Grief Runs Deep: Where Is the Hope?

Day 3

Dr. Joseph Stowell says, "Even though your heart is breaking and tears are clouding your eyes and staining your cheeks, God does give us something worth trusting in tough times. And that's Him, and Him alone."

When your heart is breaking, you can place your hope and trust in the Lord.

"Be strong and take heart, all you who hope in the LORD" (Psalm 31:24).

Anne Graham Lotz defines hope: "Biblical hope is absolute confidence in something you haven't seen or received yet, but you're absolutely confident that whatever God has said is going to come to pass."

She also declares that "Jesus is your hope for the future. One day Jesus Christ will come back, and He will set all of the wrong right. Good will triumph over the bad. Love will triumph over hate. Righteousness will triumph over evil. He's going to make it all right, and you can have absolute confidence that that's going to take place. That's your hope."

It's not always easy to find hope in our day to day life and it is certainly hard after you have lost someone close to you.  I think you spend so much time questioning why things have happened that you can't think of hope.  I guess when you are asking why you could also ask 'why not?'  God promised us salvation for all that believe that Jesus came to save us from sin.  He promised we would return to him in heaven. He did not promise life would be easy, that 'getting there' would be a walk in the park . He knows it will be tough and he has given us trials, life itself has given us trials.  We can chose to walk with him in Hope or we can choose to question, live in bitterness and anger and sadness.  We can chose to believe that He is with us or or not.  We can chose to find hope in the life after this one.

Jeremiah 29:11 For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.

1 Corinthians 15:19 If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied.

Romans 5:2-5 Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.

Sovereign God, I choose hope. I choose faith. I choose life. Give me an unshakable faith in You. You have given me so many opportunities to find hope, so many wonderful things that You have lead me to and so many blessings that I can see and find hope in.  I remember clearly the day I realized that I needed to come to you, to turn to you and ask you into my heart or I stood the chance of not seeing Cole again.  That is such great hope... the knowledge that our lives are not over when we leave this earth, that this is not our home, just a stopping ground until we join you in Heaven.  
I choose this hope, I choose to have faith in you and all you will lead me to. 
 Amen.