Three Thoughts about Finding Hope in 2022

While still in our twenties, a friend said to me, “I thought that one day I’d have all the answers and my problems would be solved.” This was also my belief.

            Life’s not a fairy tale where one day you get the girl, or the glass slipper fits and then ride off into eternal happiness. Instead, life’s full of ups, downs, curves and sometimes it’s messy. While grappling with my own ups and downs at the beginning of 2022, three realities about hope and hopelessness became clear to me.

Do not fear, for I am with you.

Do not anxiously look about you, for I am your God.

I will strengthen you, surely, I will help you

Isaiah 41:10 (New American Standard Bible)

 

It was the beginning of 2022. The changes since my move to a new area of Houston four years before were causing me to feel untethered and adrift with no understanding as to what to do. When prayer seemed to offer no answers, I decided a trip to a near-by resale shop would provide that needed respite from the uncomfortable feelings. There, I came upon a Chicken Soup book. After buying it, I went straight home and started devouring the stories of people finding hope in the midst of hopelessness. The readings caused a stir in my heart, and challenged me to remember some times when I too found that unexpected help.

            It was dark and I was lost in an unfamiliar city. Sensing the area was not safe, but with nothing such as a Google map to guide me, fear set in. It was the kind man put in the right place at the right time who told me how to get back to my destination.

            There was only about forty-five minutes left to the trip when the moderately bad weather turned into torrential rains. With my visibility altered, I feared running up on a stalled car but with no time to react. Up ahead, though, was a white transport truck with lights all across the back. I knew to stay some distance behind it and mimic the driver’s driving. If he swerved, I would swerve. The truck driver never knew he was leading a lone driver into Hattiesburg, Mississippi that stormy December night.

            I hit my face hard in the fall. After returning home and whipping off the blood, all I wanted to do was sleep, but my dog, Toby, frantically kept me awake. Only later did I learn I could have gotten a concussion, and, somehow Toby sensed that sleep was dangerous.

            Those memories of my own rescues caused my heart to soar with a faith that God really would help me. It was this belief that changed the earlier hopelessness to hope.

Thou Shalt Have No Other Gods Before Me

Exodus 20:3

How could this happen? I was young with no real estate experience, but believed it was time to stop renting and buy.  The condo became a horror show when within a year I had fourteen leaks, sometimes with water pouring through the ceiling. Replacing what was supposed to be a new roof was expensive and most of the people were still transitioning from being a renter to a homeowner. Anger over having to pay out money to fix a problem that wasn’t theirs caused a rift, yet my place was in ruins. The roof was eventually changed, but the condo never seemed right for me.

Having prayed for help before buying the place, it was confusing as to why there hadn’t been any signals I was on the wrong path. Truthfully, God did try to get me to slow down with this purchase. It happened when my cousin who had experience in real estate called and begged me not to buy the condo or at least talk to his lawyer first. But God’s warning went right over my head. Why?

 I later realized that I may have prayed to my heavenly Father for guidance in buying the condo, but my real god was pleasing those in my life and His answer had to also please them, or I wasn’t listening. When my agent and friend was offended at my cousin’s suggestion, I bowed to her. It never occurred to me that possibly the call was God’s way of showing me that buying that particular condo was unwise and to keep looking. When pleasing others was my god, I became blinded and deaf to truth.

            It was only after taking control and putting God back on the throne, that I was able to find the right home.

 

For We are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works which God prepared beforehand, that we should WALK IN THEM.

Ephesians 2:10 (New American Standard Bible)

            Who’s determining your future: Recently a woman said that she read some of my blog posts and could tell that I enjoyed writing. Truthfully, writing has always been a refuge and a joy, a way of getting out of my soul those things that seemingly need to be said. There was a time, though, of several years that the words quit flowing.

            “You’ll never write a book.” The author yelled at me. A week later at a conference, the leader pulled out my contest entrant and started reading. He was using my words and way of writing to explain to everyone how not to write.

            After these two experiences I lost confidence and the words ceased to flow. I believed God had taken the ambition of becoming an author from me. Several years later, the need to write began to stir in my soul. Through prayer an understanding of what had taken place five years before formed within me. My inability to express myself in words had nothing to do with God, rather the harshness at the hands of seasoned writers had broken my spirit. This reality led me to understand that yes, my spirit had been broken, but it wasn’t dead.  With some fear and trembling I once again put pen to paper. Since those days, I have written blog posts, and three books. One was self-published and the other soon to be self-published. The fourth book is now in the making.

            I shudder to think of the joy I would have missed in my life had I bowed to the criticisms of others and let that broken spirit rule my life.

A Summary about hope.

            Though there is nothing wrong with studying different ways to find hope, hope that leads to success comes at the heels of faith.

            When another or something else becomes our god, we are blinded to the truth of the path we should walk.

            Sometimes when the belief takes over that we have nothing to offer, that is the time to think back over our life’s story and see who said, “You can’t.” “You’re not enough.” When you find the answer, taking back the control is your first step in the journey of hope.