Hope

Psalm 31: 21-24

1 Peter 1: 3

John 14:1-4, John 20: 19-22

Hope

When the explorer Shackleton was on his quest for the South Pole in 1914-15, his ship the Endeavor was trapped in ice and he was compelled to leave some of his men on Elephant Island. As his ship was crushed and sinking he knew he had to try to find help. He promised that he would return for them. He took the best boat they had, strengthened it with materials salvaged from the ship Endeavor, and went on a 500 mile journey to find help at a base station further north. But when he tried to get back, he found a sea of ice between him and the island.

What should he do? He had promised, and he felt he had to keep his word. He tried to reach them, but failed. He tried again and again, but without success. Beyond the ice were his trusting companions, who had every confidence in him. They had only a few supplies with them. At that time of the year it seemed stupid to hope for any favorable change in the weather, and he was told that there was absolutely no hope of getting his little boat through the great ice barrier to Elephant Island.

He could not stop trying. He must reach his men; so at the risk of losing his boat and the lives of his crew, he pushed in nearer to the island; and unexpectedly there came an opening in the ice. He hurried in, rescued his men, and in an hour was back again with all on board. Had they been delayed only a few minutes, their frail vessel would have been destroyed by the crashing of the ice as it closed in.

When they were sure they were beyond danger and the nervous tension was over, Shackleton said to one of the rescued companions, "Well, you were packed and ready, weren't you?" "Yes," came back the reply, "we never lost hope. We believed you would come for us, even though circumstances were unfavorable. You had promised, and we expected you; so each morning we rolled up our sleeping bags and packed all our equipment, that we might be ready." And now they were all safe and homeward bound, happy that they had been prepared daily.

Before Jesus departed from this world, He left a definite promise in John 14:1-4. The Lord does not go back on his promises.

Hope. Webster’s dictionary defines hope as “the feeling that what is desired is also possible, or that events may turn out for the best; to look forward to with desire and with reasonable confidence.”

When Jesus was crucified, the disciples were completely without hope. They felt the last 3 years had been for nothing, and they were afraid. Even after Peter and John had looked into the empty tomb, and saw for themselves what Mary Magdalene had said about the tomb being empty, they still did not understand that Jesus had risen. They went back to their homes. Then Mary saw Jesus in the garden, and went to the disciples and told them about it but still they were so afraid they stayed locked away together. They had no reasonable confidence. Jesus had to appear to them directly in that locked room, before they understood and before their hope was restored. That the disciples saw happen on that day we know as Good Friday was a terrible thing, so terrible it would leave anyone who saw it without hope. They were crushed. Their hopes for a bright future for the Israelites were crushed.

The God we know in Scripture is a God deeply, personally, involved in our lives. A God who feels deeply the loss of every life, and the suffering of a nation. "Since my people are crushed, I am crushed," says the Lord. "I mourn, and horror grips me." There was nothing “good” about Good Friday. Not for the disciples, not for Jesus, not for God. It was not something our loving God wanted to happen to his Son.

The message of our Christian heritage is hope within redemption. Yes there's good, and yes,
there's evil; but good is never pure, and evil is never irredeemable. So the gospel offers us hope, a reason to believe with confidence. Neither earthly good nor evil is absolute. And the thrust of history is toward the heavenly good, toward the will of God. But we arrive there not by perfection, but by a continual process of healing, of death and resurrection, of conversion.

For Christians, the central hope of our faith remains the life, death, and resurrection of Christ. Christ's death was at the hands of both human good and human evil. In the hindsight of history, we look back on the events between Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem and the crucifixion as culmination of evil. However, most everyone who helped get Jesus hung on the cross thought they were doing it for a good reason. Rome wasn't bad as Empires go. They were pretty tolerant. But it couldn't tolerate a person like Jesus—especially the local officials who were afraid he might start an uprising when the city was full of Jews wanting out from under the Romans. Judas thought he was doing the right thing by identifying Jesus to the guards who came in the night. When he realized what he had done, he committed suicide in remorse. The High Priest Caiaphas had good reasons for believing it was better for one man to die for the sake of many and maintaining the peace. Pontius Pilate thought he had made a good decision by giving the Priests and people a choice. But that didn't make him right. Jesus' disciples were frightened for their lives. That didn't justify their cowardice. Humanity couldn't tolerate God in human form, so we killed him. It was a terrible evil.

But God redeemed that evil act by raising Jesus from the dead. Jesus asked for forgiveness for those who put him on the cross, and God extended forgiveness to Jesus' murderers by raising Jesus from the dead. God offers hope for humanity in raising Jesus from the dead.

This is not good defeating evil. It is God taking evil and transforming it into good. We too, as Christians, have an obligation to work to transform evil into good. Each of us is called as a Christian to do what we can to counter the bad things that happen around us. We are called on to carry God’s love to others, not just through our gifts in the offering plate, and not just to our friends or people we know and like. We are called upon to give and to forgive, as Jesus gave and forgave.

Sometimes what we can do may seem very small and unimportant in the larger scheme of things, but we never know just how important a little act of kindness may be, how some small thing we do might bring hope to someone else.

In 1994, daily the city of Sarajevo was under siege. Mortars and artillery fire instantly transformed once beautiful buildings into rubble. Sarajevo's citizens were frightened, weary and increasingly despondent. Then, one February day, a mortar shell exploded in the market killing 68 civilians. Many more were wounded and maimed from the blast.

A cellist with the Sarajevo symphony could no longer stand the killing. He took his cello to the market, sat down amidst the rubble and played a concert. When he finished, he simply took up his instrument and left.
Every day, for 67 days, until the shelling stopped, he came to the market. Every day he played a concert. It was his gift of love to the city. He did it because he felt his community needed hope.

Because of the hope given us by the Resurrection, we are called upon to give others hope. We are called upon to play music in the midst of turmoil, draw a cross in the dirt, wipe the tears of a stranger. Jesus said, “As you have done it to the least of these……….”

Hope is music in the heart. It is a gift given to each of us to see us through the night. Once you have lost hope, you have nothing left to lose. Utter hopelessness kills everything it touches. But hope gives us strength to continue, whether it be a marriage that is worth saving, a life that is worth living or a situation that is worth salvaging.

In the end, hope is a spiritual thing. When all is in chaos and ruin, hope is the knowledge that the music still goes on. In this vast and infinite universe, we are not alone. There is a God, and he loves us. He loves us so much he gave his only begotten Son.

During those times when all may seem to be crumbling down around you, can you hear the music in your heart -- the song of hope? Listen carefully. It is there, playing for you. Amen