The Bridge To Love
START HERE: God is Love
END HERE: Love Never Fails
I was born in New Brunswick, Canada in the summer of 1957. The Province has a motto: Hope Restored.
If I told you my story you would probably forget it. But your story? That you will never forget.
Have I been hopeless before? Yes. Likely you have been too- even if only for a handful of fleeting moments. And if you haven’t, you almost certainly know someone who has been hopeless.
The geography of your soul is not at all like mine, nor is it like those closest to you. So, whether I told you my story of hopelessness, or you told me yours, we would have one thing in common: there is less Hope than we need and Hope needs to be restored.
If you’ve been betrayed by someone close to you-
If you’ve been abandoned, forgotten, ever felt left out, overlooked or misunderstood-
If you’ve failed at something you sought after with all your heart-
If you’ve had a dream stolen from you by the greed and lust of others-
If you’ve been dismissed, devalued or discouraged-
If you’ve been touched by overwhelming grief, physical challenges or pain resulting from your own unwise choices then, over time, the landscape of your soul can be left compromised and vulnerable.
A loss of hope… whether a few hopeless hours or days, a prolonged season of hopelessness or a seemingly relentless spirit of ‘hope deferred’ continuing to knock at your door- any level of hopelessness can render the strongest and most gifted among us with thoughts we’d rather not entertain and emotions so powerful that strength ebbs from our being.
Whoever we are, our starting place was in the heart of God, therefore our starting place was in Love. Love brought us here purposefully. Sometimes we lose sight of the fact that Love is responsible for our being here.
How we lose the ability to see Him clearly is part of our own growth and wrestlings here on earth… which is our story.
“God is Love.”
1 John 4:8
If we begin in Love, how do we lose hope in this life when we are surrounded by that Love? If God is Love, how do we lose our confident expectation in His goodness manifesting itself in our lives?
When we put our pain and loss at the center of our focus, hope begins its disappearing act. The longer we focus on our pain, loss, grief, disappointments, conversations about who ‘done us wrong’ and shattered expectations, the more our hope fades and we start destroying the ‘response bridge’ we have built to Love.
“Faith, Hope and Love remain- but the greatest of these is Love.”
1 Corinthians 13:13
We are a people of faith. People of faith have hope because we are anchored in a place where we can see into a realm that natural eyes cannot see.
Hope confidently trusts God through the process called “waiting”. When the wait gets too long, Hope goes back to Faith and asks, “Are you sure?”
When Faith speaks up and says “I am certain, unwaveringly certain,” Hope goes back to confidently expect that Love will do as He has promised.
But what happens after a season of waiting in which there is no fulfillment? Hope then returns to Faith and asks “Are you really sure?” but this time Faith replies, “I’m wavering and I am not certain any longer”.
If Faith only works by Love, then a wavering Faith produces the inability to see Love for who He really is. And when you can’t see someone for who they really are, it makes working together, walking together and agreeing together almost impossible.
“Love never fails.”
1 Corinthians 13:8
To the degree that we can no longer clearly see Love, we can then find ourselves disconnected from Him.
We don’t usually disconnect willingly, but it is a consequence of allowing pain, loss or disappointments to stay at the forefront of our thoughts, focus and emotions.
If Love was real to us once, then let’s hasten to hear Him again declaring to us: “Love never fails”.
When we can see Love, our bridge to Him can be rebuilt and Hope Restored will be its name.
written by: dawn fenn
by invitation, written for: LisaHentrich.com - God and My Girlfriends blog- February 14, 2019