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Language is a powerful part of our daily lives. The English language is one that is arguably the most difficult to understand, because we use our words in so many ways. We even categorize our words in different ways.
We have terms such as nouns, verbs and adjectives that help us to group them. We also have more simplistic ways to group them, such as by the number of letters in them. Yes, I'm thinking first of… four-letter words. We don't pay much attention to three-letter words, or five-letter words. However, our ears perk up when we hear the term "four-letter word," don't we? Now when I said this term, what's the first word that came to mind? Hopefully your first thought was, "Now wait a minute, I'm reading a column called Finding Faith… now what should this word be?"
Well, let me help you consider some of the words that might have come to mind. We're now coming into the last week of Lent. There are disciplines that we may have followed during this Lenten season. We are reminded to pray during Lent. We could have heard that it's common practice to give. Many of us also give up something for Lent, often a favorite food. This means that we fast. These are all good four-letter words to come to mind. We're now coming to Palm Sunday and Easter, so I suggest that we think of one of my favorite four-letter words… which is hope.
We're now also into spring.
If we look for them, we'll see daffodils starting to pop up. I know in my yard, they've been trying to break through for a couple weeks now. Did you know that the daffodil symbolizes rebirth and new beginnings? New beginnings bring hope to all.
Then, as we come out of the darkness of Lent, Easter brings us into a time when we turn to the light. It's a time when we embrace the new life and growth around us. It's a time when we should also embrace the source of that growth around us and also encourage growth to continue within us. This new growth also brings hope.
As we celebrate Easter, there is hope for all of us -- hope for new life, hope for a better life and hope that this better life includes a stronger relationship with God. We can find hope in so many ways.
Now, let's look at hope from a different perspective -- from God's perspective. What might hope look like for God? (I say "might" because only God knows these hopes for sure).
God may hope that we have our ears more attuned to God's calling to us and God may even hope that we think first of the important four-letter words, God's words, such as love, pray, give, life and gift (among others).
The coming Easter season is a time when God's constant calling to us becomes louder. It's also a time when we're more likely to hear it.
This calling will most likely not come to us in a normal English conversation. It will come to us through God's language. It will come through emotion, revelation, and comfort. It will come through reinforcement, encouragement, and teaching. It's up to us to feel God's language -- to listen to God's language and give a more loving meaning to what we include in our language as "four-letter words."
May God's peace and comfort be with us all.
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Finding Faith is written by area pastors. Today's column comes from Pastor Gary Shumway of Garman Lutheran Church in Pine Creek and Grace Lutheran Church in Jersey Shore.