It was one of those days that changed my life forever. The kind that not a single circumstance changed, yet every corner of my heart did. The day God asked me to abandon my hope in everything of this world. My children and their health, school work, brushed teeth and hair. Their futures and every single aspect of their lives I carry as both hope and burden. My dream of teaching Holy yoga everyday, planning retreats that transform men, women and children’s lives. A ministry where God saves people and relationships. He asked me to abandon my hope to be debt free and to have a home, free time, enough exercise to reach my fitness goals and to even be a good cook! He beckoned me to imagine my life with no expectation for any of these things. He led me to imagine circumstances where all the hopes I had would be gone. A life in prison alone for the rest of my Earthly days. Maybe a life being completely paralyzed, death of my entire family or terminal illness. He bid me to strip myself of my expectations to see where my hope truly was.
I saw every hope of mine was placed in something I wanted him, expected him to give me on this Earth. But those things were not meant to have my heart or my hope. For where my hope is there my heart would be. I saw how tightly wrapped my security was in hopes of a fairy tale of romance. Though it’s been trampled in pain and deceit I'd kept it alive. He asked me if I would abandon myself of all these hopes that were not guarantees but merely my dreams. If I abandoned all of these things what would I have left? Where would my heart have anchor? If I gave up this hope where was I supposed to put it? I knew it belonged in him but hadn't it been there? Where had I gotten this wrong.
I saw every hope of mine was placed in something I wanted him, expected him to give me on this Earth. But those things were not meant to have my heart or my hope. For where my hope is there my heart would be. I saw how tightly wrapped my security was in hopes of a fairy tale of romance. Though it’s been trampled in pain and deceit I'd kept it alive. He asked me if I would abandon myself of all these hopes that were not guarantees but merely my dreams. If I abandoned all of these things what would I have left? Where would my heart have anchor? If I gave up this hope where was I supposed to put it? I knew it belonged in him but hadn't it been there? Where had I gotten this wrong.
Then comes that super fun scripture that stabs your heart into piece only he can repair. Hope is not something man can conjure up on His own but a GIFT from the Lord. Seriously? I can't DO anything to secure this hope? I felt hopeless. Literally.
The thought of giving up earthly hope petrified me. These hopes were what brought me so much comfort. It felt like all my joy was flooding out of my body and it dizzied me. Then he told me that cutting the rigging of this anchor would allow me to walk out of the wilderness, the desert place he brought me to, to empty me. He held his hands out ensuring me that this anchor I would lose could be held in His hands instead. He never forced me to let go, He never forced me to break or to be emptied. He simply showed me and offered another way.
What he offered me was His love. He offered for me to stop clinging to worthlessness. Knowing my hungry soul wouldn’t choose another. He showed me that the moment he thought of creating me he loved me. He intricately weaved together every perfectly imperfect part of me. My loud mouth, my pride, my insecurity, my walls, my obsessive control, my passive aggression, my lack of boundaries, my tendency to quit, hide, run, lie, blame, yell, fight, busyness. He showed me his delicate plan to make me unique in every sinew of my being. I am His child, I bear his resemblance. He breathed life into me, He never ever for a single second stopped loving me and he will never, ever leave me. I am His beloved child. He will never forsake me or abandon me. He is coming back for me to rescue me and bring me to the paradise he created me to live in. He longs to love me. I look back at the things He has promised me, the desires deep within my heart. The spaces of my inmost being that he created and plans to fulfill. The things he has already given me that bring me hope and that I have future hope in. When He gives the gift from the Holy Spirit to have this hope I have a choice. I know that I cannot leave this desert, this liminal space, until I trust in His all consuming love enough to let go this anchor and cross over into my eternal hope that will anchor my soul.
I say to Jesus I want to give him my heart and I want to accept the hope. The promise of eternity with Him in the garden I was made for. I am scared because I don’t know the way and I don’t know how to let go. Then He reminds me I don’t have to, all I have to do is be still. Suddenly I am not afraid anymore. I close my eyes and I can see him take my hand, leading my bare feet, free form into paradise. This is where I place my hope. Nothing but this moment matters, nothing that was before will ever trouble me. No tears will ever fall again from my eyes. Around his neck he wears every tear I ever cried and he assures me he saw every single one. Ushering me into eternity I know the familiar feeling that settles through my body, shalom.
