Advent Hope for Those Who’ve Lost Certainty

The first Sunday of Advent traditionally focuses on hope. We light candles in the darkness, wait expectantly, and trust that God will make all things right.. 

Yet, I confess to feeling uneasy when I think back to all those years lighting the hope candle within the cocoon of evangelicalism. Being sure and certain were prized in those communities, and I learned to ignore what I was actually experiencing in favor of only seeing a preferred future event of healing, rescue, peace, financial gain, etc. 

My hope was tied to fantasy thinking and specific outcomes. 

Now I find myself in a different place. No longer tied to the faith traditions of my youth, but still clinging to a deep sense of the divine in a way I can’t fully articulate. I’m not willing to abandon things I sense deeply: the divine in us and the call to hope, joy, peace and love. But I also can’t pretend the old certainties still hold.

So what do we do with Advent when we’re not sure what we believe anymore?

The Problem with Easy Hope

This habit of jumping to redemption can cause us to turn us away from, rather than towards, the complex realities of human existence.

Theologian Miguel A. De La Torre argues that “hope, as an illusion, is responsible for maintaining oppressive structures.” For those living in persistent injustice, the promise that everything will be okay eventually can become a sedative that prevents action now. Many people live permanently in a liminal space, where hope feels like a cruel joke.

My hope was easy because it all allowed me to look away and not think too deeply about what others were facing or even explore my own grief or loss. There was a desperation in only looking to the future that robbed me of how God might have wanted to meet me in the moment. 

When Deconstruction Meets Advent

Many of us raised in Church have re-examined the beliefs we inherited and questioned once sacred certainties. This process can be scary, yet I have come to believe that deconstruction is a normal process of doing good theology. It is critical thinking that reframes everything. Questioning isn’t apostasy, doubt isn’t the opposite of faith, and losing the faith of our youth doesn’t have to mean losing faith entirely.

Often this path means we find something wider, deeper and more inclusive. James Prescott’s experience resonates with mine when he shares that he is more open, growing and going deeper without his old religious tethers. His deconstruction led to a more mystics-based faith that includes Celtic liturgies, contemplation, meditation and silence as new spiritual practices. 

If this sounds familiar, I want to encourage you to not shy away from this Advent season, but to look closer. 

What Are We Hoping For?

The liturgy can hold complexity, and lighting the Advent candle can mean something different than it used to. A more open or progressive Advent liturgy speaks of Christ as “always coming, always entering a troubled world, a wounded heart,” which shifts hope from future events to present practice. Hope becomes less about eschatological rescue and more about how we show up now.

One of my theological shifts is my understanding of Christ as the eternal, cosmic presence of God in all creation, over merely the physical person of Jesus. Seeing that everything is in God and God is in everything opens me up to see people differently, and show up differently.

Maybe our hope needs to be smaller and larger at the same time. Smaller in our expectations of specific outcomes, yet larger in our trust that we’re not alone in the struggle.

Hope as Practice, Not Outcome

De La Torre argues that we struggle for justice not because we’ll win, but because the struggle itself defines our humanity. The practice is what matters, not achieving victory. This shifts everything.

If hope isn’t tied to winning, then we can’t lose it when things get worse. If hope is about how we show up rather than what we achieve, then we have agency even in situations that feel hopeless.

This feels very relevant in our troubled world. 

I still have fierce hope. But it’s not built on ignoring the pain around me while yearning for better days. It’s not the easy hope I had when I was younger, when I thought following Jesus meant having answers instead of questions. This hope is harder won. It’s a deep trust in the divinity inside me and inside the people I work alongside. It’s hope in what we can create together when we refuse to look away from suffering.

This kind of hope doesn’t require certainty about what comes next. It doesn’t even require knowing what you believe anymore. For those of us who’ve left church or are on the margins of faith, this matters. You don’t need perfect theology to practice hope. You just need to keep showing up.

We don’t have to pretend things are fine, or manufacture optimism. We can name the darkness and still light the candle. Not because we’re certain the light will win, but because lighting it is itself an act of resistance.

Hoping Together

There’s something powerful about our communal act of hoping together. I see this in Christian communities, yes. But I also see it in secular activist groups, in mutual aid networks, in LGBTQIA+ communities, and in spaces where people of all faiths and no faith gather to resist despair.

These are communities weaving hope not through platitudes but through solidarity. They’re lighting candles in the darkness not because they’re sure of future outcomes, but because the act of lighting itself matters. Because choosing to create light together is a form of hope that doesn’t depend on certainty.

The Advent tradition asks us to wait together, to watch together. But perhaps we need to reimagine this. Not passive anticipation of future rescue, but active resistance to present despair. The candle becomes a symbol not just of light coming from elsewhere, but of light we kindle together through our choices and our actions.

This Advent, maybe hope looks less like certainty and more like commitment. Less like knowing how things will turn out and more like choosing how we’ll be in the meantime. Less like waiting for rescue and more like being the hands and feet that create pockets of light in the present darkness.