Love Hard

From which perspective – hope or fear - are we going to choose to operate today and tomorrow? Our impact and ability to change the world depends on that choice. How, many ask, can we possibly choose hope with so many terrible things happening in the world? We do not need to look far to find places in the world where war is being waged or other atrocities are being committed. In 2020 alone, a pandemic shut down the entire world and killed tens of thousands of people. Millions more lost jobs and suffered indirect consequences. In the United States, arguably the most advanced country in the world, school shootings occur regularly. Racial tensions remain despite decades long battles to eliminate them. Poverty and all its consequences are nearby. Some ask whether things have ever been so bad. And how, they wonder, can we have hope.

It is true that we live in a world full of challenges, difficulties and struggles. But it has always been true, and it will always be true. In 2016, we experienced the Zika virus and more racial tensions. North Korea tested the H-bomb. ISIS ravaged its way through the Middle East. Decades earlier, during 1968, the Vietnam War waged, and Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy were assassinated. From 1958 to 1962, a famine in China killed millions. During the 1930s and early 1940s, the world experienced a world-wide war and Holocaust during which millions more died. From 1929 to 1939, 13 to 15 million Americans were unemployed, and half the banks failed during the Great Depression. We can find similar awful circumstances no matter how far back we look. During the mid-1300s, a plague throughout Europe killed approximately one-third of the known population. In the 1100s and 1200s, people murdered innocents in a misguided attempt to advance their religion during the Crusades. The list goes on and on.

If we rely on the circumstances around us to determine whether we have hope, we will never find it. History has proven this to be true. Instead, our circumstances will most often result in a perspective of fear, making us afraid of what others think of us, afraid of getting sick, afraid of what might happen if the political party with which we disagree wins, afraid of failure, and afraid of whatever circumstance or situation our minds can imagine.

Alternatively, we can choose to focus our actions and efforts on those around us and love hard no matter our circumstances. From this perspective, we learn to live in hope, knowing that no matter if or when bad things happen and difficult circumstances over which we have no control arise, we will still care for each other. How we handle and address every conversation, event and circumstance, and in turn the impact we have on the world around us, will be determined by the choice we make.

There will be difficulties. But will we respond in fear or with hope and love? During the middle of trying times and situations, the choice we make in how we respond and interact with others will have real and lasting impact. Our choice to love hard from a perspective of hope can transform fear to courage, hopelessness to hope, restlessness to peace, and sadness and brokenness to joy.