Something We’ve Forgotten How to Even Hope For
by Donavon L Riley

Jesus Christ did not come to simply ease our burdens or to smooth out the rough edges of our lives. He wasn’t interested in offering us small comforts, in making us feel a little better about the mess we’ve made of the world. He didn’t come to adjust the dials on our broken systems or to give us a new way to balance our souls, like some self-help guru peddling cheap wisdom. We’re good at inventing ways to numb ourselves, to distract ourselves from the real work, but that’s not what He was about. His mission wasn’t to tinker with the structures of power, or to give us some economic or political solution. He came for something far more dangerous, far more important.

He came not to soothe us, but to confront us. Not with gentle platitudes, but with the kind of truth that cuts through the noise. He didn’t step into our world to make us feel better about ourselves, to fix the cracks in our foundations. He came to knock down the whole house of cards we’ve built, to remind us that all our striving—our systems, our solutions, our endless search for comfort—are built on sand. He wasn’t interested in minor improvements, in tweaking the way things work. He came to overturn the tables, to show us that our attempts to save ourselves are always doomed to fail. What He offers is not a better life, but life itself.

Jesus, God in the flesh, came to face the one thing we all run from—death itself. Not just physical death, but the deeper death we carry inside us, the death that comes from living in fear, from clinging to the false comforts we’ve created. He came to confront the evil we can’t face on our own, to go into the abyss and tear it apart. He didn’t come to offer us a path to success or happiness or even peace in the way we imagine it. He came to tear the curtain, to show us the face of eternity. Death, our greatest enemy, has been dealt with—not in a way that makes us feel temporarily better, but in a way that changes everything.

This isn’t about survival; it’s about resurrection. It’s about stepping out of the fog, out of the murky deep, and into something real—something that lasts. What He offers is not just a slightly improved version of the life we know, but a life that endures beyond the collapse of everything we’ve built. Christ came not to make us comfortable, but to call us into the only reality that matters: the eternal life that starts when we let go of our illusions and turn toward Him. That’s the real work. Not fixing what’s broken, but stepping into the truth that He came to reveal—a truth that leaves death powerless and offers us something we’ve forgotten how to even hope for.

By Donovan Riley

Donavon Riley is a Lutheran pastor, conference speaker, author, and contributing writer for 1517. He is also a co-host of Banned Books and Warrior Priest podcasts. He is the author of the book, "Crucifying Religion” and “The Withertongue Emails.” He is also a contributing author to "The Sinner/Saint Devotional: 60 Days in the Psalms" and "Theology of the Cross".

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