"The Way of HOPE"

I'm afraid that we have watered down HOPE by too often equating it with our wishes.  As a writer I see words as having different dimensions to them.  Wishes are very flat to me as mere words on a piece of paper in wish-list form; words that have no true hope or love behind them.  No change of heart, no change of posture, no promise, no relationship between God and us.  But HOPE ... oh my, HOPE is different!

I am reminded of an old family Polaroid picture that is a favorite of mine.  My younger brother, Steve, when he was a very small child, would always approach my grandmother with cupped hands.  He would stand still before her, cup his little hands together, close his eyes and lower his head.  He stood before her in the hope that she might have a piece of candy or a surprise to place in his hands.  More times than not, she did.  You know how grandmothers are.

But there were times when she had only love to give him and that seemed to be sufficient for the moment.  The picture shows a little boy, with cupped hands, closed eyes, head lowered and a smiling grandmother bent low, trying to look into his face, ready to pour out unimaginable love on my brother.  The beautiful thing about this was that having nothing at that moment to place into Steve's hands was never a deal-breaker.  This little boy continued to love his grandmother and his grandmother continued to love him.  Those days when he hoped for something, yet when his hopes were not immediately realized, did nothing to discourage him from coming before our grandmother in hope again.

Our love for God and God's love for us isn't conditional to each of our hopes placed before God being realized in the way that we want them to be or even revealed to us at all.  But when we discover the way of HOPE, we see love also ... unconditional love flowing between God and a beloved child.