Does Hope Make A Difference?
FROM THE DESK OF IELA GALIANO-WILLIAMS
This blog is part of our 2024 Advent series! But can be read any time you need some hope in your season of waiting..
Sometimes the villain gets it right…or if not “right” they at least can be used in a story to illustrate profound truths about human nature.
The villain in on one of my favorite young adult fiction novels illustrates this perfectly with the quote, “Hope. It is the only thing stronger than fear.” And isn’t this a profound truth.
Even the original Christmas villain, King Herod, sought to kill baby Jesus because he knew that even a whisper of a newborn king would be a threat to his rule. It would bring hope to those he sought to oppress & too much of hope was not something he wanted.
Last year, in the first week of Advent, I asked you a simple, but perhaps deeply emotional question, “What are you waiting for?”
Do you remember your answer?
Many things have changed for me since I contemplated this question last December. Some of the things I was waiting for have come to pass, others have shifted, & still others remain in the waiting period.
What I wish I could go back & whisper to myself last year would be this question that I offer us all now; "What difference would hope make in your waiting?"
It is so easy to wait with fear. Fear that what we're waiting for will or won't happen, that it won't be how we imagined it, that we won't be taken care of, that things will get worse…& I'm sure you can keep filling in the blanks.
Yet, what if instead we waited with hope?
As Hebrews 11:1 says, “Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.”
Waiting with hope doesn't necessarily mean everything will shake out how we'd love it to (although let's not forget this does sometimes happen!), yet it is a much stronger companion to take our hand instead of fear.
And so, as we move towards the end of this first week in Advent for yet another year, I ask us all again….what are you waiting for & what difference would hope make in this waiting?
May you use this question with whatever it stirs in you to start a conversation with God & remember that you are never waiting alone.