As we draw near to the end of a challenging year, Tearfund’s Gideon Heugh reflects on what it means to be a people of hope when hope can seem hard to find.

Life can be crushing. It’s important to acknowledge that. Hope is not the same as blind optimism. Hope’s eyes are open to the brokenness around us. It’s normal to be experiencing negative thoughts and feelings during times like these. Suppressing these natural responses to difficult circumstances can be damaging. We need to let our grief be grief; our weariness be weariness; our anguish be anguish. Hope doesn’t ignore the darkness; it swallows it up, using it as fuel that we might shine all the brighter. Hope gets its hands dirty.

I saw this with my own eyes when visiting Malawi at the beginning of this year. One community we visited was facing months of hunger because the nearby river had burst its banks, ruining their crops. We were told that the river never used to flood, but now it does so regularly. One of the effects of this is that children can’t go to school. They need to work instead, so that they can help their families buy food.

Perhaps the most difficult thing to see was the resignation in people’s eyes. But that’s where the church comes in. Tearfund’s local church partners are working with these communities to reignite their belief that a better future is not only possible, but that our actions can help bring it into being.

This is part of what it means to be the people of God: to not only imagine that things can be better, but to actively create that reality. To be Christ’s hands and feet in the world. And to keep believing – even when it hurts.

Please pray. Take a few moments to reflect on the challenges you’ve been faced with this year. Think about the frustrations, the disappointments, the fears. Then invite Christ to infuse those difficult feelings with his presence. Then say, ‘I acknowledge these thoughts and feelings. I accept them for what they are. I know that things can change, and I believe in God’s power to change them.’

St Mungo’s continues to financially support the work of Tearfund throughout the world.