Hope for the Hopeless

I recently have been pondering and thinking deeply about my hope in the Lord. Job's words to his friends in Job 13:15 ring in my ears. Job declares, "though he slay me, I will hope in Him [God]". Job is declaring in his hopeless state, his only hope is in God. Thought Job has no hope in himself, he hopes in the Lord.

This verse has me thinking about hoping in the Lord and has brought me to a stark realization. The only way I will ever have hope in the Lord, is when I lose all hope in myself. Or to say it another way, it is only when I become utterly hopeless about myself that I will really hope in God.

When I hope in the Lord, I am placing all of my trust, faith, and future prospects in the hands of God. Placing my hope in the Lord is akin to resting all that I am in God's hands. Hoping in the Lord is coming to the end of myself and knowing that I have nothing more except God and God alone. But I can only come to this realization and fully hope in the Lord, when I am truly empty of hope and no longer self-reliant.

This means, the greatest obstacle to hoping in the Lord is myself. If I feel like I have enough strength, then I will trust my strength. If I have come to the conclusion I am smart enough or have enough wisdom, I will turn to myself first. If I think I have enough wealth, material goods, provisions, or relationships, I will rely on these things first. When something inside myself or around my life gives me, even a glimmer of hope, I will turn to this hope and not to the Lord. Hoping in the Lord will always play second fiddle if there is hope in myself.

But when I come to the realization that I no longer have hope in myself, only then will I truly be able to hope in the Lord. When I become hopeless, only then will I truly find hope in the Lord. So hoping in the Lord is an exercise in draining myself of any hope. It is a discipline where I remove my eyes from myself (becasue I am hopeless) and turn my gaze to the only hope that truly never fails, God. Hoping in the Lord is hoping in the only place where true hope can be found.

So if you are like me, and have never truly thought through hope in the Lord, it begins in a hopeless state. Only when we truly find ourselves hopeless, are we able to see the hope that is found in the Lord. There is always hope for the hopeless becasue only those who are hopeless will see the only hope that is found in the Lord.