Opportunity & Hope

Hope is the fuel of Christian pilgrimage.  We should all be focused on hope…

Liberty assumes and finds breath in the experience of hope rooted in opportunity.  Simply stated, where there is opportunity, hope is fueled and people excel!

Our great nation is the product of individuals’ innate and powerful yearning for hope — so desired and valued that they fought, struggled and bled in order to secure the experience of opportunity for future generation so that they too may hope.  As a result, the dynamism and impact of the United States of America!

The past several generations, generations like mine that have never truly experienced need, yet are fully immersed in desire, have been impacted by a challenging ideal — that our society is expected to provide results to individuals, rather than an opportunity to achieve those results.  Blatantly articulated by former President Obama, who while speaking recently in South Africa introduced the idea of universal income, where the government provides income to individuals even though they have not worked for it.  A guaranteed result, rather than a guaranteed opportunity.  Providing opportunity was the bedrock securing liberty in America, how can we skip the stage of opportunity?

I fear that voiding the experience of opportunity and moving ahead to guaranteed results has and will continue to instigate a dormancy of stewardship amongst citizenry.  How could the words of Khalil Gibran (made famous by President Kennedy) be appreciated or honored: “Ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country.”  

Without engaging opportunity at a foundational level, it would be exceedingly difficult to truly invest in hope.  Without struggle, there is no victory.  Without the Cross there is no Resurrection.  Absent this lineage of thought, it is easy to understand my generation’s (and those immediately before & all those after) confusion with needs and desires.  How it is possible for a teen to throw a temper tantrum because they do not have the latest iPhone, how a recent college grad assumes they have been discriminated against because they were not provided a corner office after the first month on the job, and how the nanny-state has grown in a country founded on the idea of liberty.

But…  we can find examples that go against this trend.  I was so pleased to have read a recent article about a young man who walked 20 miles to his first day of work because his car broke down and he did not want to miss his first day!  He valued the opportunity of employment to such an extent that nothing would hold him back — truly an American experience!

Side Note: the article articulates that in the wee hours of the mornings, local police saw the young man walking, picked him up, bought him breakfast and gave him a ride.  Support our men & women in BLUE, they support us!

Bravo to this young man!  He engaged the opportunity to work, did it with great honor, and the results came.  To the point that his boss actually gifted him his own car!

Even indirectly, when opportunity is valued prior to the expectation of results — hope abides.  The proof: thanks to this young man, I grow in my hope for this great nation, which I am blessed to call home.