Hope through lent week 5 Hope for future! I don’t know about you, but it feels pretty impossible to think about the future and how it could look during the ongoing restrictions of this pandemic. I seem to live with a constant hesitation to plan or HOPE for anything. The questions of when can we go on holiday? When can we see family? When can we start meeting up with friends? In January 2020 we were renting a home, that we had lived in for 10 years. It was a 2-bed house, and my 2 daughters had to share a bedroom. In that January after 10 years of wanting to buy our own home, and for my girls to have their own room, I prayed, and I asked God to help me achieve this. Move forward a year and even with lockdown we have purchased the house, the home we lived in for 10 years, off our landlord and have built an extension to provide an extra bedroom. I have to say that last January this seemed impossible, and even more so with the pandemic. It’s not as if this happened overnight, and it wasn’t without its battles, but it was a desire of my heart as a father: to provide for my family, and for my girls to have their own room. Which they now have. I know this might seem like a pretty selfish cry out to God, but for me at the time it was real, and God met me in that place. Question: Have you ever asked God for something that seemed impossible? Jesus dies on the cross Read Matthew 27:32-56 Crucifixion must be one of the most monstrous of all human inventions. Whipping sometimes preceded crucifixion. The condemned man was whipped with thongs of leather to which pieces of bone or metal had been attached There were times when people died as a result of this beating. Next the victim was nailed through their hands and feet to a wooden cross, which was then lifted to a vertical position and fixed firmly in the ground. He was then simply left to die. He was not killed immediately - just impaled in a position from which escape was impossible and left there until dead. By sheer instinct the person would struggle to keep alive throughout this torture. Under their own weight their body would slump forward constricting the lungs and restricting breathing. But again, and again, despite the intense pain in pierced hands and feet, they would heave their chest upwards to draw breath - in an attempt to stay alive. Ultimately death would come as a relief but only after hours and hours (often days) of indescribable agony. Jesus died after six hours on the cross, and Pilate was amazed that he had died so soon (Mark 15:44). I acknowledge that our current circumstances are in no way as extreme as the trauma of the crucifixion, as this was the most horrific form of execution. Yet there is a connection here: there is something powerful about choosing to sacrifice our daily norms for the sake of protecting other people. During lockdown, social distancing, wearing a mask, home schooling have all become the norm. It feels so long ago that I was able to go and meet friends, go on holiday and pop to the shop without checking for a mask first. A single year has changed 40 years of habit! Question: What has become surprisingly ’second nature’ to you during this past year? And I wonder if it was a bit similar for the disciples whilst Jesus was on the cross, suffering this intense pain and torture. The last 3 years were filled with healing the sick, ministering to the poor, eating together, hoping together and fighting over silly things like who was the greatest. I bet all of those moments seemed so distant and seemingly detached while they saw Jesus hanging there, dying on a cross. But that is only because they didn’t really understand what Jesus had been saying all along. They didn’t see the big picture, they didn’t fully realise that this wasn’t the end, but the beginning of the fulfilment of the promises of God. “There is a hope we find in the phrase ‘the promised land’. With Christian hindsight we now see that the ‘land’ is not a specific area of geography. Rather, the territory of the Kingdom of God—the ultimate promised land—is the heaven-on-earth space which Jesus now inhabits by the Spirit in and through the Church: you and me.” David P.Seemuth Jesus' death on the cross allowed us all to enter into the promised land God had prepared for us! A space where, wherever we are, we can live in complete unity with God through His Spirit. A place full of HOPE and freedom, a place where heaven meets earth. And this could not have been possible without Jesus giving up his own life on that terrible cross. So, what does that mean for us now? What lessons can this teach us about hoping for a future we can’t always imagine? Like me wanting to buy a home with enough bedrooms for my girls, it is ok to ask for what feels like the impossible. Question: Is there a situation in your life that seems impossible to overcome? In any situation, even in the pain of lockdown, God can bring the freedom and hope of heaven on earth. It may not be in the way we think or plan in our minds. Just as the cross bringing freedom to mankind wasn’t the way the disciples thought Jesus would do it. We have full exposure to the Spirit of God now and can experience His freedom even within our own restrictions. Freedom to be and live in heaven on earth. Freedom to HOPE for a future of his ‘kingdom coming on earth as it is in heaven’. So keep hoping for a future of freedom from your situations. Pray and cry out to God for that future to come. HOPE can be hard to find, but it is always there. As we enter into the fifth week in Lent I want to share some challenges for the week to help us find HOPE and share HOPE with others. Actions: Write down the things you are hoping for, regardless of how insignificant they may feel. Pray to God for each one Share them with a friend or homegroup so you can journey and pray together for them If there is a way you can practically meet the hopes that a friend shares, maybe think and pray about whether you can be the answer to their prayers. “Hope...Sometimes that's all you have, when you have nothing else. If you have it, you have everything.” Unknown