I AM YOUR HOPE AND FUTURE

Have you completed 4 years of college with the hope that you would get a good job and no one was hiring?  Have you saved all your life with the hope that you could travel when you retired, only to find your health was too poor to do so?  Have you married with the hope of spending a lifetime with your spouse and found that they wanted out of this commitment?  Have you ever hoped to have children, only to find out you are infertile?  Or have you placed your hope, like we did, in your career to provide for you in your later years, only to find it dissolve right in front of your eyes?

Early in 2007, after we lost our largest client whose commission would have provided for the entire year, I woke up in the middle of the night by these words "I AM YOUR HOPE AND YOUR FUTURE".  I don't know if it was in a dream or an audible voice, but I do know it came and settled deep inside of me.  I have held onto this ever since.

Christmas is the time when we celebrate the birth of Jesus.  All the manger scenes have the baby all neatly wrapped in a nice hay-lined stable.  But the truth of the matter, this was when LIGHT stepped down into darkness.  What an event this was!  But this was only the beginning.  Jesus became an adolescent boy who went up to the temple to teach the religious scholars.  He attended a wedding where he turned water into wine.  During his 3 years of ministry, he spent all of his time loving and caring for the needy, healing the sick, the weary, and the broken-hearted and releasing the chains from the one's locked  in bondage.

But he was also rejected, despised, hated, beaten, spit on, jeered and crucified on a cross.  He died and was buried, and rose from the grave after 3 days for you and me.

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.  John 3:16

There may be some who have never heard this promise.  If that's the case, please take some time to ask God to reveal this truth to you so you can invite Jesus into your heart.   If you are a Christian, you have already done this and have been assured a place in heaven, but so many dear people are living as paupers here on earth because we have misplaced the eternal hope with things that will one day pass away and will not assure them of anything.  Many view life from the time they accept Jesus to the time they die and go to heaven as a saggy mattress.  Uncomfortable, lumpy and downright crummy!

For the last couple of years, we have faced some major difficulties and obstacles not having the income that we once had.  There was a time when I could buy anything I wanted, but now we live within a budget and make every penny count.  There was a time when we did a lot of financial gifting, but my heart wasn't broken for the poor.  There was a time when I thought I trusted God, but now I know I couldn't survive without him.  There are many, many days when I wish things were a little easier,  but trust God has a good plan for my life even though the circumstances can be shouting otherwise.  My circumstances may never change, but my outlook has.  My hope will never let me down.  My hope will always provide my daily needs.  My hope will always comfort me.  My hope will never leave me.  My hope is eternal and everlasting.