Saturday, April 6, 2013

Hope - Isaiah 40:28-31


28Do you not know?
Have you not heard?
The Lord is the everlasting God,
the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He will not grow tired or weary,
and his understanding no one can fathom.
29He gives strength to the weary
and increases the power of the weak.
30Even youths grow tired and weary,
and young men stumble and fall;
31but those who hope in the Lord
will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint.


I love how this verse starts off…… hey man, didn’t you hear? You mean you don’t know? Whoa, let me tell you about our God. He is everlasting, yeah, that’s right; the energizer bunny doesn’t have anything on our God. He doesn’t get tired. He doesn’t get weary. He is God and “God’s got this”. 

Make no mistake; those are physical attributes associated with our human condition. He is not human, he doesn’t get tired or weary. He doesn’t need to take a break and catch his breath. He doesn’t need a moment of silence in order to wrap his head around what we just did. No one can fathom his understanding.

He is our Lord and He is well equipped to take care of us. 

It brings me comfort to know that God doesn’t get weary of my mistakes or my feeble attempts to live within His will. I fail time and time again at “being good”. It is a good thing that the ability to “be good” isn’t one of the boxes that needs a check mark next to it on the admittance to heaven application.  

I do get weary, I do get weak. I’m there right now as a matter of a fact. Having spent the last week recovering from minor throat surgery I find myself weary of the pain that each swallow brings. It is a pain that just doesn’t want to go away and is worse each morning. Yeah, I have some pain medication that dulls the pain but wow. I was not prepared for this at all. I am not myself anymore, no, not until I can eat, speak and drink as I used to. I’m tired and probably dehydrated. My mind is weary.  

I’m not alone this week either, my best friend is working his way through some issues right now too. Yeah, he has been suffering to say the least. We all have been there right? At the bottom, at the end, with nowhere to go. So we just want to quit. We want to walk away from our life, even if only for a moment. I am so proud of him. He just doesn’t want to fake it anymore and is looking to make a stand and make some much needed changes in his life.   

Another new friend is surrounded by death. This past week she found out that her dog has terminal lung cancer. There is no money right now for treatment. Her cat, who has lived to an amazing 17 years has stopped eating and is also close to the end of her days. Her car is also in the shop. She isn’t even driving her own vehicle right now. She has a loner. Yet, she still hopeful. She knows God is with her. She knows that her hope is set in something solid.

This is enough to drag anyone down right? Geesh, life can be so hard and so unforgiving. Here is the thing though, if you asked any of us if we had any hope left at all you would hear a resounding YES! 
We are down but yet we walk with a quiet confident hope that God is working in all these issues.  

Even though our lives have been flipped upside down at this time and we are unsure what will come next we all share one thing. We all have HOPE. 

Not just a general hope either. We don’t sigh and think….well…….maybe……things will work out for the best. We do not resign ourselves to some glib idea that just maybe, if the stars align, things will get better. 

No way, we have a confident hope that our God is working out all things to our benefit. ALL THINGS. Even our mistakes. It is true. 

The rest of today’s passage covers that right? Read it again.  

29He gives strength to the weary
and increases the power of the weak.
30Even youths grow tired and weary,
and young men stumble and fall;
31but those who hope in the Lord
will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint.

There it is, did you see it? Those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength.
We all get weary from doing life. We all make mistakes and we all fall short of “being good”. If we let it, if we let him, Satan will accuse us and persecute us in these areas. Make a stand. Don’t believe his lies. 

You are a child of God and as such, you have direct access to the source…..
Access to the strength to get by……..
Access to the ability to get up again…….
Access to walk and not be faint……..
Access to run and not be weary…….

Friend, I know your life just doesn’t make sense sometimes. I get it. I am here, as I said, facing today I am a bit lost and a definitely a bit weary. I am tired of hurting and am tired of watching those around me hurt and struggle. But here is the thing.   

I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else with anyone else. This passage is so so true friends. We must maintain our hope. It is essential for us. To live without hope is to not live at all. We do have so much to live for, even in our misery, even in our valleys, even when the odds seem to be stacked against us. We are all capable of having hope. 

Put your hope in the Lord. It will be a sustaining hope.


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