HOPE

In my worst moments, I think HOPE is magical thinking. 
It means going against the logic of what my eyes see, ears hear and brain processes to believe that things can get better or turn around.  Without evidence of the potential for change or transformation, it seems like an abdication of one's determination to MAKE change or bring transformation.

In my best moments, I believe HOPE is what I had on a T-shirt some 20+ years ago from Sojourners Magazine - "Hope is believing in spite of the evidence, until the evidence changes."  There is always hope that things can and will change, turn around, be transformed.

The difference is loving faith and action - to be clear, LOVING FAITH IN ACTION.

I believe that prayer is conviction toward action and then in action.
I believe that love is committed action.  I know that of Agape Love, particularly.

My faith is in God's presence and transformative power of hearts and minds.  That happens through voices, hands and feet of people.  God works in relationships.  God works in community.  God works when people find a common faith and love and put them into action.  Lives are changed and transformed in God working through relationships and in community.  The Holy Spirit of God is active and relentless.

I do not ask God to supernaturally intervene.  I ask God to change me and move me to act in this part of God's Kingdom here and now, according to God's will.   I believe that we are in a relationship with God and called to be God's feet and hands, hearts, minds and voices in the world.  Prayer that is asking for God to intervene in the world is an abdication of our responsibility as God's followers.  Love that is a feeling without committed action is an abdication of our devotion to obey Jesus' command to live Agape Love (active commitment/committed action on behalf of the other, even stranger and enemy, and especially the most vulnerable).

My faith in Jesus is a faith in Jesus' Way as God's Way for us and a better way for us to live in this part of God's Kingdom here and now.  I have a deep faith in Jesus' Good News and in the Holy Spirit's relentless pointing to it as OUR way to live in the world, this part of God's Kingdom, here and now.  "Thy Word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path."

"My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness; no merit of my own I claim but wholly lean on Jesus' name."  My hope is that by living Jesus' Way of Agape Love and Grace, others will take note and decide to live it as well, by the moving of the Holy Spirit.  My hope is that it will transform hearts, minds and therefore lives as we repent (change our thinking and therefore our direction, turn around in our way of living.)   All I can do is bear witness to Jesus by actively living His Good News of Agape Love and Grace and let the Holy Spirit do what the Holy Spirit does.

In Agape Love (active commitment on behalf of the other), Prayer (convicted action in this part of God's Kingdom, here and now ) and Faith (an act of trust in Jesus and Jesus' Way), my Hope is transformed from magical thinking into a belief in and work toward Jesus' Way in the world, and the belief that perhaps others will do the same.

So, I still have HOPE.  There is still HOPE.

Pastor Jamie