The only thing that separates our pasts from our futures is the present. It is both the frailest and strongest of dividers. Nothing can ever go back, and though nothing can truly come forward, we have the ability to reach back and hold onto the past. It is this present, this very moment upon which everything hangs. At least this is so in the mortal world. In the eternal world there was a climax. It happened 2000 years ago.
Hope is based on the future. What we can make of it and what can happen. Faith fuels hope and can send it into a burning frenzy. Such is the burning eternal hope of the Christian faith. In this mortal world, though, hope is often elusive. Maybe it’s that we in this world we are chained to our senses, and when the fear comes we often let go of hope.
We must always remember that we serve whatever it is we fear. If we fear standing out, we serve conformity; if we fear financial situations, we serve money; if we fear how people see us, we serve vanity; if we fear loss, we serve control; if we fear rejection, we serve the rejecters; if we fear the dark, we serve the darkness; if we fear God, we serve love. What we conquer we do not fear. We may shudder in the darkness, we may cry in the lonely nights, we may scream in the frustration, but when we press forward we conquer that fear.
We are more than conquerors…if we choose to conquer this darkness in this present moment.
