So Harvard University is going to celebrate a black mass and call it an historical reenactment. We see real antagonism towards Christianity in the public life of this country. We see civilization being attacked on all fronts around the world. We see the cold world war returning although many don’t want to admit it. We have thousands of children being murdered in Africa, and no one pays any attention until 300 girls are kidnapped and some movie stars Twitter about it. All around things seem to be getting more “hopeless”. Interestingly enough Harvard wants to reenact a service in honor of the prince of hell, and Dante tells us that the entrance to hell has a large engraving which says “abandon all hope all ye who enter here”.
“The New Testament hope is the prospect of a condition that will satisfy all needs, supply all wants, liberate from all restrictions of life, all consequences of sin, since over against the uncertain present actually satisfying future beckons, on the basis of faith in the promises and facts of salvation”. Those words come from a theological word book of the Bible. They tell us something fascinating and that is that the Christian hope is really based in the future. It’s based in the end of the age when Christ will return and create a new heaven and a new earth. All the facts of this life, all the problems, all the trials, all the tribulations, all the seeming failures are looked at by Christians through the lens of Christ’s coming again at the end of the age. Thus there is a fascinating commentary that Paul makes about the life that we live in this world. “If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men the most to be pitied”. 1st Corinthians 15:19.
There is a very practical consequence to this it seems to me, and that is that we can look practically at the problems of this life and all the issues that we see around us and do some impractical things because we are not tied to or wrapped up in the “stuff” of this world. We are always looking forward to in hope to the time when there will be no time.
