Trusting to Hope

Mount of Blessing, Israel

From my series on trust, I find myself being led to the concept of hope. It has been a battle, though, as I try to reconcile that oft quoted verse in Romans 5:5 where it says that hope doesn’t disappoint.

I know the bible to be true and stand by its veracity, and its application to my life. That is the only thing standing in between me taking up a pair of scissors and redesigning that part of my precious scriptures. I’m sure tomes have been written on Proverbs 13:12, “Hope deferred makes the heart-sick, but when longing is fulfilled, it is a tree of life.” But what happens when you seem to be stuck in the land of the deferment of hope?

As I pondered this, I sense the Lord pressing a bit on the issue. Laughing in the face of the Creator is not polite, but it was an instinctual reaction, and He’s still cleaning me up, in many ways. I realize that I can dodge the issue, which, to be honest, I have been for several months, but He has His own plans and purposes that rarely seem to match ours. So here I go, down this journey. And as I started to really focus, I realized that hope never seems to let its light flicker out. In another entry I wrote years ago, oddly enough, Trust to Hope, I commented about hope, “… the heart was fashioned to always hope – it always has to hope in something. And it has an amazing amnesia of what happened to hope the time before.”

Hmm. Hope – it is infinitely more than wishful thinking, but rather, a confident expectation. Hope remains, in some way, form, or fashion, always. 1 Corinthians 13:13: “Now these three remain, faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is love.” Hope is one of the three that remain, a light that refuses to be put out. And so begins this next adventure

Our Deepest Fear

So I have this quote on the side of my blog that encourages me every single time I take the time to read it:

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.” -Marianne Williamson, Quoted by Nelson Mandela at his 1994 Inaugural Speech

What does it speak to? Our identity, our destiny, our fear. Pride, humility, and all that. We are His children, and He chooses to partner with us, and often takes us to places that are over our heads, and we look to our own inadequacies. True, we are inadequate without Him. But, as David Crowder sings, He has made everything glorious, and He made us, so what does that make us?

So when there is something we know we must do, and we are intimidated and shrink away because we don’t feel qualified, or do not want to seem better than others, what does that accomplish? There are times when you are put in a place for “such a time as this”, and it becomes not about you, or your talent, or your ability, but about manifesting the glory of God.

And the fear of pride makes its insidious way into our thoughts, making it about us again. I heard a saying that false humility is a form of pride. “Your playing small does not serve the world.” We need to recognize that we are children of God and shine for His glory, and give people a picture of what it may mean for them to shine.

And so I ask, who are you to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? You are a child of God, and it’s not just some of you, it’s everyone. Let perfect love cast out all fear, and be an example to others to let their light so shine, too.

Find Your Voice

There is something nerve-wracking about baring your creative soul  in vulnerability to the world, you know? But as I continue to explore me, this is part of it. So this poem I wrote over a year past has been on my mind so now it becomes part of my thoughts to the world…

Find Your Voice

Why so silent
My precious one?
You are wonderful
So precious,
Created to sing
To speak
To whisper
To shout
To be heard!
Find your voice
And let your joy find its way
To encourage, to comfort
To love.

Oh, my heart sings
So full of joy
Full of my glorious one.
Find your voice!
What you’ve done so far
All you’ve said
Are simply shadows,
Echoes, really,
Of the glory inside of you.
Touch your heart,
Open it up and pour out
Everything you have!

Find your voice
My intimate lover.
The power and glory and majesty
That is in you,
That IS you
Desperate to come out
To overflow out onto those
Who are starving and thirsty
For who you are.
So open your mouth,
Find your voice
Speak the Word
Sing praises
Shout your love.
My precious, glorious one
My darling among maidens,
My dove, my perfect one.
My Bride.

The Black Door

Several generations ago, during one of the most turbulent of the desert wars in the Middle East, a spy was captured and sentenced to death by a general in the Persian army. The general, a man of intelligence and compassion, had adopted a strange and unusual custom in such cases. He permitted the condemned person to make a choice.

The prisoner could either face the firing squad or pass through the Black Door.

As the moment the execution drew near, the general ordered the spy be brought before him for a short, final, interview, the primary purpose of which was to receive the answer of the doomed man to the query: “What shall it be – the firing squad or the Black Door?” This was not an easy decision and the prisoner hesitated, but soon made it known that he preferred the firing squad to the unknown horrors that might wait for him behind the ominous and mysterious door. Not long thereafter, a volley of shots in the courtyard announced that the grim sentence had been fulfilled.

The general, staring at his boots, turned to his aide and said, “You see how it is with men; they will always prefer the known way to the unknown. It is characteristic of people to be afraid of the undefined.

Yet I gave him his choice.

“What lies beyond the Black Door?” asked the aide.

“Freedom,” replied the General, “and I’ve known only a few men brave enough to take it.”

I heard this story several years ago, and it totally rocked me. Is it true? I have no idea, but I recognize very well the spirit behind it. It changed my worldview, the way I thought. So often the fear of the unknown is so much bigger than the fear and/or despair of the situation in front of us, we’d rather just deal with what we see. In a very real way, it keeps us from living, and from living a life that transcends our every imagination. And you know what keeps us from that? This insidious thing called fear.

But, “There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves torment. But he who fears has not been made perfect in love.” (1 John 4:18)

See, one of the enemy’s greatest weapons is fear, and he knows it. It works so well, he doesn’t have a whole lot of variety – why change what’s not broken? If you have a great destiny (and you do), the best and easiest way for satan to block it is to wrap it up in fear – fear of failure, fear of risk, fear of trying, fear of people, fear of success (yeah, I went there), fear of… you fill in the space. If we don’t have a foundation and a reality in Love, that fear will have us standing in front of a firing squad instead of opening the door to the journey of our destiny.

It’s hard, I know. We’ve lived with fear all our lives, and when we’ve dealt with one layer, there’s another issue that jumps out to taunt us. But Love is being perfected in us, as it says in the verse previous to the one I quoted. And as it get perfected in us, fear has no place. It gives way to expectation and anticipation, love of the adventure, because we have such a creative Abba who loves to hide things for us to find – even behind big, black doors.

So when fear comes to overwhelm me and try to derail me from the awesomeness of my destiny, I refuse to turn away and sit in the execution square. I will open my self up to the perfection of His Love, and move forward into the unknown. He’s a big God, He can take care of me, and I trust Him. And doors, no matter the color, usually open into wonderful opportunities, and if that’s where God is leading, then that’s where I’m going.

Are you coming?