when we cling on to whatever that is perceived to be worthy of our effort and looked upon as the best deal we can ever get in our entire life, we lose sight and we forgo the great things that God has in store for us. Not just great things, but things that could possibly only appear in our wildest dreams.

Max Lucardo:

Hope is not what you expect; it is what you would never dream. It is a wild, improbably tale with a pinch-me-I’m-dreaming ending. It’s Abraham adjusting his bifocals so that he can see not his grandson, but his son. It’s Moses standing in the promised land not with Aaron nor Miriuam at his side, but with Elijah and the transfigured Christ. It’s Zecharish left speechless at the sigh of his wife Elizabeth, grey-headed and pregnant. And it is the two Emmaus-bound pilgrims reaching out to take a piece of bread only to see that the hands from which it is offered are pierced. Hope is not a granted wish or a favour performed; no, it is far greater than that. It is a zany, unpredictable dependence on a God who loves to surprise us out of our socks and be there in the flesh to see our reaction.