All Hope Is NOT Lost!

Last night, one of my student's facebook status read, "I don't want to be here anymore."  I had an idea what he was dealing with.  It was probably a breakup.  As adults, we look at such relationships as trivial and flighty.  However, to the broken hearted teen, it is anything but trivial.  Momentarily, he has lost all hope.

How does Webster define hope?  Hope is a desire accompanied by expectation of or belief in fulfillment.  It is a wonderful thing to have hope for a given situation.  The situation may be grave.  Doctors say there is a 90% mortality rate.  Yet, the deep seated hope within us says that there is still a chance of survival.  The chance may be small, but hope clings to that chance and believes that it will happen.

What are we to do when we realize that the expectation will not become a reality.  The alternate reality stares us in the face, taunting us, "Why did you even dare to hope?"  At that moment, we are tempted to lose all hope.  Look at all the wasted energy that went into hoping.  Now what?...  Now, my friend, you cling to the whisper of a thought that you will not always feel the despair that you are currently experiencing.

I drive thirty minutes out into the country to teach. The first year I taught, I would get to work very early. Every morning, I would pass by Alexis as she was standing at the end of her road waiting for the school bus. We didn't even know each other's name, but that was our first connection.

Since then, I have had the privilege to teach her.  We had our good days that year, when we laughed and learned much. However, life also dealt us both some bad days. During those times, it just wasn't much fun. She and I have a special saying that we shared on such days: Tomorrow will be a better day!

It is a simple a statement of hope. In the moment, for whatever reason, you feel as though a black hole has opened up and swallowed you into the chaos of darkness and nothingness.  You have no reason to believe that you will ever feel better again.  But, you make a conscious choice to believe that you will not stay stuck in the quagmire. It usually starts out as a state of mind. There may not be one shred of evidence that life will get better. In actuality, it seems to only have the possibility to get worse.

A good friend gave me a wonderful illustration. She said, imagine that you are in a dark tunnel. You look down that seemingly endless darkness and see nothing. Then you look again. There it is! At the very end is one small ray of light squeezing its way through the keyhole that will eventually be your escape from the darkness. It is then that you can say, "Yes, tomorrow will be a better day."

Life can take many things away from you, but there is one thing that noone or nothing can ever steal from you:  Hope.  I believe Martin Luther King, Jr said it best, "We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope."

Psalm 71:14 (New International Version, ©2010)

14 As for me, I will always have hope;

I will praise you more and more.