Hope
March 16, 2025
I tend to get too “wordy,” and I hope this fault won’t be confusing anyone and trip them over my many words. My purpose is to inform, enlighten, and reassure readers of the pragmatism, reasonableness. and reliability of God, Jesus, and the Bible, and there are already too many opinions to stumble over… Don’t stumble over this one…
Something my wife and I have published on this topic before. Yet, I still feel the need for more emphasis and clarity, because many people still do not understand about being “born again.”
It is so essential, having to do with living fulfilling lives constructively and generously and having an enduring eternal consequence.
Without being born again this eternal cosnsequencce remains invisible, a ship beyond the horizon.
Not at all guaranteed by our birth, not at all assured by joining any group — religious or not — but when we have a hunger for truth and righteousness and justice, then please consider what I have to say.
Individuals have to apply themselves to a process of introspection before proceeding.
Without the realization that you and I are contributors to what is untrue, what is unrighteous, and what is unjust, if we cannot even consider that we have done harm or hurt to anything or anyone ever, if we only look for excuses or to blame other people or things… That would not be generous, nor constructive, nor fulfilling.
That way of thinking is just a maelstrom, and your ship will founder and your life will end up shipwrecked. Without a change in the course of your life you will be lost at sea.
But God has provided the stars as guides for the sailor. He has provided a map for us, showing how to make course corrections so we can find our way to safe harbor.
Patty and I already started listening to Him and we have found that safe harbor, and we are now anxiously awaiting for the last leg of our journey.
Now, I suppose my drifting off into allegory has been confusing to some, but I wanted to try to paint a picture for those who are more visual learners than good listeners or actual experiential learners.
Now let me get past the Blame Game and anchor from sailing the ocean blue…
Changes. The need for personal changes, once noticed, might make us try to change ourselves or sometimes just accept, as fact, that “it’s just the way it is.”
I don’t like that latter choice — probably because I suffered so much depression for so long a time. To me, fatalism strikes me as giving up without a fight, and that doesn’t seem to be a way to proceed through life happily or productively. It seems to miss the mark. It seems to me to be an unfulfilling way to approach life.
Here’s something encouraging from the Bible:
Jesus said, “I have come in order that you might have life — life in all its fullness.” — Good News Translation (GNT)
One of the first things to know that maybe you have heard differently is this next quote
“For God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not die but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to be its judge, but to be its savior.” — John 3:16–17, GNT.
From my life experience, I know working one’s way to God is sometimes like hacking your way through the jungle with a dull machete to cut out all the growth blocking the pathway.
Some of the things that have to be cut through range from experimenting with drugs to hacking your way through false teachings, from self-doubts to egotistic hangups, from people who do us harm to an uncaring world which helps no one — not only things that trip us up, but things that completely turn us off like how various groups treat us.
Both Patty and I have individually discovered that we ourselves or our families or our friends or any other people or methods, philosophies or religions had the capacity to be as our life guides, rescuing us from that jungle, clearing that overgrown path for our long trek out.
Saying it another way, “A person has to clear the air in order to breathe.”
Now, Jesus had an enlightening conversation with a Pharisee named Nicodemus (John 3:1–21).
At the start I was surprised that after Nicodemus’ formal, polite, and complimentary intro, Jesus abruptly took him in a whole different direction. He skipped the formalities and answered what the Pharisee really had on his mind…
“Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the signs you are doing if God were not with him.”
Jesus replied, “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again.”
I can just picture Nicodemus becoming suddenly alert, responding in his mind, “Say whaaat?!?”
Now, I suppose, people who aren’t seeking answers to Life’s Questions, have no such questions about life, let alone curiosity about God, Jesus, and the Bible. I understand that.
Growing up and for some time after, I didn’t either.
Maybe, also like me, they’re content where they are or have no suspicions that there is more to life than meets the eye.
On the other hand, I have read many essays of folks who have chosen to go another way or to seek out another person for the answers, usually in other rote philosophies or religious rites.
Sooner or later they will discover such paths are dead ends or traps. They seem attractive at first, but then, many adherents tire of all the demands and strictures imposed — whether in Christian denominations or in mystical hideaways with some version of a zen leader… or “Influencers” perhaps?
There is also this rather strange situation where at some point. people who have been told that they are Christians trip and fall, realizing that maybe they are not Christians at all!
What does the Bible say people trip over? The stumbling stone.
“And why not? Because they did not depend on faith but on what they did. And so they stumbled over the “stumbling stone” that the Scripture speaks of:
‘Look, I place in Zion a stone that will make people stumble, a rock that will make them fall. But whoever believes in him will not be disappointed.? — Romans 8:32–33, GNT.
A further explanation is this:
“For God in his wisdom made it impossible for people to know him by means of their own wisdom. Instead, by means of the so-called “foolish” message we preach, God decided to save those who believe. Jews want miracles for proof, and Greeks look for wisdom. As for us, we proclaim the crucified Christ, a message that is offensive to the Jews and nonsense to the Gentiles; but for those whom God has called, both Jews and Gentiles, this message is Christ, who is the power of God and the wisdom of God. For what seems to be God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and what seems to be God’s weakness is stronger than human strength.” — 1 Corinthians 1:21–25, — GNT.
What I am trying to get at is Biblical hope is much more about knowing than mere thinking — wishful or otherwise.
My wife and I had heard about Jesus but only through the filter of our family church denominations.
That exposure didn’t show us our need to respond. Only after we did decide to turn to Jesus did He become reality to us. Only when we got serious did we begin to place our hope in Him and to really believe God exists, and because of what He gave us: positve outcomes and beneficial changes…
The joy and love that filled us up made us hungry for more, and we began following through the Bible stories and through fellowship with others who had also begun this new life.
It became a very dynamic way to walk throughout our life paths, but it was not a huge struggle to attain. It became a cooperative working together with God, with Jesus, and with discovering the meat and potato realities of the people living with God — which we learned through their dynamic stories laid out in the Old Testament.
God had become near and not some delusional phantasm far off and shrouded with obscure riddles.
Yes. It is work, but about as much work as unwrapping a present.
Yes. We can continue to be stubborn about doing our homework.
Yes, We aren’t instantly little Jesuses running around in some kind of nirvana perfection. But we are given wiggle room to live and learn. We also know that now we are”…being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus .” — Philippians 1:6, NIV.
In other words, Jesus does all the heavy lifting.
It’s like this verse, “Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” — Matthew 11:29, NIV.
Ya know, I didn’t fully understand this invitation, even though my family came from an agricultural background. So, until I read how the yoke worked… …The farmer would take a trained and experienced ox, putting it in one side of the yoke. Then, he would put a younger, inexperienced ox in the other side of the yoke. This would balance out both the training and the power needed to pull the plow.
So, the picture became fuller and complete: Jesus yoked in one side and a new Christian, like Patty or myself, in the other.
That is what it is like being a Born Again Christian.
If a person is not changing in their behavior with the resulting production of good fruits like the list in Galatians 5:11–12, NIV — “…love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control…” Give them time… I would say they may not have been “born again” but have been fooling themselves. Then, too, and more likely, they probably are like that younger ox still having to grow and strengthen, not having become quite ready for the yoke and to be plowing ahead together with Jesus…
There was this song playing in my early years of being born again that said “Take a look at yourself and you will look at others differently.”
As I have written before, we all need to stop playing The Blame Game.” Instead of pointing the finger at others’ behaviors, we should take a hard look in the mirror and stop comparing ourselves to ourselves.
Now, I know that this essay has become the longest one I’ve ever published here, and I appreciate anyone who has persevered with patience… So, I will leave with a little bit of lightness:
“Put Your Hand in the Hand” is a gospel pop song composed by Gene MacLellan and first recorded by Canadian singer, Anne Murray, in 1970" — https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki
Young people liked an early version cited below, while the older generation preferred the second one which has a lot of bonus tracks which was a sweet, great surprise for me:
Ocean — Put Your Hand In The Hand (1971) (Original Live Audio)
My final thought as advice, is this: Please consider reaching out to Jesus, because He is reaching out for you.
