Risk Frustration

"To hope is to risk frustration. Therefore, make up your mind to risk frustration." -from New Seeds of Contemplation by Thomas Merton

Too often I find myself unwilling to hope. I find myself willing to wish, but less often willing to hope. In wishing, I conjure up an ideal that I am not willing to take part in and therefore have no hope of actually experiencing. In hoping, I realize that I must participate and accept the consequences of that which I am hoping for.

If I wish for peace on earth, then I am content to simply imagine a world in which there is no strife or meanness of hatred. I don't actually believe in it, nor am I willing to work for it.

If I hope for peace on earth, then I am expected to turn the other cheek, to love my enemy, to sell what I have and give it to the poor. I must be willing to make the sacrifices that come with hope.

Morgan Freeman's character, Red, famously spoke the tagline to the movie "The Shawshank Redemption" -"Hope is a dangerous thing. Hope can drive a man insane."

At the very least, it can bring frustration. Because that which we hope for means that which we are willing to work for, and sacrifice for, and die for. And those sorts of things take time. The impossible can take awhile.

But it can still happen. And does happen. And has happened. And is happening. In the person of Jesus and through His Spirit at work in us, we see the impossible being made possible. Being made possible by the one and through the one who calls us to hope. Who offers us a new beginning and a new way and a new life, but only a life that begins with death, only a way that leads to a cross.

In "The Shawshank Redemption", the main character, Andy Dufrense, gets free from prison by crawling through a sewer pipe the length of five football fields. Red sums up his sacrifice this way: "Andy Dufresne - who crawled through a river of shit and came out clean on the other side."

Sometimes freedom means a river of shit. Most times hope means frustration. But that doesn't mean you shouldn't hope, it just means you should risk frustration.