Feeling hopeless can be devastating. Whatever the source, when we find ourselves hopeless or even approaching hopelessness, it’s as if a great chasm has opened up between where we are in life and where we need or want to go. Feeling hopeless stops us in our tracks. The things that can evoke hopelessness in us may seem endless: personal illness, the loss of a job, the abuse of a superior on us, the current state of American politics, the killing of black Americans in our streets in what seems like one unbelievable police shooting after another, personal debt, the maligning of those who are “different” among us. The list could go on, and yours and mine would become very personal. They all amount to some huge gap in the road we would like to see ourselves traveling with no apparent way across that gap.
Two weeks ago at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Gwinnett we sang an African American Spiritual, “There Is More Love Somewhere.” If you like, you can listen to it here sung by the Jason Shelton Choir for the Unitarian Universalist Church of the Larger Fellowship. As we stood at UUCG and sang that song, something welled up in me that I would call Hope. With each simple line of that song, I was reminded that there is more love somewhere. There is more hope, somewhere. There is more peace, somewhere. There is more joy, somewhere.
I may not be experiencing love, hope, peace or joy right now for very good reasons, but there are those experiences, somewhere. As the remainder of each line asserts, I felt myself so deeply encouraged:
I’m gonna keep on,
’till I find it,
There is more hope, somewhere.
Sometimes, I need the community of souls to which I belong to remind me that there is a bridge across the gaps I feel in life, and the making of that bridge begins with the reminder that there is more of what I need–love, hope, peace or joy–or compassion, courage, or curiosity–somewhere. I need my fellows to encourage me to go find it. And my fellows do encourage me that way.
Today, you may find yourself facing the gap of hopelessness. Click on the link above and listen to this inspiring, simple song. Listen to the community of souls to which you belong, and find that encouragement you need. You may also be one in the community souls who today becomes the voice of love, hope, peace and joy to someone else.
Keep on. Till you find it. There is more hope, somewhere.
Bob Patrick
Thanks Bob for another inspiring message.