“We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair.” (2 Cor. 5:7-8)
One of the movies they show on TV all the time is Stephen King’s “The Shawshank Redemption,” set in an old, bleak, and brutal prison. In one scene the main character, inmate Andy Dufresne, has been placed in charge of the prison library. He receives a large donation of books, and recruits other inmates to help him file them on shelves.
One of the men picks up a book and reads the title haltingly, “The Count of..Monte…Cris-co.”
“That’s Cristo,” Andy corrects him. “The Count of Monte Cristo.”
The man tries to read the author’s name. “By Alexandre Dum…Ass. Dumb-Ass? Ha ha!”
Andy provides the correct pronunciation and then tells the man, “You know what that’s about? You’d like it. It’s about a prison break.”
To which the inmate replies, “Then we’ll file that one under educational!”
After an inmate recommended it to me, I picked up and read the very thick “Count of Monte Cristo,” which is about much more than just a prison break. It’s a powerfully told story of justice and injustice, love and hate, revenge and forgiveness. The hero, Edmund Dantes, is imprisoned in a solitary cell deep in an island fortress for a crime that he did not commit. Dantes grew weaker and more downhearted with each passing year. Eventually he stopped eating, determined to end his life. One night as he lay in his cell hoping that death would come soon for him, he heard a sound of scraping from behind his cell wall.
Dumas writes, “Though weakened, the young man’s brain seized on the idea that is ever present to the mind of a prisoner: liberty.” He sensed that it was some unfortunate prisoner like himself trying to escape. And with a renewed hope he began to eat again and started his own excavation of his prison wall, digging toward the sound of the scraping noise. Dantes worked for days, digging the hole in his wall. But one day he encountered an obstacle. It was a huge smooth beam that blocked the hole. It meant that he had to dig either above or below it.
In frustration, Dantes cried out, “Oh, my God! My God! I prayed so fervently that I hoped thou hadst heard my prayer. My God! After having deprived me of my liberty! After having deprived me of the peace of death! And after calling me back to existence, have pity on me, oh, my God! And let me not die of despair!”
As if in answer to his prayer, suddenly a man’s voice called out, seemingly from under the ground, “Who speaks of God and of despair in the same breath?”
The voice belonged to a fellow prisoner named Abbé Faria, who had been trying to tunnel to the outer wall, but had instead dug towards Dantes’ cell. The two men eventually connected their tunnels and became friends, with Abbé Faria acting as tutor for the younger Dantes, providing him the education and social skills he would need to remake his life in the world, while they continued to plan their escape.
But the question that gave me pause was the one that Abbé Faria asked in response to Edmund Dantes’ prayer: “Who speaks of God and of despair in the same breath?” Because I can readily answer, “Me! I’ve done that!” And perhaps you have, too.
Despair is that overwhelming feeling that you have run out of options, that there is no possible way you’re ever going to survive the situation in life you find yourself in. In the Old Testament, the prophet Elijah, who spent a lot of time on the run from the authorities, was told by God to take refuge among Israel’s enemies to the north. The Lord told Elijah, “I have commanded a widow there to feed you.” Elijah did as God said and met the widow as she was out gathering a couple of sticks to make a cooking fire. But the woman had no food to share. In fact she was so desperate that she planned to take the handful of flour she had left and a splash of oil, “and bake it for myself and my son, that we may eat it and die.” (1 kings 17:8-12) That’s despair! There’s no more food. So we’ll eat what we have left and then starve to death. No options. No hope.
It’s a feeling of hopelessness that is as powerfully overwhelming today as it was 3,000 years ago for that starving widow. It’s when the oncologist tells you that there are no more treatment options. Or the bank forecloses on your home. Or your social security income forces you to choose between food and medicine. Or your spouse decides life is better without you. Or the jury says “guilty” and sends you to the big house. No choices left. No options. No hope.
The apostle Paul knew a thing or two about hopeless situations, about despair. He writes to the church in Corinth, “We do not want you to be unaware, brothers and sisters, of the affliction we experienced in Asia; for we were so utterly, unbearably crushed that we despaired of life itself.” (2 Cor. 1:8) That’s pretty heavy hopelessness for such a pillar of faith! There’s some question as to the nature of the crushing events that Paul is referring to. It could be that he was in prison. Or it could even be that he faced the possibility of death by wild animals in the bloody arena at Ephesus. (1 Cor. 15:32) Whatever the situation, Paul says it was so bad that he despaired of life itself.
The Greek word for despair that Paul uses, exaporeomai, is stronger than mere hopelessness; it means to be extremely without any way out. For Paul, this was the end. No more options. No way out. Like the starving widow, the only thing left to do was die. “We despaired of life itself.”
But even when trapped by life-threatening, soul-crushing life circumstances, Paul says that there is a power that fills him, a supernatural hope and consolation that comes directly from Jesus Christ. He writes later in his letter to the Corinthians that we human beings are simple clay jars, but we can be filled with an extraordinary power that comes from God, and not from within ourselves. “We are afflicted in every way,” he says, “but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair.” (2 Cor. 5:7-8)
This is the power of the Holy Spirit! It’s the indwelling spiritual power of Christ himself that allows us to look despair right in the face and instead be filled with hope. It doesn’t mean living in a false reality where you pretend that there are no difficulties before you. And it doesn’t mean minimizing the extreme hardships of life that can weigh us down. It means facing the bleakest of circumstances, sometimes on a longterm basis, and feeling deep down in your soul that God is with you, filling you with love and peace and joy and hope.
It’s hard to describe this hope, because it is so otherworldly. There’s a song by the band Tenth Avenue North called “I Have This Hope,” and I think it does a pretty decent job.
“But sometimes my faith feels thin,
like the night will never end.
Will you catch every tear,
or will you just leave me here?”
That’s the despair part. But then the chorus sings out:
“I have this hope
in the depth of my soul.
In the flood or the fire
you’re with me and you won’t let go.”
It’s that depth-of-my-soul hope that puzzles my fellow inmates, when they ask why I’m always so upbeat and positive. It even confuses some of my friends on the outside who wonder how I can stay joyful and hopeful when I’m knee deep in the hoopla. All I know is that I may not be able to step out of the darkness and despair of this prison, at least not right now, but each step that I take I can take in the light of God’s grace, filled with the hope that God is with me, both now and in the better days that are coming, just outside of these prison walls. And my prayer for you is – despite whatever might have you discouraged or disheartened – that you may be filled with this depth-of-your-soul hope as well.