Making Today MatterSample

Our Risen Hope

If this is one of God’s games, I don’t want to play anymore,” she said.

“You think God plays games with us?” I asked.

“I fought long and hard to survive breast cancer. I trusted God all the way through, and now it’s back. And I’m done.”

I bumped into her at one of my favorite coffee spots. She introduced herself as someone who’d heard me speak a couple of years previously, and she asked if I had time for coffee. We talked for a long time that day. I asked if I could pray for her before she left, and she politely declined. “What would be the point?”

I watched as she slipped out the door and stepped into the rain. I prayed for her anyway. I prayed for her to find hope.

It’s a terrible thing to lose hope. Some of us are there right now. Some of us have broken bodies; some, broken hearts. And others of us never imagined we’d be in a place like this—doubting, struggling, wondering why God seems to have stopped listening to us and stopped loving us.

I’ve been reading through Matthew’s gospel, and this morning I came to this:

“When Judas, who had betrayed [Jesus], saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returned the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and the elders. ‘I have sinned,’ he said, ‘for I have betrayed innocent blood.’

‘What is that to us?’ they replied. ‘That’s your responsibility.’

So Judas threw the money into the temple and left. Then he went away and hanged himself.” (Matthew 27:3–5)

Oh, Judas, if only you could have waited for three more days! Yes, you would have been in agony on Friday, but on Sunday morning you would have seen hope rise from the dead!

I don’t know what you face right now, friend, but I do know that while we may lose a few battles on this earth, we will—because of Jesus—win the war. Don’t despair!

On Sunday morning Hope rose from the dead.