Today's text talks about hope, a key ingredient in life.  To have hope is to expect something good to happen, that the best is yet to come.  Hope is a key element in life, but hopelessness drags us down into the sinkhole of doubt that can lead to the quicksand of depression.  What color would you paint your hope?  Yellow?  Pink?  Green?  How about gray?

          There is a touching book titled, Gray is the Color of Hope.  The author came to that conclusion as she studied her own gray uniform, the one she wore as a political prisoner in a Soviet slave-labor camp.  In 1982, Irina Ratuskinskya began four years in a Siberian slave-labor camp due to her unrelenting campaign of freedom for her people.  Ten other women shared her gruesome fate in prison.  Together they continued their efforts for human rights even within the bureaucracy of the prison.  Their clothing was a tool for daily punishment.  Their uniform was freezing cold, loose with a plunging neckline to entertain the guards.  Yet the women pieced together the smallest scraps of cloth or fiber from bandages, mattress ticking or socks to help each other stay warmer.

          Three times a year married prisoners were granted a visit from their husband.  Irina was given a gray gift for her husband's first visit.  A fellow prisoner took one of her work garments, covered with dirt and oil and made her an outfit to wear.  She worked the fabric for hours with slivers of soap, soaking it in chemicals and piecing the soft gray mass into a skirt for her to wear.  But the visit never took place.  Guards removed her privileges because Irina failed to wear a headscarf while crossing the yard.  Yet her friend's effort in making the skirt turned its soft gray color into a symbol of hope amid the apparent hopelessness of a Soviet prison camp.

          I guess gray is my color, too.  I have two gray suits, two gray sportcoats, two gray cars and I once had a pair of gray shoes.  It began in 1985 when I came to Colorado and bought a gray Daytimer.  Somehow in those first years, gray became my color of hope for a new beginning.

          I'd had two successful pastorates in North Dakota when I received a call to a church in Riverside, California, a congregation that seemed like the opportunity of a lifetime -- beautiful area, new building, eager people.  But it soon became obvious the move was a mistake.  Traffic, smog, population density and irrational fears plagued us, and unrealistic expectations of church leadership that left me feeling like a foreigner.  Moving to southern California was the beginning of a downward spiral that consumed my every ounce of effort, resulting in neglect of family and eventually resignation of my pastorate.

          But Dave Prust became my friend there.  It was Pastor Dave Prust of Wisconsin who understood midwesterners and helped make me feel I wasn't alone.  Dave's great sense of humor and warmth made me laugh and gave me hope.  But it was the same Dave Prust, marathon runner, all-around great guy, who just months after we met, was diagnosed with aggressive leukemia.  After about six months of cancer treatment at City of Hope, he was strong enough to preach just one more sermon at Immanuel Lutheran Church there.  I took the Sunday off to hear him as he spoke on this text:  "We rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us because God's love has been poured into our hearts."

          In the midst of my personal hopelessness, God sent a dying man to give me hope.  And in the midst of his extreme illness, God gave him hope.  Dave's hope didn't appear out of nowhere; it came from God's love in the midst of his suffering.  Watching him struggle, many of us learned that when you're in the midst of quicksand, God is always there keeping you afloat.

          You and I all have our sufferings, but in Christ those sufferings can produce endurance, that ability to hold on a little longer.  And endurance produces character, that God-given inner strength of resolve we didn't know we had.  Character produces hope, the expectation that something better is soon to come.  And not just any hope - it's hope in God.  God's hope does not disappoint us.  It comes with His love poured into our hearts by His Spirit.

          You see, it's all from God.  The faith, hope, character, endurance -- they're all from God.  Even suffering can come from God, something we don't always like to consider.  Just remember, all suffering has a purpose, even if only to bring us closer to God.  Dave taught me about that, and so every year in Lent I wear one of his several pectoral crosses his wife gave me.  This one even bears the teeth marks of his little daughter Rachel, who today is a grown woman.

          One of my favorite people came again last Monday - the Trashman.  What a great guy!  Every Monday he faithfully comes to take away all my trash, crumpled papers, all the wretched smelly things we needed to toss out.  The Trashman puts them all in his truck and drives them to some place I don't care to go, and there he buries my trash with everyone else's.  Every Monday the Trashman gives me a fresh start.

          In those days California had a lot of trash in the road ditches and Dave and I used to joke about Jesus the Trashman.  Every day He gathers all the sin and garbage we've made, and carries it to the dump called Calvary and makes is disappear.  Jesus buries our trash with His life so that you and I can start out fresh every day.  Then He invites us to be His brothers and sisters and even adopts us into His Family by Holy Baptism.  In Christ's family we have status.  We're children of the heavenly Father, and no one can snatch us out of our Father's hand.

          A King was once visiting the villages of his kingdom, receiving his peoples' cheers and admiration.  As the King entered the market square in one village, peasants surrounded his royal carriage.  To the amazement of all, a brash young farmer stepped up and spoke.  "Grant me a favor, Sire," he pleaded.  "Give me some special blessing only you can give."  The villagers were astounded at his request but even more surprised at the King's response.  "Of course," he said.  "Come here, get in my carriage and come to the palace.  I offer you the hand of my daughter in marriage, so you can be my son-in-law and live in luxury for the rest of your days."

          At first the young man was delighted.  It all sounded too good to be true.  But then he considered what the offer meant.  No more Saturday nights at the tavern!  No more of his old friends.  He'd have to bathe every day, and learn court manners and have official duties.  After a short reflection the young man lowered his eyes and said, "No Sire, no thank you.  It would take me from the familiarity of my home.  I would be uncomfortable.  It would ask too much of me."  And the King left that village with his greatest blessing declined.

          Imagine that!  Turning down the opportunity of a lifetime just to be able to live in the past.  How could he be so dumb?  We'd never do that - that's for sure!  We know better!  But do we?  We know that we can't live up to God's expectation of perfection.  We need our heavenly Father to rescue us and clean us up when we dirty our lives so much.

          About 25 years ago there was an earthquake in India that reduced a grade school to a pile of rubble.  And it happened during a school day, crushing scores of children under concrete and steel.  Parents wailed and grieved as they were told there was little hope.  One father rushed to the scene and was told the same thing.  But this father was persistent.  He simply had to find the boy he loved, even if it meant punishment.  He walked around the school until he located the place where his son's room should have been.  But that room was on the first floor, under two other floors of bodies and rubble.  Frantically the father climbed onto the pile of concrete pieces and started to dig.  With his bare hands he started to dig.  No gloves, no shovel, no tractor or loader, just his bare hands pulled and tossed pieces of rubble.  "Hold on, son!" he shouted again and again.  "Hold on, son."  The father worked furiously all day and night.  He continued until digging became dangerous as he went deeper into the darkness with a tragic mess.  Finally this courageous father heard what he'd been so hoping to hear.  "Daddy!"  His son and several classmates were still alive, trapped inside a small cavity in the rubble.  And what he heard his son say was this, "See I told you Dad would come.  He promised me he'd come whenever I needed him."

          You and I are like that little boy and his friends.  By our sin, we're buried under a terrible pile that threatens to suffocate us.  I recently read in the newspaper about a little boy who had dug a hole in a wet pile of sand and it finally caved in on him.  It was just sand, but it was too heavy.  The poor little guy was unable to pull himself out and died.  You see, there's no way you and I can dig ourselves out from under the weight of our sin.  We're stuck there.

          But Jesus Christ came down to live in this world and rescue us.  He dug into the rubble and found us.  The Bible says you and I were dead in our trespasses and sins, but Jesus has made us alive.  We were buried and He found us, but it had a terrible cost.  As He dug into the rubble of the world, it came crashing down on Him, and He died.  And in that death, He gave us life.  And now today He lives again to give us hope for life.

          That same Jesus is digging thru the rubble of your life right now.  "Hold on!" He's calling out.  "Don't give up hope.  Don't let it smother you."  We have a Savior digging to find us, telling us to endure, to hold on because endurance brings character, and character brings hope, and hope in Jesus Christ never disappoints us.

          2 Corinthians 4:16 says, "Therefore we do not lose heart."  I love that passage.  Don't give up hope!  Never quit!  In Jesus, there's no burden so big God can't remove it, no problem so bad God can't fix it, no sin so great God can't forgive it.

          Peter, a man who almost lost hope, once wrote, "Always be ready to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have." (1 Peter 3:15)   That's what each of us can do, to tell others of the hope we have.

          In May of this year, we're getting a team from Harvesters For Christ who will help us share our hope.  They'll be here for three weeks helping us grow in faith, share our faith and help people of Castle Rock.  More about that later.  Right now let us all share the hope we have.  God grant this for Jesus' sake, amen.

Copyright © 2005 by Pastor Bob Tasler.  All rights reserved.