Hope in a Lost and Groaning World
As we clumsily stumble into the new year it is hard to not feel a bit lost and overwhelmed. 2020 saw lockdowns happening globally, poverty in our local areas soaring, a racial justice movement, natural disasters and the environmental crisis,terrorism... so much loss and devastation. As we enter another lockdown the novelty of distractions in the form of zoom quizzes has worn off and to be honest, I just don’t fancy making yet another banana loaf.
The Covid-19 pandemic has left us longing for so much both as individuals and collectively. It has also shown us that we all need hope. Sometimes we look for it in something that changes with the seasons of life- putting our hope in a job, or in our friendships, our children, our spouse, our leaders.
Since the pandemic began, a lot of the usual sources of hope have been shaken; with lockdowns removing childcare options and forcing us into closer quarters than usual or the loneliness that comes with living in isolation, job losses, health worries, global leadership concerns. Our hope will be in something, so if it is in something fallible, we can feel totally hopeless. Is there anywhere secure we can place our hopes?
Racial injustice isn’t a new issue to us as a family, particularlyto my husband. He’s the black half of our mixed-race marriage, our Afro-Celtic clan. Issues that I naively thought were distant historical learning curves have been shown time and again as current realities. Since last year we have seen the world talk about racial justice in a way that has happened before, but not in my lifetime. The hope felt in the wake of the devastating murder of George Floyd was incredible, and my black family and friends spoke more about hope than I had ever heard prior to that. Getting lost in that hope, however, led to disappointment when the buzz inevitably died down and overt racism became louder and more emboldened.
Could looking to what Jesus says about racial justice and his plan for creation fill us with the hope we are looking for?When we see how integral justice is to the gospel; stories of overcoming injustice interwoven throughout the Bible culminating in a saviour who paid the price in order that we can be justified before God, we discover that Jesus does actually care. In fact, he fully felt the weight of injustice, treated as unjustly as a person could be. It gives me much-needed perspective to realise the difference between secure hope of knowing he cares for creation and a wavering worldly wish for injustice to cease.
There is a picture created in a letter to the early church in Rome that I really love. It speaks about God’s creation groaning as if with labour pains. Labour pains are agonising(seriously!) but they are not futile. All that powered me through that first labour was thinking of the child I would get to hold at the end. Compare those pains to the pains of a migraine, for example, and the difference is striking. A migraine is fruitless, no rewards wait at the end. If the letterread that we were groaning as if with the pains of a migraine,then the Gospel story would feel very differently wouldn’t it?God not only cares but understands our pain and points us back to himself as our longed-for security. During this overwhelming time, we can groan with the losses andinjustices of the world, of which there are so many, safe in the knowledge that our hope is secure when it is placed in the God who cares.
Kirsten Abioye
Kirsten spends her time in Midlothian juggling life-admin, work, coffee drinking and chronic overthinking (with a bit of homeschooling added to the mix for now thanks to Covid-19!).