It’s the Hope...
It’s the Hope...
There’s a line from the show Ted Lasso that’s become iconic. Ted asks a fan, disconsolate about a crucial upcoming match, why she doesn’t have more hope in the team. Her answer sounds like wisdom earned the hard way: “It’s the hope that kills you.”
The line works because everyone in the room understands exactly what she means. Hope can feel dangerous. It opens us up. It makes us invested in an outcome, and that investment makes us vulnerable to disappointment.
So we learn to keep our expectations low. We assume the worst and hope to be pleasantly surprised, rather than risk having our hopes crushed. Most of us know that sting: the job that fell through, the relationship that ended, the diagnosis that came back wrong, the prayer that seemed to go unanswered. Somewhere along the way, many of us learned to protect ourselves by hoping less.
That’s what makes this week’s epistle reading from Romans 5 so striking. St. Paul knows that argument—and he runs straight at it. Not the hope Jesus brings, he says, that hope does not disappoint. We boast in that hope. We exult in it. We glory in it. And not only when life is easy, but even in suffering. In the middle of life’s hardest seasons, in fact, we rejoice in that hope.
See you Sunday.
Steve+
NEWS AND ANNOUNCEMENTS
Second Sunday Sandwiches—Sunday following worship.
June Vestry Meeting—Sunday, 12:15pm.
Weekly:
Around the Table—A prayer time for women, Thursdays, 9:00am, at the Wishart’s. Email Lauren for details.
Morning Prayer—Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday, 8:00–8:30am, on Zoom.
Men’s Bible Study—Thursdays, 7:00am, at 1309.
Photo: Getty Images
