Hope is a fuel that enables us to live by faith and not by sight. Many of us find it easier to languish in despair than we do to live in hope, for despair (which is from a word meaning a lack or absence of hope) is fuelled by the visible. It requires vision and commitment to live with hope, to refuse to believe that what we see with our natural eyes is the final story.
Jeremiah, living at a time of oppression and invasion, bought a field in Anathoth. (Jer 32:1-29)
That must have seemed a ridiculous thing to do, because the Babylonians were about to take over the land and owning property in an occupied country does not seem like a wise investment. Eugene Peterson, in commenting on this chapter, says ‘All acts of hope expose themselves to ridicule because they seem impractical, failing to conform to visible reality. But in fact they are the reality that is being constructed by is not yet visible. Hope commits us to actions that connect with God’s promises.’ (Eugene Peterson, ‘Run With The Horses’, P 174)
He goes on to say ‘hope acts as the conviction that God will complete the work that He has begun even when the appearances, especially when the appearances, oppose it’ (see Phil 1:6, Rom 4:18) and concludes ‘hope is buying into what we believe. We don’t turn away in despair. We don’t throw up our hands in disgust. We don’t write this person off as incorrigible. We don’t withdraw from a complex world that is too much for us.’ (ibid.)
Jeremiah’s action seemed ridiculous, risible, eccentric, incomprehensible. Others around him must have mocked him for his act of faith. People will do the same when we step out in faith, doing things that seem to make no visible sense. But as William Stringfellow says, ‘hope is living constantly, patiently, expectantly, resiliently, joyously in the efficacy of the word of God.’ (William Stringfellow, ‘An Ethic For Christians And Other Aliens in a Strange World’, P 138) The most practical thing we can do is hear what God says and act according to that word we hear. ‘Hope-determined actions participate in the future that God is bringing into being.’ (Eugene Peterson, ‘Run With The Horses’ P 176) With the benefit of hindsight, we know that the Babylonian invasion was not the end of the story for Israel. We know that Jeremiah’s actions were nowhere near as ridiculous as they seemed. But for us now, living in the middle of our story with God, it requires great faith to hope in God. Ps 42:5 reminds us ‘Why, my soul, are you downcast? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Saviour and my God.’ Keep hoping. God’s not finished with us yet.