My wife and I returned from two-year European expatriate assignment and we looked forward to conveniently driving to my parent’s home on Christmas Day to see family rather than flying international. My siblings and their spouses previously agreed to draw names for gifts, and to limiting gifts to a nominal amount as this greatly simplified our Christmas shopping.
We passed out the gifts and did rounds of one-by-one gift openings. Although it seemed a bit too ‘controlled,’ this process allowed time for each person to open a gift with the entire family participating. I found joy in sharing in each other’s excitement, almost as if I received the gift. When it was my turn, I opened a small rectangular gift that was from one of my siblings. It was Barack Obama’s new book, The Audacity of Hope. There were grins around the living room since I was, at that time, one of the more conservative members of my family. I chuckled and said, “This is the book I always wanted to read!” After laughter from my family, the rounds of unwrapping continued.
When I receive books as presents, I read them. Over the years, I have greatly enjoyed reading these books because these books opened new avenues of thinking outside my biased selection of books. I knew about Barack Obama after he won the 2004 Illinois Senate seat which propelled him to national prominence. He was a young, highly educated black man with a booming voice that exuded self-confidence and public ease. Oprah Winfrey promoted him on her Chicago talk show. He was politically inexperienced and was running to be the next President of the United States at the age of 46. I dutifully read his 375-page book on hope.
Obama’s hope was for politics to be different. He decried the bitter political partisanship exhibited on campaign trails and in Congress. He was an idealist who called for the nobility of spirit as reflected by the founding fathers. He dreamed of another political world without the need to raise millions of dollars of campaign funds or court the media for attention. Obama wanted to tackle the problems that faced the nation and find bipartisan solutions. He truly desired a radically hopeful political consensus. His hope was audacious because for almost all Americans, his dream seemed so unrealistic given the political reality at the time.
Obama’s campaign started slowly and was considered a long shot because his Democratic primary opponent was Hillary Clinton, the wife of a former president. She was the front runner for the Democratic nomination and had garnered the early campaign funding and political endorsements. Slowly, over the course of the primary campaign, Obama’s political rallies grew. Then he won the Iowa caucus as a black man in a white midwestern state. Suddenly, people started believing in his message of hope.
In our secular post-modern world, a hopeful person is more likely deemed foolish and naive. Being cynical and pessimistic is a sign of intelligence and worldliness. Imagining the world as something other than dark and cruel is viewed as being unrealistic. Obama’s message, regardless of his political views, transplanted hope into the negative political arena. His youthful and energetic countenance uplifted his followers who wanted to change politics. Hopeful people breed hope in others.
Christian hope is defined as the “anticipation of the future as the fulfillment of God’s purposes based on God’s covenant faithfulness and the resurrection of Jesus Christ as known by the work of the Holy Spirit in the church.” (Westminster Dictionary of Theological Terms) While Obama’s hope centered on transforming US politics, Christian hope is focused on transforming creation. It is during Easter that we celebrate the audacity of hope, the resurrection of a dead person to life eternal. On Easter morning, Christians celebrate a glimpse of the new creation while surrounded by a sinful world. Obama’s slogan was “Yes we can.” Christians shout on Easter morning, “He is risen.” and hear in return, “He is risen indeed.”
I leave you to ponder hope with the words of the Apostle Paul, who carried the hopeful Christian message into the suffering Roman Empire. He planted churches around the ancient world and wrote hope-filled letters. His greatest epistle was to “God’s beloved in Rome, who are called to be saints.” (Romans 1:7)
“I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now; and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies. For in hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what is seen? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.” (Romans 8:18–25)
