I am an avid sports fan. I often record the games of my favorite teams so I can watch them later. (Skipping commercials is wonderful in itself!) In order to avoid learning the outcome before I watch the game I have to steer clear of television sets that might show the score. I also have to tell people who might know the outcome not to tell me, or even hint to me, how the game ends. No matter how I try, though, now and then I accidentally learn the outcome of the game before I get to watch it. One time, my favorite baseball team was playing in a big playoff game, and I learned the final score before I actually watched it (my team won!). I still watched the game and at times found myself actually nervous (old habits die hard), but kept reminding myself, Remember, we win. You know how this ends, Jim, so don’t get discouraged.
Paul wrote to the Colossians, “When Christ…is revealed, then you will also be revealed with him in glory.” Paul is pointing to the return of Christ, something that United Methodists, along with several other traditions, affirm in the common liturgy: “Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again” (italics mine). The return of Jesus has been an important belief for his people from the beginning to the present. We live in a broken, troubled world. Things around us fall apart; marriages and governments and economies collapse. We find ourselves making a mess of our lives from time to time and it forces us to wonder, Are we going to make it? Will everything be alright?
What Paul is saying in Colossians 3:4 is the same truth I told myself while watching my tape-delayed baseball game: “Remember—we win.” The return of Jesus will be a full and final consummation of a battle that has already been won (on the cross and in the tomb). In this verse, Paul is counseling the Colossians to set their minds on this truth. He wants them to think about that glorious day and to know—to know with certainty and not merely wish for—how it all ends. There is a word for this certainty in a good future: hope.
Hope is not wishful thinking; it is being certain that the future is bright.
Hope gives us confidence. Hope gives us assurance. Hope enables us to trust, to have faith in the present moment, no matter how bleak. Hope gives us peace in the midst of strife. Hope brings us joy in times of sadness. Confidence, assurance, trust, faith, peace and joy are things that make life wonderful, they give us strength and courage, realities that make us sleep well and work hard. As long as we have hope we will never give up.
Only the Gospel, the good news, of Jesus can make this happen. The rest of the world looks to advances in technology and medicine and politics in hopes that new gadgets and pills and bills will ensure a happy life. But they always let us down. They cannot make a dent on the reality that, while defeated, the devil, sin and death still exert a partial force over human life. Only the reality of the resurrection, and its final consummation in Christ’s return, can bring us the confidence, assurance, trust, faith, hope, peace and joy that will make our lives magnificent, the kind of life we were made to live.
Taken from Hidden in Christ: Living As God’s Beloved by James Bryan Smith. Copyright ©2013 by James Bryan Smith. Used by permission of InterVarsity Press, www.ivpress.com.
