Studs Terkel was a fine writer who wrote often inspiring books about the strengths of common people. Recently I picked up one of Studs Terkel’s last books at a thrift store for a dollar. It was published in 2003, and I love its title, Hope Dies Last. It has the subtitle, Keeping the Faith in Difficult Times.
The title comes from a comment by a farm worker (Studs seldom quoted “big names” but usually “the little guy”); in this case, it is a farm worker laboring stooped over in the fields before the time that Cesar Chavez organized the United Farm Workers. She said, “We have a saying, ‘La esperanza muere ultima.’ Hope dies last. You can’t lose hope. If you lose hope, you lose everything.”
The Bible is book of hope. Reading it can give you renewed hope. In the book of Isaiah we find a passage about hope in chapter 40, verses 28-31. The Word proclaims – “He gives power to the faint and strengthens the powerless. Even youths will faint and be weary, and the young will fall exhausted; but those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint” – that last section breaks through as words of hope to those who have seemingly lost hope.
I suggest that these are words of hope to any of us who experience loss of any significant kind – the death of someone dear to us, to be sure, but also our own health, a job, a significant relationship, a marriage, self-confidence, a sense that life, essentially, is good. Sometimes we lose all that we depend on, and we are ready to lose hope. And the words of the prophet ring out, “Have you not known? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth.” There is a history beyond human history upon which you can lean. Ah, the old hymn, “Leaning on the Everlasting Arms of God.”
These words of hope that are found in the 40th Chapter of Isaiah can be a refeshing drink for us in times of need. This is the chapter which begins, “Comfort, O comfort my people, says your God.”. Originally, these are words directed to the faithful Israelites living in exile in Babylon. But they have a resonance and power for all of us who are grandfathered into Abraham;s blessing by Jesus Christ, and they still have power for us today.
Isaiah preaches to us, "Even youths will faint and be weary, and the young will fall exhausted; but those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.”
Jesus Christ brings that power which renews us, gives us new life, “born again,” we say. But Christ brings rebirth in other ways than conversion, or the knowledge of who we are in Christ, as important a first step that certainly is for us.
Sometimes being “born again” is not an ecstatic spiritual experience but the slow thawing of a frozen soul, chilled to the bone by death, by loss, by regret, by difficult bosses and even harder jobs, by layoffs and firings and the perils of unemployment.
Wait on the Lord. He will renew your strenth. He will take us to a new "normal." In him we see the hope which sees us through and returns us to a solid place. In Him, we can find the strength to never give up, to keep on going, to be reborn in the midst of difficulty. In Him, we find the fortitude to let our greater hope defeat the tough times of life.
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