Perhaps the one who best understood the relationship between God’s word and hope was a pagan, the Roman centurion who, after pleading with Jesus to heal his sick servant, in the face of the Lord’s immediate willingness to come to him declared himself unworthy for the Lord to go to his house and said to him, “only say the word and my servant will be healed” (Mt. 8:8). One word from Christ was enough for him to have a sure hope in the salvation Jesus gives. Faith enabled the centurion to understand that what arouses hope in God’s word is that it is indeed a Divine Word, the word that the One who makes all things personally addresses to our need for to save us and gift us eternal life.
Peter also understood this at a time when many had abandoned the Lord and only a few awkward and insecure disciples remained with Him. This happened after Christ’s ‘I am the bread of life’ message in the synagogue at Capernaum, saying, “This teaching is difficult; who can accept it?” (Jn. 6:60). How come Jesus’ word was a reason for others to leave when for Peter and the other disciples it was the only reason to stay with Him? “Lord, to whom can we go? You alone have the words of eternal life” (Jn. 6:68). The words of Jesus remained for Peter and his companions as a last thread of hope in a fullness of life they could only hope for from God. But why and how could Peter’s hope, like that of the centurion, cling to the word of Christ? What gives the word of the Lord this power, this solidity whereby we can surrender to it with the full weight of our lives in the face of the danger of sliding into despair, death or nothingness?
God’s word can be a source of hope for us as God is and remains the source of the word itself. Only if we hear the word from the voice of the Word, present to us and who looks upon us with love, can it nourish in us an unshakable hope, because it is founded on a presence that never fails. God’s word is a promise in which the One who promises is utterly and totally faithful. Christ promises us himself when he says: “And behold, I am with you always, until the end of the age.” (Mt. 28:20). Jesus’ last word and promise before he ascends into heaven, is the promise of himself present to our lives, not only at the end of time but every day, in every moment of our lives. “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us” (Jn. 1:14) until he died on the cross for us. Psalm 27 cries out to the Lord, “if you are silent to me, I shall be like those who go down to the Pit” (Ps. 27:1). We have within us the deep, ontological awareness that if God does not speak to us, if God does not create in us at every moment with his word, then death, the dissolution of life, is inevitable for us. Instead we trust in the God’s Word through whom all things exist (cf. Jn. 1:3). We welcome the Word that calls our souls to life. [based on a text of Dom Mauro-Giuseppe Lepori, Abbot General of the Cistercian Order]