The oxygen of hope

Rev Dwight Fletcher

For 21 months straight, the headline has been COVID-19. What it is … how it is spread … sanitisation practices … number of infections … clusters … vaccines … death. As we try to keep track of all the news, it seems that whatever little hope we were able to muster throughout the day is snatched as we are bombarded with everything that seems to be wrong. At the end of conversations with others, we are often left to wonder how we will survive.

The book of 2 Kings chapter 6 tells a similar story of a very difficult period in Samaria’s history where God’s people endured much suffering. The country of Samaria was in desperate times – they were under siege for so long that a severe famine had set in. The famine was so great the people resorted to eating unclean animals like the donkey. This was a big deal for them as eating unclean animals made them unclean and thus separated them from God, according to their Law.

While this was an awful situation to say the least, it was not the worst. The king passed a woman who told him a chilling story about being so desperate that she ate her own son. In their moment of distress not only were the people going against God’s law but they were also going against natural law and eating their own children! It is clear that hopelessness to this point of desperation had overcome the people of Samaria. It slowly eroded their peace and sensibility and despair soon set in. When we despair, it tends to impair our judgement and we cannot see things as clearly.

So it’s crucial for us to not just have an optimistic hope in a better future, but the rock-solid unflinching type of hope that can only be found in our faithful God. Like Samaria, we as a global community are going through our own difficult period and we need hope to sustain us. Unmet expectations, joblessness, health concerns and financial woes are legitimate concerns that people are facing now. If we are not careful, the feeling of hopelessness can easily turn to anxiety, sorrow or pain and then despair – the complete loss or absence of hope.

A number of years ago, researchers performed an experiment using rats, to see the effect that hope had on those undergoing hardship. Two sets of laboratory rats were placed in separate tubs of water. The researchers left one set in the water the entire time and found that, within an hour, they had all drowned. The other rats were periodically lifted out of the water and then returned. When that happened, the second set of rats swam for over 24 hours. Why? Not because they were given a rest, but because they suddenly had HOPE! Those animals somehow hoped that, if they could stay afloat just a little longer, someone would reach down and rescue them.

God recognises our need and declares to us that He is our hope. The Psalmist said, “My hope is in You” in Psalm 39:7 and this hope could not be more needed than at a time like this.

The Swiss theologian Emil Brunner once said, “What oxygen is to the lungs, such is hope to the meaning of life”. If hope holds such power for unthinking rodents, how much greater could its effect be on our lives! But we each have to determine that we will take hold of this hope to keep pressing through.

Next week, we will delve deeper into what the Bible gives us as the antidote for hopelessness.