Hope: It is a Good Thing
[Spoiler Alert: The article discusses the ending from the 1994 film The Shawshank Redemption.]
In the movie The Shawshank Redemption, the two main characters, Andy and Red are prisoners. The men face a lifetime behind bars. Andy queries Red about the latter’s “lost interest” in playing the harmonica.
“It does not make much sense in here,” Red explains.
Andy replies, “Here is where make the most sense.”
After further explication, Red asks, “What are talking about?”
“Hope,” Andy responds.
“Hope,” Red explains, “is a dangerous thing. Hope can drive a man insane. It’s got no use for a man on the inside. Better get used to that idea”
We can empathize with Red’s disdain for hope. A life-sentenced prisoner does well to accept his plight. Yearning for a never-coming freedom undercuts an inmate’s ability to embrace the current predicatment. Red seems correct: believing in a fantasy future unravels a person’s present. Andy, though, will not “get used to that idea.” Throughout decades of unjust imprisonment, his enduring hope prevails over the ever-present clank of prison doors.
As Christians, we are called to hope – a steadfast embrace of God’s forthcoming deliverance. In the Old Testament, the theme of hope becomes pronounced during the exile. The once great nation of Biblical Israel is holistically defeated. Yet, the prophets pronounce edicts of hope. In fact, the three major prophets all take significant effort to declare God’s forthcoming plan to rescue the people.
Isaiah 49.8-9: This is what the Lord says: In the time of my favor I will answer you, and in the day of salvation I will help you; I will keep you and will make you to be a covenant for the people, to restore the land and to reassign its desolate inheritances, to say to the captives, ‘Come out,’ and to those in darkness, ‘Be free!’
Jeremiah 31.17: So there is hope for your descendants,” declares the Lord. “Your children will return to their own land.”
Ezekiel 36.24 For I will take you out of the nations; I will gather you from all the countries and bring you back into your own land.
Hope is also a theme in the New Testament. Continuing with the biblical use of the idea, hope is the recognition that present circumstances are filled with despair, but God’s plan will eventually turn desperation into glory. The fulfillment of God’s plan resides over the horizon. We cannot see it, but we know it is coming. Likewise, we cannot see tomorrow’s sun, we know it is coming. In both cases, we live by faith today – trusting tomorrow to God.
Romans 8.20-21 For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God.
With the repeated and clear biblical call toward hope, I offer this question: are we a people filled with hope? Often, Christians, live behind prison bars. Our hope is muted by the burdens of life. The present moment is so overwhelming that we cannot look to the horizon. We become people anchored to the now rather living in the hope of tomorrow. But as we trust God, we will find the burdens of now create opportunity for the glorious deliverance of tomorrow. And as we continue to trust God, we will experience deliverance that once seemed impossible.
Returning to The Shawshank Redemption, near the movie’s end, Red – now a paroled elderly man – walks along a rock wall to find a message left for him by his dear friend Andy. The movie’s orchestral music shifts to Red’s forgotten instrument, the harmonica. The parolee finds a notes that, in part, reads, “Remember, hope is a good thing. Maybe the best of things.”
As the movie ends, Red finally “hopes.” While the viewer feels joy for Red’s hopeful exuberance (and rightfully so), let’s be an Andy rather than a Red. Let’s hope in the worst of circumstance. Let’s hope when the shackles still clang around our feet. Let’s hope when we see nothing but walls.
