The Healing Journey

April 21, 2025

“We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope.”
— Martin Luther King, Jr.

Hope is one of the three theological virtues, which include faith and love. Sometimes hope is the least understood when we need it the most. It is easy to lose hope, but hope is something that we must ultimately cling to, especially when the future seems grim. The following excerpt from the book, “Transforming Grace: Becoming Thoughtful Men and Women of God,” offers a perspective that especially applies to those grieving:

“Hope is the road on which we travel through suffering safely. Hope protects us from idleness in the spiritual life in that there is no greater call to do our spiritual work cheerfully then when we are suffering.

“Being convicted about hope is the way we immunize ourselves from cynicism, which might be somewhere near the opposite of hope. When we sustain a series of sufferings, we can find that our hope is flat. We may kick it, metaphorically speaking, throw water on it, and even try to shock it electrically through our favorite scripture or devotion, and what occurs? Nothing. Hope does not leap. Hope sometimes lies still. This is a frightening state of affairs. But a person often only recognizes a suffering in another when he himself has suffered….

“Let us look to Jesus on Easter Sunday morning. Imagine he is sitting outside of his tomb, which had enclosed his broken body that is the remnant of his expired humanity. Death had seemingly overcome him. There was no evidence of his divinity visible to human beings as the stone was rolled across the opening of the tomb.

“But hope is a funny thing. It is like oxygen in that it is invisible. It is like the wind in that it can often only be recognized by its effects….

“Who would deny they feel the spirit and presence of their ancestors who have gone before them if only for an instant in hope? It’s something like oxygen. We must be careful never to pollute it, deny it or damage it. The resurrected Christ lives in each one of those who welcome hope, and we must never be more certain of this than when we are suffering desolation.”

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