In the book More Hot Illustrations for Youth Talks, the story is told of an experiment conducted at the University of California at Berkeley involving Norwegian field rats. The rats were placed in a tub of water, where they were forced to swim until they grew exhausted and finally drowned. During the first experiment, the researchers discovered that on the average, Norwegian field rats were capable of swimming for over seven hours before drowning.
A second experiment was conducted, exactly like the first but with one exception. When a rat was getting too exhausted to swim any longer, the researchers would remove the rat from the tub of water for a few seconds, then put the rat back into the water to continue swimming. These rats were able to swim for almost 20 hours before perishing. The researchers concluded that the rats in the second group were able to swim much longer than the first group because they had hope. They had experienced a rescue—and what kept them going was the hope that they would be rescued again.
I need hope in my life, and I suspect that you do, too. As wonderful as life is sometimes, and as beautiful as this world can be, something is still very wrong. I don’t know how I would live if this life were all I had. Even if I followed Jesus, but only for my time on the earth, somehow it wouldn’t be enough. As Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 15:19, “If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied.” But I believe with every fiber of my being that an incredible hope lies beyond the grave and that my last breath will usher in an eternity that’s far beyond anything I can imagine.
With that being said, I do need some hope for this life, too. Maybe I’m weak, but I don’t want to wait it out and suffer through life’s tragedies and difficulties while I yearn for the good life to begin. I want a better life now. I don’t want to repeat the same mistakes and commit the same sins over and over and over. I don’t want to cause anyone pain. I want to make the world a better place. I want someone else’s day to be brighter because they crossed paths with me. And I can’t do (or not do) these things on my own. I need a power that’s greater than me and my abilities.
Thankfully, I have such a power or, should I say, the power has me. I was “buried with [Christ] through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, [I] too may live a new life” (Romans 6:4). I can walk by the Spirit and be led by the Spirit and have the fruit produced in my life that includes “love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness and self-control” (Galatians 5:22-23a).
I have confidence that things will get better in my life and I anticipate a new world where God “will wipe every tear from [our] eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away” (Revelation 21:4). You could say that I have hope, and I have hope. And that’s good, because I need it.
Troy Burns