Dreams and hopes

Friday evening I decided to watch a Korean movie Do You Like a Spring Bear? 봄날의 곰을 좋아하세요? with actress Bae Du-Na 배두나.

Bae Du-Na plays a supermarket worker who has lost many boyfriends because of her less than traditional feminine traits. One day she find a message in a library book of art linked to a painting. "You're like a little bear awaken from hibernation. I am starting to fall in love with you..." She begins a paper chase from book to book captured by the mysteriously attractive words convinced the words are from Vincent for her. In the pursuit of this imagined love she almost misses and almost loses the love of someone much closer. It's very definitely a chick flick and almost a mirror image of I Wish I Had a Wife 나도 아내가 있었으면 좋겠다. Both epitomise the idiom that 'a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush'.

I think both movies reveal that there is an important difference between hope and dreams. The main characters in both movies have to lay aside dreams to find something more concrete, someone right under their nose. Both movies are also open ended as to whether the relationship will really happen and therefore all there is, is hope. They both do not have as yet good endings rather bring new beginnings.

So many people want solutions to situations (including myself!). Recent conversations with those hurting for different reasons has made me want their situations changed. But all I can do is listen, pray and give them an insight or vision of God's love. We want quick fixes. But really things are more about opportunities, seeing situations as a gift perhaps to be creative or hopeful or trusting of God. To dream in a situation is to escape it, to hope in it is to live it out.

There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven: a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot Ecclesiastes 3:1-2