Sharing hope

Wednesday in the Third Week of Lent

 

Sustain me according to your promise, that I may live,

and let me not be disappointed in my hope.

Psalm 119:116

 

I walk into the room filled with colleagues that I haven’t seen for three years. Suddenly, my heart swells, expelling an ache I hadn’t known was there and I am astonished at the unexpected tears. I can hardly identify the feeling. Relief? Grief? Something else? I didn’t know how much I was missing all this life, until I see it now.  

 

And it is vibrant life. I am surrounded by beloved, faithful partners in the task of holding out hope. We are all weary from the road we have been traveling. And the journey has changed each of us. We are, at the same time, like wayfarers meeting at a resting place along the road, and like far-flung relatives gathered around the table at a family reunion.

 

I identify the feeling: gratitude. What I see in the faces and hear in the voices of my friends is hope realized. And the acknowledgement that this is God’s doing. We are not, and have never been, in this alone. And in this very act of gathering, God renews our strength for the journey.