Hope -vs- despair

My family spent the first weeks of August vacationing in Montana. I grew up in the "Big Sky Country" and I don't know how to explain it but the sky just does seem bigger. That's especially true at night where, free from the "light pollution" of more populated areas, the stars seem to be suspended so close you can almost touch them.

One night as I sat on the deck observing the majesty of the skies I was joined by my cousin. As we visited, I was constantly distracted by the amazing number of "falling stars" that illuminated the sky.

"When I look up at the stars", I told him, "I can't help but believe in God." His response floored me.

"Really? I don't like to look at the stars anymore," He replied. "When I do, I feel so small and insignificant"

For the next hour we dialogued over our vastly different views of the universe. It was as if we were looking through opposite ends of the same telescope. While to me the "heavens declare the glory of God" (Psalm 19:1), conversely in the vastness of the night he felt that he was just an insignificant speck, here today and gone tomorrow. What an expression of hopelessness.

Paul writes that, "the mindset of the flesh is death," but that the mindset of a believer leads to "life and peace" (Rom 8). In his book, "The Divine Conspiracy," Dallas Willard contrasts these two views of the world.

The mind of the spirit is life and peace precisely because it located us in a world adequate to our nature as ceaselessly creative beings under God. The "mind of the flesh," on the other hand, is a living death. To it the heavens are closed. It sees only "That inverted Bowl they call the Sky, Whereunder crawling cooped we live and die." It restricts us to the visible, physical world where what our hearts demand can never be. There...we find we constantly must violate our conscience in order to "survive."

And that was the sense of despair my cousin described. He expressed to me a Darwinian view that his life was no more significant than that of his beloved dog or a crawling ant. They were all just trying to "survive" and when that struggle ended they would cease to exist. In our over one hour of conversation the greatest statement of optimism he could muster was, "I hope I'm wrong".

Sometimes we can forget the despair and hopelessness of those who don't know Christ. Apart from a spiritual mindset that God alone bestows, our neighbors and friends lead lives that are" at the worst so painful and at the best so monotonous, poor and limited that the urge of escape, the longing to transcend themselves if only for a few moments, is and has always been one of the principal appetites of the soul." (Doors of Perception, Huxley). Some attempt to feed this worldly appetite with adventure, money, or at best service to humanity. Others may try to numb the gnawing pain by taking chemical vacations. However, there is nothing of this world that can satisfy the hunger or fill the vacuum that inhabits every human soul.

It is for that reason that we are called to "always be ready to give a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you." (1 Peter 3:15) While my cousin listened politely to my "hope", he still cannot comprehend a universe where a personal God would love mankind so fully. To be honest, either can I. Any yet I know it's true. That's what I feel when I look up into the night sky. That is my hope!