Hope Now

"Everything rides on hope now. Everything rides on faith somehow. When this world has broken me down. Your love sets me free." -from "Hope Now" by Addison Road

If there has been a song that I have sung over and over to myself, or out loud, over the past few months-- it has been this one. I found myself singing it watching the sunset in Africa, walking paths with kids holding my hands and staring, watching the waves from the wind come in on Lake Tanganyika, walking the halls of my school, through my house after a frustrating phone call or conversation, and even on my prep when I'm in my room by myself and no one hears me. All of those moments have boiled down to one thing-- the world. Time and time again, it has broken me and not healed me. It has knocked me down and not picked me up. It has bruised me and not cleaned my wounds. It has said hurtful things and gave nasty looks and never apologized. The world breaks... it falls apart and is, unfortunately, unfair and unjust. What am I to do? Where do I turn in these moments? In those moments, there are so many emotions, laughing, smiling to hide the pain, tears in rims of my eyes, and sometimes I feel that the scars that I have show brighter on my skin than normally. My heart must beat faster and my eyes must look down. My ears stop hearing and definitely stop listening and all I can think about is how messed up I am. How devastated and destroyed I have been. How deep the pit I was found in must have been. How I crawl and lie in it over and over. How I ignore the call of God to my precious heart as He pursues me... as He always hears me... as He always sees me and always heals me and never walks away from me. I find myself with the Prodigal Son eating with the pigs and yet my Daddy picks me up and pulls me away because what He wants for me is better. It's better than the brokenness the world offers, it's better than the lies that they will tell and any apology that could ever be given. He gives me hope and His love sets me free. And today as I felt those emotions and those hurts and heartaches because of a phone call, my heart sang "Everything rides on hope now..."

We cannot count on anything else but His plans and provisions, but His goodness and mercy and grace, but His love and to encounter all that, we must place our trust in Him and become dependent upon Him. He never changes. He never fails. Be encouraged. He is the same and He sees you. You are not alone. Rely on His hope. His love will set you free.
-Melis