Hope. Hope has always been such a strong, secure, happy, motivational word for me. What do you hope for ... is a challenging and thought-provoking question. And now in the face of Christmas and presents, I am struck by the fact that the things my children hope for is what I always try to deliver. However, in order to deliver what they want; or hope for, they have to know what it is they hope for. There in, for my kids, lies the problem. They don't always know what they hope for.
Hope is a desire for something you do not see or tangibly have at the time. During this time our kids hope for video games, big wheels, scooters, soccer boppers (have you seen those?) and a myriad of other things. We may hope for happiness, reconciliation with a family member or friend, a healing, a break-through, a get-away, and, as so many things reference this time of year, hope for peace.
As humans isn't it easier to live our lives hoping for things that we have a tangible sense of? We can visualize a get-away, even a reconciliation, usually because we have spent thought and hopefully prayer on it. And our kids can, for sure, visualize nailing their sibling with soccer boppers. My own kids have clearly described their own visualization of sitting on the couch, watching television in snuggies. But that tangible hope is exactly the hope, produced by faith, that God wants us to have in his promises for our earthly life and our eternal life. Remember Hebrews 11:1: "Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see." As I re-read that verse I am struck by the word 'sure'. How sure are we, and our kids, of God's promises? Are we rooted in his promises? Do his promises drive our daily actions, our conversations, our motivations?
Romans 8:24 & 25 says, "For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he already has? But if we hope for what we do not have, we wait patiently." Now, I am not trying to say that we have to wait and hope for all of God's promises, but his promises transcend time and span the breadth and depth of our life. Additionally, His ultimate promise, the promise of eternal life, is something to hope for and patiently wait for. Isn't eternal life His ultimate promise? The promise to live with Him forever? So as we wait and hope in that ultimate promise we live out our faith with love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.
The crux of that hope for our kids, and their ability to live a life that illustrates the characteristics of the nine virtues that demonstrate the fruit of the spirit, is that they are rooted in ALL of God's promises. What promises are our kids sure of? What do they believe? What are they rooted in? What do they believe God will deliver to them just as strongly as they believe in Mommy and Daddy's ability to deliver their tangible hopes?
We have started our family statement of faith and it is a picture of a tree that we all had a hand in creating. The roots are God's promises, the trunk is love, and the leaves, branches, and fruits are the fruit of the spirit. What is your family statement of faith? And what better time to define the promises we hope in than Christmas, when our ultimate hope was born?
By His Grace
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