There is Great Hope Found in Knowing How The Story Ends

I wrote the following a year ago. Sometimes I wonder - when I read things like this - if it wasn't God practicing an article a year ago he wanted to read to me today.

And maybe he wanted to read it to you too?

I love the advent season. I guess my love for it is rooted in this first Sunday. The Sunday of that first candle. The candle of hope.

I learned a lot about hope years ago working with at-risk kids. I concluded what made most of them “at-risk” was the reality they were growing up in situations short on hope. Those kids helped me come to define hope as the answer to the question I think we all ask ourselves every day:

How does this story even end?

Many of those kids were growing up in traumatic situations filled with abuse, addiction, abandonment, poverty and more. Day after day they had to ask themselves, “how does this story end?” I don’t blame them for the less than happy endings they often projected for their lives.

Here’s the thing – once you stop believing in happily ever after in your life – when you lose hope – the chances drastically increase that you’ll start making decisions that achieve that conclusion.

I saw first hand, over and over, what happens when a group of kids without hope gather together. Fueled by a shared hopelessness, they convinced themselves destructive ideas weren’t bad ideas at all. They were simply the most rational pursuit of hope they had to cling to in at that moment.

And I completely understood that.

That’s because even though my situation in life was maybe less traumatic than many of those young kids, I still ask on a daily basis “how does this story end?”

There was a period in my life when I was very non-committal about my answer to that question. My hope was rooted in making it through the day happy - not on how I saw my life concluding. As a result – some pretty bad ideas didn’t sound so bad in my life.

But that was before I decided ALL my hope is found in the Christmas story. The story of a savior coming to earth to bring hope to every story. For every single person asking how does this story end, Christ came to say, “with me.”

More importantly, he came to offer a hope that is more than a thought or an idea we can cling to as an answer in desperate times, he offers a hope we can invite into our lives to reshape the questions we ask every day.

These days, I find myself asking how can I best live my life in preparation for the day I meet that baby in a manger face to face. Whether it’s a good day or a bad day, whether my circumstances are ideal or less than that, I try to ask myself less frequently “how does this story end” and more “how in this moment can I best prepare for the ending I know is coming - that baby in a manger coming again?”

The beauty of my newfound hope in Christ always answers that question for me. He guides me and fills me with the strength to move in the direction of a conclusion with him.

Oh, I screw it up. Daily. But that no longer changes the ending to the story. It doesn't mean there's a new script. With Christ as my hope the ending stays the same.

There’s great hope in knowing how the story ends. There’s great joy in filling your heart with that hope. There’s no better time of the year to share that hope with others.