A Thrill of Hope

I have a grandson with autism and when he was first diagnosed I was crushed.  Naïvely, I saw his future without much hope for a full, vibrant life.  Since there is no known cause for autism there is no known "cure". I was hopeless that he would live a life full of relationships and opportunities that those without autism live. 

Ten days before my sixteenth birthday I was raped while a gun was held to my head.  The memories that I carry with me forty-one years later can be as life-like as the night it happened and I can feel hopeless that they will ever stop being a part of my life. 

I bet there is something in your life right now that seems hopeless to you. Maybe you're struggling with a relationship or letting go of past hurts.  Maybe your hopelessness is because of an illness or an addiction of some type, whether it be your own or someone you love dearly.

The fact is we live in a fallen, broken world because of sin. Because of sin we are separated from God and subjected to the consequences of that separation and brokenness. Sometimes innocent people suffer for the sinful actions of another.  Sometimes our own brokenness causes pain for ourselves or someone else.  

Before Christ was born, the world was truly hopeless. There was no way to ever be restored to a right relationship with God.  The sin of the world ran deep just as it does today, but because of God's great mercy, He sent Jesus to save us from ourselves and break the chains that Satan has so deceptively ensnared us in.

The birth of Jesus Christ brought us not only a savior but hope.  Hope that we can be restored to God because of who Jesus is.  Hope that what we are experiencing today in our sinful, fallen world will one day be over and we will live a life free of grief, a life free of pain, and a life lived fully in the presence of our Savior. 

Before Christ, there was no hope. Today without Christ there still is no hope. Because I know Jesus Christ to be my savior He has given me a new identity and a hope that only lives because He lives.

That hope changes the way I see my circumstances.  My grandson is a child of God and God has already showed me that when I see things through the lens of hopelessness, as I did when he was first diagnosed, I am refusing the gift of hope that Jesus gives when we believe in Him. God has a plan for my grandson's life and autism will not keep him from that plan.

That cold November night forty-one years ago has not left me without hope. My Jesus has written His name over that sinful act and He has given me more than I ever thought I could have, more than I ever felt worthy of. My identity is not in what happened to me but in whose I am, and I am God's. The memories are consequences of sin, although not mine, but I have hope —an absolute assurance—that one day my whole being will be made new...memories and all. 

Jesus Christ came to give you hope too. Your identity and your worth are not defined by whatever is causing you to feel hopeless.  When you believe that Jesus came to pay for your sins, you step into the hope that is Jesus Christ.

It may be hard to believe that you could ever be forgiven for what you've done, but God tells us over and over again in scripture that there is no sin that He won't forgive when we believe in His son. No sin is more powerful than the love and redemption of Jesus Christ. 

Lastly, let us not think that hope is the same thing as a wish. It is not.  A wish is expressing a desire for something to be so. Hope is rooted in expectation. We expect that which we are hopeful for to one day be fully realized. Jesus is hope. Outside of Him we are merely wishing. 

He is hope wrapped in flesh and that flesh was wrapped in a swaddling cloth and placed in a feeding trough for a bed.  He left the splendor of heaven to come to earth to give again that which was defiled in the Garden of Eden–a right relationship with God. 

Have you accepted His gift?