Daily Lesson for July 24, 2014

Today's lesson is from Romans chapter 15 verse 4:

 "For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope."

These last few weeks I have been studying the work of Brene Brown, best-selling author and professor at the University of Houston Graduate College of Social Work.  Brown studies what she calls "whole hearted" people, and their ability to survive and even thrive amidst struggle.  One of the primary things Brown has learned in her research is that whole hearted persons are people of great hope.  And what she discovered about hope - to her surprise and to mine - is that hope is something which is both taught and learned.  In other words, hope is something that can be passed down, one generation showing another how to hold their hopes in spite of whatever circumstances they may find themselves in.

So I'm reading this 21st century researcher Brene Brown, and the open the Bible and see Paul saying the same thing 2,000 years before.  Paul is writing the church in Rome, a church under persecution from both the Roman government and in conflict with certain parts of conservative Judaism.  Paul knows they need hope and he tells them where to find it - in the scriptures, in the stories of those who have gone before, in the lives of those who in spite of great difficulties held on. Through their endurance, Paul says, we too find the courage to hope.

Hope is learned; and it is taught by the passing on of stories of hope-filled people.  This is why for millennia the Scriptures have been such a source of power and inspiration to those forlorn, oppressed, and abused - because the strength of Hagar, or the courage of Esther, or the perseverence of Moses is literally passed down from one generation to another through the pages of the family Bible.

And it all just makes me think, in our current generation's Biblical and historical illiteracy we are in danger of losing more than a few good stories from times past; we're actually in danger of losing hope itself.