Holding out Hope

Recently, our big family van started exhibiting what engineers would call non-optimal performance. In more understandable terms, it was running terribly. I immediately started wondering what it would cost and how quickly we could get it fixed.

Often, when circumstances suddenly change for worse, or for the non-optimal, our first thought is how we can change them back to the way they were.

For many of us, that has been the most difficult part of the Coronavirus pandemic. Even if we haven’t been sick or haven’t lost a job, we are yearning for normal and we’re not sure how to get back to it. As days turned to weeks and weeks to months, we’ve even started wondering if normal is coming back at all.

Let’s be honest, we have placed an inordinate amount of hope in normal - hope that rightfully should be placed in the Lord.

The writer of Hebrews encouraged us in this way - “Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for He who promised is faithful.” Hebrews 10:23 The hope we profess is in a Person, not a situation.

Normal may never fully return. If it does, many will remember that they were unsatisfied with normal to begin with.

We were never instructed to trust in situations - only in Jesus, who can sustain us in any situation that we choose to give to Him.

Paul told us not to lose heart, because it was possible to be renewed inwardly (as opposed to being renewed by the surrounding environment). In 2 Corinthians 4:17, he wrote, “For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison…”.

The current departure from normal is being used to shape our hearts to fully receive and contain the glory of God for all eternity.

Normal wasn’t doing that at all.

Hope in Jesus. He is there for us through it all and beyond.