Grace and peace to you. And Happy Advent!
It is during this season of Advent, which leads into Christmas, that the sanctuary of St. Mark is filled with the color blue. It is the color that represents hope in our tradition.
The apostle Paul writes in his letter to the Romans, “May the God of hope fill you will all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.” Being hope-filled people is not always easy. It never has been. The Bible, from beginning to end, shows example after example of the struggles people endured, even while — and also because — they worshiped the God of hope. This includes the apostle Paul.
To be clear, hope here isn’t some pie-in-the-sky aspect of our lives, such as hoping to win the lottery. It isn’t even about being optimistic about, say, how we are hoping a new calendar year will be better than the current one.
In his book, Theology of Hope, Jürgen Moltmann writes about how hope is independent of people’s circumstances. Hope is grounded in the faithfulness of God. Hope is based on the possibilities of God regardless of how things are.
The hope we have is rooted in our faith in the God of hope. It is the God of hope who sacrificed all God had to bring true and everlasting hope to this broken world, and to save this world, by coming to us as a helpless and defenseless baby who would grow up to be a man who would die on a cross only to rise again!
I like how the apostle Paul writes for God to have us be overflowing with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit isn’t giving us just enough hope for ourselves. It is giving us an abundance of hope. So much hope that we can carry hope, bring hope, and proclaim hope to the world, especially to those who are in seasons or times when they feel little or no hope. As members of the body of Christ, we can share and embody the message of this hope for others. We can see, listen, be with, and support those who feel hopeless. We can remember how the God of hope comes into the valleys of our lives and walks with us.
This Advent, our midweek worship services are based on a series titled, “Restore Our Hope.” The services are held 6:30pm each Wednesday on Zoom and Facebook Live, and they go for about 30 minutes. Each service includes prayers, readings from Isaiah and reflections on those readings, and music from some of the musicians at St. Mark. I invite each of you to take time during your busy week to come to these services and hear the hope-filled good news that God has for each of us.
Finally, my family and I want to wish all of you a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! This St. Mark community does embody and shines brightly the hope that God gives and wants each of us to have! We carry that hope with us as we walk with Jesus and with each other into 2025!
Pastor David