Did you know that God speaks hope to you in many different ways? If you’re looking for hope today, I have a testimony about how God spoke hope to me in surprising ways.
How God Speaks Hope in Surprising Ways
The lessons I’ve learned are helping me reflect on Jesus’ words in this verse:
The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.
John 10:10 NIV
Last week, I struggled with a mild blue feeling. I think it descended on me for several reasons. One, the initial shock of the quarantine had worn off, and I was finally adjusting to the new normal. Two, I was slightly bummed that Easter celebrations would be so different due to the quarantine, though I was determined to look for hope no matter what.
Since rain was in the forecast for Sunday, we traveled to our hunting grounds on Saturday to spend some dry time outdoors. Normally a hike in the woods is better than medicine for me, but I still couldn’t shake the week-long blues.
A Surprising Source of Hope
On the 40-minute drive home, my daughter scanned through the Sirius XM stations. We stopped on one and let a contemporary song play.
Then an oldie came up from my childhood – Back in the High Life by Steve Winwood, with one of my favorite artists, James Taylor, singing in the background. (Watch the video to giggle at the 80’s hairstyles and fashion!)
This upbeat song was a #1 pop hit in 1987, when I was 10 years old. I can’t tell you how many hundreds of times the local radio stations played it, but I know it was often playing in the background while I was in my room coloring or reading.
However, last Saturday, it’s as if I was hearing the song for the first time. This glass-half-empty gal paid close attention to the optimism and hope in the lyrics: “All the doors I closed one time will open up again.”
'All the doors I closed one time will open up again.' God can use songs like this to give us hope. #hope #christianencouragement Click To Tweet
God’s Hope In a Song
How many doors have closed in your life since the quarantine began? For me, doors to church, restaurants, my library, shops, and even my in-laws’ house for Easter. Also the doors to my children’s schools, which affects me too. Let’s not forget the gates to stadiums for baseball games. For you, other doors have closed, I’m sure. And it’s normal for us to feel a little blue about the doors that we’ve had to close against our will.
God used this decades-old, secular song to remind me the doors that are closed now will reopen in his timing. Doors God knew would have to be closed for a while, to not only keep me safe but to teach me to be more patient, grateful and hopeful.
God will use whatever it takes to speak hope to our hearts. Most often he’ll speak to us through his Word. But if he wants, he’ll use a song, TV show, conversation, or anything else to wake us up to hopeful truths.
God will use whatever it takes to speak hope to our hearts. #hope #inspiration #christianliving Click To Tweet
More Signs of How God Speaks Hope
Here are other ways he surprised me with hope on this altogether different Easter:
– A rhyming Easter message from my childhood pastor. He used to deliver them only at Christmas and Easter services, which I anticipated with delight. This year he emailed me a new one for 2020. What a treat to read it aloud to my own family on Sunday morning!
– Our church’s live stream Easter service, with the sermon on Revelation 21:5, one of my all-time favorite verses. It’s the theme verse for my favorite book from 2017, which I enjoyed reading again on Sunday.
– A beautiful Missouri bluebird building her nest on a tree branch right in front of our porch. I would have missed it, had I not been reading the weekend newspaper outside before it rained.
– A delicious steak dinner with my family, complete with strawberry slab pie made from scratch by my 11-year-old daughter. Then a fun round of minute-to-win-it games, which ended in a fishing contest between my two sons. This made for a unique Easter memory which we will remember without any blue feelings!
Back in the High Life of Hope
Jesus has come that we may have life to the full, not always shuttered behind closed doors. We have to endure this time for a while, but not forever. He’s hidden hope in many corners of this closed-door time. We just have to open our eyes to it. It’s all around us, in nature, books, songs, sermons, and other unexpected places. Hope that the high life – the abundant life – life to the full – will return soon.
Here’s to the day we’ll be back in the high life again, celebrating God’s goodness with doors wide open. But we can still celebrate him now even with doors shut, watching and waiting for signs of hope.
How is God speaking hope to you in this closed-door season?
Here's to the day we'll be back in the high life again, celebrating God's goodness with doors wide open. #hope #encouragement #inspiration Click To Tweet
Prayer:
Dear Jesus,
No door can shut your hope out of my life.
Even when the disciples were huddled behind closed doors
you appeared among them on Easter Sunday,
astonishing them with brand-new hope.
I pray that you will show me the hope you’ve already hidden
inside this closed-door season.
May your hope be my anchor when the enemy
tries to steal, kill and destroy it.
When the doors finally open, may I never again
take your hope for granted, Lord.
I thank you for the abundant life
you have prepared for me
both inside and after this season.
Amen.
I pray that whatever you are facing right now, this prayer has encouraged you. Do you have a prayer request to share with me, or feedback on this devotion? Simply reach out to me on my Contact page.
Thanks for stopping by today! I encourage you to also check out my books and my video/printable guided meditation series. Blessings to you!
How God Speaks Hope in Surprising Ways: Learn how to look for signs of hope that God is sending you. #christianliving #hope #encouragement Click To Tweet
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