Hope: The Antithesis of Depression, Deaspair, Loneliness, Hate, Oppression, Disease, Hunger, and Death. -or- My Bad, It's Valentine's Day

The one great word I know, that when it is even said quietly by broken voices makes something deep inside my chest burn, is “hope”.

Our situation on this volatile, shifting, spinning and slightly tilted place is heavy with both the weight of a thing we call gravity, and the futile, short, and (in the words of one of our wisest) “meaningless” lives.

Our time here—those of us living and breathing now , those who have lived and breathed with us and just before us, and likely those that will live and breath in the coming days months and years—is spent walled in and roofed over by a variety of epidemics.

For some, there are the epidemics of disease; cancers, AIDS, and other names of things that basically all mean that our own bodies have let us down.

For others, there are epidemics of oppression and frustration, hunger and hate, ignorance and apathy.

For still others, (even those of us who have full bellies, comfortable residence, leisure, and who often live as ignorant and apathetic oppressors and frustrators of others), we are faced with the epidemics of depression, deep pangs of loneliness, and despair.

For all of us, there is the epidemic of Death. We like to ignore this in our own culture, and we don’t do death well; usually awkwardly and uncomfortably. But for all of us, we have a slot of years that end in lifelessness. That end as decay and death buried under dirt. There has been no escaping this death; this epidemic that while we deny its hold on us, still slides its finger down our backs from the moment our heart first beats.

But there is a story, that seems so hard to find and hear at times today. A story that changes things. A story about a man who came to free us of our epidemics. We are offered hope. We are told that we do not have to be so alone, and that when the epidemics of sadness and despair arise; we are offered comfort, peace, and quiet rest. For the oppressed and frustrated, there is freedom, empowerment, and release, even in the very midst of the struggle. For the hungry; there is the call to fill bellies and dispense love. For the diseased there is hope of healing. And for the Ultimate Epidemic—for the ever-waiting and ever-threatening “End,” for our oldest enemy Death—there is the hope of Life. The Defeat of Death. The promise of all-things-new and an epidemic-free existence. Hope that there is Life the way that it is meant to be.

But don’t believe that that is the whole story…

With our slot of epidemic-ridden life, we are offered to live in the Hope now. We are offered the opportunity to dispense hope in pieces. We are offered minds and skills and gifts to heal the sick, and at the very least comfort them. We are offered the job of being advocates for the oppressed, feeding the hungry, and dispensing love instead of hate. We are offered to share hope in such a way with one another that the pangs of loneliness, the sorrow, depression, and despair, can become fleeting side-stories to our being of Love, and Peace, and Joy. And all of this, in the very face of our epidemics, in the very face of death and dying and hopelessness.

This is what captures me about the Story. I am not ashamed to say that I need this story, and that the world needs this story. We need this story not to come to us in conquest or forcefully, or in argument or in trickery. We need the story to come just as He came; humbly and quietly, with love and patience and care.

Do not let your epidemics own you. Be free. Hope and give hope.