Season of Hope

This word hope has been entering our lives more often than it ever has in our lives.  I recognized it most recently in the conclusion of the Rogue One Star Wars movie.  It showed up in a memory verse simulator app I'm working on for Romans 15:13 which says, "May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope."  When looking to the future, depending on our outlook, we can either have hope or feel hopeless.

The four weeks leading up to Christmas, my wife and I decided to celebrate Advent, going through a daily devotional in anticipation of the day that Jesus was born.  It occurs to me that anticipating something that has already happened is a strange concept, but getting a little taste of the anticipation that many people back in those days had towards their coming King was a beautiful experience.  We lit four candles--first week, one, second week, two, and so on--representing God's promises, His peace, His love, and finally hope.  The importance and significance of Christmas was compounded in doing this for four weeks straight as opposed to one day or one church service on Christmas Eve.  I vaguely recall lighting these long purple and pink candles as a kid.  The light is most beautiful in a dark room, which reminds me of Jesus declaring himself as the light of the world, who came to light up the darkness.  We, too, as Christians are to "in the same way, let our lights shine before others so that they may see our good works and give glory to our Father who is in heaven." (Matthew 5:16).

November of 2015, Missi and I were surprised and blessed with the news of pregnancy.  The thought of having a baby was part of the plan...eventually, but we weren't really sure how we felt.  Us parents? A couple months later, after feeling more okay with the thought of becoming parents, we lost the baby.  We were extremely hurt by the loss and amazingly friends and family provided support and words of encouragement and experience that softened the blow of loss.  Fast forward to April-ish, pregnant again.  We apologize if this was news to you, we were much more cautious with how quickly we shared the news with people, probably due to the fear of another loss.  I recall in myself being much slower to want to connect with this baby.  I didn't want to get hurt again.  Second miscarriage. It happened almost too quickly.  Thankfully we took the loss easier than the first, but I wish I would've meditated on parenthood and trusted God more with the pregnancy.  Not that we would've followed through with these names at birth, but the first two babies we named Monster (it was very painful for Missi) and Blessing (getting another opportunity for a baby).  The two losses were hard but we got to experience the joy of our close friends having their baby this past May.  Fast forward to today, Missi is pregnant once again and this time she has made it into the second trimester.  Hope is doing well, healthy, and further along than both babies were.  We've been much more willing to trust in the Lord for His control over the pregnancy, much more willing to connect with the baby even if it means future loss, and much more hopeful of his/her birth in June 2017, thanks all to the Lord.

More instances of hope in our lives, our sister-in-law made us an ornament with the word Hope on it, unaware that that was the name we chose for this pregnancy.  Visiting my in-laws for Christmas last week, I found a beanie baby (remember those?) of a bear kneeling down in prayer.  "Cute," I thought. Then I looked at the given name inside the ty tag.  "Hope!" my inner voice shouted.  Not sure if my in-laws are aware, but we took that beanie baby with us for when the baby is born.  Hope that was okay. Love you!

I live in a neighborhood where it can become the normal to have little to no hope.  Bills need to be paid, yet questions as to how they'll be paid become routine.  Not an unfamiliar sight, ripped up lottery tickets.  If two guys buy lottery tickets, one is hopeful in winning and the other isn't, yet they both have losing numbers, did the hopeful person lose anything in losing?  These are the questions that are difficult to answer.

Serving food at our Christmas party

This year of ministry has been extremely difficult.  You never know when a kid will throw a fit, throw a fist, or throw markers. There always seems to be at least one meltdown each day, if not five.  Many of the kids are new with us, many are on the younger side, and it can be easy to go home at the end of the day hopeless to seeing any positive progress. Sometimes I feel I see more negative growth than positive.  However, at our Christmas party before Christmas break, we invited the kids and their families to celebrate the holiday with dinner and some donated gifts.  Unprompted, several of the kids wanted to help serve their families the dinner.  It started with one volunteer and ended up being six or seven kids following suit, happily, willingly helping out.  Am I blind to when these things happen throughout the school year, only fixating on what's wrong or was I witnessing a moment of hope for these kids.  I feel that hope gets a lot of help when there are signs to that thing hope for coming true.  I feel these are some of God's quiet assurances that He is in control, watching over the entire situation.

Al'Savion building a gingerbread house

Please pray for baby Hope's growth and development.  Pray for these kids that are deeply loved by Jesus Christ, enough to die for them.  I hope you've had a wonderful Christmas season.  Continue to celebrate Jesus, not just Christmas and Easter.  He wants us to be a light to others so that they may give Him glory.