Standing on the Promises by Lewis Smedes

Author:Lewis Smedes
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: ebook, book
Publisher: Thomas Nelson
Published: 2010-04-27T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 17

HOPEFUL PEOPLE MAKE

REGULAR REALITY CHECKS

Puff on pipe dreams and you get the smoke of illusion. Sniff illusion and you get the first whiff of hopelessness. Hope needs to stay clear of illusions and stay on track with reality—not confined by reality but not out of touch with it either. This is why we need to make an occasional reality check on our hope.

Let me suggest a few checkpoints.

Am I actually hoping for this or do I only think I ought to hope for it?

Preachers are forever reminding believers like me that God promises us some wonderful things which we ought to hope for. The burden of knowing we ought to hope for them tempts us to pretend that we really do hope for the things we are supposed to hope for. We sing old gospel songs of hope like “Standing on the Promises” even though our hearts are frozen by fear into a lump of despair. We read Bible passages about being born again to a living hope while hope floats dead in the swamp of our aching spirits. We get into such a habit of using the vocabulary of hope without ever experiencing the power of hope that we lose touch with what is real and what is pretend in our hoping.

So maybe a reality check on hope is especially vital for religious people. But religious or not, we all need to ask ourselves: Do we really wish for the good things we say we hope for, and do we really believe that they are possible?

Do I hope for it or am I only curious about it?

Everybody likes to have inside information on how things are going to shape up in world affairs on the way to the world’s end. But curiosity about what is going to happen is not the same as hoping that it will. Not even when we feed our curiosity on ancient biblical predictions tailored to our times by imaginative interpreters.

Do I have a sound reason for believing that what I hope for is possible?

We need more than a wish and a dream to support our hope. We need sound reasons for believing that the things we wish for and dream about are possible. People who want to be more hopeful need a nose for the difference between reasonable hope and pipe-dream smoke.

Do I get enough sleep?

Sometimes what hope needs most is a good night’s sleep. Sleep-deprived people are inclined to be hope-deprived people. So a check on our sleep habits is at the same time a reality check on hope. For some of us, the way back to hope is the way back to bed.

Is my body’s chemistry in balance?

Chronic hopelessness comes with chronic depression just as chronic depression comes with chronic hopelessness. When the two of them hitch up, they drag us down into the darkest valley of dark despair. And the cause may be, not a failing of the spirit, but a rogue chemical in our biosystem. When this is what is going on, the way back to the light may be a prudent prescription of well-tested chemicals.

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