Hope, revisited.

I still seem to have a case of "Blogger's Block". (see post below). But as I was visiting one of my favorite sites this morning, (in)courage, I got a glimpse of inspiration. Write an entry about hope, win a T-shirt. Nothing creates inspiration like the chance to win something free, right?!

Hope. That's a topic that could produce a hundred blog entries. I could write a blog about hope itself. Eagerly I log in, crack my knuckles, and wait for inspiration to flow from my fingertips.

*sound of crickets*

Nothing.

Oh boy. This case of blogger's block is worse than I thought. How can I not come up with anything about Hope?

To try and get my thoughts flowing, I turned to Google for direction, to find the meaning of hope. Suddenly I remembered having done this before. Have I written a post about hope already?
Checking the archives- yes, there it is. Hope, written Thursday October 23, 2008. I wrote this shortly after my grandmother died. I don't often go back and re-read things I've written. I don't write because I think what I have to say is any kind of spectacular. I write to keep from going insane. And on the roller coaster ride of insanity that's been the last year and a half, this blog has been my safety bar. But every great once in awhile, I'll read something I wrote and I think, "did I really write that? That's not half bad."

Here's what I had to say about hope back then:
According to the all-knowing Internet, hope is "a belief in a positive outcome related to events and circumstances in one's life. Hope is the feeling that what is wanted can be had or that events will turn out for the best."
Isn't that kind of like being optimistic? Not really... optimism is more of.... a thought process that leads to a positive attitude. Hope is a belief, an emotion. You can talk yourself into being optimistic- but hopefulness comes through belief. And faith. I think you can be optimistic without faith, but faith is the very foundation of hope. Emily Dickinson wrote in a poem that "'Hope' is the thing with feathers-- / That perches in the soul."

The verse on my daily calendar today is "Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for He who promised is faithful." Hebrews 10:23. The word that sticks out most to me is unswervingly. That is HARD to do. I can't say that I've been able to do that. I've never lost my faith, but I definitely have lost hope. But that's the beauty of faith. If you lose your optimism, you don't really have anything to fall back on. It's kind of hard to talk yourself into being positive, when you feel like you're in a downward spiral. But even if you lose hope, or feel like you've lost it, you still have faith to catch you as you fall. And you don't have to talk yourself back into hope. Faith lifts it back up.
"Yet this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope. Because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed, for His compassions never fail. They are new every morning, great is your faithfulness." Lamentations 3:21-23

I can be optimistic that 2009 is going to be a better year. I can be optimistic that things at work will change. I can be optimistic that Mr. Right will someday call (soon, preferably!) I can be optimistic that mom-mom and Emily are better now, even if it wasn't the way I would have chosen. I can be optimistic that things will get easier. I can even be optimistic that mom might make chocolate chip cookies. But those things are all based on the power of positive thinking. My hope is based on the faith in knowing that even if that all doesn't happen, He's still going to be there in the aftermath and mess.

So that was me then. Where am I now on the whole hope thing? Well, things at work have definitely changed, although being laid off certainly wasn't what I was hoping for. Mr. Right seems to have misplaced my number. The hurt at losing my grandmother and my sister within 6 months of each other hasn't lessened much. As far as things "getting easier", that changes from day to day. Some days are easier than others. In the chocolate chip cookie department, a few days after I posted that entry, I received a box from my Aunt Pat. Homemade chocolate chip cookies. Who says God isn't all about the details?

So 10 months later, not much has changed. In some ways, things might be a little worse. At least 10 months ago, even though I hated it, I was working. Now I have no full time job, and no idea what I want to do when I grow up. I'm 26 years old, and I feel like I have not much to show for it. And yet I have to ask myself, do I still believe now what I wrote then? That my hope is based on the faith in knowing that even if all those things don't happen, He's still there in the aftermath and mess?

The answer is of course, yes. What good is hope only in the good times? If you can't find it when the proverbial chips are down, I don't suppose you ever really had it in the first place.

I hope 10 months from now my circumstances will be different- and by that I mean different in a positive way. I hope to have a job. Or maybe to finally be back in college. And, yes, having a Mr. Right would still be rather nice. I hope that memories of Emily bring a smile instead of the hollow, empty feeling I get when I hear her name. I hope that 10 months from now I can say that I am genuinely content with who I am.
But if none of these things pan out, I can say with every fiber of who I am that my hope isn't built on circumstances. It's built on Someone who is greater than any circumstance.