A man driving a sports utility vehicle came to a detour sign that read, “ROAD UNDER REPAIR.”  A little construction was not going to stop this man and his SUV from getting to where he wanted to go.  So he drove around the sign and navigated the construction site with good success.  His success continued for about twenty miles until he came to the absolute end of the road beyond which there was a gorge in the road with no bridge.  He reluctantly turned back and retraced his route.  When he approached the back side of the same construction sign, he read what someone had written on the back of the sign:  “WELCOME BACK, STUPID!”   (Pastors story file, 15.6.8)
 It's important to be realistic about our hopes and dreams and plans, isn't it?   If we are not realistic, we may set ourselves up for disappointments that are unnecessary.
I no longer hope to become an astronaut.   I never did hope play football for the National Football League.   It is not likely that I will ever play first chair violin for the Boston Philharmonic.   There are reasons for this.  Some of those reasons have to do with my genetic makeup.   Other reasons are more related to choices I have made.
 It is important to be realistic about what we hope for, but it is equally important not to allow our realism to decay into fatalism.

 In the movie Schindler’s List, there is a very tense moment when Schindler--the businessman whose creative scheming saved many Jewish lives—stands beside a Nazi officer on the platform of a train station on a sweltering hot day.  A train carrying its human cargo stops briefly on its way to the death camp.  The people inside the train are suffocating, sticking hands out between cracks and crying for water.  Having compassion for the people, Schindler grabs a hose, turns on the water and sprays it over the top of the train cars, so that the water trickles in on the people inside.
 The officer stops him.  He says:  “You should not do that. You will give them hope, and that would be cruel.”
  The Nazi officer had a fatalistic attitude toward the people on the train.  Schindler, I believe, was a realist, but he was a realist who was motivated by the hope that something could yet be done for these people.
 The question that I want you to consider today is this:  what motivates your life?  Is it fate or is it faith?
 Many people feel that their life is predetermined by someone or something.  That belief or attitude is called fatalism.  Fatalism is the hopeless perspective of so many soup cans riding the belt in a factory, just waiting for the factory worker to dump tomato or onion or asparagus soup into them.   Another word for this attitude is resignation.  And it could be expressed with the word commonly used today:  whatever.     What will be will be, I just have to accept it.   I have no real power over what direction my life takes.  Resignation is the attitude of those who live by fate.
 Resignation, or the feeling of being fated, is expressed in a variety of forms.
 One of the most common is called shame.  Shame feels something like guilt, but it is more deeply seated and more destructive than guilt.   Guilt is feeling bad because of something we've done.  Guilt can be resolved because we can receive forgiveness, we can make amends, we can resolve the problem.  But shame is that deep down feeling that we are bad – not just that we've done bad things, but that at the heart, we ourselves are bad.   And that is a tough nut to crack, because it's about who I am, not just about what I've done.  If I feel shame, I am sure that I'll never be able to change.  This is just the way I am.
 Another way that we might experience fatalism is in the feeling of being overwhelmed.  Lewis Smedes calls it “too muchness.”  Life is just too hard, too demanding.  I'm not smart enough to understand all that, not strong enough to accomplish all that life demands.  God asks too much of me.   A man by the name of Jim Stovall became blind at the age of 29.  While he still had partial vision, he volunteered at a school for the blind.  He was assigned to help a four-year-old boy who was blind and severely handicapped.  Stovall spent a great deal of time trying to convince the boy that he could tie his own shoes and climb stairs in spite of his limitations.
 “No, I can't!” the boy insisted.
 “Yes, you can,” Stovall replied.  And the debate continued.
 Meanwhile, Stovall fought his own limitations.  Because of his declining vision, he decided to quit his college courses.  On his way to withdraw from college, he decided to resign his volunteer position as well.
 “It's just too tough,” he explained.  “I can't do it.”
 “Yes, you can!” said a little voice behind him.  It was the four-year-old who had refused to tie his shoes.
 “No, I can't,” Stovall said with conviction.
 “Yes, you can!”
 Stovall realized that if he didn't continue, the child would give up, too.  So, Stovall stayed in school and graduated three-and-a-half years later.  The same week he graduated, his little friend tied his shoes and climbed a flight of stairs.  (fresh illustrations, 42)
 Yet another expression of fatalism is futility.  There's just no use.  It won't help.  Nothing's going to change.   No matter what I try, someone or something will undo the good I try to do.  What is there to hope for?    This is our dog Ramey, when it's treat time.  Very often, we toss a treat to each of the dogs and they catch them.  But Ramey's vision is not so great any more, and  sometimes she misses.  What's interesting is that she doesn't go after the treat that's lying on the floor.  Why? She knows that Misty will get there first.  What's the use trying?   It'll never work.  It's futile to try.
 And there's the treadmill effect, which is the feeling Smedes calls “going nowhereness.”    It's like trying to run in a dream.    Some people believe that what they did was so bad that they are stuck with it forever.  They can never get past it, never get over it, never forgive themselves.  Other people feel that they are fated by something somebody did to them in the past.   They were abandoned by their parents, raped or beaten as a young child, they lived in an alcoholic home.   And they feel that this experience has set the direction for their life.  And that direction cannot change.  Still others simply believe that God has stacked the deck ahead of time, and there is nothing to be done about it.  It's been predetermined or predestined to happen this way.   So, whatever!
A man who was driving his car along a very rural road was forced to stop because a flock of sheep was blocking the road.   Some time passed before the shepherd appeared.  The man in the car yelled, “I could starve here!”  The shepherd replied, “Your mistake was in stopping.  Sheep are like troubles.  Show them you mean to go forward and they'll move aside.”  (story file, 14.12.4)

 As Ed has said on a number of occasions, behind every action is an intention, behind every intention is a belief.  So, if we believe that our life is fated to be a certain way, that is the way we will live.  If we are living by fate, hope is tough to come by.  We are easily discouraged and may even create our own failures, just because we think they are inevitable.
 But there is another choice we can make.  Another way to believe, and another way to live.   If we live by faith, then our life has hope.
 If we have faith, we are not inanimate objects like soup cans in a factory.  We are more like baby birds, waiting in the nest for mama and papa bird to come and bring a nice tasty worm.  Baby birds are hungry, eager, alive, growing, wanting to spread their wings and fly.  They know instinctively that what their parents will bring them will help them grow into the adult birds they were meant to be.  This open, eager attitude is hope.   Hope is the attitude of those who live by faith.
 The basis for our faith, and therefore the basis for our hope is found in our relationship with God.  The Bible tells us that we matter to God.  God created us, God gave us life, God gave us forgiveness in Jesus Christ, God made us a part of God's own family.   In our Bible passage for today, Paul says that when we don't know what to pray, the Holy Spirit prays for us.  And he says that “all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose.”  Some translation turn it around and say “In all things God works for good. . .” In either case, the emphasis is on God, not “all things.”  God has a purpose for us, and that purpose is good.  When we commit our life to Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit comes to dwell in us, bringing along a new sense of destiny.  Our lives are headed somewhere.
We have a new sense of destiny as Christians.   I'm sure that you noticed in this passage that Paul uses the word predestination a couple of times.     Predestination can be a scary word, because if we don't know what is meant here, we may think that we are fated after all.  The Bible says it, we're predestined.   The word that Paul uses means to set certain limits or goals ahead of time.   God has certain goals and plans for us.  But understand what Paul is not saying.  He is not saying that we are predestined to be ugly or stupid or lazy or a failure or worthless or any of those other negative labels that we may feel fated to be.   God's goal for us is to be “conformed to the image of his son.”   We are destined to become like Jesus.   This is God's plan for us, and it is to this end, that the Holy Spirit prays for us.
Do you believe that you matter to God?  Do you believe that God's plan for you is good?
Sometimes our fatalism spills over into our prayers.   And we need to ask ourselves, when we pray, do we really expect God to make a difference in our life, or in the life of those whom we love?  Do we believe that God can change things, or do we believe that our weakness is stronger than God's strength?  Richard Foster says that when we pray, “we are working with God to determine the future!”  (Celebration of Discipline, 32)   We can influence the future by our prayers.   That suggests of course, that we are praying with an open mind, a mind that is willing to believe that God is still alive and active in our world, and in our own life.   Things can be different.  We can be different.
The mighty Niagara River plummets some 180 feet at the American and Horseshoe Falls.  Before the falls, there are violent, turbulent rapids.  Farther upstream, however, where the river's current flows more gently, boats are able to navigate.  Just before the Welland River empties into the Niagara, a pedestrian walkway spans the river.  Posted on this bridge's pylons is a warning sign for all boaters:  DO YOU HAVE AN ANCHOR? Followed by, DO YOU KNOW HOW TO USE IT?  (fresh illustrations, 64)
Faith is your anchor.  If you feel pulled along by a current that is stronger than your willpower to resist it, throw out your anchor!   The anchor will hold, because God is in it.  And God will redirect your life and get you safely to shore.