Assured.

June rushed by in a blur of busyness leaving absolutely no free time to write; but that didn’t cancel out the soul growth spurts. Along with the ever lingering lesson of pursuing peace, June taught me about one specific thing.

Hope.

Holding to hope. – Being assured of hope. - Refusing to let go of hope.

Hope seems like a simple word, one you find on rustic wooden signs in every craft store. It’s something we carelessly voice in front of meaningless anticipations while other times its kept so deep and quiet in our hearts because it surrounds something too precious to share.

Hope can emerge when it is least expected but when it is most craved, it can fall flat in disappointment.  

This past month I found hope in an unforeseen place. A week later I lost my hope that was set in an expected place.

Let me bring you on this journey with me.  

In one of my previous posts, I briefly explained where I’m currently at in my immigration situation. At this point I am legally allowed to stay, work and drive without an issue while we wait for the final step, (that being an interview to get my green card), but the one thing that we were cautioned not to do was cross the border back into Canada yet. I have had a travel permit for a while now but our lawyer explained that it functions more as a parole card than a permission card.

Simply meaning if the guards at the border are having a rough day, they could fully deny me entrance back into the States for who knows how long.

Since December we’ve been planning to return to Canada for a summer vacay in mid-June. So when we received that set back information, our plans of going to home changed from definite to prayerfully waiting on a more guaranteed option. Considering that I hadn’t been back to Canada, or seen any of my extended family for almost two years and our plans to go in June were aligned perfectly with my cousin’s high school graduation, I had a lot of excitement packed into this plan that was suddenly pending.

For those in between winter/spring months I tossed back and forth on whether I wanted to risk it or not, all while anxiously checking the mail every day for a simple letter with an interview appointment that would seal us in safely. May was almost passed and we had yet to receive said letter so I closed my mind and dropped my high held hopes of getting to go home.

In one last suggestion and attempt to make this wish happen, we contacted the border itself to fully explain our situation and current status, and why we would be coming back. They told us as long as I had no criminal charges there wouldn’t be any problems. So it appeared that we had a green light to carry on with the trip!

While hearing straight from the border’s mouth that travelling should be fine calmed my nerves some, I still had warring masses of worry surrounding the idea.

See, before moving to America initially for college, I lived 20 minutes from the Maine border and my family would cross over almost once a week for cheaper groceries and gas. Practically our whole town did it and there was never a problem. State your name, where you’re from, where you’re going and you could go on your merry way. But post college and post internship deportation and all the immigration mess that came with it, crossing the border for me went from being easy peasy to two hour long interrogations, being held in a room with two-way mirrors and repetitive details upon details. Each crossing brought more fear, intimidation and criminalized feelings.

So forgive me if I wasn’t too gung-ho for another adventure to the place that held the power to separate me and my husband.

But as the date to depart got closer my excitement overwhelmed my fear. We packed overflowing suitcases and a puppy in our backseat and drove 13 hours to my parent’s house.

Crossing into Canada wasn’t any trouble since I’m still a citizen so once we were finally over we could breath and enjoy the coming 10 days.

The best part of the whole plan was that my cousin had no clue we were coming until she found us hiding in her closet. The surprise went down flawlessly and finished with her barely breathing and holding back tears as she dropped to the floor in shock! The days to follow were jammed with family and best friends, way too much food, and exploring waterfalls and rivers.

Then day 10 arrived and I woke up with dread. I dragged around to get ready. We prayed before we left and I kept praying the whole 30 minute drive there. I had been praying for weeks in advance and right until the second we pulled up to the guard window. But looking back now I can see that my prayers were laced with practicality, settling to ask for minimally a not horrible outcome, because that seemed like a request God might just have time to answer.

My hopes were so low that I was perfectly willing to be interrogated for hours as long as I got back home by the close of the day. My only prayer was that one way or another, we would get through. My husband held more hope than me but was fully expecting it to be difficult and irritating.

I rushed a last minute “please”, we pull up to the window and offered our passport and travel documents. A grandfatherly guard with white hair greeted us, glanced over our papers, commented on our ID pictures, smiled at our dog and then said “Welcome back guys! Have a good drive.”

We drove forward in complete shock. With massive eyes and an open mouth, I just kept looking back and forth from the open road back to the building that had been my epitome of panic and realized that God completely one up-ed everything I’d asked for. He created a situation that I hadn’t even believed to hope or pray for.

Part 1: My hope meter was hugely infused that day.

However adulting sneaks up on you after care free time spent away. Jumping back into real life brought the resurfacing of certain fears, confusion and hope stealing moments along with adding in new challenges and eventful days.  

One week after God poured this fresh batch of trust in my heart, I selfishly traded it in for misery. I was in bed, lights out, trying to fall asleep and I caved to some comments made throughout the day, ones I attempted to ignore, but in that second I accepted the looming “hopelessness” of that certain situation.

I could have fought the feelings, I could have reminded myself of the track record of the God I serve, but I didn’t.

In Ephesians 4:27 it says “..and give no opportunity to the devil.” This verse is something I have to remind myself of often because I am so prone to negative thinking and a pessimistic outlook. I coat my negativity with the excuse of practicality, to be prepared for the worse but never once has it ever made a situation better.

So this particular night I went against every effort I learned to make and I forsook all peace I had practiced to hold. My door cracked open to believe Satan’s lie of hopelessness. I panicked, I felt heavy and dark, pointless and doomed. I imagined the worst of the worst and left no room for anything else. Somehow I managed to fall asleep in the midst of that weight and woke up an hour later physically unable to move, feeling like my rib cage was closing in on my lungs because I had fallen asleep so tense. After another hour of breathing and my husband praying me through, the panic and pain lifted.

Part 2: I lost hope and felt the unrelenting weight of darkness.

The next morning I forced my bible open and God came through loudly. Every verse I turned to was addressing hope. Even my randomized devotional app spoke about it. God assured my heart that morning that our hope stays constant in the face of celebration and in the face of open ended questions. Hope doesn’t stop even when we stop feeling it.

Hope doesn’t leave even when we walk away from it.

God pours hope into every crevice of a tired heart and all we need to do is seal it there by holding to its truth. Our hopefully, repetitive prayers are heard whether we see them answered or are still waiting.

Hope’s definition is 'a joyful and confident expectation’. I don’t think there’s a better phrase to sum up the Christian walk. Every aspect of faith relies on having a joyful and confident expectation in eternity, in what God can do in us, and what he can do in our broken world.

Hope is the peace filled outcome of assurance in God’s goodness.

I know this post was more of a personal narrative/situation specific but the message can be applied to anything. It’s not a revelation bomb thought, it’s as basic of encouragement as it comes, but have hope. Be assured of it, strain for it, believe it, and be joyful in it.

Are you walking through anything right now that requires you to fight for hope? Where is your heart on the scale of hopeful to hopeless? I’ve traveled every inch of that spectrum these past weeks and I’ve found that even if my expectations get dashed for a moment, the highest end of hopeful is where I can rest the best. Whether I have to wait days or decades, I have to stay assured of God’s goodness and the perfection of His plans.

God writes infinitely better stories than any of us ever could.

There are so many verses that tackle this topic; just look at the Psalms and how David went back and forth from hands held high songs of praise to crumpled moaning, wondering if God would abandon him forever. But after every agonizing, heavy heart cry, he always came back to hope.

“Why my soul are you so downcast? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him again.” Psalm 43:5

One of my favorite examples of this clinging hope is in Romans 4:18 where it says that “Abraham in hope, believed against hope.” Meaning that before there was an attainable, visual or practical reason to hope, Abraham still believed in the hopeful and proven character of God when confronted with what appeared hopeless.

Today, let's take bold hope in God. Hope against hope and celebrate even the smallest progress. Take rest in the truth that we can continually hope and we will praise God yet more and more. (Psalm 71:14)

“May the God of all hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.” Romans 15:13

“Be joyful in hope, be patient in affliction, be faithful in prayer.”Romans 12:12