HOPE as a hedge... part 1

In Romans it says,

"Suffering produces endurance,
endurance produces character, and
character produces hope..."

Joan Chittister, internationally renowned speaker and Benedictine sister of Erie, grapples with the idea of hope in her book, Scarred by Struggle:Transformed by Hope. She addresses the idea that hope lies in the mind of God for us and in the will of God for our development.

Who hasn't struggled with God in a refusal to surrender? How many of us have challenged the strength of His mighty hand at tug-of-war ~ time and time again? I have screamed, 'God, if I let go, I can't see the end. I AM AFRAID..." But Chittister laments, "...you can't write about hope without writing about struggle..."

She goes on to say that struggle is the seed bed of hope. We allow ourselves to think that hope is a hedge AGAINST struggle and pain. That's not true. Hope is what comes out of our ongoing creativity at the time of our deepest struggle.

It's as if God is saying...

"Now you have reason to hope because you're more full of the sense of life at the end of the struggle. You're more full of the presence of God in yourself at the end of struggle than you can ever possibly be before it."

Someone once said,
'If it doesn't kill me, it will make me stronger.'

Which one of us doesn't have a heart breaking event that almost took us down for the count? Are you standing on the seventh count? Have you limped away?
~ that is hope.