To Hope...

"As long as there is life, there is hope." How many many times I've heard that quoted. A soul who needs Jesus, a childless couple, a family waiting anxiously in the ICU waiting room, a single person who wants companionship, a disease that seems unstoppable, a hurting person caught in a marriage with a cheating spouse, a child longing to be truly seen by his father... The list could go on and on and on. All the desperate times and feelings that make us yearn inside for something better. That make us want and fear so much to hope. So many times we hug each other and we say "I'm praying for you, don't give up hope." Is anyone else a little cynical about this hope thing? Maybe I'm alone in this but I for one get sick and tired of hoping for things that never seem to change. Some of the things I hope for now I'v been hoping for since I was two years old. And you know what? It still aint happened. Lately I'v been grappling with this whole thing of hope. Sometimes it just doesn't feel like there is hope. Sometimes the disease or the bills or the wounds or the relationship issues just pile up over our heads and there is not a light at the end of the tunnel. What then?

Today God and I really had it out over this issue. Its not the first time and today I was really desperate for an answer and I guess because my heart was open and I truly wanted His answer no matter what, He gave me one. I will do my level best to share it with you how He shared it with me.

So often when I hope for something thats as deep as it goes. I hope for someone to be saved and therefore I pray for it. Begging God to let happen what I want to happen. I hope and pray for healing, for a miracle in a relationship that is broken, for a classmate to see Jesus in me, for a teacher to be able to reach her students. But I forget that what I must hope in is God. To hope FOR His blessings and His working is, I believe, entirely different than to hope IN Him!!! When I hope that He will heal that person so close to my heart and instead I am forced to watch them crumble slowly to a cruel disease I am utterly disappointed in God. I am shattered that He does not care or hear my prayers or understand my heart. But if I hope IN Him and lay my needs before Him, trusting fully in His goodness and planting my hope in the solid knowledge that HI IS GOOD, then I can trust fully that no matter how He answers my cries, it is truly best. If my hope is grounded in Him and not in His answering my prayers then I will never be disappointed in Him. Will the road be rough sometimes? Yes. Will I still cry over beauty and innocence lost? Yes. Will I still question Him and beg Him for answers to my 'whys'? Yes I believe so. But if HE is my constant hope then I will truly never lose hope.

To hope in Him regardless what He chooses to give me is so vulnerable. It feels so much safer if I can control what He gives me by my prayers. To willingly lay down my hope for Him to give me the 'right' answer and instead pick up a hope that is solely based on His goodness... That is hard. It is hard for me at any rate. Perhaps for some of you this is not a struggle and if that is the case I would love to hear your thoughts on it! For me though, and I suspect for many, being ok with being completely vulnerable and out of control in our own lives is tough. It takes a very real relationship with the Father in order to know His heart and know its goodness towards us.

I want to hope in Him. Want to have this nailed down and all covered but the truth is I don't. I get angry when He gives me something I don't want or when He doesn't give me what I think at the time will make me so happy. But He is so good and patient with me! He always shows me, gently and with great care, how true it is that "My ways are not your ways, neither are My thoughts your thoughts."