When I was in high school (and college), I used to keep a journal with a bunch of quotes in it. I collected quotes like some people collect stamps or rare coins. I'd doodle them and create with them and write them on the pages of my heart.
My notebook was nothing fancy, just a collection of handwritten scribblings in a composition book.
Years later, now that I know more about art journaling and its therapeutic value, I feel like I'd be embarrassed to show you that notebook, but the truth is, I simply wish I could find it. Because while it's not fancy or artistic or creative, it represents a season of my life...
And those quotes got me through a lot of tough stuff...
Lately, one quote in particular seems to keep tapping me on the shoulder.
"Hope is a good thing. Maybe the best of things...and no good thing ever dies."
It's from The Shawshank Redemption.
The quote comes to me almost like a challenge, lately. Because I've realized that I'm afraid to hope. I'm afraid to "get my hopes up"...because if the thing I'm hoping for most doesn't come to pass, then the disppointment I'd feel would be painful.
And no one likes to be in pain.
We build turtle shells around ourselves to protect our emotions and we draw our heads inside whenever it gets bit stormy out there...for the briefest moment, we may peek up, a dot of hop on the horizon...but then, something happens and we're quickly reminded to stay behind the shell.
Protected. And unable to be hurt.
I've wrestled with this a lot. Recently, I called my sister and unloaded the whole thing on her. She may be younger than I am, but gosh, she's smart. I want to introduce you to her because she just started a blog...and already, I can tell, it's going to be a blessing. A big one.
This is us before my launch party:
I know, we have demon eyes...what're ya gonna do?
Anyway, Carrie is often my first call. My spiritual guru. My personal preacher. And she just tells it like it is, but her advice is always steeped in godliness, which is why I listen and mull and chew.
A few weeks ago, I told her about some stuff that's going on here, big stuff that requires intense amounts of prayer and list-making...I punctuated my sentence with "I'm just so scared to hope." Sigh.
I sometimes wonder if she, like God, gets tired of telling me the same thing.
"You don't put your HOPE in the THING," she said. "You put your HOPE in the fact that GOD wants what's best for you. So if this thing doesn't happen, then there's something better..."
I remember literally, physically trying to wrap my brain around this concept and I ended up saying, "I have NO idea how to do that."
After MUCH soul searching and a lot of Bible study, I think I'm finally starting to understand...It's not about getting the house you want or the part you want or the book deal you want or the job you want...It's about knowing (in the deep recesses of your soul) that God wants the best for you.
He wants you to soar.
And if you can put your hope in that, in Him, then the disappointment you feel is blanketed with the knowing that there is something better for you. Suddenly, the disappointment is more bearable because you know it's simply a bump on the road to something else.
When I look back on the times I've hoped for something (the attention of a boy, a house I thought I had to have, a part I desperately wanted to play) it's clear to me that although I felt disappointment every time one of those things didn't come to pass...that there was a great plan at work here. A better plan.
A better husband.
A better part.
A better house.
So now, I'm in the hoping again...at this moment...I am clinging to that revelation. Hoping that this time around the mountain it makes more sense to me. That it's more real to me. Because the Bible says Hope does not disappoint...
And I know now that means hope in GOD doesn't disappoint.
What are you hoping for? Are you afraid to hope? Are you, like me, struggling to say what you want? To say it out loud and not let the fear of disappointment hold you hostage?
Do me a favor? Check out Carrie's Blog...it's brand new, but it's call "A Prisoner of Hope." And those are bars we could all stand to get behind!
