Never Beyond Hope

As I sat at breakfast gulping down a plate of biscuits, hashbrowns and eggs, I felt despair settling over me like a wet oppressive blanket. I had just contemplated a series of problems with my wife pondering them from every vantage point and finally determining that there was no hope. The enormity and gravity of the situation was and still is way beyond our control. I tried to peer way down the road of life to the final outcome of these trials but all I could see from my perspective was a dead end road. Hope sank life a diver doing a swan dive.
In between bites Brenda and I talked. She mostly listened as I thought out loud about all the possible scenarios or our situation. She offered words of encouragement and a different perspective than I was seeing in that moment. She has always done that for me and truly when the writer of proverbs states that the man who has found a good wife has found a good thing is true. She is perfect compliment to me, quiet, reserved, wise, and balanced in approach to life. Her words were the first seeds of hope.
I am not sure when it happened later on that day. I am pretty sure it was while attending a Sr. Adult banquet and listening to Dr. Don Newbury, former president and current chancellor of Howard Payne University, give a talk that shook me out of my despair and brought hope back to me full force.
Hope is such a fragile thing. The person who trudges through life without hope will live with a pessimistic point of view and fully expect to have a life of nothing but heartaches and hardships. Let that same person cling desperately to hope and they will expect trials to end, better days to come, and the assurance that God is always there.
In my journey I get to visit with many people and inevitably we talk about problems. Everybody has them. Some are bigger than others and some last longer than others. Everyone reading this faces some challenge, some problem or crisis that seeks to strangle and choke what little hope we may have. I also get to peer into the eyes and more importantly into the souls of those who have hope or those who live in the vice grip of despair.
For the person walking through life without belief in God’s existence or without a vital relationship with the Lord, where does hope come from? It is absolute foolishness to put hope in ourselves. Our resources are limited, whether they be mental, physical, emotional, or financial. God’s resources are infinite. Our perspective on problems can be inadequate and incomplete but God’s perspective is all wise, astute, and incisive.
As you watch the evening news and read the paper are you filled with hope or anxieties? As you keep a close watch on the stock market do you feel hope fading with each drop on Wall Street? Where do you go to cope with life? Many run to cheap thrills, sordid entertainment, and destructive behavior but God offers something better and more lasting. He offers the promise of Himself to help and intervene in life if we follow His principles and live by His precepts.
[Ps 42:5] “Why am I so depressed? Why this turmoil in me? Put your hope in God, for I will still praise Him, my Savior and my God.” There is always hope with God. Even when I am looking into the grief stricken faces of those who have lost loved ones. “We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, concerning those who are asleep, so that you will not grieve like the rest, who have no hope. Since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, in the same way God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep through Jesus.” [I Thess 4:13-14] There is still hope for those worried about their financial futures [Matt 6:25-34]. There is even hope for the ones who have faced problems and carried heavy burdens so long you feel your situation will never change. “He told them a parable on the need for them to pray always and not become discouraged.” [Luke 18:1] In other words, we ought to always offer prayers with the hope and expectation that things will get better and live in continual despair. The bills will get paid. The sun will come up again after the rainy nights and days. Depression does lift and the darkness dispels as bright rays of God’s hope pierces through the gloom in our minds and our souls.
I am thankful for a seventy year old retired college president who came into my life last Friday with laughter, infectious joy and reminded me of the hope I have in my Savior Jesus. Suddenly my problems that had consumed my mind only hours earlier over a hot breakfast at a small diner seemed smaller and even petty. If I could be the one who jolts your heart back toward God and ultimately back toward hope then I would count this article a great success. Regardless of what you are going through, you are never beyond hope if God is your companion.