Hope I

I have been thinking a lot about hope recently, as a concept. I feel like there might be some deeper lessons in this, so I am planning to revisit it in the future. For now, a story.

Several years ago, my life felt like it ended. What I had been working toward for months, years, or possibly even my life had abruptly ended. At least, that's how it felt to me. My life had been building up to this one thing, and it had been taken away from me. I was completely crushed, and I didn't know where to turn. I literally had no idea what else to so with my life, and I was completely devastated.

In my agony and pain, I wanted to express on the outside what I felt on the inside, even if it was a bit dramatic. So during a worship set led by some of my favorite worship leaders ever, I found myself in the back of the room, on my knees, bawling my eyes out. I was in agony, crying out to the Lord, without a hope in the world.

In my mind's eye, a scene flashed before me. A middle-aged woman with brown skin and long dark hair, dressed in a beautiful sari, was in the middle of a crowd. She had flung her body over a rectangular wooden box: the casket of her son, the pride of her life. She wept sobs that wracked her body, mourning his death as her own.

In an instant, I felt the Lord gently ask me, "Why are you crying? This woman has no hope. You at least have hope."

God wasn't being rude or a jerk about it, but he did have a point. Even though it felt like my life was over, I still had a lot to live for. Even though I had no idea what to do with my life, I still had hope. I still had Jesus.