Even If

“I know the sorrow and I know the hurt would all go away of you’d just say the word.  But even if you don’t, my hope is you alone.”  So many people turn away from God when things get hard.  When the going gets tough we can get angry at God and blame Him for our pain because we know He can take it away.  This song by MercyMe should be our prayer in times of hurting.

We all have been hurt.  We have all had times in our lives where we are at our absolute worst and have no hope at all.  There is so much pain and sorrow and we wish it would go away.  Most of the time we curse God and beg for Him to take away whatever is causing us so much hurt, most of the time believing He won’t.  So instead people turn to drinking or drugs or self-harm or something else to take away their pain.  We put our hope into materialistic things that in reality won’t help at all.  Instead of getting angry at God for not helping us in times of great sorrow, we need to put our trust and hope in Him.

Once again we’re going to go back to when I was in middle school and high school.  I was in so much pain during those few years.  I turned away from God thinking He couldn’t help me.  I was one of those people that turned to self-harm.  I had so much heartache from feeling so alone that I thought the physical pain would help and take it all away.  But it didn’t.  Finally, when I was completely at breaking point, God saved me.  I put my hope in Him and He was able to bring me away from all of that and showed me I wasn’t alone.  If I had put my hope in Him from the beginning I would have saved myself a lot of pain and trouble.

Now for a story where I did put my hope in God.  Going to college is a really scary thing at first.  You are alone, without friends, and expected to do a lot of things for yourself because you’re an adult.  You have to completely start over.  After my first day of classes my first semester I completely broke down.  I cried for hours.  I felt so alone and had no idea what I was doing.  I was convinced I wasn’t going to make any friends because of how introverted I was.  I had my roommates but I knew I wasn’t going to be good friends with them because they were all into the party scene.  I had so much sorrow and hurt, but instead of just letting it consume me, I turned to God.  I prayed and asked for peace and comfort.  I asked Him to give me complete contentment in Him.  I put all my hope in Him.  I knew that God would provide me with friends.  Maybe not right away but I knew he would provide for me.  The very next day I met one of my best friends completely by chance.  We had two classes together and ended up being paired up for a short class project.  Ever since we have been best friends and I know we will be friends for the rest of our lives.

It is so important that we put our hope in God in the midst of all our hurt and fear.  I know it’s hard, but even when He doesn’t give us an answer right away or doesn’t take away our sorrow right away; we still need to completely trust and rely on Him.  He will provide for us, just like I talked about last week.  Even the sparrow knows He holds tomorrow.  Put your hope in God even in your darkest times.

I’m just the daughter of a small town girl… putting my hope in God alone.

images taken from Google.