80th Annual Village Fair (9:30-1:30) and 10th Annual 5K (8:30am) on August 16th
- Bible Study with Seth is on 21st at 7pm (1st and 3rd Thursday; in person and via Zoom)
- August 17th, we will be joining INC at SAUMC for a Tropical Worship with a Steel Drum Band (there will be no services at CCNOT that day)
- Sunday Discussion Group with Pastor Charlotte Sunday is August 31st after Church (last Sunday; in person and via Zoom)
- Next Death Cafe is September 27th at 4pm (join us for an informal conversation around death and dying that may include curiosities, living well, and managing grief–we provide the sweetness with snacks and coffee)
- Council Resumes in September
Watch the recording HERE. Recording posts after services are complete each Sunday (usually by noon).
It was Julia Roberts, Vivian, in Pretty Woman who said that “the bad stuff is easier to believe.” And wow it seems there there is so much bad stuff. We watch the news and it full of bad local news and bad national news and bad world news. Our circles are bigger than they have ever been with our network of friends and friends of friends and friends of friends of friends. Every where we look one of our friends is dealing with a big load of “bad stuff”. It’s splashed all over our televisions and feeds.
Then, we have what’s happening in our circle of influence. Those we have tea with and study with and talk with and read bedtime stories with. Sometimes, by the end of the day, we’re so exhausted and overwhelmed by the “bad stuff” that we don’t have the energy even for those within our circle of influence.
It’s very easy to begin believing that these times are more “bad” than they ever have been. Like it’s more awful than it’s ever been before. Like, this time, for real, the end is near.
This isn’t really new. It’s been “awful” since before Jesus was crucified on the cross–it’s why the Story was and is so relevant. People have thought the end was near since the beginning before the beginning and in nearly every single time of war and blight that has come before this time of disturbance and unrest.
This is nothing new. We’re still human and humans are still human. We behave with such incredible goodness and such terrible badness. We create and we destroy. We love and we hate. We injure and we forgive. We doubt and we have faith. We despair and we hope…
Thank goodness we hope.
We need hope. Hope makes us stronger, stronger in the Courage sense of strength. Hope makes us wiser. When we have little or no hope, when we despair, we are more susceptible to believing things that are not true. We are more likely to go along with whatever is being told to us. We don’t check the facts. We don’t ask questions, or think, or ponder. We don’t “test” what’s being told to us. We just go along with it.
And yet, hope is a central tenant to the path of Jesus. Hope clears our lenses (spiritually and psychologically) so that we can see just a bit more clearly. Things may be not so good, but they are also very good. People do terrible things, but they also do incredibly wonderful things.
In Jesus’s time, there was a lot to despair, but one of the gifts of the Jesus Story is that people prepared and hoped. We still prepare, and practice and hope. Regardless of time, we are still children of God (of Grace, of the Universe; we’re Spiritual Beings).
It’s the Mystery of “already” and “not yet”. And within that lies hope. Perhaps in hope lies what we Believe in and what we believe in in the meantime. Perhaps hope is what we’re waiting for and what we’re working toward in the meantime. Hope is a power to motivate us to think and plan and do and prepare.
Hope is a core and necessary tenant of faith. We cannot lose hope just because things seem “harder than they’ve ever been”.
Hope is not optimism. Optimism is often based on happy results, whereas hope can survive and thrive within and through challenge. Hope thrives in the bleakest of times. We’ve seen this in our histories. Optimism may not include action and follow through, whereas hope relies on action and follow through.
Hope is human action. Hope is us. It is a Belief that we have planned well and are going in the right direction. That we are on the right path when there are so many paths before us and that, as messy as it all seems, we are headed toward something Good…even if we cannot see it. And that good requires our individual and collective work.
Brene Brown defines hope as an action, engagement, a verb, not an emotion. It is the ability to make clear (and achievable) goals, to follow the path, and believe that we are on the right path toward that goal. It is the possibility that comes with our intellect and skillful use of that intellect.
The interesting thing is that while hope is not an emotion, hopelessness and despair are emotions. They arise out of a lack of hope. A lack of hope is the inability to create a goal (we don’t know what we want; we can’t figure out or choose a path). There is an inability to act or follow through on that path. We don’t believe that we’re on the right path or that there even is a right path anymore. We struggle to believe that it matters. We can see this in our own lives and in the bigger picture around us.
Despair leads us the believe that when one thing goes wrong, everything is wrong, or even we are wrong (shame). For those who have not dug so deeply into words, shame and guilt are different. Guilt is “I have done something wrong”. It can be a mistake, an oops, and an opportunity to do better in the future. Shame is “I am wrong.” Guilt comes with hope and possibility. Shame is the beginning of the road to despair and hopelessness.
If hope is necessary for seeing clearly and understanding and comprehending, we need hope to make wise choices in our lives and for the world around us. Maybe by having hope, we can slowly make a dent in the belief in falsehoods. By having hope we see clearly how our own small individual actions do create change for good. Hope makes us wiser, that’s nice. Despair makes us less wise, that’s not so nice. We need hope.
Hope means engagement. Engagement being the opposite of disengagement. Hope is a keystone of healthy communities. People coming together to get the Good Work done. No wonder hope is such a central tenant on the path of Love.
Without hope, we are less wise, we think things like: I won’t be around to see it, why bother? Or…that’s not “my” problem. A lack of hope makes us small and isolated. The human intellect married with hope is the ability to see our connectedness. Connection to the the past, our ancestors and the wisdom and knowledge that has come before. It is also to see our part in a future for our children, and children’s children, and all the good that we have to pass on.
Hope is a skill. Skills are learned, honed, and strengthened through practice. Hope is learned through setting realistic goals, following the path set out by those goals, and the belief that it is a worthy goal. Hope as a skill is using our intellect to choose wisely and with Grace and then do the work on that path to the best of our ability. Hope is the motivating factor within which we know better. We know better and we follow through.
On a big world scale, it doesn’t matter that we will not see see things through to the end. The important thing is that we are part of the path to that end that we collectively believe in. That we are a small piece in what matters most.
We’re not just waiting and hoping and doing, but becoming a part of the web of goodness. We know what we are called to do and we do it. We continue to do and follow through because it matters.
Hope is the keystone skill of trust and faith and belief. Hope is the keystone of our reciprocity and our part with one another, God, and Creation.
God of Original Goodness, lead us into this week with our eyes alight on hope. Turn our eyes to see what Goodness is being done all around us. Tune our ears to hear words that bring us hope and lead us toward the path of Love. Guide our hands toward actions that lead toward Tenderness and Hope for our fellow humankind and all beings. Amen
*If you need a little hopeful support: Jane Goodall’s Reason for Hope is a great book. Brene Brown also has much to say about hope.
Community Church of North Orange & Tully 