guts to hope
10.7.2011 
Few things speak hope like a puppy or a beautiful child. K still lives at Rancho Ebenezer and is 9.Not everyone understands how you can spin two lassos at the same time, one of hope and one of grief. Jodi Picoult, Vanishing Acts
Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life. Proverbs 13:12
To hope takes guts.
To hope is to join Adam and Eve again in the garden. A desire fulfilled is a tree of life. The phrase “tree of life” takes us back to Eden. The tree was in the middle of the garden. Next to it grew the other tree. The forbidden tree. We ate. We died. And we have struggled with hope ever since. But it also calls us to remember the end. We, as overcomers, will feast on the tree of life which is in the paradise of God (Rev. 2:7). The leaves of the tree will be for the healing of the nations (Rev. 22:2).
When we hope, we risk heart sickness. The vultures of disappointment surely have eaten more than once of our flesh. The reality is that often our hearts are sickened here on the other side of the Garden.
My family had hoped…
To remain in Honduras to love the children in our ministry
To build an addition to our school
To be there until Edgar graduated high school
I’ve heard of other brutal choices missionaries had to make to leave the children they were loving. I know what it is like to walk away. When the rubble of life overwhelms, you have to make a devastating choice. On the wall in our den in Honduras, I painted a tree. To me the tree represented life. A day came when we had to walk away. We placed the precious children back in the arms of the Shepherd who loved them before we had even seen their smiles.
The grief that followed threatened to take my very breath away.
My grief is not over. Grief doesn’t end. It evolves and blends and changes. It changes you. The things I grieve are far too precious for the grief to one day be “done.” Gradually, I am trusting God with my pain and my sons in Honduras. Over time, He is showing me that He is the Defender of the Weak. And He shows me that the Weak is mainly me. I can trust Him with the Weak – my Honduran sons – more when I can trust Him with the weak in me.
When I ask Him about evil – and I have asked - we don’t get much farther than. “It exists.” And, “I AM is bigger.” And, “I am more glorified because I can turn what men meant for evil into good and glory and purpose.”
Faith has grown in my heart where I have allowed the Father to hold me in the pain. My strength and hope speak of a loving Father orchestrating a larger story here on earth. Often I don’t understand the “scenes” of this story, but I trust the Screenwriter.
When a desire is fulfilled, it is the hors d’oeuvre for the feast of heaven. Until then, we have hope.
We must so hunger for a different tomorrow that we risk losing today to gain it. Dan Allender
Reader Comments (3)
painfully powerful~
What goes on in the heart in the dark of the night is known only to you and God--grief and hope intertwine like a rope. Thank God He holds the other end and reins me in.
I know you two women, Carol and Marilyn, have tasted both these crackers: grief and hope. You do not disdain the Lord's work but willingly say to Him: You will, Lord. Glad to know you and your stories and see how the ScreenWriter is at work. He is, indeed, at work in you.