Well, we've been through Lent and some of us are glad that it's over. We feel the same way about some events and periods in our lives. Sometimes we feel like a bad time is going to last forever. But it's funny how, as my mother used to say, "This too shall pass." We go through dark times but we usually end up learning and growing from them and getting over them.

Easter is the hope that God offers during bad times, a light in which we can believe even while we're still in the darkness. The resurrection of Jesus Christ is the action of God in the world, a paradigm for hope in all valleys and dark journeys of our lives.

I believe that every Christian's middle name is or ought to be "Hope." Hope is really the major characteristic of a Christian. Hope is faith in things unseen (to paraphrase St. Paul). Anyone can believe in what they can see, touch, and feel.

But the real issues of life, love, loss, death, fear cannot be resolved by anything we can see, touch or feel. They can only be dealt with by the Grace of God through hope, and the greatest symbol of hope in Christendom is resurrection, God's power to raise anything and anyone from the depths.

Copyright ©2003 Calvary Episcopal Church

This article first appeared April 20, 2003 in The Chronicle, the newsletter of Calvary Episcopal Church, Memphis, Tennessee.