Most people are familiar with Hebrews 11:1 as it is the clear definition of faith: “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen.” Surely we have each plugged what we hope for into this “equation” and then waited for the “substance” to manifest. My most dramatic examples are my hope for a husband and a child. After “surrendering” my life to the Lord in 1982, it took eight years for my hope for a husband to become a reality, and then it took another eight years for our hope for a child to be embodied in our Jewel. Clearly, I understand what it is like to wait and learn to trust God.

However, as I look at the definition of faith, a question presents itself to my mind: as faith is the “substance” of what I hope for, then if I have lost my hope, is faith then the substance of nothing? Last week, as I reached out of some dark doubt place for a lifeline from the Lord, He spoke Hebrews 11:11 — “By faith Sarah herself received power to conceive, even when she was past the age, because she considered Him faithful Who had promised.” Looking it up, I felt (for just a moment) the alarm of “surely He wouldn’t have me birth a child at 70!” Of course, this gave me a true emotional connection to Sarah: how must she have felt when God gave her this promise when she was “past the age?” As I meditated on this verse, I wondered what He wanted me to take away from it.

Sarah was dealing with “infertility,” the inability to conceive and bring forth a child. Of course, this is something we humans deal with on many levels beyond that of bearing children. Perhaps we have had a vision of starting a business, writing a book, quitting smoking, rekindling love seemingly lost in a relationship, or living a more healthy and vibrant life. We have the desire and feel the “call,” but nothing happens…we are unable to “conceive and bring forth.” When this goes on for a long time there is often a “death of the vision,” and this can be where hope dies as well.

In the next verse of Hebrews it says, “Therefore, from one man (Abraham) , and him as good as dead, were born descendants as many as the stars of heaven and as many as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore.” In the two or three weeks since the Lord led me to Hebrews 11, what has stuck in my mind is this image of “as good as dead...” I have been feeling such a sense of a “death of hope” within myself that I began to search my memory for what might have happened recently to have brought me to this place. Then it came to me: on a rare peek into Facebook, I happened on a series of videos which I was enjoying until I saw the heart crushing video of a dad whose 12 year old son had hung himself since the Covid 19 quarantine caused the suspension of his normal life. This seemed to crystalize for me how difficult these decisions are…how hard it can be to be human. In trying to keep students safe by shutting down the schools, this young and promising life is over…I wish you could see the picture of this bright and intelligent lad. So “the substance of things hope for”– seeing his only son again–can only be realized for this father through a hoped-for reunion after death. This resonates with the heart cry of a friend who has suffered LONG with disability, illness, surgeries, and loss. She wants to “hear the trump” of the LORD and join Him in the sky!!! She is ready to move on from this world! How many of us have lost hope for this world and now focus on our hope for heaven?

I was a very happy kid, and had a true concern for people. My world was “manageable” as I grew up in a small midwest town where the public school reminds me of what Christian schools look like today: not perfect, but with all of us pretty much on the same “page.” The “descent” of my life happened over a six year period from my junior year in college when I lost my virginity through rape, chose social work as a profession, and then landed in a faraway state. I was a “court service worker” with a caseload of 45 juvenile delinquents whose life situations or “crimes” had led to their being committed to the state. What I saw and experienced in those three years followed by three years working on a psychiatric unit (where shock treatments were performed in the room next to the my activity therapy room) chipped away at my hope for this world to be anything resembling what my childhood world had seemed.

Surrendering my life to Christ brought a cleansing and healing from much of that: as I learned to “cast your cares on Him for He careth for you,” I came to know Him and His faithfulness. However, these past few years have seemed like a mortar and pestle– grinding us down with all the anger, hate, deception, division, and now this pandemic.; and the hope that seems to remain is that one day I can leave this world and be with Him face to face…When the only hope remaining seems to be the hope of death, is that hope?

This week, after weeks of quarantined isolation, two friends and I met in my garden for fellowship and prayer. It was what Ric was talking about: a “gathering of spirits.” As we talked, laughed, cried, and finally prayed, we could feel the comfort, joy and strength ebb into our aching hearts. During this time, the Lord reminded me of the truth that all our issues eventually go back to Him: my besetting, recurring sin is –at its core—that I question God’s faithfulness–just as I had done when confronted with the overwhelming realities of the “delinquents” on my caseload, the hopelessness of lives on the psych unit, the irretrievable loss of a son to suicide, etc. Gathering together, we are strengthened and comforted…reminded of the faithfulness of God as we are often more able to see His faithfulness in the lives of others than in our own lives. Rereading Hebrews 11:11, I see that Sarah “received her ability to conceive because she considered Him faithful Who had promised.”

So what has God promised me that can revive my hope? “I AM with you always.” (Matthew 28:20). “So God has given both His promise and His oath. These two things are unchangeable because it is impossible for God to lie. Therefore, we who have fled to Him for refuge can have great confidence as we hold to the hope that lies before us. This hope is a strong and trustworthy anchor for our souls. It leads us through the curtain to God’s inner sanctuary.” (Hebrews 6:18,19). “For where two or three gather as my followers, I AM there among them.” (Matthew 18:20). Psalm 16:11 promises “…in Your Presence is fullness of joy.” Nehmiah 8:10b exhorts me “Do not be grieved, for the joy of the LORD is your strength.”

As we gathered in the garden to pray, God was faithful to His promises and was present there with us. In His Presence, as His Word promises, we found fullness of joy! His Spirit showed us that, in our weariness, our “shields of faith” were dangling by our sides; but, rediscovering that the Joy of the LORD is our strength, we felt strengthened to lift up our shields once again.