Scriptural Studies

Sorrow Transformed To Joy

February 26, 2020

The longer I journey through life, the more aware I become that nearly everyone has endured sorrow, pain, or loss—in ways frequently hidden from the rest of the world. But those things aren’t the end of our story. Rather, we have a glorious hope found in the goodness of God.

One of the most magnificent assurances in Scripture is that God works all things for our good. As Christians, most of us have an intellectual understanding of this, but God wants it to be a living, breathing truth in our lives. It’s a bedrock promise reflecting His nature—that HE is always good and always kind. It’s an assurance we can rest in during the hardest of times. He redeems all things, and He gives joy in the place of mourning.

So what is our role in this process? One key element is the choice to trust in Him and hold fast to the truth His word reveals.

Psalm 84:5-7 says:

Blessed are those whose strength is in you, who have set their hearts on pilgrimage. As they pass through the Valley of Baca [valley of weeping or lamentation], they make it a place of springs; the autumn rains also cover it with pools [blessings]. They go from strength to strength till each appears before God in Zion.

We make the choice to set our hearts and minds on God, on the unseen and eternal (Colossians 3:2) and to remember we’re on a pilgrimage in this world. There’s a promise that as we do so, God Himself will supply strength and He will transform the very places of sorrow and suffering into springs which give life and pools of blessing for us and those around us.

Shortly before I was healed, The Lord reminded me of a passage from Hinds Feet on High Places (an allegory I read many times through my childhood and teen years). In the book, the protagonist Much-Afraid accepts the invitation of the Shepherd to journey up to the High Places. He promises to give her companions to accompany her, and she’s delighted—until her companions turn out to be Sorrow and Suffering. But when she finally reaches the High Places, not only is she herself transformed from Much-Afraid into Grace and Glory, but Sorrow and Suffering are transformed into Joy and Peace.

Obviously, this is a concept found throughout Scripture. But in this case, God reminded me of it afresh through story. He offered the reassurance that He was working this in my life, even when there was no evident manifestation at the time—and that I was to keep my focus and attention on Him, on His nature, and what He was speaking and doing.

While I saw a manifestation of this process a few months later (albeit after many years of waiting), the transformation of joy to sorrow doesn’t always happen quickly. It doesn’t always happen in a way we readily perceive or in the way we would choose. But it always happens. On that, Scripture is clear.

Further, it’s in the place of trial and difficulty that God opens doors of hope and restoration, as illustrated in Hosea 2:14-15:

Therefore, I am now going to allure her; I will lead her into the desert and speak tenderly to her. There I will give her back her vineyards, and will make the Valley of Achor [trouble] a door of hope.

These Scriptures provide fuel for great hope, and there are so many more. Isaiah 61:3, Psalms 126, Psalms 30:5, Matthew 5:4, and countless others address this topic.

If you’re in a difficult season, reflect on these Scriptures. Ask the Holy Spirit to breathe life on them, to make them living reality in your soul. He will be faithful to strengthen you and impart joy, even in the midst of trouble.

I’d love to hear your stories of how God redeemed difficult situations and brought joy in the place of sorrow. If you’ve experienced this, please share!

Abraham and Sarah: Lives Marked by Hope

January 28, 2020

In seasons of intense pressure or loss, living in hope may feel like an impossible ideal. For this reason, I love the story Abraham and what it reveals about our journey of hope and faith. Most likely, you have at least passing familiarity with Abraham’s life—both his title as father of the faith and the numerous times that he stumbled. His wife Sarah also is honored as a mother of faith, a woman enabled to experience the impossible because she considered God faithful.

Throughout Abraham and Sarah’s lives, God brought them into situations that stretched their faith and required the continued exercise of hope and trust in God. When Abraham was seventy-five, God gave him an incredible promise—that his offspring would be as numerous as the stars in the sky. This promise required supernatural fulfillment, as Sarah had long ago passed the years of child-bearing and endured barrenness throughout their many years of marriage.

Little did Abraham know at the time that it would take twenty-five years before the arrival of his promised son, the first sign that a nation would indeed follow Abraham. Genesis gives the expanded version of their experience during this time of waiting, but Romans sums it up this way:

“Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed and so became the father of many nations, just as it had been said to him, “So shall your offspring be.” Without weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his body was as good as dead—since he was about a hundred years old—and that Sarah’s womb was also dead. Yet he did not waver in belief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God, being fully persuaded that God had power to do what he had promised.”
Romans 4:18-21

So what can we learn from their journey of persevering in hope?

There’s so much here, but four points particularly stand out to me:

Understanding the power of God strengthened Abraham in his faith and enabled him to hope against hope. Abraham experienced God working on his behalf many times through the years. He’d witnessed God’s supernatural activity throughout his life, and he knew God had the power to do what he had promised, no matter how impossible it appeared.
Glorifying and praising God increased their ability to hope—and it does the same for us. In the waiting, Abraham continued to look to God and give glory to him. When we fix our eyes on God instead of our circumstances and choose to thank Him for His goodness at all times, it transforms us from the inside.
Triumphant hope faces the facts, but then looks beyond them. Abraham’s faith and hope did not require a denial of reality, nor would such a denial have been healthy. Abraham acknowledged the natural circumstances (old age and barrenness) without weakening in faith. In some circles, the power of positive thinking and speech receives such an emphasis that people feel they cannot speak honestly about their circumstances. That isn’t walking in hope. Hope acknowledges the facts, and then looks beyond them to the truth of what Scripture reveals about God, His power, and His ability to fulfill His word.
Even when we stumble and doubt, God’s grace more than covers our weakness—we’re not disqualified from walking in faith. This is tremendously important to understand. While Scripture records Abraham as a father of faith, a man who left behind everything familiar to follow God into an unknown land, a man who enjoyed intimate friendship with God, he also sinned in several major ways—including sleeping with another woman in an attempt to force the fulfillment of God’s promise to Him and fathering a son with her whom he later rejected. Yet when you read God’s account of Abraham, he says Abraham did NOT waver in his belief, but rather walked in faith and hope. God views us through the lens of grace. So if you find yourself struggling to hope or battling unbelief, know that God keeps account very differently than we do. As we turn to Him and repent, his grace more than covers our weakness. Like the father of the suffering child in Scripture, we can pray “Lord, I believe; help my unbelief!” And we can pick right back up in our journey of hope.

What other truths have you gleaned from the lives of Abraham and Sarah? I’d love to hear.

8 Practical Ways to Cultivate Hope

January 21, 2020

What you plant and nurture grows. It holds true in the natural realm, so also the spiritual. If you want to increase in hope, take action and incorporate some of these practices in your life:

1. Fill your mind with Scripture.

Romans 15:4 says that through the encouragement of Scripture, we have hope. Reflecting on Scriptures about God’s kindness and faithfulness will cause hope to increase, and so will meditating on Scriptural promises that specifically pertain to your situation. Look for what the Word says about the circumstance you find yourself in. Make these Scriptures personal and intimate, as God intended them, by adding your name and applying it to your life. Write down the living Word and put it on your mirror, your car dashboard, or any place you will see it often. As we saturate our minds with the Word, hope will increase in our souls.

2. Ask for empowerment from the Holy Spirit to walk in hope.

Pray as Paul did for “the God of hope [to] fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit” (Romans 15:13). Ask for the filling of the Spirit and supernatural grace to walk in hope. Sometimes all we can do cry out for help and trust that God will breathe on our emotions and bring hope. By His grace, He gives us hope (2 Thessalonians 2:16).

3. Choose hope.

We have a choice to hope or give up. Will you guard your heart because of past hurts or disappointments? Or will you embrace the truth revealed by God in His word and what that truth means for your life? 1 Peter 1:13 tells us to set our hope—it’s a an active determination on our parts. And Hebrews 10:23 echoes this, instructing us to “hold fast to the confession of hope without wavering.”

4. Speak hope-filled words.

Just as what we hear from others impacts us, what we speak to ourselves also influences the course of our souls (James 3 compares the tongue to a bit on a horse or a rudder on a ship, both of which determine the path taken). Just because you speak something doesn’t mean it automatically comes to pass, but bringing our words into alignment with heaven does steer the course of our souls.

5. Command your soul to hope.

One potent use of our words is to instruct our souls to hope in God. This may feel strange at first, but throughout Scripture we find people declaring to God “my hope is in you.” In Psalms 42 and 43, the psalmist speaks directly to his soul, saying: “why are you so downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God.” We have authority to direct our souls, and we don’t have to fall prey to every emotion, rather we can bring ourselves into alignment with hope.*

6. Keep your heart free from offense and bitterness.

We’re commanded to guard our heart, which is the wellspring of life. Keeping it free of bitterness, anger, and offense plays a key role in this. It’s easy to become offended with God when we don’t understand what’s going on (as if we had the right to do so), but offense chokes out hope and faith. Jesus said, “blessed is the one who is not offended because of me” (Matthew 11:6). The same applies in our relationships with others.

7. Engage with testimonies of God’s goodness.

Read, listen to, and reflect on testimonies of what God has done for others and remember and ponder what He has worked in your own life. We all have stories of His faithfulness, and we’re meant to meditate on them and share them. God instructed the Israelites to set up memorial stones that would serve as prompts to tell of what God did on their behalf (Joshua 4). And Revelation 12 declares that we overcome by the blood of the Lamb and the word of our testimony. When we hear how God has worked in the lives of others and meditate on what He has done on our behalf, it builds hope.

8. Surround yourself with people who speak hope and life.

As you’ve likely experienced, people often cast doubt, speak negative words, and discourage hope, often without realizing it. Many people have surrendered to negative mindsets and speak fear and worry into the circumstances they see in their own lives and the lives of those around them. By no means do I suggest that you cut those people off (after all, many of them may be loved family members or long-standing friends), but simply be mindful of your dialogue with them and be sure to also seek out those who will bring words of hope and truth into your situation.

How do you cultivate hope in your own life? I’d love to hear from you.

*Sometimes underlying physical/chemical issues cause depression or other emotional difficulties that need addressing—and I recommend taking necessary action in those situations—but those cases aside, many times we simply need to take authority over our souls.

Read Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3 of the Fundamentals of Hope series.