POH

As I was reading a book last week three words jumped out at me and wouldn't let me go. It was one of those times you read something and think "huh, thats a interesting" but keep on reading, only to find out about three hours later that the phrase still hasn't left your mind and it keeps getting bigger and bigger. The book didn't focus on these three words but I have a feeling that in a few months one of the only things im going to remember are these three words. Have I stirred up enough suspense to give them to you yet? I suppose so, drum role please.....'prisoners of hope'. Kind of anti-climatic wasn't it. I apologize if I let you down, it seemed more dramatic in my head, I guess you'll have to wait three hours.

All around me (and in me) I see despair, poverty, failure and I think does God really exist? Is there really any power in Jesus? If I was to answer this question out loud I am quite sure that I would say yes, but I think that deep down a part of me really wants to say no. How can all this stuff be true yet the church be what it is and the people who they are. How can I be a 'Christian' and look and think like this? I feel trapped between hope and despair. Kind of like the disciples huddling in a small room wondering what went wrong "how could our hope have been killed on a cross?" "How could we have let ourselves be vulnerable to the idea of hope, well it won't happen again, I'm not falling for it twice"--'Doubting' Thomas. It's probably the reason Thomas wanted to touch the hands of Jesus, the last thing he wanted to do was to give in to hope again, " there's no way im going to get crushed again under the false notion of hope again it hurts too much". I suppose this is why when picturing the disciples I always most associated myself with Thomas. Jesus knew Thomas wasn't doubting the way we think of doubt, he didn't need evidence to 'believe' he needed evidence to hope again, he was scared that Jesus really did raise from the dead, he was scared to place his hope back in Jesus. It probablly took him 3 days to harden his heart enough to believe that he never really hoped in Jesus in the first place. Hearing Jesus was alive just wasn't enough to break down that hardened heart.

However, can you imagine the joy in Thomas when the hands of Jesus were felt and the hardened heart was broken with hope restored. I think hope may be one of the hardest things for Christians caught in this time of "not yet", living in a world that has been redeemed but not fully. We have a foot placed in two realities, the one of a fallen world and the one of a redeemed world. One day the redeemed world will be the only reality but "not yet". It is placing my hope in the redeemed world that I find so difficult. Too often my eyes decieve me into believing some circumstance is more powerful than Jesus. I think this is why I love the phrasing so much. Prisoner has a dark and negative connotation while hope gives the impression of light and joy. Endearing the idea of "not yet".

I would have no other foundation to believe this phrase had Thomas not touched the hands of the living Jesus after his death on the cross. It is a hope that is greater then death and all that resides in this fallen world. It is in this hope where I find freedom to live as if there is more then what I see. I now realize that Easter is the cell in which I find myself a prisoner of hope. It's dark in here but I can also see a light.