By: Joel Ramirez
You do not have to look hard to find despair in the world. There are multiple examples of people doing desperate things because of despair. In fact, the words desperate and despair share the same origin in definition. Despair simply means without hope. Desperate is the feeling or showing a hopeless sense to a situation. Both words share the cause of being without hope. When we apply this knowledge to the many examples of despair and desperation, we see the root cause is lack of hope. Think about the last time you heard either word used and your mind will quickly pull up an image from a natural disaster or someone suffering great loss. You may even have remembered a moment in your own life when things were especially difficult. We all have or will experience great loss and defeat with despair ready to step in and dictate our actions. God knew from the beginning that we would encounter such things and that we would be challenged with times where despair would stand looming. God also loves us so much that He provided His Word to help guide us in such times.
I offer the example of Peter. When we are first introduced to Peter in the Bible, we have an example of a bold man who stands strong like a great immovable stone. This is emphasized by Jesus’s first recorded words to Peter in John 1:42- “You are Simon the son of Jonah. You shall be called Cephas (which is translated A Stone).” This is a recurring theme in Peter’s life and his writings. Peter is the bold one and if you recall, it was Peter who walked to Christ on the water. Matthew 14:28- “And Peter answered Him and said, Lord, if it is You, command me to come to You on the water.” Even as Peter began to sink at Jesus’s feet, he did not show despair because he cries out “Lord, save me!” If despair had griped Peter’s heart, he would have sunk into the water believing there was no hope of being saved. Peter still had hope that Jesus would save him. Let us fast-forward to the night of Jesus betrayal. On this night, Peter boldly tells Jesus that he will stand by him and he even draws his sword, cutting off the ear of Malchus, when the guards come to arrest Jesus. Before the dawn breaks, it is Peter who fulfills Jesus’s words by denying his Lord three times, each time more bitterly than the previous denial. As the rooster crowed that morning, Peter recognizes his betrayal of Jesus in his words and actions. Matthew 26:75- “And Peter remembered the word of Jesus who had said to him, Before the rooster crows, you will deny Me three times. So he went out and wept bitterly.” Similarly, Judas was dealing with his own actions and betrayal of our Lord. Matthew 27: 3-5 reads “Then Judas, His betrayer, seeing that He had been condemned, was remorseful and brought back the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and elders saying ‘I have sinned by betraying innocent blood’. And they said, ‘What is that to us? You see to it!’ Then he threw down the pieces of silver in the temple and departed and went and hanged himself.” Both men had betrayed Christ and both men were remorseful. But it was Judas who showed despair in hanging himself. Judas had no hope while Peter held to his. We see here how powerful hope is in guiding our actions. If Judas had any hope as did Peter, he too could have been called by Jesus after the resurrection. But it was Peter who found humility in his hope and was able to be bold in his submission to God’s will. In the first epistle of Peter, Peter is able to expand on his hope as he writes to encourage the pilgrims of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia as they are preparing to face persecution. Peter writes in 1 Peter 1: 3- “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.” Here, Peter attributes the one and only true source of a living hope to the resurrection of Jesus Christ. You may find hope in people or things but only the hope in Christ’s resurrection is sustainable. You can compare it to Jesus’s parable of the wise and foolish builders, Matthew 7:24-27. To build faith on anything but your hope in Christ is like building a house on sand that will surely wash away. But to build your faith on the hope of Christ is like building a house on the rock and it will withstand any storm. There is also direction given in that parable because Christ begins it by saying “Therefore everyone who hears these words of Mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man…” Peter also calls us to act upon this hope in 1 Peter 1:13-21 “Therefore gird up the loins of your mind, be sober and rest your hope fully upon the grace that is to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ; as obedient children, not conforming yourselves to the former lusts, as in your ignorance; but as He who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, because it is written ‘Be holy, for I am holy.’ And if you call on the Father, who without partiality judges according to each one’s work, conduct yourselves throughout the time of your stay here in fear; knowing that you were not redeemed with corruptible things, like silver or gold, from your aimless conduct received by tradition from your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot. He indeed was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you who through Him believe in God, who raised Him from the dead and gave Him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God.”
Bad things and trying times will be in everyone’s life without exception. But despair and desperate actions do not have to be the result. Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 4:8-9 “We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed- always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our flesh.” We have a living hope in the resurrection of Jesus Christ that we too will be raised up. But this living hope is only accessible through obedience to Jesus’s words in the putting away of the old man of sin so that we should no longer be slaves of sin and susceptible to despair. We can in turn show those who live in despair our hope in difficult times and be as a beacon to those who are lost. Matthew 5:16- “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.” I pray for you as Paul writes in Romans 15:13 “Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope by the power or the Holy Spirit.” May you never know despair again because of the living hope in the resurrection of Jesus Christ.