Ephesians 1:18 I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people.

This is in the middle of another of Paul’s impossibly long sentences, but it contains some important truth. The scholars who first assigned chapter and verse numbers to Scripture had an incredible task! That aside, what jumps out at me is that we are called to hope. The world can at times be a hopeless place, but God calls us to hope! I’m reminded of a video I saw just yesterday of a Holocaust survivor who is always smiling. He lost his whole family, and endured some pretty horrible things himself, in the Nazi death camps, but God has given him a gift of hope, so even today, in his 90s, with two daughters and many grandchildren and great-grandchildren, he rejoices in God’s grace toward him. In the video he was speaking English, though he is Polish and lives in Israel, and he described himself as a “glass-half-full kind of guy.” That’s a huge blessing, but definitely an exception. What Paul is talking about here applies to every believer, if they are willing to accept it. What God has prepared for His children is glorious beyond words to express it, and the more firmly we lay hold of that by faith, the more unshakable our hope will be. This isn’t in the category of “I hope it rains soon,” (which is something many around here are feeling right now) but a hope that will carry us through anything, even Nazi death camps! The devil doesn’t want us to be aware of this, because he delights in human misery, so holding firm to our hope in Christ is a vital part of resisting him. (James 4:7)

I have always been a pretty optimistic sort of person, because I have been aware of the love with which God has surrounded me. Part of my ministry is imparting hope to the people around me. The lady who will probably be my successor as pastor here was at one point under such clinical depression that she was unable to leave her house for over two years. Now, she is as bright and cheerful a believer as you could hope to meet, even though her circumstances continue to include things that are humanly upsetting. Yesterday she was sharing that her son’s three children are all seriously sick, but she’s still filled with hope! For myself, my wife has a laundry list of medical issues, and I’m not immune to the effects of time, but I know that God’s plans for me are marvelous, and I look forward to their unfolding. Yesterday I became very upset over a particular song translation, because that touches on my sense of identity and legacy, but then I had a time of marriage counseling with a young couple who live close to here, who will be having their wedding in two weeks, and the awareness of the Lord flowing His truth through me to them erased all the tension I had felt over the song translation. I am not immune to attacks, so I too must lay hold of the hope I have in Christ, and rejoice!

Father, thank You for that experience yesterday, both sides of it. May I indeed rest, relax, and rejoice in You, just as You have told me to do, so that Your love and grace may flow unhindered through me, for Your glory. Thank You. Praise God!