A Passionate Sense of Potential

In a Charlie Brown comic strip, Linus is eating a sandwich. He makes this observation: “Hands are fascinating things. I like hands! I think I have nice hands! My hands seem to have a lot of character. These are hands that may someday accomplish great things ….These are hands that may someday do marvelous works. They may build mighty bridges or heal the sick, or hit home runs, or write soul-stirring novels! These are hands which may someday change the course of human destiny!” Looking at Linus’ hands, Lucy says, “They’ve got jelly on them.”

I love the fact that Linus notices the potential in himself. He sees beyond the jelly, beyond the moment, beyond the day, to what one day might be. In life, it is a lot easier to be like Lucy – to find the problems and to get stuck in what is.

Danish philosopher, poet, and theologian, Soren Kierkegaard once wrote, “If I were to wish for anything, I should not wish for wealth and power, but for the passionate sense of the potential, for the eye which, ever young and ardent, sees the possible. Pleasure disappoints, possibility never. And what wine is so sparkling, what so fragrant, what so intoxicating, as possibility!”

Let us pray: May we never lose hope, O God, for we remember that with you all things are possible. Grant us this day a passionate sense of potential. Amen.