Hope

There is a word that calms all my fears, and bids all my sorrows to cease.  Though life is certain to rush around me in a torrent of winds, there is one thing, and one thing only that will keep me sane and striving to live a life worthy of the gospel of Christ.  Hope.  This is the one word that has infiltrated the many pockets of my mind for months now.  God has shown me in ever increasing depths of the wickedness of my heart, and he has countered that by showing me the complete and perfect hope that he has in store for me.  In spite of all my downfalls, all my shortcomings, all my flaws, I am confident that God has a plan for me that is leading me ever closer to his heart. 

I am confident because Romans 8:18 tells me that “the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed in us.”  I feel like that doesn’t fully compute with me.  The things that God has coming for all Christians—the absolute wonders of his presence in Heaven—are so much greater than the difficulties that overcome us now that these hard times aren’t even worth mentioning.  We’ll have so much joy to occupy our thoughts and time that these hard times will be just a waste of brain space.  Nothing.  The future glory is so great that the present tribulations will be a miniscule pinprick of darkness next to a magnificent roaring flame.  Think about that when the hard times come again.  The joy that’s coming is so much greater than that pain.   Hold fast, fight the good fight, and every day live in hope of the coming glory of Christ. 

In his [fantastic, amazing, I-wish-I-could-read-it-every-day] book Mere Chrsitianity, CS Lewis has a chapter on hope in which this quote can be found: “If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world.”  There might be a day soon [if it has not already arrived] when all you and I have to hold onto is this hope.  When the only thing that gets us through the day is knowing that there will be a day that is better than this, where every desire is fulfilled in God.  I have days where I feel like I’ve sinned so much and so completely jacked everything up that all I can really think about is that day that is coming.  That future hope and glory.  And I believe that’s the reason hope has been such a massive, complicated, and beautiful word to me.  In the midst of this sinful life that I will never get right, what else do I have?  What else is there to hold onto other than the knowledge that I am saved by a grace that is continually pulling me heavenward? This world offers me no guarantees of happiness or love or peace—there is nothing to be gained here.  But because of hope, I pray along with Paul—to live is Christ, and to die is gain.