The Pattern of Things

I’m finding that it’s hard to have much hope these days. I feel like an old grump when people try to look on the brighter side of our nation’s decay and collapse. Someone said to me recently that they had to hold onto some hope or they would devolve into despair. So I got thinking about this thing called “hope” and wondered how it is possible to have any kind of reasonable hope when our personal world, or the world around us has collapsed.

Recently I listened to a podcast with Kristen Tippett about hope. Here is what she said;

“Hope lives very close to despair. There is much these days to bring us to a feeling hopelessness. However, hope is NOT wishful thinking or optimism. Hope, is rather an orientation, a choice in the face of reasonable profound despair. Hope attends to reality in all its complexity. It looks the world full on in the face and refuses to accept that things have to be this way.”

John Lewis the congressman and civil rights activist said it this way; “Imagine the world you want to inhabit and then live “as if” that is the reality.

Hope is not wishful thinking or optimism. Hope is muscular. It requires exercise and attention. But first, we must have something to hope for.

It is human nature to “hope” that things will go back to how they were.

When the inevitable changes of life come we mourn what we’ve lost and what was. We long for things to go back. We especially resist those kinds of changes that bring us to our knees. Death of loved ones, loss of health, financial ruin, or any number of “setbacks” cause us to remember the past and long for it to return.

Right now, in America we are experiencing huge changes. For me, somehow our present crisis feels like more than a detour. It seems like a crumbling, a shaking, a disintegration, a falling down, and I want things to go back to how they were.

So do we hope against hope that somehow things will turn out ok and go back to what we loved? Or do we orient ourselves to a different kind of hope?

Richard Rohr, one of my favorite authors, teaches that there is a pattern of things that we can see in our personal lives, in nature, in institutions and in empires. This pattern is:

ORDER——DISORDER——REORDER

Nature is probably our clearest teacher in understanding this pattern. We see the glorious order of summer give way to the disorder of winter’s death and decay, and then the vibrant emergence of spring. Order, disorder, and reorder.

Notice, the reorder is never the same as the original order. It is always new. It is not a going back to what was. Upon examining our own lives we can see the pattern is the same. If you’ve ever lived through a divorce or the death of a loved one you know that the new order is not anything like what “was”.

For example, when Jesus was on earth the Jewish people were living in a time of disorder. Their nation had been destroyed, and they now lived under the cruel iron rule of Rome. It is only natural that they longed for things to go back to the way they were. Therefore, they kept boxing Jesus into a neat little “king” package and expected He would liberate them from their captors. Then they would go back to being a great nation again. Sound familiar? Jesus, of course, was taking them, and all of us, to a new place, a new kingdom, and a new way of being. He was introducing reorder.

Hanging on to what “was” and hoping to go back is a surefire recipe for anxiety, agitation, and discontent. Let’s face it, this disorder stuff is really really hard. We cannot imagine what might be, but we do know what was. So we want to go back.

We are now collectively experiencing a time of disorder. Separation of powers, judicial integrity, human decency are all under attack daily. Things like rule of law and truth-telling are dissolving in front of our eyes. I want it all to stop. I want our country to go back to what it imperfectly was.

But, as long as I cling to that hope, I am full of fear, anger, and anxiety.

So, it occurred to me one day that I could actually accept that we, like the Jews of old, are living in a time of disorder. It is all coming down. It is horrifying to experience, but it is the truth. The only way I can accept this as reality is to fix my heart and mind on the reorder that will eventually come. It may take 10 years or 50, I don’t know. But I believe the pattern of things is that disorder eventually fizzles and then a new thing emerges.

What this new order will look like we don’t know. I must say that I doubt that it will be some cosmic return of Jesus. I expect it will be a new order of being on earth. Hopefully many of the excesses of consumerism, obsession with technology, isolation of persons and families will have washed itself out. We may see an awakened society, sobered by the ruin they saw and experienced. Perhaps there will be a society that values all people and upholds the laws of protection for everyone.

So not matter what kind of disorder we may be experiencing it might be helpful to stop trying to “go back” to what was.

Instead as John Lewis encouraged us we can, “Imagine the world we want to inhabit and then live “as if” that is the reality.”

Disorder is uncomfortable. Disorder is also inevitable. So we have the choice to live in despair, or to practice the exercise of muscular hope.

Every time I hear another bit of bad, dark, scary news I am working to reorient my mind by saying this:

“I know I am living through a time of disorder. It is frightening. It is sad. It is infuriating.. But I will not become hopeless. I will acknowledge that the way things are and always have been is happening now. Order, Disorder, and Reorder. I wonder what kind of glorious order God will bring out of all this”.

This is muscular hope. This is the choice we all have now.

“Oh Lord, You know the disorder we are experiencing in our personal lives and as a nation. It is no surprise to You. May You keep us from being filled with despair or cynicism. May you give us muscular hope that acts out your love and kindness even when we see no optimistic reason to do so. May you bless us with your peace we pray.”