A Message of Hope

Someone once wrote that without hope, one cannot live. To live without hope is to cease to live.

There is a great deal of truth in those words. In the frequently challenging and often frantic world in which we live today, hope, for many people, is something that seems to be in short supply. There are potentially many hardships of life that might cause sadness, loneliness and despondency.

Yet hope is one of the key Christian attributes and one of the most important gifts that can be offered to humanity today. Nothing brings hope back to life like Easter. For the Easter message gives us hope in a sometimes bewildering world and hope provides us with the fortitude to face the uncertainties of the future.

The morning of Easter Sunday always arrives as an optimistic and refreshing reminder that there is a better tomorrow, a rainbow after the storm, healing after hurt, light in the darkness and hope amidst despair. A time of renewal and regeneration. Those who live on the ‘outside’ of hope can take comfort in the story of Easter.

Before dawn on the third day, a miracle occurred. When astonished people visited the tomb that morning, they found the stone rolled away and the body gone. They were asked by angels, “Why do you seek for the living One among the dead? He is not here, but He has risen just as He said”. (Luke 24:5-6; Matthew 28:6)

One cannot fully explain all that happened on that first Easter day, but something inspiring and reassuring did occur against all odds, defying conventional logic. And this hope in the resurrected Jesus still gives birth to hope today. This hope can encourage and inspire us in our own lives too.

The prayer of St. Patrick perhaps frames it in a better perspective:

Christ be with me, Christ before me,
Christ behind me, Christ in me,
Christ beneath me, Christ above me,
Christ on my right, Christ on my left,
Christ where I lie, Christ where I sit, Christ where I arise.
Christ in the heart of every one who thinks of me, Christ in the mouth of every one who speaks of me, Christ in every eye that sees me, Christ in every ear that hears me. Salvation is of the Lord Emmanuel – Christ with us. So, may your salvation this Easter, O Lord, be ever with us wherever we are.
Amen.

Fr Chester Lord 
School Chaplain