Hoping When It’s Hard (Part Two)
About a month ago my 19-year-old daughter, Sarah, asked me if I could change anything in my life, would I and if so, what would it be. I responded quickly. “I wish my life hadn’t had so much pain.”
Sarah didn’t say anything. Perhaps she reflected on the fact she’d been responsible for much of that pain.
My daughter is the “puppy” I blogged about earlier this week. Despite the warning God gave her through my dream, she left the protection of her godly upbringing and set up house without her shield of faith or her sword of the Spirit.
Satan didn’t wait for an invitation to move in.
“By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thorn bushes, or figs from thistles? Likewise every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit.” Matthew 7:16-18 NIV1984
When Sarah had to reach up to take my hand, I saw a piece of framed artwork at a Christian bookstore. I can still visualize the tiny black figures painted on clear glass. The silhouette pictured an apple tree towering over a woman swinging her little girl up into her arms. The caption below read: Every good tree bears good fruit.
I remember sending up a quick prayer. As a young and inexperienced mother, I dared to hope. “Lord, could that be me and Sarah?” I sensed God’s peace fall on me, accompanied by an absolute assurance. “Yes,” He seemed to say. “You are a good tree and Sarah is good fruit.”
I never let that promise go. Even when Sarah’s lifestyle appeared rotten to the core.
Such hope—hope that pushed back the evidence of a broken promise—was hard.
“Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into the grace in which we now stand. And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us.” Romans 5:1-5 NIV1984
