HOPE: The Title of the Hardest Year of My Life

I never really understood it when, come December, people would say, "it's been a really hard year." When I heard people say that or saw people write it, I would pensively look back on my own respective year. Sure, there may have been tough moments, but they were always intermingled with moments of joy, laughter, goodness. To simply look upon an entire year as hard seemed overwhelmingly negative to me. But today, I stand before you as a 25-year-old and say, for the first time:

This has been a really hard year.

And, for the first time, I understand what that means. There have been some amazing moments: successfully completing my first year of a full-time professional job, standing beside my oldest friend as she got married, celebrating with countless other friends (sometimes from afar) for the weddings or new babies, developing precious and meaningful friendships in Athens, having transformative times in the presence of Jesus, and, oh yeah, saying YES to forever with the love of my life.

And yet, these often incredibly joyful times do not define the year 2014. For me (and likely for much of my family), 2014 has been defined by pain, mistrust, and death.

So much of my year has been spent in a place I never knew existed. A place of deep despair and confusion. A place of jarring hurt and aching pain. A place of anger and frustration.

The first part of my year, I spent exhausted and worn thin from my job. Right around the time that my job situation changed, my family started falling to pieces. Then, just when it seemed those pieces were starting to get picked up, my 80-year-old grandfather spent a week on his near-deathbed before passing away. In addition, a dear family friend went to be with Jesus after a long battle with cancer, and my future brother-in-law continues to fight his own cancer battle.

Two weeks after my grandfather's death, Tim proposed. Being engaged amidst this sea of human frailty has been eye-opening, to say the least. My dear friend and mentor described engagement as "a magnifying glass on you, your relationship, and your family." And in so many ways, I couldn't think of a worse time to have anyone inspecting my family.

So...maybe 2015 will be better. Because, hey, it's a new year!

But I hate that. I hate the idea that just because a year changes, because a number on a calendar shifts, I'm expected to have hope. In 2015, everything will be better! Make better promises, eat better food, take longer runs. It's a new year, which means it can be a new you. A new life. A new whatever you want.

These are lies.

My hope doesn't come from a calendar. It doesn't come from a 2014 turning into a 2015 at the stroke of midnight. It doesn't come from a new year's resolution that I will try my hardest to keep. Time, hours, years...they're an infinite creation's attempt to make sense of a finite world.

You and I were made in the infinite, beautiful, and perfect IMAGE OF GOD. Which means that none of this--the resolutions, the diet pills, the self-help books, the dropping ball--can possibly be good enough to give us hope. Our hope, our fulfillment, and our purpose can only come from the Creator who Created us, and the Savior who was Hope incarnate.

This has been a really hard year.

I have learned more about myself, about my family, and about my God than I ever imagined I could learn. As I become more and more aware of my own depravity, of humanity's hopelessness, I am continually and increasingly more aware of the hope of Jesus Christ.

Next year might be even harder than this one. And the next 10 years might be even harder than that. But you know what won't change? The love that my Creator has for me. The love that He has for you, for my family, for my fiancé, for my grandfather--who is now in His presence for eternity.

Only the true and real hope of the living God could bring light, peace, and joy out of this year. Only He could be gracious enough to allow me to look back on everything that was hard and see LIFE in each of those moments of death. And the same God will be the only constant in the rest of my life.

Why would I put any amount of hope in a calendar year when I can put my hope in the never-changing, unconditionally-loving God of the entire universe?

But I do. Over and over again, I seek out hope and promise in the things of this world. And I am repeatedly let down, until I find myself dragging, worn out and broken, back to the cross. And Jesus is there waiting for me every single time.

This has been the hardest year of my life. But I would do it all over again, because I have seen and experienced the glory of God more than ever before.

That's just the kind of God He is--the one who takes the worst year of my life and, through His power, grace, love, and mercy, makes it the best year of my life.

I remember my affliction and my wandering, the bitterness and the gall. I well remember them, and my soul is downcast within me. Yet this I call to mind and therefore have hope: Because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed, for His compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness. I say to myself, 'the Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for Him.' The Lord is good to those whose hope is in Him, to the one who seeks him; it is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord." (Lamentations 3:19-26)

So I will wait for Him. And I will not wait for hope to arrive with the new year, but I will instead receive the unfailing compassions of God every morning of every day. 

Thanks for reading,
Leslie