Hope and an Open Heart

This might seem obscure, but the passage I'm referencing for today's devotional is found in the Old Testament, in the book of 2 Kings. At that time, there was a prophet, or a holy man, named Elisha. Amongst the people of his day, he was well-known for working miracles...or perhaps even better said, as a man through whom God worked miracles.

There was, in this particular story, a woman who was barren (unable to have children). Her deepest desire and hope was to have a child, and specifically, a son. As a backdrop to the passage I'm reading today, her path had crossed with that of the great prophet Elisha, and he prophesied that she would indeed, have a son...and she did.

Time passes, and we come to the passage in 2 Kings 4:

"The servant took him (the son) in his arms and carried him to his mother. He lay on her lap until noon and then died..."

When grief comes after what seemed to be the most extraordinary of miracles...when your wildest dreams seem to have come true, and then are dashed on the rocks...it is the bitterest kind of pain. I can easily imagine that this woman may have wished she'd never had a son at all...at least then she wouldn't have had to experience the searing pain that came with his death.

Yesterday I wrote about courage, and as I write today about hope and an open heart, I realize that it takes courage to remain hopeful...

Hope opens your heart to expectation...it is rooted in trust, and in vulnerability. In a world that can be rough and harsh, where trust and vulnerability are risky and the chances of disappointment and pain are high, keeping a hopeful and tender heart requires a deep and soulful kind of courage.

This is the miracle then...that we can continue to live in hope and openness. As Eugene Peterson says in his devotional book Solo, we are called to live with the deep assurance of God's desire for us to possess hope, and joy, and peace.

In the overarching story of God's love for us, we can be sure that our hope is secured by his goodness...and that even when our hopes are temporarily dashed, his tender mercies will keep us whole until the very end.