How important is hope?I recently read a book called “Fatal North” by Bruce Henderson. The book examines America’s first attempt to reach the North Pole and what went terribly wrong. It tells the tale of the ship captain’s death under suspicious circumstances, violent dissension among the crew, the ship’s evacuation and eventual sinking. Then came a brutal struggle for survival on the barren polar ice and two dramatic rescues.
Here are a few exerts from George Tyson’s Journal. He was part of the crew, which was abandoned by their shipmates on an ice flow. I chose a few of the entries that describe some of the hardships they suffered for the six long months they spent on the ice flow. The entries are not necessarily in the order of events.
We lost sight of the sun’s disk three days ago.
“ Miserable we,
Who here tangled in the gathering ice,
Take our last look of the descending sun;
While full of death, and fierce with tenfold frost,
The long, long night, incumbent o’er our heads,
Falls horrible.”
The sea is running very high again, and threatening to wash us off every moment. The ice is much slacker, and the water, like a hungry beast, creeps nearer. Things look very bad. We are in the hands of God; he alone knows how this night will end.
The weather was very bad again last night; snow-squalls, sleet, and rain.
Blowing a gale, very severe, from the northwest.
The children often cry with hunger. We give them all we can.
Fearful thoughts careen through my brain as I look at these eighteen souls with not a mouthful to eat. Meyer is actually starving. He can not last long in this state.
Some of the men have dangerous looks; this hunger is disturbing their brains. I can not but fear that they contemplate crime. After what we have gone through, I hope this company may be preserved from any fatal wrong. We can and we must bear what God sends without crime. This party must not disgrace humanity by cannibalism.
We have nothing to eat; everything is finished and gone. The prospect looks bad enough; but we can not have been saved through such a night to be starved now. God will send us some food.
God in creating man, gave him hope. What a blessing! Without that we should since have ceased to make an effort to sustain life. If our life was to be always like these last months, it would not be worth struggling for; but I seem to have a premonition, though it looks dark just now, that we shall weather it yet. Hope whispers, “You will see your home again. The life-spark is not going to be extinguished yet. You shall yet tell the story of God’s deliverance, and of this long trial.”
Our small piece of ice is wearing away very fast, and our provisions nearly finished. Things look very dark, starvation very near.
I trust in God to bring us all through. It does not seem possible that we should have been preserved through so many perils, and such long-continued suffering, only to perish at last.
Last night, as I sat solitary, thinking over our desperate situation, the northern lights appeared in great splendor. I watched while they lasted, and there seemed to be something like the promise accompanying the first rainbow in their brilliant flashes. The auroras seem to me always like a sudden flashing out of the Divinity; a sort of reminder that God has not left us … This has thrown a ray of hope over our otherwise desolate outlook.
After about six months of being stranded on an ice flow they were finally rescued. One of the reasons the main character attributes to their survival was hope.
Is their hope after the events of September 11? Like the concept of hope betrayed in this story, the believer has an eternal hope based on the mighty power God demonstrated through Christ’s resurrection. The believer eagerly awaits with confident expectation for Christ to take us out of this world to be with Him and the redemption of the body. Romans 8:23-25 Not only that, but we also who have the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, eagerly waiting for the adoption, the redemption of our body. For we were saved in this hope, but hope that is seen is not hope; for why does one still hope for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we eagerly wait for it with perseverance. We know the best is yet to come and how blessed it will be to receive our glorified body and to spend eternity in heaven with the King of kings. It is this hope that can carry a Christian through the toughest times.
Because of sin death entered the world and a curse was placed on the earth. While events here on earth may appear to be spinning out of control we need to remember that God will not suffer evil to prevail. Whatever misfortune befalls God is able to turn it to His advantage. Someday God will carry out His vengeance and send all His enemies including Satan to the lake of fire; banishing death and all the effects of sin forever. Until that judgment day we must have forbearance and longsuffering and trust in Christ for our heavenly future. Christ did not come to remove our human sufferings but to show us a way through it and by His strength we are able to bear it. (1 Corinthians 10:13)
Hold onto Christ. He is our hope! |
