Hope and No Hope

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27th January: Hope and No Hope

Brothers, we do not want you to be ignorant about those who fall asleep, or to grieve like the rest of men, who have no hope. 1 Thessalonians 4:13 (NIV)

When my predecessor as Editor of the Medical Journal of Australia died, he left two instructions about his funeral service. One was that I should give the address. The other was that the service should conclude with the Hallelujah Chorus. The first of these was for me no only a great honour but a great joy, for all the sadness of his passing, I had worked closely with him for ten years, and he, who was many years my senior, had treated me like a younger brother. He was by no means a sanctimonious man, for he loved life. Nor was he a noisily religious man. But I had come to know him as a man of deep and thoughtful Christian faith. In that respect the bond between us had strengthened, especially in his later years, when his thoughts had turned more and more to Christ and his redeeming love. I was able to tell of that when I spoke at the funeral service. And his second instruction brought the triumphant sound of the Hallelujah Chorus as witness. He was one of those of whom it can be said with glad sincerity and with no false piety;`Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord' (Rev 14:13).

But Paul does not hide the other, darker side of the picture. One of the loveliest pieces of music that I know is Sibelius' The Swan of Tuonela, music that is utterly beautiful and utterly sad. It tells of the swan in Norse mythology which moves for ever around a lake in the world o the dead, carolling a mournful song. The cor anglais sings this song with heartbreaking sweetness and melancholy. It is a song in which there is no hope. It tells of those who are without hope and without God in the world (Eph 2:12).

Do we value enough the hope that we have?

And do we care enough about those who have no such hope?

Thank you, Lord God, for the sure and certain hope we have
in Christ. Help us to care more about those who have no
such hope.