If godly hope feels elusive today, consider how you can first acknowledge the pain before God and second how you can recognize Him at work to make it easier to choose hope
Suffering is rampant in our culture, smacking us in the face everywhere we go. Yet, as people of faith, we are told to cling to hope as an anchor in hard times since Jesus is our source of hope. We believe this truth, but in the presence of suffering can often wonder what it looks like to practice that hope, especially when we can’t make sense of the pain.
- How do we offer hope to someone with Stage IV cancer who is told the tumors are too widespread and the cancer is inoperable?
- What does hope look like when a wife learns that her husband is having an affair and announces that he’s moving in with his girlfriend, leaving her alone to manage not only her shattered heart but those of their four now-emotionally-distraught children?
- How can we encourage the woman who works overtime at a dead-end job that she hates just to make ends meet, all the while knowing that she still can’t pay off her mountain of debt?
Unfortunately, these three scenarios are painful realities for loved ones in my life right now. I’m sure you, too, can immediately think of family and friends enduring immense heartache as they have no choice but to persevere through tragedy tenaciously.
It’s challenging to admit that our faith doesn’t always have easy answers. It can feel much more comfortable to hide behind empty cliches (“Just trust God!”) instead of vulnerably asking ourselves, “How can we live out the hope we profess when things feel utterly hopeless?”
Christian hope is more than a positive attitude or a fresh perspective on a tough circumstance. Do others see that type of otherworldly hope radiating through us when we’re traversing the dark night of the soul and have every reason to plunk ourselves in the pit of despair? And how can we offer true hope to others when walking the hard road is part of their journey too?
Unanswered hope makes a heart sick.
None of us can claim to have mastered the art of finding hope, especially when this world gives us new daily opportunities to slide into the bitterness, sadness, and exhaustion that are an easy alternative to hope. As a Christian mindset coach, I meet women every day who are scarred by unresolved emotional and spiritual pain that leads them to hopelessness. These aren’t the seekers or casual attendees. They are the VBS leaders, Christmas choir directors, and the ones who always bring an extra dish at the annual church picnic. They know Christ and long to faithfully serve Him. Yet behind closed doors, it’s clear how years of hiding from emotional hurt and unanswered questions about life’s difficulties have left these saints walking wounded. Despite knowing the love of Christ, they can’t shake the feeling of “I’m still not good enough” and find it challenging to stand strong on Christ-centered hope.
Why do they find themselves “believing truth in their heads but not in their hearts”? Like a house built on sinking sand, many have built a shallow faith in surface-level truths and simple platitudes about trusting God during hard times. These truths seem adequate until they experience an extreme tragedy like a house fire that steals their possessions or the loss of a newborn hours after birth. What’s left in the aftermath of devastating loss? A cascade of unanswered questions. While the “why” questions can be excruciating to face, I believe they can be God’s engraved invitation to draw closer to Him in the wrestling for answers. He is our greatest ally in compassionately acknowledging our suffering; these questions are the path to accessing much-needed comfort and hope. Like Romans 5:3-5 mentions, hope can be one of the precious gifts forged in the fires of suffering.
However, if someone chooses to avoid confronting these questions or pushes down the emotional turmoil, it’s as if a callous forms on the heart and authentic hope becomes much more elusive. They may keep going through the motions of church and faith, but often without realizing it, their spiritual walk becomes less authentic. This is when that tension forms between logically knowing spiritual truth and wanting to protect oneself from future pain. Unfortunately, this is the condition many Christians face. They love Christ and long to experience His sustaining hope for their unresolved situations but feel like they can’t rest in the daily victory of hope, which only adds to their frustration. They wonder, “How can I get past this? I believe, so why can’t I just experience the gift of hope?
2 ways to encourage emotional and spiritual healing by practicing hope.
If you’re looking for hope today, friend, I want to offer some key scriptural truths as a compass to reawakening hope, either if you recognize that you’ve allowed a callus to form on your heart from past trauma and unanswered questions or if you’re walking through a tough season right now and you want to lean into God’s hope as your strength.
Hope acknowledges the pain while still believing in the possibility.
Hebrews 11:1 reminds us that faith shows the reality of what we hope for, meaning it’s a logical decision. Yes, hope is a logical certainty in the things we cannot see, but we mustn’t forget that hope is also rooted in emotion. While it’s true that our feelings fluctuate and change and are not gospel truths, God has designed our emotions to be like “check-engine lights” to our spiritual, emotional, and psychological health. We must pay attention to our feelings, especially during life’s most painful moments. This is why acknowledgment is the first step in cultivating authentic godly hope.
Many of David’s psalms give a wonderful example of how to honestly navigate a hurtful reality while remaining anchored in the possibility of hope. For instance, in Psalm 42, David repeats the pattern of acknowledging his emotional anguish and comforting himself with God’s promises that bring him hope. Some fear acknowledging emotional pain will make hope much harder to find. It does seem contradictory that hope is found in recognizing pain first. However, compassion from God leads to a connection with God, and we must know that God understands us before we can choose to step into the kind of trust that leads to supernatural hope.
Hope is an active choice that sometimes stands outside of logic.
Acknowledgment is the first step, but then we must decide if we’re willing to believe in God’s kind of hope that often defies logic. This is the choice Job made when he said, “Though he slay me, yet will I hope in him” (Job 13:15). What allows us to cross this chasm of trusting in hope even though it may not make sense? Once again, it’s found in regularly cultivating an honest connection with God. Our relationship with Christ builds bridges of hope while focusing on rules and religion cause our hearts to freeze up.
While we’re most desperate for hope when emotional pain is at its climax, hope grows a little at a time through a choice to recognize God’s presence in everyday moments. Can we see how God woos us daily with little fingerprints of His love? Do we stop to notice these and connect opportunities to see God at work in every circumstance beyond our knowledge and wisdom? God gives us permission to savor the good and let go of fear, even when life is hard. Each of these recognitions makes it much easier to choose godly hope when we’re tempted to succumb to discouragement and to wait with confidence for the Lord to answer our prayers (Micah 7:7).
If godly hope feels elusive today, consider how you can first acknowledge the pain before God and second how you can recognize Him at work to make it easier to choose hope. Discovering how to grow in hope is always a worthwhile endeavor since it not only enriches our spiritual connection with Christ but also gives us a chance to demonstrate the light of Christ through our brokenness.
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Alicia Michelle is a certified NeuroCoach and host of the award-winning Christian Mindset Coach Podcast. She loves equipping Christian women with practical brain-and-biblically-based tools to overcome anxiety, perfectionism, and self-sabotage so that they can cultivate godly confidence. Get her free training on how to overcome negative thoughts and manage anxiety at VibrantChristianLiving.com.
