I've got February 15 marked on my calendar. In fact, I was tempted to circle it in bright red and add as many gold star stickers as I could fit on the square, because that's the day the last of the puppies goes to its new home. Puppies are cute, yes. But unless you've had a few in your home at one time, I don't think you can begin to imagine the amount of mess and smell generated by 6 (I'll bet you that Roger and Anita weren't singing any happy songs about dalmatian plantations after a week of 99 little pups in the house!) So you can be sure that I'm counting the days! Now there's nothing inherently wrong with looking forward to a particular day or event, whether it be the known end of a trial, or something exciting that you've been planning and working toward for a while. And there's a place for remembering that most of our trials are really relatively short-lived. But if February 15 is my ultimate hope, or even my main one, I've put my hope in the wrong spot. I can look forward to that day with all my might, and daydream about the freedom that will be mine on February 16, but that is only the end of the "puppy trial" season. There is bound to be something else lying in wait just behind it. In fact, I can already see some crazy weather gathering speed in the distance.
I think we all have a tendancy to place an inordinate amount of hope in the end point of a trial. We start young--we don't like being told what to do as kids, and all we can think about is how great it must be to be an adult and be allowed to eat ice cream for breakfast if you want to. We think everything will be better once those 4 years of school are over and we've got a degree under our belt. We do it all the way through an agonizing 9 months of pregnancy and don't stop once we become parents. "Oh, I can't wait until I don't have to change another diaper!" you've said, not realizing of course, that you'll only trade in the Huggies for regular mad-dashes to filthy restrooms everytime you leave the house. The grass is always greener on the other side of this, isn't it?
But placing all our hope in the end of a particular trial often only leads to discouragement and hopelessness. For one thing, trials are often followed by trials. You get to the end of one just to jump into another--out of the frying pan, into the fire, as the saying goes. Yes, most of us have periods of relative peacefulness and ease along the way. But no one goes all the way through life that way. We are promised trials in this life. And they often seem to cluster, or come in waves. For another thing, sometimes trials are inordinately long and the end is nowhere to be seen. You cry out with the psalmist, "How long, O LORD?" and there seems to be no answer. If you are used to just looking forward to getting through "this thing", what do you hope in when there's no promise of getting through it at all?
No, February 15 is not the end of all my troubles. Not in the least. So if the grass isn't guaranteeed to be any greener on the 16th, where is my hope?
1) My hope is in the finished work of the cross. Regardless of how long or trying this difficulty is (and I'm well aware that 8 weeks of puppy care is a very small and short trial!), I can rejoice in the fact that it is not an expression of God's wrath toward me, because I have a sure hope that Christ took all that wrath on my behalf at the cross. And "if God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us." (Romans 8:31-34)
2) My hope is in God's very present steadfast love toward us. Our hope is not merely in something that happened in the past, or in something that will happen sometime in the future, but in God's current, never-ending, steadfast love toward us that sustains us in all our trials. The cross is the proof of it; the hope of heaven the promise of it. But we need the hope that even now in THESE difficult circumstances, God's steadfast love and faithfulness are toward us, upholding us, and able to carry us to the end. One of the reasons I find the Psalms so helpful in times of trial is that over and over again, the steadfast love of God is called to mind and extolled. "Whoever is wise, let him attend to these things; let them consider the steadfast love of the Lord." (Psalm 107:43) "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written, "For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.” No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord." (Romans 8:35-39)
3) My hope is in the future of heaven, and ultimately the new heavens and the new earth. There IS an end to the trials of this life, and it will come at a definitive point in time (though no one knows the hour). And that will be an end to all trials of all kinds for all eternity. That will be the point when hope is no longer merely hope, but actual sight! (Romans 8:18-25) "Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.” And he who was seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” Also he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.” (Revelation 7:1-5)
February 15 may well be Freedom From Puppies Day (barring any unexpected hold-ups), but if my hope is not in that certain date, or the vague ending of some other trial, but rather in the finished, ongoing and future character and work of God, then every day can be Freedom Day, and my hope is in a sure and unwavering target. And that is a hope worth having!
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