Hope Against Reason
Good things have happened in my life lately (I had my first article published in a magazine and turned twenty five – good things happen in October I say). But I’ve amazed myself in that amidst the good, my eyes couldn’t keep off the bad that was there before the good, the bad that just refuses to go away no matter what new good things come my way. This is what caused me to focus on scripture passages that speak about hope, because in a situation that doesn’t respond to my faith, my hope is challenged.
The Bible has so much to say about hope and one consistent thing is how those who choose to put their hope in God will not be disappointed (see Isaiah 28:16; 49:23, Psalm 25:3, and Romans 5:5). Reminding myself of this truth made me conclude that if I felt the result wasn’t what I had hoped for then I shouldn’t stop hoping.
There’s a lady I like who embodies this truth. Funny enough, none of the women mentioned in Mark 5 are called out by name, instead, we identify them by their condition. We first read of ‘the dead girl’ who was Jairus’ daughter and the ‘sick woman’ or the ‘woman with the issue of blood’. How horrible it must have been for her to be identified by something she hadn’t done but that had happened to her. Not only did she have to find a way out of her situation, she had to wrestle with how it sought to steal her identity, how it wanted to be part and parcel of who she was.
I like her because she had every reason to give up hope, every reason to stop fighting and just accept her fate. Firstly, she had suffered her condition for twelve years. Nothing eats away at hope like passing time. We’re all very hopeful when we’re starting off, pretty sure that we’ll get called for that job interview immediately after graduating. But when a year passes without one job interview, then another, and another, you slowly slip into a state of believing that it just might never happen. When you grow older and more and more goals go unmet, you tend to lose heart. Ask any lady in her late thirties who wants to marry.
Secondly, “She had suffered a great deal under the care of many doctors and had spent all she had, yet instead of getting better she grew worse” (Mark 5:26). It’s one thing to have time pass with things not changing, another to have time pass and things get worse. Because with things worsening, resources diminish. It pains me to think of the amount of pain and suffering this woman must have gone through, in that time in history even. You see her hopefulness in returning to health in the fact that she sought out “many doctors”, not just a few. We see it in how she spent, and spent, and spent, until she ran out. And all for things to just get worse instead of improving.
And still she did not lose hope. When she heard about Jesus, she didn’t say “well maybe He did all those things for all those people because they were men, because they were ceremonially clean, because they hadn’t suffered this much, for this long…” she didn’t say “well it’s a little too late”. When she heard about Him, she concluded in her mind that this was her chance at receiving the healing she’d long hoped for. She determined in her mind that she’d approach him, touch him, and be freed from her suffering. And it happened.
When I thought about her and wondered how she managed to get through without losing her mind, I remembered a sentence in Hebrews 6:19 “We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure.” Hope keeps one grounded. When the storms of life hit, when the winds rage, and the waters threaten to sink your ship, hold on to hope, it is a firm and secure anchor. Keep trusting God that you’ll make it, keep telling yourself that He will not fail, that He is faithful and good, that he doesn’t disappoint…that way, you’ll find strength to face another day. You’ll smile again, you’ll make plans again, find reason to live again. Just keep having hope. And when you feel you have absolutley no reason to keep hoping, remember Abraham...
The Bible has so much to say about hope and one consistent thing is how those who choose to put their hope in God will not be disappointed (see Isaiah 28:16; 49:23, Psalm 25:3, and Romans 5:5). Reminding myself of this truth made me conclude that if I felt the result wasn’t what I had hoped for then I shouldn’t stop hoping.
There’s a lady I like who embodies this truth. Funny enough, none of the women mentioned in Mark 5 are called out by name, instead, we identify them by their condition. We first read of ‘the dead girl’ who was Jairus’ daughter and the ‘sick woman’ or the ‘woman with the issue of blood’. How horrible it must have been for her to be identified by something she hadn’t done but that had happened to her. Not only did she have to find a way out of her situation, she had to wrestle with how it sought to steal her identity, how it wanted to be part and parcel of who she was.
I like her because she had every reason to give up hope, every reason to stop fighting and just accept her fate. Firstly, she had suffered her condition for twelve years. Nothing eats away at hope like passing time. We’re all very hopeful when we’re starting off, pretty sure that we’ll get called for that job interview immediately after graduating. But when a year passes without one job interview, then another, and another, you slowly slip into a state of believing that it just might never happen. When you grow older and more and more goals go unmet, you tend to lose heart. Ask any lady in her late thirties who wants to marry.
Secondly, “She had suffered a great deal under the care of many doctors and had spent all she had, yet instead of getting better she grew worse” (Mark 5:26). It’s one thing to have time pass with things not changing, another to have time pass and things get worse. Because with things worsening, resources diminish. It pains me to think of the amount of pain and suffering this woman must have gone through, in that time in history even. You see her hopefulness in returning to health in the fact that she sought out “many doctors”, not just a few. We see it in how she spent, and spent, and spent, until she ran out. And all for things to just get worse instead of improving.
And still she did not lose hope. When she heard about Jesus, she didn’t say “well maybe He did all those things for all those people because they were men, because they were ceremonially clean, because they hadn’t suffered this much, for this long…” she didn’t say “well it’s a little too late”. When she heard about Him, she concluded in her mind that this was her chance at receiving the healing she’d long hoped for. She determined in her mind that she’d approach him, touch him, and be freed from her suffering. And it happened.
When I thought about her and wondered how she managed to get through without losing her mind, I remembered a sentence in Hebrews 6:19 “We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure.” Hope keeps one grounded. When the storms of life hit, when the winds rage, and the waters threaten to sink your ship, hold on to hope, it is a firm and secure anchor. Keep trusting God that you’ll make it, keep telling yourself that He will not fail, that He is faithful and good, that he doesn’t disappoint…that way, you’ll find strength to face another day. You’ll smile again, you’ll make plans again, find reason to live again. Just keep having hope. And when you feel you have absolutley no reason to keep hoping, remember Abraham...
"Even when there was no reason for hoping, Abraham kept hoping - believing that he would become the father of many nations." Romans 4:18a (NLT)
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