From the Pastor: Nov 2026

Dear Friends,

It occurred to me that a stewardship campaign based on sharing the joy of hope might feel a bit incongruous when it coincides with election day, which can feel like a fractured time of heightened negativity.  It’s hard to feel joyous and hopeful, isn’t it?  And now we’re being asked to share it?  You betcha!  I invite us to the incongruity of our counter-cultural faith in God and God’s people.  Now is the time we need to shake off the hopelessness the world’s ethos of power-grabbing and people pushing in favor of a hopeful devotion to kindness, welcome, humility and sharing. 

      Is that even possible in today’s world?  I believe so.  "My soul finds rest in God; my hope comes from the Almighty. Truly God is my rock and my salvation, my fortress.  I will not be shaken." Psalm 62:5-6  Over the years, I’ve occasionally run into people who tell me I’m being foolish for being too optimistic, but while I often lean into that, I don’t have blinders on to the pain and misery all around.  It is my hopeful attitude that gives me strength to face it and try to give the world something different.  

       Let me share with you two of my favorite quotes about hope.  The first is from author and scholar Cornel West, who says, "Optimism and hope are different.  Optimism tends to be based on the notion that there's enough evidence out there to allow us to think things are going to be better . . . Whereas hope looks at the evidence and says it doesn't look good at all, it doesn't look good at all, but we're going to go beyond the evidence to create new possibilities based on visions that become contagious to allow us to engage in heroic actions, always against the odds, no guarantees whatsoever; that's hope. I'm a prisoner of hope, though.  I'm gonna die a prisoner of hope.  Never believe that misery and despair have the last word.”  from Twilight: Los Angeles, on PBS April 29, 2001

       The other is from an author unknown, so I might as well claim it for myself, because it lives in my heart, as taught to me by my faith in the light of Christ:  "Those who bring sunshine to the lives of others cannot keep it from themselves."  

        Let us share of our abundance, in tithe, talent, treasure—and our bedrock faith that our hope comes from the God of love, and our faith cannot be shaken.

With joy and thanksgiving,

Martin