Find Your BraveSample

This past year was a tough one for me. The storms were relentless, one after another after another. My father passed away suddenly. Someone hacked into my husband’s and my personal accounts and ultimately stole thousands of dollars. I experienced a couple of knee-buckling, backstabbing betrayals by some close friends. And finally to top off my banner year, Philip was diagnosed with lymphoma.

I don’t tell you about all these storms because I want your pity. I just wanted you to know that you are not alone in your storms. Hope is what sustained me this year. Hope that it would get better.

Hope is for all of us. Not just those “glass half full” people. Hope is not wishing, and it is not “positive thinking.” Hope is a sure expectation that God will do what He promised. Hope is like floaties. Have you seen children in a pool wearing those little flotation armbands in order to keep their heads above the water? Hope is like that. It keeps you floating until you get to solid ground.

Are you in the middle of a situation in which hope seems lost? Maybe you have lost your job. Or your husband had an affair. Or you can’t seem to kick that addiction. Or your child continues to struggle at school. Or you’ve heard the word cancer from your doctor. Or you wonder if the secret dream in your heart will ever come to pass. How is hope possible? The Old Testament prophet Jeremiah has an answer:

I’ll never forget the trouble, the utter lostness, the taste of ashes, the poison I’ve swallowed. I remember it all—oh, how well I remember— the feeling of hitting the bottom. But there’s one other thing I remember, and remembering, I keep a grip on hope. (Lamentations 3:19–21, MSG)

Sometimes the bravest thing you can do is to keep hoping. Oftentimes, to keep a grip on hope will take both hands. Where are you drowning? Put on those floaties. You are being made stronger with every wave, and this storm is not bigger than God inside you. His name is Immanuel—God with us. He is not just the God up in heaven watching aloofly as His people suffer. No. He is with me. He is with you. In every moment.

ACTION: Go ahead and get your hope up. This dark moment is not the end of the story.