My friend Ryan Hurst Carter was killed in a horrific car crash last year. We had been seminary students together, former coworkers at our church, and friends. He fully embraced his life, loving God and loving people with every fiber of his being. When he died he was twenty-seven years old.
When I heard about his death, I wept. I was traveling and felt completely alone, surrounded by thousands of strangers in a cold airport. I grieved the loss of my friend, but I also felt the weight of my church’s grief. Ryan was dearly loved by our congregation. How would I break this news to them? How could I hold their grief along with my own?
Worship that Sunday morning was raw and difficult. I cried through the pastoral prayer as I prayed for his widow, our friend Megan.
When it came time for communion though, I found a source of strength. I declared it loud enough for my broken soul to hear: death is no match for life. I dared to say that our grief was not the final page of the story. I clung to that audacious hope which the resurrection will bring. We took the elements of bread and cup, and we remembered the suffering, grief, and sorrow of Christ, who gave himself so that our joy might be complete.
Paul tells the Philippian church that his imprisonment has made the brothers and sisters confident enough to dare to speak the word with greater boldness and without fear (v. 14). The early Church stared straight into the face of suffering and dared to speak a word of hope against it. I’m sure they were afraid. But their hope was stronger than their fear their trust in Life was greater than the threat of death.
Consider
When have you dared to speak a word of hope, though despair loomed large?
Pray
Merciful God, may our hope be stronger than our despair. Give us the courage that dares to speak words of hope with great boldness and without fear. Amen.
