Nostalgia Presents Hope: Following Jesus’ Way to Serve Youths in Dealing with Crisis

Abstract

Despite at the peak level of strength and power, young adults are also prone to experience life crises. Hence, it’s crucial for churches to cultivate reinforcement approach to encourage and provide emotional support for young adults who experiencing life crisis. Though not specifically addressed for young adults, Jesus, in the Gospel of Matthew demonstrated the community service for people dealing with crisis. One notable pastoral approach carried out by Jesus in his service is utilization of “past experience” known as “nostalgia” in psychological studies. In Matthew, Jesus adhered to 2 types of nostalgia ‒ personal (Matt. 18:2) and historical (Matt. 22:32) nostalgia. This empirical research conducted on 103 young adults of hkbp Cibubur, East Jakarta. The study aimed to test hypothesis on whether nostalgia can predict hope for the future, which generates motivation, strength and creativity in the midst of life crisis. The result suggested that nostalgia may predict hope on people whose dealing with life crisis [R2 = 0.21; F (27.08, 1), p < 0.001].