“Find rest, O my soul, in God alone; my hope comes from him. He alone is my rock and my salvation; he is my fortress, I will not be shaken. My salvation and my honor depend on God; he is my mighty rock, my refuge. Trust in him at all times, O people; pour out your hearts to him, for God is our refuge.”- Psalm 64:5-8
As I looked at those big blue letters spelling out the word hope God seemed to be asking me; just where is it that you place your hope? Good question. I hope for a miracle that will see my baby girl live and not die. I hope for a good job. I hope for a new church where I can serve and preach and teach and so on. I hope for a nice home for my wife and children. I hope for stability and assurance in difficult days. Perhaps you hope for peace of mind; or for the renewal of a relationship. Perhaps you hope for the pain to simply go away; be it the pain of loss, the pain of sickness, or the pain of guilt. Whatever it is, what is it that you hope for. As I shared my hopes to God, in my mind of vivid imagination I could hear the heavenly buzzer going off. You know the buzzer of which I speak. You are watching a game show and the contestant have been asked a nice challenging question. They stand up straight and give the most insightful of answers and then…buzzzzzzzz. Nope; wrong answer. The question was not what I hope for, but rather what I hope IN.
But God, is it wrong to hope for these positive things for my life and family? No! But you see, what I had to learn is the same thing we all need to learn in our times of darkest night. When you are searching for the light at the end of the tunnel; when you are truly seeking to step out on faith; where is your faith. My faith is not in the light at the end of the tunnel, for that is what I am hoping for; my faith is found in my hope and belief that there is a light. When you are seeking to trust in God your hope has to be in God. The Hebrew word being translated hope here, “tigvah,” deals not with the word hope as we understand it but rather in where the hope is being placed. The Psalmist is telling us to find hope in God alone. We are, by the very definition of the Hebrew word being used here, to live with “expectancy” in God; who is who He says He is. He is the One we live for.
I absolutely love the words of this psalm. “He alone is my rock and salvation...Trust in him at all times…God is our refuge.” Perhaps life has kicked you and left you struggling with how to make it through…only He can be your Rock and Salvation; not your money, looks, dreams or best intentioned family and friends. So you find yourself in the midst of a deep dark pit…trust in Him. You find yourself hurting in ways that cannot be imagined by people who have not been there…He is your Refuge and Strength. To trust Him is to live in faith that He can and will see you through the dark times and so you put your hope and expectations in Him and Him alone.
Once again, it sounded so very good and plain to me. After all I had placed my hope in so many things that I had forgotten that one simple truth. As Jesus had said, without Him we can do nothing. Yet, I still found myself having still another question. How do you take all your dreams, desires and struggles and place the hopes for them squarely in God and God alone? What is it that drives our hopes in the first place? And then God bade me to turn around and look to the head of this cross in which I sat. I may have entered at the foot of the cross, a simple man with hurts and needs, but now I sat at the heart of this cross, between faith and hope and looking up at one last stained glass window. And there, written in those big blue letters was one final word…LOVE.
(to be continued)
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