Hope Only

COMPOSED

An assured future splinters into broken, meaningless shards. Expected joy disintegrates. A foundation of trust shifts underfoot, now unstable.  Submerged beneath loss, heart and soul wander amidst confusing wreckage. The devil’s cruel triumph is complete in its chilling bleakness. Faith now seems overconfident, presumptuous. Restoration appears impossible; love is silent, hidden. Following such collapse, unsurprisingly, is sadness and deep lament. From a perspective of needless shame, isolation consumes.

Oblivious to truths of a Story only faintly remembered, we focus on easing the pain of an egregious betrayal. Raw emotion impatiently demands distraction, and we cling to chosen idols. Mindlessly licking our wounds, we are resistant and doubtful as to how His truths might fit into our dilemma. Satan relishes in our self-absorption. 

Yet from this insistent distress and darkness, tiny glimmers of hope will emerge. Undaunted, these miraculous seeds sprout up to nourish our languishing spirit. But in deliberate seclusion, we hesitate to indulge in such confident, growing expectations. Hope seems dangerously foolish.

AMPLIFIED

Each of our stories incorporate distinct details, differences that suggest we share no common ground. Yet in our most critical need -- and the Source to supply it -- we are richly connected. What do we desire, but unconditional love and acceptance? What do we simultaneously both fear and long for, but to be known fully? What do we emit, but selfishness and stubborn rebellion toward God? We want to reign; we furiously resist a Savior. How dare He infringe on our independence. We can be such ugly versions of ourselves, in terrible need of finding our spiritual home. Still, His grace watches over us.

Noisy yearnings lead to vacant relationships and futile pastimes, as we try to satisfy uncertain needs. We are discontent. The result of our striving is only the hollowed, rotting pulp of insecurity and dismay. We mistakenly try to fulfill our deepest longings without seeking the One who both created those longings and supplies their fulfillment. In an intertwined irony, we become the least deserving recipient of that which we need to survive. Even so, our story is essential; we are worth being known. So hope keeps our heart beating.

Silenced with consummate need, at last, we hear God’s Voice. Despair is a mercy given to draw our hearts toward His, a magnificent love and lasting provision of protection and peace. Toward the fruit of His incomprehensible Spirit and His Living Word. He delicately threads this catalyst of Hope into our pilgrimage. Relentless hope that will not let us sink, that defeats the onslaught of Satan’s tempters, so that they slink away quietly, leaving us intact and whole. Pivotal hope that brings a quick and certain shift in perspective, an unexpected joy, an unpredictable development. Trustworthy hope that continually encourages, uplifts, reassures, and accompanies us. Unwavering, unstoppable hope, written so clearly into Scripture, accessible to our hearts through His whispering Presence. This is the platform of stability and balance that we begin to crave and value, as its impact wards off all fear. 

The aching pain of unrelenting loss becomes a pathway that leads right up to His Sovereign Throne of Grace, on which we finally land; relieved, content, overjoyed, home. Hope Only becomes quite enough for us, powerfully nurturing a growing confidence that God actually satisfies. Joy really does come in the morning. This hope, and His gentle surprises, feeds our very souls, keeps our inner being alive when we feel lifeless and numb. Gritty, determined, brave, this true hope repels Satan’s shadowy lies, his lurings. This hope weaves itself right into the fabric of our circumstances -- our story -- with such intimate, thoughtful detail, that we are certain the God of the universe has descended to restore us Himself. And indeed, He has.

POSTLUDE

“We calculate and estimate, and say that this and that will happen, and we forget to make room for God to come in as He chooses...Do not look for God to come in any particular way, but look for Him...Expect Him to come, but do not expect Him only in a certain way. However much we may know God, the great lesson to learn is that at any minute He may break in. We are apt to overlook this element of surprise, yet God never works in any other way.” O. Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest, January 25

“Has God trusted you with a silence – a silence that is big  with meaning?...Can God trust you like that, or are you still asking for a visible answer?...A wonderful thing about God’s silence is that the contagion of His stillness gets into you and you become perfectly confident – ‘I know God has heard me.’” O. Chambers, My Utmost For His Highest, October 11

“Any problem that comes between God and myself springs out of disobedience; any problem, and there are many, that is alongside me while I obey God, increases my ecstatic delight, because I know that my Father knows, and I am going to watch and see how He unravels this thing.” O. Chambers, My Utmost For His Highest, December 14

“It is a question of faith in God – the rarest thing; we have faith only in our feelings. I do not believe God unless He will give me something in my hand whereby I may know I have it, then I say – ‘Now I believe.’ There is no faith there…When I have really… let go entirely, there is…a complete overwhelming sense of being brought into union with God, and the whole thing is transfigured with peace and joy.” O. Chambers, My Utmost For His Highest, December 6 

“The things that make God dear to us are not so much His great big blessings as the tiny things, because they show His amazing intimacy with us; He knows every detail of our individual lives.” O. Chambers, My Utmost For His Highest, June 3

“God’s order has to work up to a crisis in our lives because we will not heed the gentler way.” O. Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest, January 1

“Have we come to the place where God can withdraw His blessings and it does not affect our trust in Him? When once we see God at work, we will never bother our heads about things that happen, because we are actually trusting in our Father in Heaven Whom the world cannot see.” O. Chambers, My Utmost For His Highest, October 23

“Faith that is sure of itself is not faith; faith that is sure of God is the only faith there is.” O. Chambers, My Utmost For His Highest, December 21

“Why shouldn’t we go through heartbreaks? Through those doorways God is opening up ways of fellowship with His Son. Most of us fall and collapse at the first grip of pain; we sit down on the threshold of God’s purpose and die away of self-pity…If through a broken heart God can bring His purposes to pass in the world, then thank Him for breaking your heart.” O. Chambers, My Utmost For His Highest, November 1

“The way will open. God cares and His plans unfold. Just love and wait. Love is the key. No door is too difficult for it to open. What cause have you to fear? Has He not cared for and protected you? Hope on. Hope gladly. Hope with certainty. Be calm, calm in My Power.” A. J. Russell, God Calling, Jan. 6

“We act like pagans in a crisis, only one out of a crowd is daring enough to bank his faith in the character of God.” O. Chambers, My Utmost For His Highest, May 30

“The test of our spirituality comes when we come up against injustice and meanness and ingratitude and turmoil, all of which have the tendency to make us spiritual sluggards. We want to use prayer and Bible reading for the purpose of retirement. We utilize God for the sake of getting peace and joy, that is, we do not want to realize Jesus Christ, but only our enjoyment of Him. This is the first step in the wrong direction.” O. Chambers, My Utmost For His Highest, July 10 

“And He will tax the last grain of sand and the remotest star to bless us if we will obey Him. What does it matter if external circumstances are hard? Why should they not be! If we give way to self-pity and indulge in the luxury of misery, we banish God’s riches from our own lives and hinder others from entering into His provision. No sin is worse than the sin of self-pity, because it obliterates God and puts self-interest upon the throne…When God is beginning to be satisfied with us He will impoverish everything in the nature of fictitious wealth, until we learn that all our fresh springs are in Him.” O. Chambers, My Utmost For His Highest, May 16

“...tears came to Jesus when he looked out over Jerusalem and realized the fate awaiting that fabled city. He let out a cry of what Shusaku Endo has called mother-love: ‘O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing.’ I sense in that spasm of emotional pain something akin to what a parent feels when a son or daughter goes astray, flaunting freedom…Or the pain of a man or woman who has just learned a spouse has left – the pain of a jilted lover. It is a helpless, crushing pain of futility, and it staggers me to realize that the Son of God himself emitted a cry of helplessness in the face of human freedom. Not even God, with all his power, can force a human being to love.” P. Yancey, The Jesus I Never Knew, p. 160

The Jesus I Never Knew, Copyright 1995 by Philip Yancey, used by permission.

ENCOURAGING WORD

Hebrews 6:18-19  ...we who have fled to take hold of the hope offered to us may be greatly encouraged. We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure.

Isaiah 50:10  Let him who walks in the dark, who has no light, trust in the name of the Lord and rely on His God.

Romans 8:24-25  But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he already has? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.

Isaiah 30:19-22  ...you will weep no more. How gracious He will be when you cry for help! As soon as He hears, He will answer you. Although the Lord gives you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, your teachers will be hidden no more; with your own eyes you will see them. Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, ‘This is the way; walk in it.’ Then you will defile your idols….you will throw them away…

Psalm 34:18  The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.

Psalm 130:5  I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in His Word I put my hope.

2 Corinthians 4:16-18  Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal. 

Psalm 71:14  As for me, I will always have hope…

Psalm 62:8  Trust in Him at all times, you people; pour out your hearts to Him, for God is our refuge.

Isaiah 30:15;18  This is what the Sovereign Lord, the Holy One of Israel, says: ‘In repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength, but you would have none of it...’ Yet the Lord longs to be gracious to you; He rises to show you compassion.

Micah 7:7-8  But as for me, I watch in hope for the Lord, I wait for God my Savior; my God will hear me...Though I have fallen, I will rise. Though I sit in darkness, the Lord will be my light.

Lamentations 3:25-26  The Lord is good to those whose hope is in Him, to the one who seeks Him; it is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord.

Hebrews 11:1  Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.

Romans 5:3-5  Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us. 

Romans 12:12  Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer. 

Psalm 106: 13  But they soon forgot what He had done and did not wait for His plan to unfold.

1 Corinthians 15:19  If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men. 

2 Corinthians 3:12  Therefore, since we have such a hope, we are very bold. 

Ephesians 1:17-18  I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you…

1 Peter 1:13  Therefore, prepare your minds for action; be self-controlled; set your hope fully on the grace to be given you when Jesus Christ is revealed.

Jeremiah 29:11-14 ‘For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you,’ declares the Lord, ‘and will bring you back from captivity.’