christ produces hope. It’s too bad that he wrote it in such a way as to make it sound automatic, because you and I know that suffering does not necessarily produce endurance. Suffering produces whining, and whining produces victim-mentality, and victim-mentality produces emptiness.

Hope is the gift of God, a gift that is confirmed by the love of God poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit. The work of the Holy Spirit makes the difference whether suffering results in hope or in emptiness, but you and I are not completely helpless in the situation. There are things we can do in order to work with the Holy Spirit in order to accept hope, so that our own trials will produce endurance, and endurance produce character, and character produce hope, a hope that will not disappoint us, but will keep us going through suffering and trial, going on toward glory.

Two things come to mind. One: I have become a believer in positive self-talk. Saying affirmations to yourself really can change your attitude about things. When a dear friend was struggling with his job, I asked my brother – who works for a big firm and has a lot of experience with these sorts of things – how I could help my friend. He said that in most bad situations there are only two things you can change: your environment and your attitude. My friend could get another job, or he could change his attitude about the job he had.

There is a lot of value in short, affirmative statements that you can say to yourself that will help your attitude about your trials in Christ. “God made me and God doesn’t make junk.” “God loves me.” “Christ died for me.” I was a bit troubled when the youth group at a previous church selected as their theme for the year, “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.” That seemed more like resignation than affirmation, but I think it helped them. Statements like this cannot save you; they help because they are true and positively affect your attitude. It is still the work of the Holy Spirit to shape our character in response to suffering, a character that produces hope.

The second thing you can do is to know enough about the way God works so that you trust the good will of God for you. It suddenly struck me: the principal purpose of Bible study is not to increase our cognitive understanding about God, to add to the body of facts we have. The principal purpose of Bible study is to know deeply and intimately the stories of people who have been involved with the living God. Which stories influence you: stories from the Bible, or your favorite sitcom, reality show, or movie?

God made three promises to Abraham: that he would have innumerable descendants, that they would have a land of their own, and that they would become the source of blessing for the entire world. God kept all three promises – they took a long time, especially the third one – and anyone who gives up everything Abraham gave up needs to know the faithfulness of God. The people of Israel spent forty years in the desert, formative years, but challenging years – facing hunger and thirst, not to mention enemies. The stories of those years are sobering, but wonderful, reading. And you know what lay at the end of those forty years: the land of milk and honey.

Slaves running from the South toward the North, following the Drinking Gourd (the Little Dipper), finding help from the Underground Railroad and aiming for the Promised Land beyond the Jordan River (the Ohio) knew that story. They knew the troubles of the people of Israel and they knew the faithfulness of God who led them across the Jordan.

You will find the stories not only in the Bible but in the histories of churches, in the lives of the saints, and perhaps even in your own family’s memories. You need to know the stories of God’s faithfulness, the stories of those who have suffered in the name of God but always lived in hope. They are the stories that nurture our hope, that shape us to be able to accept hope.

Work on your attitude and know the stories of the faithfulness of God. That is your part and mine. God will do his part: God will be faithful, and God will seal in our hearts a hope that does not disappoint, through the Holy Spirit that God has given us.

God of hope: fill us with all joy and peace in believing, so that we may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Robert A. Keefer

Westminster Presbyterian Church

Clarinda, Iowa