Looking for hope, and answers to your prayers?

by | Hope Series

There is HOPE for you!

What are you clinging to?
Where is your hope planted?
Where you place it will determine
where you spend eternity!

 

As for me, I grew up in the church; invited Jesus into my heart and was water baptized at the age of five. My mom had me at church every time the doors were open, giving me wonderful opportunities to learn about Jesus. As a kid, you assume your normal is everyone’s normal too. As I grew older and met people from many different walks of life, thanks again to my mom exposing me to the world, I discovered that everyone didn’t get the same church upbringing that I was blessed with. I also discovered over time that there were so many faiths and religions and sadly, many different gods that people worshipped.

As a child excited about Jesus, my hope was in Him, I didn’t know I had choices at that point. In my euphoria from experiencing the love of Jesus, I eagerly tried to spread God’s love and “save” everyone. I wanted to make sure everyone knew Jesus and was going to Heaven. I had become so eager to share Jesus that those closest to me felt the need to reel me in because I was scaring and/or annoying people with my enthusiasm for Jesus.  The result of the “reeling in” caused the air to go out of my “excitement filled” balloon so to speak and I began to keep my love for Jesus all to myself so as not to offend anyone. Through a series of events that included that one, I began to lose self-confidence and self esteem and appeared to be very quiet and shy.

 

Where did “hope” go?

Trying to adjust to the new me at a very young age, I worked hard to be what I thought others thought I should be or wanted me to be. When I started down this path, I had no idea how dark it would be. As a child, it’s impossible to discern that becoming a people pleaser would be a “hell of its own.” On this path, “hope” is totally distorted and misplaced. Regardless of being in church, I lost my focus on the love, hope, and peace Jesus offers as I was placing those three things in others as I was trying to figure out how to make people happy and like me.  I fell into a trap of putting seeds of hope everywhere and anywhere while working tirelessly trying to water every seed trying to get all, or at least one, to grow.

Sadly, I spent over 50 years in this trap until one day I finally crumpled in a heap at Jesus’ feet, repented, and asked Him to help me get out of that bondage. I knew I had reached the bottom of the pit of darkness on the very day that God opened my eyes and showed me that I had put all hope in my husband, whom I loved and adored instead of in Him. I had spent a lifetime trying to get others to love me and want me in their life (since I had run everyone off talking about Jesus as a kid) and had become consumed with what others thought of me instead of what God thought of me. I thought I loved God and had a relationship with Him, but I didn’t really. I went to church, I served, I prayed, and did all the things good Christian’s do, but I didn’t realize I didn’t have a relationship with Him.

I had put my hope in others instead of God. Those “others” I hoped would like me always let me down. They didn’t love me or want me in their life. They didn’t appreciate everything I was doing for them to get them to like me. All that exhausting effort to be liked while ignoring Jesus whispering my name and calling me to Him.

 

Blessings from the “pit”

It wasn’t until that fateful day in the pit when God began to open my eyes was I able to finally see the “light.” God started with where I found Him that day, in the wrong place – the place where I had placed all my hope in the love of my life, my husband. God loves me so much that He said it was time to correct that error. God showed me that He was going to be taking my husband away from me.

God had blessed me with my soulmate in my late 30s.  We adored each other and knew that God had brought us together. Our years together were eventful, but blessed, as God stretched and tested our faith, time and again. With each test our love grew stronger for each other, to the point that we had put each other before God. We felt like God was our center, but our hope was still more in each other than in God alone. Thankfully God didn’t give up on us. In His grace and mercy, He broke us free from this trap we had walked right into.

The way God chose to snap us out of our stupor was to allow my husband to become sick with an incurable disease. It was my love’s time to go home and be with Jesus. We both knew that God was separating us and we were heartbroken. It took this catastrophic event to wake us up so that we would take off the blinders we had only for each other and turn to God. His plan worked, we put all our hope in God as we cried out in desperation for it not to be true. We begged God to heal him and give us another chance, but we both knew that God had given us a number of chances already and we had not changed. It was a bumpy road to get back on God’s straight and narrow path but when we finally did it together, it was then that we both found freedom, true hope, and indescribable peace.

 

Living in the land of “hope”

From the time my husband was diagnosed, to the day he went to be with Jesus, was 5 years and one month. God was so gracious and merciful to us through those years as He held us close, stretched us, taught us, and loved us every step of the way. We had almost twenty five years together and I will cherish every moment, the good ones and the rough ones. I went from thinking I would die without him in my life, to having such an indescribable peace that Jesus would comfort me after he was gone and I would be just fine. Talk about a “180,” that was truly a miracle for me to put all my hope in God and not in a person for the first time in my 50 + years, at the point that happened.

Only my daughter can testify to how much I loved my husband. When he would go out of town on business trips, which was often with his work, I became almost non-functional as a mother. I would make myself sick with worry that something would happen to him in his travels, and became totally obsessed with fear that someone would take him away from me. My non-existent self-esteem and self confidence when I met him, had continuously grown through his love and patience with me, but when he was away, the enemy would flood my mind with lies that I couldn’t shake.

It took me a while to realize that he loved me as much as I loved him and I had nothing to worry about. It was through the incredible love we had for each other that it made us an easy mark for the enemy. If the enemy couldn’t break up our marriage, he was going to cause us to turn from God together in our intense love for each other. It worked, until God rescued us. It’s sad that we had to be permanently separated for us both to find complete healing and willingly, wholeheartedly follow Jesus on His narrow path.

I share this with you because I want you to know this same peace that comes when you have a relationship with Jesus and put all your hope in your Creator, the One True God that gave you breath, YHWH God.

 

How to find your hope

It has been almost three years since my love went to be with Jesus and I can tell you with confidence that Jesus is still in the “Miracle” business! When I willingly and wholeheartedly chose to put all my hope in Jesus, a peace washed over me that felt like warm flowing oil poured onto my head that ran down to me feet. That’s the best way I know to describe it. You will know it when it happens to you, when you willingly and wholeheartedly go “all in” with Jesus.

When I reached that point of peace before my husband did, he immediately noticed a huge difference in me. I went from saying “I can’t live without you,” to, “Jesus will take care of me, I’ll be ok, don’t worry about me.” I had become so calm in Jesus’ peacefulness that at first my husband thought I didn’t love him anymore. He was used to my “desperate” love for him and suddenly it had become a “peaceful” love for him. Once I explained what God had done in me, he wanted that peace too. So we prayed, and God opened His eyes and heart; he also found that peace in putting all his hope in Jesus. Suddenly he wasn’t afraid to die and go be with Jesus without me. Truly an “only-God could do that” moment. From that moment until he passed away, we were able to enjoy our last moments together, no longer fretting, but reminiscing about our life together and planning for my future without him. Such a difference in our temperaments after we aligned our hearts and hope with Jesus.

This very same “peace,” Jesus offers all of us. I’m not any more special than you. Repent today, crawl up in His lap and let Him wrap His arms around you, and let Him love and care for you.

He loves you and wants a relationship with you. He wants to spend eternity with you in Heaven. If you don’t have a relationship with Him, invite Him into your heart today. If you are like me and spent a lifetime riding the fence, serving God and man/the world, fall to your knees and repent today. Jesus is waiting for you to take His hand that is outstretched to you.

 

How do I cling to hope?

Remember, the enemy doesn’t want you happy, peaceful, hopeful, or calm. He doesn’t want you in a relationship with Jesus either. Take comfort in knowing that God sent His son, Jesus, to die for your sins so that you could spend eternity with Him. Then when Jesus arose from the grave, He sent His Holy Spirit, His Comforter to teach you and care for you. He knows that we live in an evil and fallen world and He knew that the devil would be prowling around like a lion looking for those to devour (1 Peter 5:8), so He made provisions for us to be safe from him. It doesn’t mean we will have a pain free and easy life. It means He will protect, provide and give us peace through the trials and God’s stretching of our faith.

Here are a few of His Promises to “cling” to:

“Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice. Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand; do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” Philippians 4:4-7

“You must fear the LORD your God and worship him and cling to him. Your oaths must be in his name alone.” Deuteronomy 10:20

“Be careful to obey all these commands I am giving you. Show love to the LORD your God by walking in his ways and holding tightly to him.” Deuteronomy 11:22

“Serve only the LORD your God and fear him alone. Obey his commands, listen to his voice, and cling to him.” Deuteronomy 13:4

“Rather, cling tightly to the LORD your God as you have done until now.” Joshua 23:8

“I cling to you; your strong right hand holds me securely.” Psalms 63:8

 

Need help with first steps to finding your hope?

For starters:

Keep it simple.
Do the ABC’s and repent today.

Then pop over to our website to the Good News page for complete info:  https://chosencrowned.one/good-news/

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May God bless you and keep you

Note: the long version of our story is in a novel format in the bookstore on our website. https://chosencrowned.one/abandoned-but-not-alone/

Join me on:
Telegram: https://t.me/chosencrownedone
Instagram: ChosenandCrowned & Grace Reacher Books
Podcastle: Chosen & Crowned – Coming soon

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