Hope is never alone

Thought of the day: Fasting hopelessness 

Hope is never alone

On St. Patrick's day we are reminded of the story of a man who found hope when he thought he was alone. 

During Patrick's boyhood, the Roman empire was near collapse and too weak to defend its holdings in distant lands. Britain became easy prey for raiders, including those who crossed the Irish sea from the land known as Hibernia or Ireland. When Patrick was sixteen, he was seized by raiders and carried off to Ireland.

Most of what is known about St. Patrick comes from his own Confession, written in his old age. In his Confession he wrote about his capture:

After Patrick was captured and taken to Ireland as a slave by an Irish chieftain named Niall, he was sold to another chieftain in northern Ireland. Much of Patrick's time was spend alone on the slopes of Slemish Mountain, tending his master's flocks of sheep. During the long, lonely hours in the fields and hills of Ireland, Patrick found comfort in praying. In his Confession he wrote:

...
" every day I had to tend sheep, and many times a day I prayed -- the love of God and His fear came to me more and more, and my faith was strengthened. And my spirit was moved so that in a single day I would say as many as a hundred prayers and almost as many in the night, and this even when I was staying in the woods and on the mountains; ... and I felt no harm, and there was no sloth in me -- as now I see, because the spirit within me was fervent."
"As a youth, nay, almost as a boy not able to speak, I was taken captive ... I was like a stone lying in the deep mire; and He that is mighty came and in His mercy lifted me up, and raised me aloft ... And therefore I ought to cry out aloud and so also render something to the Lord for His great benefits here and in eternity -- benefits which the mind of men is unable to appraise." 

St. Patrick found hope during his time of slavery. He was taught by God the power of the trinity. As he prayed from his spirit he connected with his savior who presented his lonely heart to the creator of the universe. In return God's peace flowed through the Son to the Spirt who lived within St. Patrick. He was being taught relationship, community and unity alone on the slopes of a mountain. I'm guessing the mountain was covered with shamrocks because he used them to illustrate to others the relationship of the trinity. The shamrock has one stem, but three leaves.. We are the stem that connects to the three; Father, Son and Holy Spirit. 

Our hope is found in the Holy Spirit who is within us... We are never alone.

"I still have many things to tell you, but you can’t handle them now. But when the Friend comes, the Spirit of the Truth, he will take you by the hand and guide you into all the truth there is. He won’t draw attention to himself, but will make sense out of what is about to happen and, indeed, out of all that I have done and said. He will honor me; he will take from me and deliver it to you. Everything the Father has is also mine. That is why I’ve said, ‘He takes from me and delivers to you." John 16:12-15 MSG

Hope laughs

Thought of the day: Fasting hopelessness 

My hope laughs

Laughter is a weapon given to us by God. 

He will still fill your mouth with laughter, your lips with shouting (Job 8:21) 

God laughs at the wicked - because God always has the final word.

"The Lord shall laugh at him: for he sees that his day is coming. ( Ps 37:13)

God causes us to laugh at those who would cause destruction.

"The righteous also shall see, and fear, and shall laugh at him..." (Ps 52:6)

Why would God want us to laugh?

Laughter eliminates fear 

It comes from a loving God who knows laughter defeats the enemy every time. 

In trying times, laughter is faith that sees the promised victory!

God is in charge 

He told Job:

"At destruction and famine you shall laugh: neither shall you be afraid of the beasts of the earth." (Job 5:22)

"Laughter - uncontrollable joy.

Laughter does a heart Good, like a medicine

When enabled, laughter walks on the wings of the wind . . . upon clouds, and is carried in God’s arms

It is the garment of praise unleashed into a broken world

Laughter is the echo of the vacant grave . . ."- Mabel Andlers

I see hope in the "pits" of life.

Thought of the day: fasting hopelessness 

I see hope in the "pits" of life.

"So when Joseph came to his brothers, they stripped him of his robe, the robe of many colors that he wore. 24 And they took him and threw him into a pit. The pit was empty; there was no water in it." 

Genesis 37:23-24

I have been studying the story of Joseph, on and off, for the past 2 years. 

During this time I have also been running into a reoccurring theme of :"love God, love others."

Jesus replied: "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’[a] 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself."

Matthew 22:37-39

I was not sure why these two themes kept presenting themselves to me ... until this past week.

 In the beginning of the story of Joseph, we see his brothers ,who hated him, throw him into a pit. They wanted him dead because he was a dreamer and he was his father's favorite. God had given him a dream that one day he would reign over his father and brothers. When he shared this dream with his family, he ended up on a path that led to pits of slavery and prison. 

Lets just say this did not look very promising. He spent the next 13 years in captivity wondering if his God dream would ever come true. He suffered greatly in the pit, but he also must have hoped greatly too. I believe the pit was a place where God prepared him for his dream. 

His pit was his school. 

In the pit he learned all the skills he would need to reign. I think he also learned in the pit to love God so he could love others. Which by the way is the greatest of all the commandments. 

He made the pit a place where he learned to lean on God. It was a place where God filled his hollow broken heart with love so he could some day love "the others" who tried to kill him.

Could our pits be a place where we learn to do what Jesus said was most important? A place where we learn to love God with all our heart, soul and mind so that we can love our neighbor as our self.

While we lean on God in our pit, His perfect love restores our hearts. It is a journey where the heart goes from hollow to whole. When your heart is whole with Gods love it will overflow to others. 

The pit restored Josephs heart to be able to say to the brothers  who hated him, "do not fear , I will take care of you".

  "Joseph replied, “Don’t be afraid. Do I act for God? Don’t you see, you planned evil against me but God used those same plans for my good, as you see all around you right now—life for many people. Easy now, you have nothing to fear; I’ll take care of you and your children.” He reassured them, speaking with them heart-to-heart." 

Genesis 50:19-21

My hope is: I have a Savior

Thought of the day: fasting hopelessness 

My hope is: I have a Savior; I'm not mine or anyone else's savior.

Have you thought?

1. I've got to fix this.

2. This is my fault, so I will fix this.

3. I feel so bad for them so I will fix them.

The burden we feel to fix ourselves or fix others can be overwhelming. I believe that we can get in the way of how God wants to deal with us by thinking we can do the fixing on our own. Truth is God will allow us to choose “our will” over “His will”. That is what makes Him a loving God. He will never make us choose Him or His will. We must see that our need to fix is really our way of taking on the role of "Savior". When we do this we eventually become overwhelmed and worn out. Not a bad place to be if you turn to the true Savior, Jesus Christ and confess you've stepped in His place. Then confess your need “to fix” and ask Him to take the place of the fixer, healer, deliverer. Our obedience in this area is foundational to hope. It ushers in rest for you "the fixer" and builds trust that God's heart is best. Remember, God knows this is a process. It’s all about recognizing good and evil, real and false.

"There could be no true obedience from the heart unless there was the freedom to disobey"-Rick Joyner

Being Obedient by allowing God to be God is hard! Especially when someone we love hurts for a long period of time. We must remember that our job is to encourage and pray. To be an example of God’s healing and delivering power. To know and trust that we have prayed and placed that person in God’s hands. And to realize that sometimes all we can offer is a hug and the simple words of hope "This is a season and it will pass." You can believe it because it’s proven to be true in my own life. God saved me and He will save you!

The hope we hang onto is if we do our job God can do His Job.

Jesus is our vision of hope

Thought of the day: fasting hopelessness 

Jesus is our vision of hope

The cross before Jesus represented death. Our view was one dimensional . We could only see the power it had to steal, kill and destroy. 

But

The cross after Jesus represents power over death. Our view is now multidimensional. Now we see the power it has to restore, resurrect and renew. 

We see so simply that anything can change after an encounter with Jesus. He changed our view of their electric chair from gruesome to glorious. 

"it is finished" were three words spoken by our savior that changed our view of the cross forever. They opened the door to hope. 

He encountered our worst fear, death, and said to it- enough! 

Our hope is He had and still has the final word to our gruesome circumstances. Our hope trusts that His encounter with them will restore, resurrect and renew 

Believe that in our encounter with Jesus He will say, enough, I have come to give you life!

Hope forgives

Thought for the day; fasting hopelessness 

Hope forgives because forgiveness always ushers in new life. 

I'm so glad that hope see's past sin, confusion, heartbreak and my broken way of seeing things.

"Jesus prayed, “Father, forgive them; they don’t know what they’re doing.” Dividing up his clothes, they threw dice for them. The people stood there staring at Jesus, and the ringleaders made face...s, taunting, “He saved others. Let’s see him save himself! The Messiah of God—ha! The Chosen—ha!”

Luke 23:34 MSG 

How hopeful! That our Father would see past His own heartbreak to pray forgiveness for those who were putting Him to death. You know what I think He saw when He looked down from the cross as He died? I think He saw the hearts of His Fathers children losing hope. I believe that somewhere deep in their hearts they wanted Him to be God in that moment. I think they wanted to see the power of an almighty powerful God come and save His son. Their hope was dying right before their eyes and Jesus knew it. His prayer was for them to not make agreements with their hopelessness in the deep pit of heartbreak. 

Truth is Gods ways are different than our ways. New life always comes after old life (the worlds ways). And it all begins with forgiveness . We must learn to see through His eyes, His heart. Our Hope was born the day Jesus died on the cross. 

Our hope is secure because Jesus forgives.

Hope focuses on joy.

Thought of the day: fasting hopelessness 

Hope focuses on joy. The joy of The Lord is our strength. 

Don't allow your circumstance to shape your belief in God.

Allow your belief (His word) to shape your circumstance.

Hope keeps its eyes on the joy set before to overcome present circumstances. Jesus was able to endure dying on a cross by focusing on the joy of conquering death. 

The more we know... Him, the more we love Him, the more we trust Him.

Truth: God loves me. He is always with me and has great plans for me.

"We must focus on Jesus, the source and goal of our faith. He saw the joy ahead of him, so he endured death on the cross and ignored the disgrace it brought him. Then he received the highest position in heaven, the one next to the throne of God."

Hebrews 12:2

GOD'S WORD® Translation (©1995)