Of Christmas and Celebrating Hope

The story of Pandora and her box (or jar) has been retold for thousands of years, with minor variations.  The key elements of the tale from Greek mythology are consistent.  Pandora was endowed with many wonderful gifts and talents, among them beauty, music, persuasion, and others.  She was also given a box, which she was told never to open.  Try that out on anybody:  “Here is an interesting box.  It is yours.  DO NOT EVER OPEN IT!”  I expect that the result would ever be the same, the box will eventually be opened.  As the story goes, it was, introducing into the world evil in all of its forms.  Last of all, however, from the bottom of the box, came hope.

I believe hope to be an underappreciated and little understood gift from God.  Hope is essential to happiness, salvation, and life.  I know of no happiness without it, I cannot imagine any achievement not preceded by hope.  In all salvation, temporal or eternal, hope draws us forward.  It is foundational to life and living. Hope is ever at war with despair (for example, the Spanish word for “despair” is desesperanza, or the absence of esperanza, “hope”):  despair is life-draining, while hope feeds life.

In this understanding of hope, I do not refer to the weak sentiment most common in everyday parlance, the wistful wishing for something better, a wish that seldom acts as a motivator for effective action.  I have in mind the hope spoken of by God and His prophets, against which the forlorn reach from despair—as valuable and comforting as that may be—pales in comparison.

Consider how the power of hope is described in this account of the preaching of the ancient American prophet, Ether:

Wherefore, whoso  believeth in God might with surety hope for a better world, yea, even a place at the right hand of God, which hope cometh of faith, maketh an anchor to the souls of men, which would make them sure and steadfast, always abounding in good works, being led to glorify God. (Ether 12:4)

Notice the power of this hope, an anchor to the soul, making those who possess it sure and steadfast, the person who has gained it always abounding in good works.  Nothing weak or wistful here.  Such hope is a mighty, heavenly gift, with mighty results.  Also notice the connection between hope and faith, the former being a powerful fruit of faith. 

I have thought that a fair definition of “hope” is the personal recognition that something desirable is attainable.  By faith we learn of the desirable object as well as gain the recognition that it is within our reach.  When that happens, hope is born in our hearts, and we are stirred to action to attain it.  That is life itself.  Dead things, inanimate objects, reach for nothing, always acted upon, never doing the acting.

There are many things that each of us values and would very much desire to attain, to gain, to build:  love, knowledge, wealth, improvement, new abilities, bridges (real and figurative), but we do not act to realize our desires until we first gain the idea that we can be successful.  Without hope of success we may go through the motions in a lame sort of way, guided by routine that can become drudgery.  We are energized—even beyond what we thought were our limitations—as soon as we gain a vision, as soon as we believe the prized fruit to be within our reach, when we have hope.  Then there is little stopping us.  Obstacles are overcome, means are found, tools are made, skills developed.  

In my reflections I have named my three daughters Faith, Hope, and Charity, as each one seems especially to personify one of these three great gifts of God.  My oldest daughter would be named Hope.  Throughout her life, once she has gotten it into her head that something worthwhile is within her reach she has done whatever it takes to realize it.  Because of that, through great and consistent effort, overcoming many obstacles, she has become rich in all of the eternal things, in everything that matters.  Her mother and I admire her for it.  Her achievement need not be unique.  It is within reach of all of us.  Each may have such hope and become so rich.

There are many reasons for the perennial popularity of Christmas.  Surely one of these is that it is a celebration of hope offered to everyone.  Salvation did not come to earth with Christmas.  The sacrifice and atonement that Jesus Christ would work out to bring about all salvation would await another three decades after His miraculous birth.  With Christmas, the birth of the Savior, there arrived in Person the assured hope that salvation would come.  The angel who appeared to the shepherds at Bethlehem the night of the nativity was filled with that hope, with that assurance, that caused him to rejoice and share with the shepherds his message “of great joy” so that they, too, might have this great and assured hope:  “For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.” (Luke 2:10, 11) 

The hope of Christ, in all of its power to action and motivation for every good thought and deed, is worthy of general celebration, every year.  The salvation of Christ has been placed within reach of everyone.  Having that hope can become a personal anchor as we realize its promise, becoming sure and steadfast, always abounding in good works, that each of us personally, here on earth, can be filled with “peace, good will toward men.”  At least in part, that is what Christmas is all about.