When Hope is Scarce

There are days when my spirit soars, free from worry, like a bird on an updraft column of air, reaching a pinnacle of height and effortlessly soaring over all of creation. Then, like the bird, I have to come back down to earth.

Gravity is a force to be reckoned with, but so is despair.

Why is it that I can be so full of the Spirit and feel complete peace within my life one day, and wake the next day to a feeling of hopelessness hanging on my spirit like a heavy blanket weighing me down?

Where do we find hope when hope seems lost? How can we restore our peace when hope is scarce?

Certainly we can’t live on the highest peaks of euphoria all the time, but neither do we want to wallow in the valley of despair.

How do you restore balance in your life?

I know there is joy that restores my spirit when I sing praises to my Lord. My thoughts shift to God and pull me out of my troubles, and I am reminded of His great Love. Yet I don’t always remember that just to lift my voice and sing will be restorative to my spirit. And sometimes I don’t feel like singing through my sadness. But when I sing, I am instantly transformed back to a child of God, loved by my Heavenly Father, and free from worries and cares.

There is a certainty that a walk in nature will make me smile, as I feel oneness with all living things of the natural world. Perhaps it is because the focus moves out of myself and into the world that I am restored. I walk along, one foot in front of the next, and the pattern becomes a soothing rhythm. 

The glorious wonders of nature surround me, and I feel connected to heaven and earth. Soon I realize I am smiling, and there is a song in my heart once again.

For me, these methods help to restore my inner peace. If I can’t get outside, and I am feeling more introspective, I might turn to meditation for its restorative properties. Instrumental music playing softly helps to tune out the rest of the world, and a mantra of “I am well” or “I am healed” calms my spirit and allows a change of inner perspective.

Prayer and meditation are excellent methods of connecting with our inner selves and with God. Through prayer, we can share our troubles with God, and release them. Through meditation, our hope and wellness can be restored. 

As a young woman of twenty years of age, I saw mountains for the first time. It was through this natural beauty that God first whispered to my heart, and I began to believe in a higher power that ordered this natural world.

I’ve always been drawn to the words of the psalmist who wrote, “I lift my eyes to the mountains – where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth.” Psalm 121:1-2 (NIV)

There is power in knowing God is in the strength of the mountains, and peace in feeling His presence in the order of the natural world. Restoring our spirit and finding hope when it seems scarce is as easy as turning our thoughts to God and laying our burdens at His feet.

Releasing our pain and our worries to the One who knows all, sees all, and is Infinite, lifts our burdens revealing our pure inner self which only seeks peace and knows hope is the pathway to finding that peace.

Freedom from Fear

We come into this life completely fearless. As young children, we will try anything - thus the need for good parenting, with voices of reason and experience.

When did we learn to be afraid?

God did not create us to be fearful. We are meant to shine for Him. Fear grows in the darkness, not in the light. We cannot let fear germinate in us. That tiny seed of doubt hidden in our deepest thoughts is like the seed we plant in the dark soil. But unlike the plants of the earth, fear stays underground.

Buried deeply in our psyche, nourished by repeated review and self-affirmation, our fear grows into an ugly mass of self-doubt and anxiety. It stifles our creativity, preventing us from sharing the beauty within each of us.

We all have gifts that are meant to be shared. Poetry, music, writing, painting, gardening and singing are only a few examples of expression of the beauty within. Hospitality, care-giving, parenting and teaching allow us to share our heart through the work we do. Our everyday interactions with people as we go about our work and our lives can be a reflection of the person we are inside. We can share joy.

What is keeping you from sharing the best part of who you are? We may harbor a seed of fear, but there is also a greater desire to express ourselves. You may have been criticized at some point in your life, which has stopped your creative expression. It happens all too often.

Not everyone is going to like everything we do all of the time. And that’s just fine. Our goal in sharing our art or our inner beauty is not to please someone, but to find our self-expression that will lead to more creativity.  The gift of who we are is a beautiful reminder of God’s love inside each of us.

Only by becoming who we are meant to be will we fully understand our place in this world. And through expressing the beauty and holiness inside each of us, through the Spirit that frees us, we honor our Maker and grow in our likeness to be more like Him.

God is pure Love, revealed through His creation. And that includes us. By allowing our inner beauty to flow into the world, we are participating in the expression of God’s love, and this makes life wholly worth living.

Resisting Temptation

Temptation. We deal with it every day. What is your temptation? Is it the sweet or fattening food that you are trying to avoid to fulfill a resolution for the new year? Do you struggle with an addiction? You certainly are not alone.

We are all drawn to the feel-good attractions in life. Our spirits crave joy, and we think we can find that joy in the momentary pleasures from a myriad of choices. But when we look to consumption for our satisfaction, we realize it is only a matter of time until we need another “fix” to make us feel good again.

It becomes a cycle. A cycle of addiction to something that will never satisfy the craving within us. It just keeps coming back, taking more and more of our time and our life. It’s time to break the cycle.

Ah, but this is so much more easily said than done. We want a good, healthy lifestyle but we struggle with all that we are “supposed” to do to keep ourselves well. It is so hard to stay on track to meet our goals for self-improvement.

Do you realize some people are actually addicted to exercise? Can this be a bad thing too? I think anything in excess is more than we were meant to do. Too much work, too much food, or turning to drugs and alcohol to quiet our minds only numbs us to what we really crave.

Deep inside we all crave peace. And joy. Belonging. Relationship. It is easier to reach for temporary satisfaction outside of ourselves than to realize that our desires run deeper than momentary satisfaction. Sometimes we hide ourselves in work or busyness to avoid dealing with internal issues we want to avoid. But we were meant for so much more.

I believe that the One who created us set inside of us a deep longing which causes us to become searchers, seeking something that will fulfill that desire within us. Some people search outside of themselves, and some search within for fulfillment.

I think the longing that we feel is a desire to connect with our Maker. I believe we are preprogrammed to want relationship with our Creator. Our belief in a Higher Power predisposes us to crave relationship with Him. It is through knowing our Maker intimately that we begin to feel our place in this world.

It may be hard for you to believe that a relationship with God can cure your addictions to the things of this life, but I know this to be true. Here are words of a song that has yet to be finished:

“You’ve got to give it all to God.

You’ve got to have the love and faith to see it through.

You’ve got to give it all you’ve got -

Enough to let it go.”                            

                                                                ~Colleen Reske

Don't expect your addiction to be cured in a flash of lightning. It takes time to build a relationship and time to understand what drew you to your need in the first place. Giving it all to God opens you up to the healing powers of the universe. All that is available to you for recovery is out there. You need to seek wellness with the same desire as you sought solace through substances. You need to earnestly seek God for help in getting well. 

It is very freeing to “give it all away”, to give it all to God. When you do, you start to develop trust, believing that there is a better way which God will show you. You have to be receptive to hearing suggestions from those people that God will put in your path, and you have to want to get well. 

There is hope for health, and freedom from whatever binds you. You have to take the first step by admitting your weakness, and cry out to God for help. Our God is all-powerful, and He can use that power on your behalf. All it takes is belief, and a desire to know the One who knows all.

The hope in finding help begins with prayer.  We can't do this all on our own, but there is hope and there is help if you want to find it. Blessings on your journey.

Third Day performing "Cry Out to Jesus", especially for my Christian viewers though this powerful message is for all. Email subscribers click here to view the video on my blog.