One of my favorite books right now is Hope Rising by Casey Gwinn and Chan Hellman. I had a great opportunity to meet Chan at a recent round table gathering in Tulsa and I was blow away with his research on Hope. A huge discovery for me was Hope is measurable, you can quantify it, you can teach it and you can prove that Hope Changes Lives! You can even fairly accurately predict ones path and decisions by the amount of hope they have...it’s fascinating. I highly recommend the book. 

Hope is a ACTION. Hope is not wishing, or even “fake” praying when its just lip service with no heart connection or action. So, often times we are using hope in a sentence wrong, we are saying Hope when we really should be saying wish. Wish is no action. 

Why so much about Hope and educating about Hope? Glad you asked...look at Isaiah 40:29-31

“He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.” - ‭‭Isaiah‬ ‭40:29-31‬ ‭NIV

This is a very common and popular Scripture verse. It’s inspirational, and very comforting. But, I do not think this verse means what most read it to mean. This verse is not removing our responsibility or giving us permission to just sit back and wait on God to take care of it all. Hope is an action. 

“...but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength.” 

Hope in the Lord...not wish in the Lord or “think” or “pray” or “sit on our butts” in the Lord. Hope is movement and joining the battle on the field. We must take the step, then the next step, then the next step, even when we don’t think we can take another step, we must take the step. 

This morning I was reading the Everyday Supernatural Bible Plan with Robin and it reminded me of my pull up journey in the gym. A few years back I started working out consistently with a few of my friends who were in much better shape than me. A part of our daily routine was pull ups. I would always watch Ryan and Judson do pull ups and how easy they made it look. They just jumped up to the pull up bar and started knocking them out. I on the other hand went across the gym, in a little bit of shame and got on the assisted pull up machine. I wasn’t able to do pull ups without help, I needed the machine to lighten the weight. I adjusted the weight and did my pull ups by myself while watching, praying and hoping I would join the guys one day. Everyday I did my assisted pull ups, slowly reducing the weight assist. Every day I did my part and the machine did it’s part to help lighten the load. Days went by, months went by and about a year later I was able to join Ryan and Judson. Today, I can crank out a lot of pull ups with no assistance. Not to long ago I harassed Ryan when we did a little competition in the gym and I beat him by 1 pull up. Wow, that felt good. Not because I won, it was a sweet little victory because of the journey I took, the pain I endured, the struggle and fight I had fought to just be at the place where I could enter the competition. 

I think about this, and it makes me think of how God and His Holy Spirit works with us. The pull up machine is the Holy Spirit. You see we bring all we have, we put in the effort, bring our plans, bring our weakness and our tired bodies and jump on the machine. Some days we need to adjust the machine to take more of the load. Other days we feel different, we feel strong and need less help from the machine. But every day we get on the machine and do the work, no matter how weak or tired we are. This is how I see “hope in the Lord.”

I think this example breaks down when you get to the end for me and I didn’t need the machine anymore. We always need Christ and should rely on the Holy Spirit...so don’t go too far with the analogy. But I think you get my point. 

Hope in the Lord is an action. Let’s bring our best and do our part today.