Hopelessly Hopeful

Welcome. My name is Susanne Elenbaas, and I am delighted to find you here at my door. I so enjoy company, especially unexpected. And, just in case you might drop by, I’ve done my best to have everything ready for you. If we are not already friends, I hope we soon will be. Hope, that is the very thing I would like to share with you. So please, come in, or make yourself comfortable out here on the porch. Feel free to look around while I see about coffee, or do you prefer tea?

You might find something which interests you under Monday Muse, Secret Place Insights, Going Deeper, Making God a Priority, About or Recipes Honed for 50 Plus Years. And if you enjoy random reading, you might like to settle into Published Writings where you will find essays, or stories, written to make a specific point or simply for heartwarming reading. What do these pages have in common? Hope. Hope for a purpose-driven life, lived as though it is never too late, but be forewarned. Such hope can lead, as it did for me, to the following state.

I quit! I mean I wish I could quit. Just one day I’d like to get up and simply quit trying, and merely accept everything as it is. I’m tired of getting up every morning to face another day of hope. I’m really tired of it. I can’t kick it off, shake it off, blow it off, or throw it off. There seems to be no way that I can get rid of it. Usually I’m alright with it, even thankful for hope. But sometimes, like today, it makes me want to scream. I want to drop it at the door and walk away. Other people do. How do they do it? I can’t. I can’t. Hope won’t let me. I try. I do. But it overcomes me every time. Am I weak, or am I strong?

I can always find something positive from ‘on the other hand.’ On the other hand … bologna! Let me cry with despair. Let me drop my unfinished projects and give up on my unfinished personal growth. Let me walk away a quitter. A quitter, wow! Let me say, “I am a failure,” take a deep breath, and tune out. Let me sit down with a big bag of chips and dip, and stare at the tube until the electricity is shut off while I’m still murmuring, “I quit, I quit, I quit.” I still want to say it again, “I quit.” Once more, “I QUIT!”

But even in despair… I care. Why must I find hope in the midst of despair? When I reach what might be the end of my rope, I unravel it and make it long enough to reach whatever is needed. I’ve never yet reached the end, the dead end. There’s always enough hope to make all things work for good.

Does every dark cloud have to have a silver lining? Leave it at every silver lining has a cloud. And I’ll just float away on that cloud into oblivion. Oh it’s no use. I’d make a parachute out of the lining, fall gently to earth, and learn something positive from the experience. There is just no escaping hopefulness. And hope breeds determination, and determination is exhausting. I’m tired. I’m tired. But hope picks me up, brushes me off, secures my stance, and equips me to face yet another obstacle.

And I wonder, does it even matter – the things I do? Maybe not, but still I can’t quit. So I remain hopelessly hopeful, but on the other hand…? Maybe that’s it. Maybe therein lies my hope of hopelessness, my hope of failure, my ability to quit. There seems to be no release from hopefulness for someone who loves the Lord, and has taken Jesus Christ as Savior. But perhaps I can find failure in the hopelessness of being hopeless? Is this where I can finally give up? It’s not exactly what I had in mind, but I will give it a try.

Okay, I’ll… I’ll give up on being hopeless. There! I quit! I have failed. I have truly failed. I think I feel a small measure of relief. I think I’m breathing easier. Yes, yes, I am. I have totally failed at being hopeless. And now I will simply quit trying; no more fighting it. I’m throwing in the towel, leaving the ring – heading for the shower. I give up. I quit.

Oh… oh… I knew it, I knew it. I just knew it. Hope won’t even give me time to wallow in my success of failure. For I’m sensing an undeniable burden for the hopeless, for those who struggle through life without a relationship with God. And I am again being reminded that God wants everyone to hear His offer of hope. I’m sure to be given the opportunity to help someone meet God and experience hope for him or herself. We’ll probably meet regularly to explore the source of hope. Together, we will surely tell others, and more and more people will become hopeful. And someday, down the road, they too will find themselves with an acute case of low energy, exhaustively murmuring, “Is there no escape from hopefulness?”