Hope

Hope is the little voice you hear whisper "maybe" when it seems the entire world is shouting "no!"

Hope.  That word has been on my mind a lot, especially over the last month.   I've actually felt a lack of it, been looking for more of it.

Thanksgiving and Christmas.  Bad things shouldn’t happen at this time of year.  It would be awesome for everyone to just be able to take a “break”.   But that isn’t how life works.  When you watch a three-year-old heart transplant patient deal with kidney dialysis, or welcome a baby into the world, only have to say good-bye to her 16 days later, hope can seem very far away to me.

Pain doesn’t take a holiday vacation - money issues, family dynamics and life’s struggles don’t take a break.  

So we all have a choice to make - to hope or to despair.  I don't have all the answers, don't pretend to have it all figured out, but I know that I want to choose hope.  I want to stand firm even though I don’t understand, even though life may not seem fair.  I choose to believe that God is loving, that He knows exactly where we are and what we’re dealing with, and that He does have a plan for our lives.  It may not be the plan that we had, but we can trust that He is good.  

I like what J. Hampton Keathley has to say about hope:

In the Bible, hope is never a static or passive thing... A biblical hope is not an escape from reality or from problems. It doesn’t leave us idle, drifting. If our hope is based on God's promises, it will:

• change how we see ourselves. It changes us into pilgrim persons, people who see this life as temporary sojourn.
• change what we value. Hope... makes us heavenly minded.
• affect what we do with our lives—our talents, time, treasures.

In the last month, I have watched as families have dealt with incomprehensible pain - with hope.  The manner in which they carry themselves and each word that they say carries incredible power, because they are choosing to hope THROUGH their pain, and God is using them to impact everyone that they touch.

We may not be able to choose our circumstances, but we can choose to live with hope and to be a living example of hope to a hurting world.  That's the legacy I want to leave - a legacy of hope.

Merry Christmas to you!