How to Have Hope in Hard Times

I have to admit: hope hasn’t always come easily for me.

I have several hope-defeating tendencies. For starters, I’m naturally one of those glass-half-empty people. It’s easier for me to see the downside than the upside most days.

For most of my childhood and adolescence, I also struggled with passivity and fear. This didn’t help during decades of toxic relationships. Hope was hard to come by when I was in emotional survival mode.

Even though I’ve been a Christian for as long as I can remember, the concept of holding onto hope is rather new to me. Through adversity in my marriage, God taught me that holding on to hope was not only possible, it was essential.

When my husband and I endured a separation two years ago, my worst fears came to life. He and I both came from divorced homes and we both had huge holes in our hearts that had never healed. Our problems spun out of control after fifteen years of marriage. On the night he left, I had nothing else to hold onto except my faith and the faintest glimmer of hope.

Hope is future-oriented. It’s faith-based. It’s the belief that God will fulfill his promises, and better days are ahead.

Since our marriage had hit rock bottom, I had nowhere to look but upward. When I looked up to God, I felt hope wash over me. It felt freeing and powerful. That supernatural hope inspired me to look for better days ahead.

Hope unshackled me from my long-held fears of abandonment. I realized that no matter what happened in our marriage, God would be with me. He would protect me, provide for me, and never leave me alone. I leaned into hope during our separation, and it powered me through the pain.

My husband and I reconciled in May 2015. Since that time, God has shown me how to hold onto hope no matter what I’m facing.

God taught me how to put on a new mindset. I have trained my naturally melancholy mind to choose a hopeful path. I meditate on scriptures and put Philippians 4:7 NLT into practice: “Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise.”

I also dream with God in prayer. When I was imprisoned by the fear of abandonment, I was afraid to look into the future because I feared all my loved ones would leave me. God gently helped me work through my fears, and he taught me how to envision a future based on hope. I began dreaming a future with my husband, children, grandchildren, and many friends, days full of life and love and hope.

Hope is my new normal. Sometimes I still face fears about what the future holds. But I no longer feel trapped in hopeless thinking. God has granted me hope in hard times, and it now lifts me up and powers me through days to come.

Also, join me for a hopeful video here:

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This post originally appeared as a guest post HERE. 

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