HOPE DOESNT DISAPPOINT

This week Obama won the presidency for 2009. This is the most elated that I think that I have seriously felt in a long time. I found myself jumping up and down and screaming in front of the television set at this win the same way I have seen my dad and brother getting about football games. I seriously had to bandage the foot that I had surgery on this summer these past few days, the jumping was that intense.

It is a feeling that is a good feeling. Its like falling in love. Its like being a child on Christmas day. You know, the receiving of the things that you want that you are not certain for sure you will get. Do you ever know if the other person will requite your interest? Does the child ever know that they will receive the gift that they want the most? Its that kind of hope, and yet its deeper than those things that I remember experiencing in my youth.

Sometimes I feel like in my adult life I have become more cynical about the things that I have hoped for because even though I have had some things turn out well, I have faced enough disappointment to feel skeptical about anything that I hoped for. I find myself gravitating towards watching musicals and reading romance novels because I think that it gives me a sense of that girlish hope that I have tried really hard not to lose in midst of hardship when I need to be exposed to something other than the Bible.

The mountain high moment that I had was honestly the most similar to moving out of my wheelchair in 2004 and demonstrating to everyone that i could walk again. There was that similar sense of joy and amazement. I think on one hand, my ability to walk again was something that we all wondered would happen. Mentally, I know I at least can own up to preparing for the worst. But I still managed to get up out of my wheelchair and walk across the room. And I felt like God was very close by in that moment. I have had a lot of good experiences in my life since then, but I do not think that I had that similar kind of spiritually mountain high experience since Barack was nominated for president last night.

We do live in a democracy, which has been questionable after the Bush regime. We are living up to a level of equality and justice as Barack Obama is the first African American president of the United States of America. We have a president that I think will bring a lot of change to the world. For the first time since I was old enough to vote, the candidate that I wanted to win won.

It was an amazing moment when in the seminary community, we took the time to pray and sing the doxology, (praise god from whom all blessings flow). I felt the Holy Spirit at work. It was as though in that moment I was suddenly praising and praying for something I haven't always felt I must proceed with caution about even though its how my faith makes me think.

But as there was a lot of work ahead of me as I made my first steps out of my wheelchair and into living independently again, there is still a lot of work for this country. None of the gay marriage laws passed. This is very much a civil rights issue that needs to be addressed. People are losing their jobs and proper health care has become an elitist commodity. People sleep in the streets at night. Women feel like they have to choose between an abortion and raising their children in the circumstances of poverty. The war in Iraq still continues to go on. There is still much on this list of injustices that I haven't written about. There is still a lot of work ahead of our country.

However it is refreshing that we may finally have a president who will be more in tune with what my understanding of justice is. Its like the hopes and fears of all the years were met with a sense of joy on November 4, 2008. We have a democrat for president. We have an African American president. Yes, our country is capable of changing. And just as my blog reads, maybe it is true, hope doesn't disappoint us. That is the hope in God that makes us yearn for justice and a truly egalitarian community. Hope is on the way!!!