The Healing Power of Hope

For in hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes
for what is seen? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with
patience. Romans 8:24-25

When I was Director of Pastoral Care at Elkhart General Hospital, I was allowed to invite all of the pastors of the area to a complimentary all-day Clergy Education event. It was not uncommon to have 70 or 80 in attendance and my budget included inviting well-known outside pastoral care persons for leadership. It felt very good when, a couple of years after I left for another assignment, I was asked to be the "outside leader" and chose "The Healing Power of Hope" as our topic.

In my new assignment, I directed a program for severely distressed marriages. People came to hear three couples who had "been there" tell their horror stories and what finally began to bring hope into the process for them. Attending couples had opportunities to reflect alone in writing and then decide together whether they would like to work on their own marriages. The pastors were invited to listen as one of those couples presented their story and then to dialogue with them about their "recovery of hope."

Not too long before, I conducted the funeral for a local physician who died from an overdose of analgesic drugs, and it had never been determined whether this was an accidental death or a suicide. His wife agreed to join us and, with her heart in her throat and a box of kleenex beside her, she told her story, then dialogued with the pastors about where she was in her recovery. The combination was electric, reminiscent of a Faith At Work event.

Mysteriously, hope grew as we linked the marriage stories and grief experienced by patients with long-term illness, moving from denial to what Elizabeth Kubler-Ross calls "acceptance." Such "acceptance" was by no means the same as "resignation." There was something hopeful and obviously "healthy" about acceptance, so that their final days were filled with positive experiences. I knew some who, though not expecting this result, actually began to recover from their "incurable diseases."

What seems to happen is that the whole-being of the person ... could we say the soul of the person ... found a new wholeness. In the discussions which followed, many of the pastors reported sharing similar experiences in their ministries.

This brought us to a "text" which seemed to be playing through the whole event like the ground-base of the organ, underllying other themes of a brighter nature. Hope that is seen is not really hope. It is more nearly "wish;" what we ask the Genie from the bottle if he grants us what we think we need. Acceptance at the end of the grief process is not like the pictures we see in our minds when we say, "If only I could have my strength back ...If only I could live until my daughter graduates ... until Christmas ... if I could finish writing my book ... if I could die without pain ..."

Hope for what we do not see is the trust that all things will work together for good, perhaps in ways we could not dream. Such hope is the healing potion for the whole person already living in some dimension of eternity. True acceptance is the relief which comes when one finally leans back into the arms of the Eternal Lover and says, "OK ... surprise me."