Pastor's Corner: Hope, not optimism

This past Sunday, did you light a candle on an Advent wreath? If you did, what was it called? Some churches might have called it Love, or Peace. At First Lutheran, we lit the candle of Hope. No matter the order, all Advent wreaths I've ever met have had a candle of Hope.

Hope. NOT optimism. In day-to-day conversation, we might use hope and optimism as synonyms, like one farmer saying, "I'm hopeful we'll get a lot of moisture soon," and his buddy replying, "Yeah, I'm optimistic so far." But if we dig a little deeper, there's a crucial difference between hope and optimism.

Optimism is based on extrapolating from cause and effect and thinking that the outcome is going to be positive. The reasoning goes: Since this happened, we can conclude that is likely to happen. For example, if my toddler currently likes to sit with a pile of books and "reads" them out loud to herself, I can be reasonably optimistic that she'll be a good reader when she starts school. If we feel the Chinook winds blowing, then we can be optimistic that some of the icy patches will melt and we don't have to be at war with the sidewalks and the outdoors. This kind of informed, grounded optimism is important in many spheres in our lives, from eagerly anticipating your next meal at your favorite restaurant will be just as good as last time, to expecting that your retirement investments will grow over time. But optimism is not hope.

Hope is expecting that there will be a good outcome not because of the solid reasoning of cause and effect, but because of the gracious, miraculous workings of God. Hope is grounded on God's faithfulness, not our calculations. As one scholar puts it: "In the Bible, hope is not the anticipation of a positive outcome based on our reason (that's optimism); rather, hope is the anticipation of a positive outcome based on God's trustworthiness." We light a candle of Hope because, as Jesus says in Luke's gospel, "your redemption is drawing near," and that is a promise of God, not a cause that we effect.

Or, as the book of Hebrews puts it, "Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful." (Hebrews 10:23)

I had a dear, dear friend in seminary, and I was struck by how much of a pessimist he seemed to be. He'd counter that he was a realist, and it was just that the reality of the world was pretty bleak. When it came to things in the news, or even the dating lives of our friends, he rarely extrapolated a positive future outcome from the available data. He might not have been a pessimist, but he was definitely NOT an optimist. And yet he was one of the most hopeful people I have ever met. He believed-believes-so strongly that God has acted and is acting and will act in this world to set all things right. Maybe not fully in our lifetime, but sometime, God will redeem this world, is already redeeming this world. God will wipe away all the tears from our cheeks. God will cause trees to flourish where once were bombed out piles of rubble. God will save us from ourselves, starting even today, even right now. This is not optimism. This is Christian hope. This is what my friend taught me. This is what our faith teaches us.

Hope thrives in times when even the most optimistic person sees only reasons for despair. If darkness has descended upon you or your world, you do not need to try to persuade yourself that things aren't as bad as they seem. You don't need to force yourself to be optimistic or be more positive or pretend that you don't feel as bad as you might at times. Instead, think of these familiar words from the book of Isaiah: "The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who lived in a land of deep darkness-on them light has shined" (Isa. 9:2). This is what our Advent preparations are all about: clinging to the promise that something radically new is coming. That a great light has come into the world, and the darkness has not, will not, cannot overcome it. Our redemption is drawing near. Not because of any cause and effect. Not because of anything we do to deserve it. But because God promises it. And when God makes a promise, nothing can be more certain.

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Pastor Megan Hoewisch

First Lutheran Church