A Revelation of Hope

Life ain’t easy. It really isn’t. There’s a war going on and a pandemic we’re recovering from. There are exams to stress about and bills to pay for. So much to do and yet so little time we have.

The buddhists say that life is suffering, and in a way it is true. As Christians, we believe that our suffering comes from the sin of Adam when he and Eve were tempted by the devil. But enough of the blame, the fact remains that life is not always good.

There is death all around us, and it is not pleasant. Even if we believe that they will go to heaven, letting go of our loved ones is always hard. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. We sense sadness in our everyday lives. Sadness from disappointment, sadness from sorrow, and especially sadness from regret. To quote Noblesse, “regret is such an extravagant emotion.”

Each day we think, “I wish things will be better.” I’m sure I’m not the only one who thinks that. For all our exclamations of faith and joyfulness and perseverance, it would be hypocritical for me if I said that I didn’t wish that God would do more to alleviate our lives.

St. Paul taught us the three theological virtues: hofalo — or at least that’s how I remember it. Hope, faith, and love. For numerous reasons I can’t really explain, I’ve always been drawn to the virtue of hope.

Hope is what’s most important to me. Hope is the fruit of faith. Hope is the foundation of love. Only if we have faith can we hope for something, and only if we have hope can we love something. Hope is what drives me up from bed each morning. Hope is what gets me saying “tomorrow will be better” every night. In these troubling times, it is now more important than it ever was, to have hope in our hearts.

And what better hope can we have as Christians than to hope that God will wipe our tears away forever? In an admittedly selfish way, I hope that one day, when my time on earth is up, I can reach the Kingdom of God to be reunited once more with all the loved ones I lost along the way. And when I do reach Heaven, I hope that I will suffer no more and finally attain peace in the presence of God.

St. John, in his revelation of the New Jerusalem, aka Heaven, described it in detail. It is a beautiful pericope, a triumphant resolution to the tumultuous stories throughout the Bible, and especially the Book of Revelation. It is a fitting ending with beautiful promises after a whole book filled with suffering. Amongst those promises, I have one that I hold really closely to myself. And here it is, the promise made to all His people:

“‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death’ or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.” ~Revelations 21:4