What can I hope for? ...

Tuesday, Nov 1, 2011. May I speak about my dreams and my hopes? It can be quite personal to talk about hopes. But it is an important topic! If we do not hope any more, we are stuck, in this case our life does not move forward any more and change is difficult. Hopes are a key part of our life!

Hopes …

Hopes are different from dreams. When I dream, I am creating a szenario how things could be. Dreams do not need to be realistic or even fit into a realistic world. There are fantastic dreams and many of our night dreams are images which express things in very strange pictures and szenes.

But hopes have a kind of realism. They need to be realistic in the sense that they can become truth. They can be fulfilled. It might be unclear to us how it can happen. But hopes should be possible, in principle.

When I hope to find a partner, for example, then in principle that is possible. The hope talks about some basic human desire. And I want that it becomes reality for me. I can hope to earn enough money to support my life. That is another realistic hope, even if I am currently unemployed and do not know how I could get back into a job.

Biblical Promises …

The bible takes up hopes and fears. It talks about the things we want. It talks about the things we try to avoid. That is one of the many fantastic features of the biblical books: they are so very realistic. They know how humans think and feel. Hopes and fears are addressed and guided.

The bible talks about our hopes - but they are not just confirmed or fulfilled. It is different with this book of life. The bible transforms our hopes and our fears. In the light of the eternal God, things change. Hopes are not destroyed, they are taken very serious. But they are not just answered. God wants us to find “true life” - and that also means that transformation is needed.

Biblical hopes are linked to biblical promises. God gives us promises. He talks about what he wants to do, and he talks about our future. He links our future and our hopes to his agenda for this world. We will sort this in more detail over the next days and explore hope, that is based on God's plans. (Roland Potthast) ... more texts