Sometimes I re-read my journals, the ones I have been writing in for years.

I wonder sometimes why I feel compelled to write, to record daily incidents and the big events in my life.  I think it must be that I want to remember.  I’m not sure what will happen to all those journals when I leave this world.  Who will read them when I’m gone, ride all my emotional roller-coasters, shake their heads and say, “who was this woman?”

Because I am very real on those pages.  I am more honest there than I am in living out my life in front of people.  My inner thoughts are there, those words that never come out of my mouth (we can all be thankful for that!).  I express joy and gladness and thankfulness.  But I also give voice to my hurts, my sorrows, my struggles, my questions.  Sometimes I am in a dark place with my words.

As I read those old journals, I see the deep valleys, the times I wondered what in the world was going to become of me.  Hope was dim.  As I read on, I see how God was with me even then, how He brought me through the darkness.  And I am encouraged to hope again.

Hope.  I’ve pondered the word lately, considered its implications to me.  How do I hope and dream for something while protecting my heart from the pain of disappointment when I don’t get what I hoped for?  I’ve recorded those kinds of experience in my journals.

I am learning a lesson.  I am learning to Hope In.  Instead of hoping for something, hoping for someone to do what I want, hoping to get what I long for, I Hope In the only One who knows what I need, what is best for me, what will help me grow to be more like Jesus.

So I Hope In God.  He has my best interest in mind.  I won’t always get what I want.  It will be painful at times.  I will walk in the darkness for seasons. But there is light at the end of my Tunnel of Hope.

For He is there.  At the end of it all, God is in my hope and I will hope in Him.

I will write my heart and my soul in the private words of my journals.  I will look back and remember Who is in charge of all of my words and all of my life.  I will see how He worked all things for my good.  And I will continue to Hope. In. Him.

For what He desires for me is right.  I pray for His desires to be my desires.

Delight yourself also in the Lord, and He will give you the desires and secret petitions of your heart.  — Psalm 37:4

Commit your way to the Lord, roll each care of your load on Him; trust, lean on, rely on, and be confident also in Him and He will bring it to pass.  — Psalm 37:5

For Hope is an open door into the ways of a good God who does all things well.  I cannot know what is best for me.  But He does.  When my hope lines up with what He desires for me, I will not be disappointed.

So I will seek His desires.  I will pray to crave what He wants to give.  I will look for His open door.  I will live in Hope.