I LOST HOPE

He who was seated on the throne said, “I am making everything new!” Then he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.”
-Revelation 21:5

I have lost hope over and over again in life.

If it’s with my dreams, a relationship, my career, or in life itself.
We all have these moments in life when we don’t see how it’s all going to turn out, and it is extremely difficult when you’re in the midst of that moment.

Are you in that moment right now during Covid-19?

You’re wondering when social distancing is going to end…
You’re wondering if you will have your prom or graduation…
You’re wondering if we will have camp this summer…

It feels like every day that goes by, our hope begins to diminish as the reality starts settling in. You wonder, what if the results don’t turn out the way you expect? What if what you have been praying for over the past few weeks goes unheard?

Hope is great to have but it’s terrible to lose.

Have you lost hope and resonate to the difficulties in this moment?

You’re feeling more worried than ever
Your anxiety is building up
You start feeling a bit depressed

Hope is what Jesus’ disciples and His friends would have had after hearing Him teach on establishing a new Kingdom here on earth. Hope that the days of being oppressed under the kingdom of the Roman Empire will soon be over. Hope that peace will finally reign amongst them. As they committed their lives to trust in this hope, they had this moment left standing in the distance staring at a blood-stained cross – Jesus was dead.

In life, we all have these moments where we anticipate God to move a certain way but it seems like He didn’t. Unfortunately, when it doesn’t look the way we had anticipated, it feels like it’s dead. We then lose hope in our dreams, in our jobs, in our finances, in our relationships or in life itself. Sometimes we lose hope in ourselves, and sometimes we honestly lose hope in God altogether. We feel broken, confused, and forsaken like those who followed Jesus did while watching Jesus on the Cross in the distance. They must have been saying to themselves, it wasn’t supposed to be like this over the next few days as they lost hope. It must have been extremely difficult for them physically, emotionally and spiritually….No different than how we might feel in these moments.

A theologian in the 1800’s once said: “Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards”.

God is still doing something.

Sometimes in the midst of those moments when life doesn’t make any sense, God is still doing something. The death of Jesus makes a lot more sense in hindsight once we know He walked out of that tomb three days later. Believe it or not, one day you might be able to look back in hindsight and be able to see what God was doing in your life from a different angle and with a new kind of wisdom.

However, today you are not in hindsight yet but I still encourage you to choose hope in Christ. God is still working but it might just look a little different that you expected and it might just be best understood backwards.