Life and Hope

Life is messy. I think I'm just beginning to realize how messy.

Currently, my life is still reeling from April 21, the day of Mama's accident. I'm still coping with all that happened, with all that went on over the summer, with being back at school, and with what the future looks like for my family. Plus I'm starting to try to make some decision about the future, which is crazy. But what is amazing to me is how pervasive the affects of April 21 are on me. There is not an area of my life that was not affected by it. I was sitting in church today thinking about how my relationship with the Lord has been impacted, and to be perfectly honest, not all of it feels good. I still feel sometimes like I was abandoned, like I walked alone, like I am still wandering in the wilderness, looking for something, anything, to give me some direction. I'm learning to rely on what I know to be true in an entirely new way. I was cleaning some drawers today, and I found a quote that rings truer to me now than when I first copied it down. "Even Jesus kept His scars after the resurrection. My stains are beautiful to Him, and as I become dirtier and more beat up, I am becoming perfect, transformed into the image of the One who made me. And I am thankful!" (Katie Davis, Kisses From Katie) The first time I read that, I'm sure I imagined becoming dirtier by serving the Lord, but now I see it as just living life.

Life is messy. Things happen, and they change you. Whether it is something like my summer in Hungary, that truly changed and shaped the way I view faith, my relationship with God, and missions, or a car accident that totally disrupts the direction of your life, life refuses to leave you alone. And sometimes it feels like I am sinking deeper and deeper into the mud. I cling to my lifeline in Jesus, and I keep wading through. The further I go, the more I realize that all I know is that Jesus is.


I've always pictured "hope" as one of those words like happiness, surrounded by daisies and light and butterflies. It has always seemed like one of those words you use when everything is bright and good and you have hope.

In fact, I am realizing that quite the opposite is true. Now hope means something deeper. Its a word for when all is dark and confusing and you aren't really sure what the next minute holds. It is a word for when despair clutches at the edges of your soul, when all you want is to give in, but instead you stand there and hold on with all you have. That is hope.

Hope means you know the odds. You know the chances. You know that everything is falling out of your grasp and that which is most feared is right at your fingertips and there is nothing you can do about it. Hope is recognizing all of those things but choosing to trust. Hope is choosing in that moment to say, "Thy will be done." Hope is clinging instead to what you know to be true - God's own glory, His salvation, His power, and His purpose. Hope is knowing that His plan may not be what you want but realizing that all you can do is trust Him.

Right now, my life is covered in dirt. I walk through the day battling different demons breathing down my neck - memories, what-ifs, worries. But even in those moments, I cling to hope, knowing that Jesus is, and that is enough. It is hard, harder than anything, but He refuses to let me go, and that is my assurance.