Hope.
4 letters, but its everything.
I live because I have hope in Christ.
Hope doesn't keep the tragedies away. The negative feelings away. But Hope is always present in the hard times.
I have a tight fellowship of friends from my college days era. We know each other well and we love each other well.
Last summer one of those people I grew to know at that little college abruptly went home to Jesus.
Suddenly, he was gone and we were left in shock. While an entire nation mourned. We mourned a personality that left a hole in our circle of friends.
Things calmed down. We were holding onto hope. And than the little baby of one of my classmates died just couple of months before his due date.
Pain and shock again. I was starting to feel bruised from watching those I loved mourn.
God was with us. He has a plan. He is good.
Than a text, another life gone, suddenly taken in his sleep. The old guy who loved us all and we loved him back hard.
The afternoon I got that text it was starting to storm. I sat under the flimsily shelter of the gazebo and while rain fell fierce around me and the tears came down fast on my face.
Not another one. I thought over and over in my head. Not someone else I was close too
I ached and cried. I sought shelter inside but the storm raged outside and the rawness of pain raged in my heart.
Wanting to ask questions, but already knowing the answers.
The wind slowed, and the rain stopped falling. I looked out my window and there was a bright rainbow in the sky.
It was like a banner proclaiming to my battered heart that God was still faithful even in the midst of unexpected tragedy.
I already knew the truth, but in that moment it was a beautiful reminder of God's faithfulness.
You don't always see the rainbow. All you feel is the storm, the pain and the uncertainty.
The rainbow is always there. Not an actual rainbow, in the sky but the promise that God will always be faithful. We may not understand the road but we can seek to understand the hope we have.
A slow journey of learning God's faithfulness. Forwards and than backwards, but never alone.
God has given us hope for this journey. Even when I can't see the rainbow I want to always trust in this hope.
