{"id":342,"date":"2010-08-24T08:43:29","date_gmt":"2010-08-24T08:43:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/thinplaces\/2010\/08\/the-frightening-nature-of-hope.html"},"modified":"2010-08-24T08:43:29","modified_gmt":"2010-08-24T08:43:29","slug":"the-frightening-nature-of-hope","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/2010\/08\/the-frightening-nature-of-hope.html","title":{"rendered":"The Frightening Nature of Hope"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

The first Christmas after Penny was born, we were singing “O
\nLittle Town of Bethlehem.” It contains the lines, about the baby Jesus: “The
\nhopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight.” And I remember
\nthinking about how frightening it was to have hope–to look to the future and
\nexpect God to work, to expect good things even if they might be difficult, to
\nexpect joy. But God gave us reason to hope in the gift of our daughter, and we
\nhave held onto our hope for her ever since. It isn’t so scary anymore.<\/p>\n

I was reminded, though, of the frightening nature of hope
\nwhen I read Psalm 22<\/a>. It begins with a cry: <\/p>\n

My God, my God, why have you
\nforsaken me?<\/i><\/p>\n

And even after this cry was memorialized in the Psalter, Jesus
\nmade it all the more well-known. He chose these words as he hung on the cross.
\nBut the Psalmist goes on, immediately:  <\/span><\/p>\n

You are enthroned as the Holy One; you are the praise of Israel (verse
\n3).<\/i><\/p>\n

It’s not the hurt of the Psalmist that frightens me. It’s
\nthe hope. <\/p>\n

The Psalmist has nothing other than his faith in God. In
\nGod’s goodness to him and the people of Israel in the past. In God’s continued
\npresence. This Psalm isn’t expressing doubt. It is simply acknowledging that
\neven faith in God does not protect us from feeling abandoned by God. <\/p>\n

But even from a place of abandonment, the Psalmist insists
\nthat it is not God’s way to abandon or forsake forever. His cry is not a cry of
\naccusation. It is a cry that expresses the reality of his experience without
\nquestioning the reality of God’s presence and goodness.  <\/span>The Psalmist gives us details. He is in
\nthis forsaken place because of the evil of human beings. And he realizes that
\nGod is his only hope. <\/p>\n

Towards the end of the Psalm, the tone changes. Instead of
\nquestions, we receive proclamations: <\/p>\n

For God has not despised or disdained the suffering of the afflicted
\none; ?<\/i><\/p>\n

he has not hidden his face from him but has listened to his cry for
\nhelp (verse 24).<\/i><\/p>\n

From the earliest days, Christians have interpreted this
\nPsalm on two levels. One, as yet another instance of honest prayer before a
\nfaithful, listening God. Two, as a reference to the faithfulness of that God
\nthrough the death and resurrection of God’s Son, Jesus. Some scholars interpret
\nJesus’ cry on the cross, the “cry of dereliction,” as evidence that he had lost
\nhis faith. But others claim that Jesus was drawing attention not only to his
\nown feeling of abandonment, but to the entire Psalm. The abandonment, the
\nfaith, the desperation, the hope.<\/p>\n

For Christians now, this Psalm offers us a reminder of where
\nto turn when life circumstances press in on every side, a reminder that only
\nGod remains faithful forever. And it reminds us that Jesus’ forsakenness did
\nnot end in separation and death. It ended in resurrection hope. He cried out as
\nthe forsaken one. And because he was forsaken, we can proclaim the final lines
\nof the Psalm, our living hope:<\/p>\n

Posterity will serve him; future generations will be told about the
\nLord.<\/i><\/p>\n

They will proclaim his righteousness to a people yet unborn–<\/i><\/p>\n

for he has done it (verses 30-31).<\/i><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The first Christmas after Penny was born, we were singing “O Little Town of Bethlehem.” It contains the lines, about the baby Jesus: “The hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight.” And I remember thinking about how frightening it was to have hope–to look to the future and expect God…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":88,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-342","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-faith","category-family"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Frightening Nature of Hope - Thin Places<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/2010\/08\/the-frightening-nature-of-hope.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Frightening Nature of Hope - 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Two major life experiences have shaped her writing and her faith\u00e2\u20ac\u201dcaring for her mother-in-law as she battled cancer and welcoming her daughter Penny into the world after she was diagnosed at birth with Down syndrome. Both experiences expanded and enriched her understanding of what it means to be human and to receive each and every person as a gift.\u00c2\u00a0 A graduate of Princeton University and Princeton Theological Seminary, she is the author of Penelope Ayers: A Memoir, and the forthcoming A Good and Perfect Gift (Bethany House). Her essays have appeared in First Things, The Philadelphia Inquirer, The Christian Century, ChristianityToday.com, and Bloom, among other online venues.","sameAs":["http:\/\/amyjuliabecker.com"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/author\/amyjuliabecker"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/342","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/88"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=342"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/342\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=342"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=342"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=342"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}