Tag Archives: hopes

December 10, 2015

30 Days of Hopeful: Day 22

By marilynnchadwick

Do you ever feel like your dream will never come true? The obstacles just won’t budge.  You can’t seem to win your spiritual battle, no matter how much you pray and pray and pray. And you feel like you are losing hope.  Perhaps you need a breakthrough.

Breakthrough was first used as a military term to signify an offensive thrust past the defensive lines of warfare. The word entered the realm of common speech during the technological age, often used to describe a sudden discovery or invention.  Breakthroughs usually occur only after repeated failures.

Think about it. Thomas Edison tried unsuccessfully over ten thousand times before his final breakthrough invention of the electric light bulb. The Wright brothers experienced hundreds of crashes before their breakthrough in flight.  And countless scientists performed endless experiments before breakthroughs in DNA research. Continue reading

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December 9, 2015

30 Days of Hopeful: Day 21

By marilynnchadwick

“Faith is the substance of things hoped for…” (Hebrews 1:1 KJV).  What things are you hoping for?  I come from several generations of school teachers.  If your mother was anything like mine, she reminded you never to end a sentence with a dangling preposition, such as “hoping for.”  So let’s ask the question another way: “For what things are you hoping?”  The King James Version completes the verse: “Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”  There’s a mysterious element, an “unseen” aspect to this thing called hope.

According to my “big fat Greek Bible,” the word elpis, translated as “hope,” describes an “inner, psychological sense of hope” and defines it as “confidence, eager anticipation, expectation, longing, or aspiration of the heart.”*

That’s a big hope—a risky, audacious brand of hope.  I don’t see a lot of “high hope” these days. People seem guarded. Cautious. Afraid to “get their hopes up.”  I don’t know about you, but I am more afraid of low-level living–without this kind of daring hope–than I am of falling from the cliff of high hopes.

Let’s ponder the question one more time: What are you hoping for? Let the thought roll around in your mind. Take it to the Lord and ask: “Lord, is this hope from you?” Then, over the next few days, seek Him with your whole heart.  Watch.  Listen.  Spend time in His Word.  Share your hope or dream with a wise friend.

Remember. Hope is hard. It calls for courage.   It’s costly and requires constant filling by the Holy Spirit.   Over the years, I have learned that to hold onto a high hope, you have to stay close to Jesus.

But with a God-given hope, the sticking power of the Holy Spirit, the affirmation of God’s Word, and a few good friends, nothing is too good to be true.  And nothing is too hard for God.

 

* The Hebrew-Greek Key Word Study Bible, NIV version, Spiros Zhodiates, ThD. Editor, (AMG publishers), is my personal favorite Bible ever!

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December 5, 2015

30 Days of Hopeful: day 17

By marilynnchadwick

Our God-given hopes and dreams can impact the entire direction of our life.  The Bible reminds us of the importance of dreams:  “Where there is no vision, the people perish” (Proverbs 29:18 KJV).  Some of the most courageous women I know are mothers raising their children in fragile neighborhoods.  These moms know that dreams can divert their children from drugs, gangs, and prison.  Dreams mean survival.

My young friend Dominique was just ten when some gang members befriended him.  “I was kind of a mascot,” as he puts it.  But gang mascots eventually become gang members, and he was headed for trouble.  One day, Dominique discovered an online chess game.  He got the hang of it and became good—really good.  Before too long, he was “busy” when gang members called.  Dominique was way too busy finding his purpose to run with gangs.

By the time he was in high school, Dominique had become the top scholastic chess player in the state of North Carolina.  In his college application, Dominique wrote: “By getting closer to the One who allowed me this chance, and continuing with the plan that we dreamed up together when I was a young child, I feel that I will be able to help someone else and make a lasting impact.”

Dominique didn’t attend church growing up.  But as a small child he had a sense of God’s destiny and a mysterious awareness of His calling through his childhood dreams of playing chess.  And when he heard a clear presentation of the Gospel his first semester in college, the vibrant young man accepted Jesus Christ as Lord and savior.

Dominique recently graduated from college–the first to do so in his family.  He plans to pursue a master’s degree.  And he continues to play chess.   He’s made his way into the realm of international competition.  This week, he’s playing against some of the best in the world at a match in London.

One thing is clear. Dominique’s earthly dreams had eternal implications that went far beyond the mastery of chess.  A reminder to take seriously the hopes and dreams of those children entrusted to our care.  Mother Teresa put it this way: Tread gently around the dreams of a child.  You might be treading on the dreams of God.

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November 28, 2015

30 Days of Hopeful: Day 10

By marilynnchadwick

I’m glad you’ve joined us for 30 Days of Hopeful. Perhaps life is hard for you right now–you’re struggling to find hope.  When all seems hopeless, I find encouragement from others who have passed through the furnace and come forth with faith shining. Their stories inspire me to hold onto my hope. I want to share one such story with you.  My friend Ange loves to encourage others with her story of hope.

I met Ange during one of my first missions trips to Rwanda and Burundi. Most everyone I met was a genocide survivor with a hard story to tell. But it was Ange’s journey of agony-turned-into-hope that inspired me most.

Ange was in high school when genocide broke out in Rwanda in 1994. She and fiancé, Emanuel, fled on foot to the neighboring Congo. They married and had baby Edna. The brutal war spilled over into the Congo. Soldiers attacked their refugee camp and Emanuel and Ange, with eighteen-month-old Edna on her back, ran terrified into the forest. They became separated as they fled for their lives.  A few days later while Ange was gathering firewood, soldiers kidnapped little Edna.

Ange ran frantically through the forest searching for the soldiers. She soon discovered the baby had become sick and died. Ange’s heart and her hope were shattered. She hid in the forest for weeks with no clean water, food, fire, or shelter. As she describes it, “It was like we were dead, but still living.”

Ange made her way to Kenya with the help of a relief organization, still searching for her husband. She cried out, “Oh God, You know that my beloved first born was taken away. And you know how I could be happy if I could find my beloved husband! Please Lord I hope you have not forgotten me.” Ange continued to seek God’s purpose for her own life while she waited for her dream to be fulfilled. Sensing a call ministry, she began attending Bible college in Kenya.  God gave Ange hope, encouraging her with these words:

We rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance, perseverance, character; and character hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out His love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom He has given us (Romans 5:3-5). 

Ange continues her story, “One day, I received the amazing news that my husband was alive! It was like a dream!!! We stayed up all night praising and thanking God!” So, after eight long years, Ange and Emanuel were reunited in Burundi. God soon blessed them with a baby boy they called Cherubim. When I first heard Ange’s story, she had just given birth to twins Joshua and Geoffrey.

Ange shares from her heart: “We have nothing to give our Lord for what He has done for us, so we give Him our thanks: Sacrifice thank offerings to God, fulfill your vows to the Most High, and call upon me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you and you will honor me (Psalm 50:14-15).”

Ange loves to encourage others to hold onto hope when times look darkest. I hope you will be strengthened by her story and her prayer for you: “May God bless you and help you to be patient in every situation you may pass through. Glory be to the Lord JESUS. Amen!”

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November 25, 2015

30 Days of Hopeful: Day 7

By marilynnchadwick

Did you know that hope can help you last long and finish strong? The Bible talks a lot about hope and its power to help us endure. Paul writes to the church in Thessalonica: “We remember before our God and Father your work produced by faith, your labor prompted by love, and your endurance inspired by hope in our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Thess. 1:3).

Turns out there’s some research to back up the importance of hope to our survival. A study that took place in the 1950’s showed how hope helped laboratory rats persevere in a stressful situation. The group of rats were purportedly placed in a vat of water and swam for about fifteen minutes to the point of exhaustion and near drowning. They were rescued, dried off, fed, and allowed to recover, before being placed in the water again. This time, they kept swimming in the water for many hours before becoming exhausted and needing to be rescued again. Apparently, the rats sensed if they could be rescued once, they could be rescued again—thus giving them hope to endure.

The human version of hope, of course, runs much deeper. It was God Himself who placed the need for hope in our hearts. In fact, He is referred to as the “God of Hope”(Romans 15:13).  It makes sense that the Bible would remind us of how our endurance is “inspired by hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.”

The Bible also encourages us to wait for hope—and this takes perseverance. “But if we hope for what we do not see, we eagerly wait for it with endurance” (Romans 8:25 NET).

What does it mean to wait for hope with endurance?  We discover an interesting secret by looking at the Greek word translated “endure,” hypomeno.  It actually comes from two words:  hypo or “under” and meno or “abide.”  Meno is the same word Jesus uses when He encourages us to abide in him (John 15:7).  So hypomeno, or endure is to “abide under” a time of trial as we wait for hope.

Friend, I don’t know what kind of trial you may be facing today. And I don’t know the dream you hold so dear in your heart. But what I do know is that abiding in Jesus can bring hope–and hope can inspire you to keep enduring while you wait.

So my prayer for you today is simply this: “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit” (Romans 15:13).

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