I started a blog when I first got married, where I would write about anything and everything.
I wasn't very faithful to it, and most of my posts were not that good, but there were a few that I really liked, so I decided to share them here!
"Noëlle, you are hopeless."
Those are the words that a priest said to me once. I wasn't too shocked. He was a funny priest, and I thought he was making a joke about how I'm always going to sin, but can't forget to turn to God, or something along those lines. His next words surprised me.
"I don't mean 'hopeless' in the typical sense. I mean that you have no hope."
Wow! How was I supposed to take that? I've always been the-sun-will-come-out-tomorrow kind of gal. I was the one who usually stayed positive through tough times. I am almost always cheerful and happy. How can I not have any hope? It didn't make any sense.
What did he mean that I have no hope?
I will be honest with you. His comment has stayed with me for months. Almost a year. I've been meditating on his words, trying to figure out what he meant. While I was in confession, when he said this to me, he continued on to talk about hope, but his words shocked me so much that I didn't hear what else he said.
I had shared my struggles with this priest. I told him about my less than ideal relationship with a family member of mine, as well as some of the struggles that my husband and I were going through. I told him that I prayed every day about these difficulties in my life but also that it could be hard at times to believe that God will work things out.
And that is how he realized I didn't have hope.
His words have forced me to reflect on my life, and on what hope actually is. Hope is not the same thing as optimism. It is not the same thing as joy or happiness.
Hope is trust.
I am going through a large struggle right now, one that is hard to talk about and hard to accept. I have tried many times to solve my problems, I have prayed to patron saints, I have said novenas, and I have asked for God's guidance time after time. But when you try for a long time with no sign of improvement or direction, it can be so easy to lose hope. It can be easy to believe that maybe God isn't listening to you. Maybe you are on your own.
But that's not true. God never leaves us alone.
Whenever I reflect on what the priest said, I am sometimes reminded of the times when God has answered my small prayers. Times when I was able to trust in God in the little things, like having all green lights when I'm running late for work. If I can trust God in the little things, and if I know that God is listening to me in the little things, why is it so much harder when the big things come along?
God loved Abraham. God wanted what was best for Abraham, and He knew that Abraham and Sarah wanted children. So God granted Abraham and Sarah with a son, but God tested Abraham. When Abraham was asked to sacrifice Isaac, he was willing to give up his greatest desire for God.
Is God testing me in this struggle of my life? Is God testing me to see if I can love Him more than I love my desires?
Hope is trust.
I have a hard time letting go. I like to hold onto my pain, my sorrows, my anguish.
Sometimes I wallow in self-pity, instead of looking for solutions. People are often saying that we need to let go of our struggles and lay them at the Cross. Only then can we find peace and joy. And I agree, but I have always had a hard time acting on those words. I wish that I could physically lay down my struggles in front of Jesus. Wouldn't that be so much easier? Probably, but it wouldn't be as meaningful that way.
This last year, I was blessed to meet an incredible woman who has a deep love for, and trust in, God. We were having a discussion one day when I vaguely mentioned my struggle, and her response was, "Not yet." That was all. She said that as soon as she heard my story, those words immediately came to her heart. She believed that God was speaking through her to me. Not yet. And while this isn't a straightforward answer to my prayers (I don't have a timeline, or a specific path to take to help me overcome these difficulties), those words gave me a sense of peace.
Hope is trust.
We all have things that we are going through. We all have prayers that we want answered. We all wish that God could come down and tell us what His plan is and what exactly He wants us to do. But that isn't how it works. How would we be able to hope if everything was laid out for us? Part of our journey as Christians is to hope and trust in God even when we don't see Him working in our lives. It is in those moments of despair and heartache that we should be drawing closer to Jesus. But more often than not, it's the other way around. When we don't see results, or don't get the answers we are looking for, we turn away for our faith and from God.
Hope is trust.
My struggle is still not over. My prayers have not been answered, and my heart aches so much at times that I don't know how to keep going. But now, after almost a year of meditating and praying about the priest's words to me, I know that no matter what happens, God's will will be done! God's vision for me is more beautiful than I can being to imagine. I may never have my prayers answered, but that doesn't mean that God has left me. He is always with me.
It reminds me of the "Footprints" poem (it's a bit overused now, but it was my favourite poem when I was in grade 4, and still is today). The man and God are walking down the shore at the end of the man's life, looking at the footsteps in the sand that the man had left throughout his life. Most of the time there are two sets of footprints, one for the man and one for God, but every once in a while, there is only one set. The man realizes that it was the most difficult times in his life when only one set of footprints appeared. He questions God about it, asking Him how He could leave him alone during those times, but God calmly looks at him and says, "It was then that I carried you."
Even now, remembering those words from the poem, I tear up. I've always found those words to be so powerful! "It was then that I carried you." God is carrying me through my difficult struggle. He is holding me close to His chest, waiting for me to relax in His arms and pass all my problems to Him. All He is asking me is to trust in Him. To love Him. To hope in Him.
I don't know what struggles you are going through in your life. Everyone has something. And like the man in the poem, God is carrying you. He is holding you close to His chest. You are His child, and He wants to comfort you. He wants you to trust in Him. To love Him.
It isn't always easy to give God our struggles. We want to hold on to everything in an attempt to control every detail. But we can't. When we realize that, it will make us so much happier.
All we have to do is place our hope in Him. I am praying for you, brothers and sisters in Christ, that you can surrender your struggles to our Heavenly Father, and please pray for me if you can!
God bless you all!
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