“God's definition of what matters is pretty straightforward. He measures our lives by how we love.”
― Francis Chan, Crazy Love: Overwhelmed by a Relentless God“You've gotta dance like there's nobody watching,
Love like you'll never be hurt,
Sing like there's nobody listening, And live like it's heaven on earth.”
― William W. Purkey
PSALM 105-106
JOURNAL
It is so tempting to place my hope in worldly success and security. Somewhere deep inside me is still this belief that if I live my life the way God asks, then maybe I can protect myself and the people I love from heartache. Maybe obedience will somehow guarantee safe passage into a blessed, tranquil life. But the reality is that this simply isn't true. There are good things that have happened in my life that seem almost impossible to explain apart from divine intervention. Yet I can also look around, and look back at my own life, and see moments when that intervention seemed glaringly absent. Why? What is the formula? What do I need to do to ensure the safe delivery of everyone I love into the future I desperately want for them? Maybe that question itself reveals what I am still trying to surrender.
I can only live the life I am given. I can only embrace the moments I am blessed to receive. That's it. Nothing more. And that scares me because my mind immediately races toward tomorrow. I want to protect it, arrange it, control it and somehow guarantee its outcome. I want hope to mean that everything I desire eventually works out. But maybe biblical hope is something far deeper. I think about all those heroes of the faith and wonder if part of what allowed them to trust so completely was that eventually the day in front of them became more important than the hope of tomorrow. Not because tomorrow didn't matter or because they stopped hoping, but because they realized that even their hope had to be surrendered to God.
Moses could not control what Pharaoh would do tomorrow. He could only stand before him today. Elijah could not know what waited beyond the wilderness. He could only listen for God's voice where he was. Joseph could not escape the prison by imagining hard enough about the dream God had given him. He had to faithfully live the day inside the prison. Stephen could not control the stones or the angry crowd. He could only see Christ and remain faithful in that moment. Paul knew suffering waited for him and still kept walking forward. The disciples followed Christ without knowing where the road would ultimately take them. And Jesus Himself knew the Cross was coming, yet He continually loved the person standing in front of Him. Maybe that is faith. The hope of tomorrow matters tremendously, but tomorrow belongs to God. Hope becomes distorted when I turn it into an outcome I believe God owes me. True hope allows me to release tomorrow precisely because I believe God will already be there. I don't have to possess the future to trust Him with it.
And suddenly Francis Chan's words seem even more profound: “God's definition of what matters is pretty straightforward. He measures our lives by how we love.” Love happens today. Romans 15 doesn't tell me to secure tomorrow. It tells me to bear with the weak, build others up, accept one another, serve, endure and encourage. Psalm 106 says, “Blessed are those who act justly, who always do what is right.” These are things I can actually do today. Perhaps that is why Scripture gives such enormous importance to faithfulness in the present while continually telling me not to fear the future.
So why hope? Why trust a God who cannot be depended upon to fulfill every earthly hope and dream exactly as I imagine it? Because there is something greater than the outcome. It is the hope that drove Paul and the disciples forward despite the warnings. It is the voice that comforted Elijah. It is the courage that moved Moses to stand before Pharaoh. It is the peace that filled Stephen before he was stoned. It is the dream that sustained Joseph through prison. Ultimately, it is the love that guided Christ toward the looming Cross. And it is that love that wraps everything, even suffering and disappointment, inside the goodness of God. Maybe Psalm 23 has been telling me this all along. It doesn't promise there will be no valley. It says He walks through it with me. It doesn't promise there will be no enemies. It says He prepares a table in their presence. It doesn't promise that I will understand tomorrow. It says goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life.
Oh wow...I am a mess. I am fearful and sometimes completely delusional about how much control I actually possess. Yet God, You are still there. That truth is perhaps the only thing powerful enough to pry my hands from the illusion of control. I can surrender tomorrow because You have given me today. I can hope for tomorrow without needing to possess it. I can dream about it without demanding it. I can pray for it without trying to control it. And then I can return to this moment and ask the only question that really matters: How do I love well today? Maybe that is how the heroes of faith lived. Tomorrow remained filled with hope, but today became filled with God. And perhaps that is what it means to truly say, “The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing.”
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