The Discipline of Hope
It’s a discipline, you know.
And like any discipline we can get out of the habit, we can lose our ground.
And when we are approaching Year 3 of a worldwide pandemic, and life as we have known it has changed, and the media screams fear, and the population frets and scatters, it can be tempting to fall off the wagon of hope.
It can be tempting to fall into the pits of despair – and yes, they are pits – and yes, many fall. In his famous allegory of the young pilgrim, John Bunyan called this place the Slough of Despond (or the Swamp of Despair). Yes, many a pilgrim has fallen into this swamp. John Bunyan seems to allude to the swamp as an unavoidable part of the Christian journey. In this place, our doubts, fears, and sin overtake us, and the only way through is the helping hand of our Savior.
In John Bunyan’s book, there are 2 that travel through the Swamp of Despair - one by the name of ‘Pliable’ gives up and goes back to the City of Destruction. Christian (the humble hero) makes it out of the swamp as he takes hold of the hand of “Help” (representing Christ), who pulls him out and sets his feet on solid ground.
And if ever there is a time that we need to take hold of the hand of “Help”, it is now. It is not the hand of our own good works or morality, but rather the Help of our Savior. And as we stretch out our hand and lift up our voice for Help, there is a discipline to keep us moving through any pit we find ourselves in.
It is the discipline of hope. The Apostle Paul referred to it as a helmet. A helmet to protect our thoughts as we travel through the quagmire of challenge and the everyday. It’s a helmet many of the heroes and heroines we admire wore as a discipline day in day out.
Nelson Mandela in prison wore hope.
Joseph, sold as a slave, wore hope.
Ruth, bereft and widowed, wore hope.
Mother Teresa wore hope, and the list goes on.
And like all items of clothing and pieces of armour, hope is something that we put on.
The Apostle Paul’s masterpiece on the armour of God includes the Helmet of Salvation.
Ephesians 6:18 Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.
Later in his life, Paul elaborates further on this, describing this helmet as the helmet of the hope of salvation.
1 Thessalonians 5:8 But since we belong to the day, we must stay alert and clearheaded by placing the breastplate of faith and love over our hearts and a helmet of the hope of salvation over our thoughts.
And the more we pop this helmet on, the more hope becomes a habit – and like any good discipline, becomes engrained in our daily routine.
Romans5: 3 Moreover [let us also be full of joy now!] let us exult and triumph in our troubles and rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that pressure and affliction and hardship produce patient and unswerving endurance. And endurance (fortitude) develops maturity of character (approved faith and tried integrity). And character [of this sort] produces [the habit of] joyful and confident hope of eternal salvation.
So, be encouraged, sweet people, as we exercise the discipline together – The Discipline of Hope.
Happy Wednesday All.
Love Kirrily xx