Hope is one of the most powerful things that you will ever have access to. Hope allows you to stop focusing on your present troubles and believe for a better tomorrow. Hope allows you to continue believing that God has something better for you than the things that you’re dealing with in the moment.
However, hope is often easily snatched away, overshadowed by the adversity, hardships, trials, and tribulations that are a natural part of daily life. In those moments, it’s up to you to find hope, even in hopeless situations.
Life is often a painful, confusing, tiresome experience. It’s not uncommon to evaluate where you’re at in relation to these hardships and start asking questions.
Why do I have to deal with suffering? Why do I constantly battle against depression and anxiety? Why do I have to wake up every morning, put on a fake smile, and muddle through life while I’m trying to find hope?
In those moments, it’s your responsibility to find hope. Yes, God will put hope in front of you, but during seasons of intense hopelessness, it’s up to us to find hope.
That’s not to say that God somehow dangles hope in front of us, putting it behind hardships, and expecting us to dig it out. Instead, it means that there are times that we have to go against our own human nature and find hope.
When the job that you’ve worked at for years gets outsourced, the doctor’s report indicates that the cancer is back, the spouse that you’ve been with for years suddenly tells you that they’ve found someone new, or the college that you’ve always dreamt of attending rejects your application, it’s hard to find hope.
Hope is not one of the fruits of the Spirit listed in Galatians 5:22-23, which means that cultivating hope is something that we have to do. Obviously, life isn’t always filled with hopeful situations, and all of us will face adversity.
In those moments of hopelessness, you have to push against the current and find hope. It won’t always be easy, it won’t always be obvious, but it’s always available.
Locking the Doors of Your Life
John 10:10 (TPT)
A thief has only one thing in mind-he wants to steal, slaughter, and destroy. But I have come to give you everything in abundance, more than you expect-life in its fullness until you overflow.
Hopefully, you’ve never experienced a home break in where someone came into your home and took things that belonged to you. However, if you have, you fully understand the feelings of helplessness that arise from enduring such a traumatic experience. When you are robbed, your sense of security is the most important thing that is taken away.
Yes, a thief may come in and steal jewelry, electronics, or other valuables, but your peace of mind is the most significant loss that you will experience when someone comes into the home that you work for and walks out with the things that are the result of your labor.
Being a victim of a robbery not only leaves you without the things that the thief took, but the emotional carnage that a robbery leaves behind is even more damaging.
That’s why Jesus compared Satan to a thief in these verses and didn’t stop at saying that he comes to steal. Instead, he wants to slaughter and destroy.
Obviously, we understand that Satan does not have the power to take your life. The Bible teaches us that God takes our breath, and we die (Psalm 104:29). However, Satan, the thief that he is, also wants to slaughter and destroy us. Since he can’t slaughter us in the literal sense, he wants to do so emotionally, spiritually, and mentally.
If you want to prevent someone from breaking into your home, there are practical steps you can take. Locking your doors and investing in a security system are some of the most obvious. In the same vein, you can lock the doors of your heart and allow the Holy Spirit to serve as your security system.
One of the things that Satan will try to steal and destroy in your life is hope. Fortunately, the Holy Spirit serves as your lock, your security system, and the protector that you need against the thief.
Don’t Focus on Failure
Hebrews 11:1-3 (ESV)
Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. For by it the people of old received their commendation. By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible.
The opening verses of Hebrews 11 set the stage for the following 37. It’s certainly no mistake that the author spoke about faith being the assurance of things that God’s people hope for. Hebrews 11 is considered the Hall of Faith, and the people who are discussed in it are considered the heroes of the Christian faith. However, they weren’t perfect people.
To make things easier for us to understand, God made sure that the failures of the people in the Hall of Faith were recorded in Scripture. Abraham had a problem with lying, Noah had a problem with drinking, and Rahab was a prostitute. However, they still made it into the Hall of Faith because of their trust in God.
That trust breeds hope. However, when we suffer personal failures, it’s often easy to lose hope. After all, if I do something terrible, isn’t it safe to assume that God is going to turn His back, leaving me hopeless? Not at all.
One of the most important aspects of finding hope is to refuse to focus on your failures. No, you don’t have it all together. You probably don’t live a perfect Christian life. None of us do. However, God doesn’t take away hope from people when they fail. Instead, He continues to extend grace and hope for us when we miss the mark.
Who’s Holding You Together?
Psalm 34:17-20 (ESV)
When the righteous cry for help, the Lord hears and delivers them out of all their troubles. The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit. Many are the afflictions of the righteous, abut the Lord delivers him out of them all. He keeps all his bones; not one of them is broken.
One of the most powerful things about hope is that it serves as a sort of binder. When everything in your life feels like it’s falling apart, and going in a million different directions, hope wraps us up like a warm hug from a loved one, and helps hold us together.
However, hope can only do that if we look to the true Source of hope. What do you look for when you need something to hold you together?
Many people look to their own personal success and the things that they’ve acquired. Sadly, those sources are temporary. Some people look to relationships with others to hold them together. While it’s important to have a trusted support system, people are prone to let us down. When that happens, we’re left in a state of disarray.
Instead, we need to look to Christ as the true source of our hope.
Allow God to hold you together in moments of hopelessness. When you find yourself completely wrapped up in His provision and goodness, hope is a natural byproduct.
A Closing Prayer:
Heavenly Father, I know that the situation that I’m facing looks bleak. On the surface, it doesn’t appear that I can find a glimmer of hope anywhere. However, I know that You are my true source of hope, and that You will hold me together, so I am not broken. Help me to look beyond my own failures and the things that I’m facing. In Christ’s name, Amen.