Tag Archives: hope

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The Hope You Need When Life Hurts

A meditation God gave us for those moments

Are you feeling hard-pressed, persecuted, defeated or in despair? If so, know that you are not alone. Many around the world are facing the same challenges you and I are facing. If your heart is weary and your strength is failing today, God’s Word holds the hope you need when life hurts.

God breathed these words [below] through the pen of Paul 2000+ years ago, to give you and I some hope when life hurts:

Do not lose heart [Insert Your Name]. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.  2 Corinthians 4:16-18 NIV.

Friend, press forward in your circumstances and keep your eyes on Jesus—all the while, remembering what He has waiting for you. These troubles are temporary and this hurt is brief in comparison to what is just ahead.2 Corinthians 4:16-18, fix our eyes, unseen, eternalWe can face suffering, shame, and hostility even if we feel weary and faint of heart because our goal is Jesus, standing at the finish line. This is the hope we need when life hurts.

We can remain steady in our focus, sure in our walk, and firm in our commitment to do His will when we keep our Savior in our sight.

Our eternal rewards far outweigh the temporary struggles we will face today. Stay surrendered to love and encourage God’s people. You can stand in full confidence knowing that the Almighty God’s plans with you will not be shortchanged.

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Studies show gratefulness might be the key

Statistics on gratitude say those who are grateful live longer, healthier lives. Studies say people who live with a thankful mindset are also more compassionate, forgiving, and feel less lonely. But living a life of gratitude is easier said than done when life isn’t going our way.

How can we be grateful when our spirit is broken and the weight of our situation crushes the life out of our praise?

When life circumstances feel unfair, unjust, and simply uncalled for, we can quickly stop trusting God and try to take control of the situation. Especially when the tears won’t stop and our situation feels like it’s getting worse.

waiting, hope, trishakeehn.com

God doesn’t want us to hold back the pain or cover it up with cliches. In those moments of despair, our loving Father wants to hear from an honest heart. Our Healer wants to handle the heartbreak.

I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. Ezekiel 36:26 NIV

God is making all things new. While the pain is real, He wants us to fix our eyes on His greater plan and promises. As we wait on God’s ways and His timing, refocusing our earthly hurts onto the heavenly hope of Jesus is for our own good.

Taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed is the one who takes refuge in him. Psalm 34:8 NIV

When our weary hearts anchor hope in the Word of God and believe He is always faithful, those worn out, wrecked thoughts transform into expectant, grateful hearts.

But thank God! He gives us victory over sin and death through our Lord Jesus Christ. 1 Corinthians 15:57 NLT

Practicing gratitude takes conscious effort. It’s easy to lapse into a negative mindset when life turns upside down. One easy way to help you see beyond your situation and reflect, recharge, and refocus on God’s Word is with one of our Bible plans focused on gratitude.

To create small reminders of God’s goodness during your day, use the YouVersion Bible Lens App to capture faces, places, and moments you’re grateful for. When you upload your photos in the app, Bible Lens will pair your picture with the perfect Bible verse. This can help transform your thoughts about the day. You can also try writing down one thing you’re grateful for either at the beginning or end of each day.

God does not push us away when we bring Him our pain. He brings us in even closer. When we refocus a burdened spirit on God’s unfailing love, we find hope that things will not remain the same. He is making all things new.

Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland. Isaiah 43:18-19 NIV

In our struggles, we can be grateful that God hasn’t left us to fight these insurmountable battles alone. Our Great Defender has defeated the valleys of life and the grave of death to give us a new life, a new spirit, and a new heart in Him!

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Do You Have Joy or Optimism

What's the difference?

Reality rarely looks like the resolutions or wish lists we write out. Between the lines, rejection will sting, stumbles can leave scars, dreams shatter and sorrow turns to tears. Sadly, we can waste years staying stuck in a moment.

Optimism tells us things will be better tomorrow. Whether that happens or not, optimism cannot control the circumstances.

Joy, on the other hand, does not come from these kinds of positive predictions. Joy doesn’t depend on what actually happens. It will show up in some very dark places because nothing can change the fact that Jesus has overcome the world. Joy is not happiness. Joy is the fruit of hope.

Sometimes we interchange ‘hope’ and ‘wish’. Even the dictionary says the two words are synonyms, but hoping and wishing is just as different as joy and optimism.

A wish is a desire, a longing, a request.  

Hope is a confident expectation of good things to come. It’s the promises of God in his Word that bring us this hope. Hope believes the solid ground of God’s grace and the gospel of Christ is enough. Hope steadies itself on trust that God is for us and his faithfulness will not fail us.

Rooted in Truth, hope and joy dwell deep in the fibers of our soul where situations and circumstances cannot reach.

A wish is yearning. Hope is knowing.

Joy and hope cannot be separate. A hopeful person cannot be depressed and a joyful person cannot lose hope. Sometimes we realize that what we once considered hope and joy were merely selfish desires for success in a job, in a relationship, or in our finances.

Hope produces sweet layers of joy that linger in a breath long after a moment. It satisfies hunger, it settles longing and fulfills the desires of our heart.

It’s in this ‘in-between’ space, in the presence of pain that hope and joy drip with sweet honey, mercy and they find the strength to hold on to what is unseen, yet known.

God’s light is more visible and real than whatever fog or shadow you might be living in.

I pray that God, the source of hope, will fill you completely with joy and peace because you trust in him. Then you will overflow with confident hope through the power of the Holy Spirit. Romans 15:13 ESV

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The Power of Honesty

friendship, trust, vulnerability, joy, laughter, trishakeehn.comThese seasons are shorter looking back from the other side. Don’t let these moments slip away.

Stretch out the sentences with your honesty; it’s a treasure that loses power the longer we wait. Even the tears unlock a vault of vulnerability that acts more like gravity between two hearts.

Unbridle the laughter when life brings you immense joy.

This place of surrender and trust is the shortest path between two people. This is how we love.

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Hope Gives Way To Strength

Sometimes crazy gets the breakthrough.

When you’ve been waiting and believing and trusting for a miracle, some days can just drain you. You might wake up thinking, ‘This is going to be the day’! The evening comes and you return with nothing more than the weight of requests unanswered and an exhausted spirit.hope, strength, trishakeehn.com

I want you to know that it’s okay to still get loud about these miracles. Your worship can turn the tide of the battle in your favor.

This kind of praise confuses the enemy because you haven’t received your miracle yet but here you are praising and shouting and lifting up the name of the only one who can turn your situation around.

The enemy wants to mute your praise because the currency of the miraculous is in your mouth. How loud would you get if your miracle was on the other side of your praises?

Get desperate about your requests when doubt creeps in. When you are so low that you feel you can’t get any lower and there’s no reason for you to believe that God is going to do anything about it…

Lift your voice. Hope will rise on the inside.

Hope when it doesn’t make sense. Hope in the midst of fear. Hope when the situation gets worse because hope gives way to strength. The Lord didn’t bring you this far to leave you. There’s a miracle with your name on it.

It’s time to get loud for your ‘all of a sudden…’ Your miracle is right behind you.

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Great Is Thy Faithfulness

When the epicenter of love, our beloved Paris, was shaken last week, the core of every heart questioned our own security. We were brushed with the brevity of life, sharing with neighbors we’ve never noticed.

Still trying to understand the reality breaking into regular scheduled Friday nights, we switched between broadcasts and social media. Those who escaped went ‘live’ on webcams sharing their story. Hearing the horror from the mouths of our Parisian friends brought us to the streets of accepting that the City of Lights is a little smaller now.

Many of us haven’t stopped tuning in since. We want to know, ‘where do we go from here.’ Last night, I needed a break from the questions. Switching over to NBC’s singing Great is Thy Faithfulness, Jordan Smith, Lamentations 3:21-23, faithfulness of Godcompetition ‘The Voice’, I carried on through the house cleaning up a days mess while cooking dinner and listening from afar.

The rice had just finished steaming as the timer told me chicken in the oven was also done. Setting dinner to the side to cool, contestant Jordan Smith started to share about his journey through singing, being different and sharing his gift on the show. He summed up his song choice, ‘Great is Thy Faithfulness’, with this statement:

“This is about the faithfulness of God. None of this would be possible in your own strength. God is going to provide because He is faithful. God says, ‘I’m going to do everything for you. All you have to do is wake up every morning and be who you are.'”

I wasn’t looking for an answer tonight, but God held His hand out and provided one anyway. There is hope because He is one faithful God.

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The End is The Beginning

Mr. Rogers, beginning, end, trishakeehn.com

You may have reached your end, but it’s really a new beginning.

Though you may not see the hope at the end of your rope, let go.

Trust.

Free fall into the unknown and find His faithfulness.

When we come to the end of ourselves, we find Him.

Everything under the sun has been leading us to this point of no return.

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Caught in the cross hairs of conflict

exodus, trishakeehn.com, sea ahead, army behind

Are you staring an obstacle in the face and wondering where you took a left turn when you should have stayed right?

The demands here and now have seized your time and you’ve abandoned your desires and dreams because the situation looks overwhelming.

Maybe in the midst of the struggle, you’re still sizing up the situation; is this high tide or low tide? Because if this is as bad as it gets, there could still be a chance to conquer the circulating currents in this conflict.

Whether this is the worst of it or not, you conclude that what lies ahead looks bleak and pretty impossible.exodus, trishakeehn.com, sea ahead, army behind

There is a sea ahead and an army behind.

The enemy is barreling down the slopes with speed and gaining ground on your hope.

You’re surrounded so you surrender not just your hands but your identity too, as the doubts close in. Defeat looks imminent.

Now you feel like you’ve failed God, you’ve failed yourself and you’re not who you thought you were.

What if the trouble you’re facing is the very wall God wants to drive you through?

Fear has an overwhelming tendency to increase in us but, praise God, so does courage.

Though the horizon looks hopeless, God has a miracle up His sleeve.

Our initial instinct is to stop everything at once. Yet, when we do that, we short sight the strong arm of God.

Give Him the opportunity to do what He says He’ll do. The Author and Creator cannot fail. This is the very nature of Almighty God.

In our trials, His power penetrates human wisdom to draw all eyes to the throne.

Stop staring at the surmounting surf and advance headlong into the swells of strife, my friend.

Do you feel adrift already, in an ominous ocean with no island in sight? Know that the waters are not beyond God’s reach.

If you’re treading in the deep end, I want to remind you the bedrock of Truth hasn’t been moved by the flood.

Take a deep breath from the bottom of your gut and exhale as you stretch your thinking. Let it lengthen your limbs a little further past their limit.

Now steady the stride of those flailing feet. There’s a Rock for you to stand on and it’s been there beneath the surface of your stress this entire time.

Trust it.

We’re all on a journey into the land God promised us.

Yours might be pursuing higher education, starting a business, selling an idea, or making a difference. Maybe it’s gaining some self-confidence, self-esteem, healing or extending forgiveness.

Stand with me here on the shoreline of your suffering as we scan over the story of Moses and the Israelites.

When Pharaoh finally let the people go, God did not lead them along the main road that runs through Philistine territory, even though that was the shortest route to the Promised Land. God said, “If the people are faced with a battle, they might change their minds and return to Egypt.” So God led them in a roundabout way through the wilderness toward the Red Sea. (Exodus 13:17-18)

I’m pretty sure whatever is in the way of your promised land, these guys felt the same futility as they stared at the Red Sea with Pharaoh’s army closing in. Their pilgrimage to the Promised Land looked hopeless being backed up against the wall of a massive inconvenience.

It’s senseless to sit here too long wondering why life has to be so hard. Hidden behind the Hollywood highlights of this story, there’s some deep truths that can help move the mountains standing in your way.

rest, press on, journey, promised land, trishakeehn.comFirst, you should rest. Army or no army, you need rest. This isn’t sleeping through the storm. It’s a peace of mind in the eye of a hurricane kind of stillness. Find a spot to camp out in serenity while you bring to God the concerns anchoring your heart.

Second, use what you have to work with. The Almighty can take what you have and turn it into whatever it needs to be in order for you to accomplish what you’ve been called to. Sharpen the skill saw. Cast out a line to your connections.

Third, press on. Oceans of emotion toss with demands every day trying to prevent us from God’s plan.

When floods of fear feel like they’re going to level your life…

As the rolling tides of resistance wrestle with you all night…

Even If there’s nothing but crickets and crashing waves staring back at you…

Press on.

While you’re waist deep in the waves of doubt or your heart is trekking up and tumbling down the rocky terrain of pain…

Press on.

Wherever the enemy packs a punch and swipes a roundhouse kick that leaves you lying flat on your face…clouds, hope, trishakeehn.com

Press on.

The clouds will come but let the helium in hope carry you higher into the heavens.

Honor God with your trust.

He is with you. He is for you. Do not be afraid.

Keep walking. Keep believing.

This storm is just a season that is about to blow over.

Your faith in His unfailing forgiveness and unconditional love is the way out, my friend.

Summon the Holy Spirit to silence the solicitations on your soul.

Sink down into your stance on the solid stone of Truth.

Wait in expectation and watch as the winds and waves obey His command.

Get ready for God’s big reveal.

Tuck that hope in your heart.

God, I release to You all that I am and everything that I have. I invite You to flood every part of my being and use me for Your glory. Thank You for using what is in my hand.

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Breaking Out From A Rut and Planting New Roots

This has been a tough few weeks. I have felt deterred by the weight of devil’s cunning devices to distract my good intentions with mediocrity. I’ve been settling on things that are ‘acceptable’ and ‘honorable’ but not beneficial or considered wise concerning His plans for me.

My determined worship that discovers facets of His being have been disturbed and I utterly miss His secrets; about Himself, His plans, His desires for my life. All this busyness has been meaningless when you consider that I’ve made Jesus a ritual of religiosity, merely breathing through the motions of morning prayer. The roots of my relationship with Jesus go deeper than my most recent attempts to usher in His presence and that is why I so tenderly confess that my heart has been slowly breaking for a breakthrough.

I didn’t just wake up here. Some weeks ago, I allowed Satan to steal my joy through a circumstance that didn’t come out as I had hoped. A rather crushing blow. I let the devil demoralize my heart by preying on one of my greatest fears. I had failed… me. Days of seeking and studying ‘joy’ did not parade in a restored life of rejoicing. With every fiber in the fabric of my being, I have been so desperate for an intervention of deep communion with God. I’ve been crying out for Christ to intercede.

Joshua 1:5 “No man will be able to stand before you all the days of your life. Just as I have been with Moses, I will be with you; I will not fail you or forsake you.”

Did you catch that? He will not fail us. We may fail, but God will not. And He is for us! Failure doesn’t always look like a grievous sin or mishap. Sometimes it’s a slow decline or decay that snatches up unsuspecting, sincere followers of Christ. God is the strong arm that picks us up when we struggle to stand on our own. Abba wipes away our tears, brushes off the bloodied scrapes on our knees and mends the wound in His warm embrace. When our Author’s plans for hope and a future seem out of reach, He reaches down to offer them up! At this time, it seems all I can do is cast myself entirely upon His ability. I’m blinded to any ambition but to please God. I’m grabbing onto the hem of His garment for healing and grace to go where He leads. As I walk in the shadow of the Almighty, He equips me to do the impossible. There I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.