Hope



Sometimes it’s the simplest things that bring the most joy.  After checking the weather forecast at the beginning of last week, I was pretty discouraged.  Rain was predicted Every. Single. Day.  So imagine my surprise when not only did the sun shine most days, but the temperature even reached 60 degrees at the end of the week.  The girls got to play outside with their friends and I finally got to log some longer runs outside after months on the treadmill.  At the end of one of these lengthy runs, I was walking up the steep hill to our home and came across these flowers at the edge of a neighbor’s yard. 

 

Triply Blessed ~ Sunshine, Long Run, and Now Evidence of Spring. 

  

 

Flowers at the end of winter always cause me to think of HOPE.

 

Having just read Romans 8 several times this past week, verse 24 comes to mind where the apostle Paul asks, “For we were saved in this hope, but hope that is seen is not hope; for why does one still hope for what he sees?”

My natural inclination isn’t always toward Hope.  Sometimes I get so distracted by the bags I’ve chosen to pick up in this life.  My heart gets weighed down as I wonder if I’ll ever get to live closer to family when so many are aging so quickly, or how our choice to homeschool will affect our girls when they’re older, or if I’m ever going to truly learn those lessons that God’s been trying to teach me the last few years, or if I’m ever going to figure out this wife and mother thing.

The topic of our small group Bible study last week was despair.  When hubby looked up the dictionary definition of despair, it read the absence of hope.

As we quickly approach the Easter season, I’m grateful for the Hope that’s been promised through Jesus.  I’m fairly certain that all of my questions aren’t going to be immediately answered.  Life is about stretching and growing.  It’s about learning to rely on the One who gives new life.  But I’m so grateful that when my heart is cold and weary after a long winter that He reaches out and places visual (bright, beautiful, unavoidable) reminders that Spring is coming.  There’s reason for Hope.

 

Psalm 27:13

I would have lost heart, unless I had believed
That I would see the goodness of the Lord
In the land of the living.

 

1 Peter 1

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, ⁴ to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, ⁵ who are kept by the power of God through faith for salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.

⁶ In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, if need be, you have been grieved by various trials, ⁷ that the genuineness of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire, may be found to praise, honor, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ, ⁸ whom having not seen you love. Though now you do not see Him, yet believing, you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory, ⁹ receiving the end of your faith—the salvation of your souls.