What About Your Church?
So let me ask you this: When you think about your church, how do you feel?
Sometimes I think we get discouraged when we see sin and failure in the church precisely because we’ve been operating in categories of optimism. If we just keep believing that people are good and everyone in the church will be good, then we will be let down.
But the answer to that is not to look at those in your church with a pessimistic point of view either. Surely there is no joy to be found in the grouch-ball who just watches and waits for fellow church members to sin.
The answer, I believe, is not optimism, but hope.
Hope is greater than optimism because it engages the reality of fallenness both outside and inside the church, but still clings to the power, goodness and faithfulness of God to redeem his people.
Hope says, “People will continue to sin, but God will continue to save. He will redeem and purify his own. The earth will be filled with his glory as the waters cover the sea.” (Hab 2.14)
Hope lives like that is true—even in your church. Because, yes, if God’s people are there, so is he. And he doesn’t change.
