I’m a mess. There, I said it. I struggle with issues like anger and fear. To top it off, I am a control freak. It is so hard for me just to stand down. And I find myself in a world that has lost love, kindness, sanity and is full of greed and depravity.

But…

I have hope and hope makes all the difference! My hope is in Christ. God wants to save us from our own destruction because He created us and loves us. He created us with the freedom to choose. All we have to do is believe and trust what He said. He said that God created everything and then sent His Son, Jesus, to earth to live in the flesh among us. And that Jesus was crucified over 2000 years ago on a real Roman cross to his death and that His body was buried in a real tomb and three days later He rose to life in the flesh. He returned to heaven after leaving behind the Spirit form of God to help us grow as believers. And He said that on a day that we have no idea about, Jesus will come again and gather up all of the dead believers and those believers left on earth and take us to live in an unimaginably beautiful place with Him to live a totally fulfilling existence without pain and death. And in this lies all my hope.

Here are the words of Jesus explaining to a guy named Nicodemus, who wanted to know why the Son of God came to earth to live as a human among us.

John 3:16-17 AMP
"For God so greatly loved and dearly prized the world, that He even gave His One and only begotten Son, so that whoever believes and trusts in Him as Savior shall not perish, but have eternal life. For God did not send the Son into the world to judge and condemn the world that is, to initiate the final judgment of the world, but that the world might be saved through Him”.

So He clearly lobbed the ball into our court. We each must choose to participate by belief and trust. We must choose to volley our thoughts and beliefs daily with Him or to walk off and leave Him. But if we participate, we become the recipients of grace for all the messing up that we have done, are doing, and will do.

It is this hope that keeps me looking to God. My hope keeps me talking to him. My hope holds me up when the world knocks me down and consequently, love and compassion grow where there was none before. Everyday my hope is in Christ. Everyday I talk to Him about letting go of my anger, fear and control issues and I see that He is making improvement in spite of me. So I have hope for a bright future knowing someday, all these issues will be a thing of the past.

If you haven’t made this choice and want to, simply tell God in a humble prayer that you choose this hope and believe in your heart that He will do what He says He will do. If you have this relationship with God, may you find a way to share it with those who want it.