I've been listening a series of three lectures by N.T. Wright to the Harvard Graduate School Christian Fellowship. Those who know Wright's stuff will find some new and interesting viewpoints here, but the format forced him to condense a lot of huge topics into really small packages. A lot of Q&A, though, but again, huge questions with unfortunately little time to develop appropriately-sized answers.

At one point, though, Wright said something that got me thinking. Not the first time that's happened. He said, and I'm paraphrasing here, that Obama's victory was huge from the perspective of seeing the culmination of a "piece of good" that most people thought hopeless, i.e., the rise of an African-American to the highest seat of political power.

On the other hand, Wright was concerned that too much hope was being placed on Obama's shoulders. He was concerned for the man because he knows that he cannot possibly bear the weight of all that hope, let alone fulfill it.

And I'm not sure, but I think I sensed a deeper concern.

What is it that we are hoping for in/from this man? Is it the mere fact of his having been elected? Well, in a sense, yes. But ask most Obama supporters, and they'll tell you that they still have great hopes for this man over the next 4-8 years.

But hope for what? Is it that he won't be a complete disaster, causing the (perhaps) unspoken assumption that an African-American can't lead this country? Let's be real...I'm certain there's an element of that out there.

But my hope is a little different. Let me put it like this.

Let's say, just for the sake of argument, Obama turns out to be, hands down, the greatest U.S. president of all time. What would that look like?

If you really think about it, the answer might be a little scary. Because the men we currently regard as at or near the top of that list were the ones who were in charge during very troubling times: Lincoln, Kennedy...

Now, look at the world around us...

Very troubling times. And they might be getting worse. A lot worse. We might get to a point that, if we were ancient Christian poets, we might label this "God's judgment." You can only build a tower to heaven so high before things seem to go really, really bad.

I hate using "Obama" and "Jesus" in the same breath, for reasons similar to what Wright was talking about, but I always tend to look at the Jesus story when considering these issues. And one aspect of the story that struck me when I was filtering this issue through that one was the timing of Jesus' ministry. He was sent when the time was fully ripe. He was sent when judgment upon God's recalcitrant people was imminent. The people were hoping for him to deliver a cure, a solution. He gave them one, but not like they had imagined. He delivered on the hope...

But it wasn't pretty. It never is.

Ask Paul. Ask St. Francis. Ask Polycarp. Ask Mother Teresa. Ask Gandhi. Ask Dr. King.

Ask Jesus.

So have hope in Obama. Appropriate hope. That's a good thing.

But think about what it might look like if Obama were ever to fulfill those hopes.

Then please pray. Not for Obama to end the financial crisis. Not for Obama to bring peace to the Middle East. Not for Obama to make your life better.

Please pray for Obama himself.

Grace and Peace,
Raffi