Five Minute Friday: Hope

Note: This post is my weekly contribution to the Five Minute Friday community that is hosted by Kate Motaung on her blog Heading Home. Click here for more information about Five Minute Friday and how you can get involved! To link up with all the other entries for today's prompt word, click here.

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I'll be honest, friends.

I don't have any fancy or uplifting words to say this week on this prompt. You see, hope is not my forte these days. It's just not in my box of things to lift me up and make me praise God. I suppose that makes me seem like a really crappy Christian. Honestly, the fact that hope is kind of in absentia makes me feel like I'm worthless as a Christian. I mean, I'm supposed to put my hope in God. Trust in Him because He is the bringer of hope and the uplifter of the hopeless.

Yeah. Just can't do it.

I can't bring myself to say the word "hope" with any kind of meaning behind it these days. My spirit and heart are wounded. They've been wounded for quite a long time. Actually, they've been wounded for two years to this day.

You see, it was on this exact date -- July 10, 2013, that I lost my hope. I was violently traumatized emotionally and the hope that used to reside deep within my spirit was wrenched away in that moment of trauma and I have been unable to find it again.

And believe me, I've tried. I have tried to find that hope.

I have looked for it in scripture, in prayer, in worship, and in the healing graces of the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick (which is for spiritual healing primarily and then physical/emotional healing comes as a secondary benefit) and the other sacraments. What have I found?

Nothing.
Nada.
Zip.

And worst of all -- absolute silence from God.

Because of this, I went a long time where I wouldn't even use the word hope in its more secular sense of something wished for -- aka "I'm hoping for a chocolate cake for my birthday" -- because even that left a sour taste on my tongue. I didn't want to hope for anything because hope could be stolen and destroyed and all without any warning.

I have since resumed using it in its secular sense, but still don't really use it in the spiritual sense. I also don't use it when speaking of my illness because every time I have said that I feel a sense of hope that I'm getting better, I wind up about five steps backward from where I thought I was with my recovery.

I mentioned this prompt on Facebook in small group of women who encourage one another and my comment was: "This week's prompt is HOPE. *facepalm*" One of the ladies in the group who was trying to encourage me said that despite everything that I'm going through that I am "living hope" and that all the things I do to get through each day and deal with this illness are "rooted in hope."

I appreciate the thought, but I think what I'm really doing is living obedience.

A very long time ago, when I was just a little girl of 6 years old, I gave my heart to God. I made a commitment to follow Him with my life. I didn't know what that commitment would entail at age 6, but as I got older, I began to understand that a big part of it was obedience to God's will for me. At first, I thought it was just obedience in things like who to hang out with, who to date, obeying my parents, going to church, etc. As I matured though, I came to realise that it was more than just those sort of big things, but the day to day little things too. At some point in my early adulthood, I realised that He wants my obedience in EVERYTHING.

Living obedience is not always easy in good times, but when life hits us with unexpected stresses, it can be very very hard. So how do you live obedience when you have no hope, feel abandoned by God and feel totally broken and crushed in mind, body, and spirit?

You do as my spiritual director, Fr.B, told me today. Take it one day at a time. When you cannot make yourself remain obedient, you lean on those around you who are faithful to Him to help you. You put one foot in front of the other. You breathe in and breathe out and somehow, you get to another day. 

And I'm not gonna lie. You cry a lot. Seriously, a LOT. You scream at God and beat your fists upon His feet. You cry some more. You consider often just turning your back on God altogether. More crying. You vent your spleen to someone who will listen -- be they friend, family, priest, or therapist. And you cry some more. The crying happens nearly daily when you're in this hopeless place where obedience is the anchor you are clinging to by a thread.

It sucks. It sucks a lot because when you're in this place, it feels as though you will never be doing anything but living obedience. No joy. No meaning. Nothing but monotonous obedience. I wish I could tell you that it gets better. That the hope returns and that the joy is abundant because of the struggle.

But that's not my story.

I'm still living obedience. As I wrestle with myself and my faith amidst all the day to day stresses of married life and motherhood and the overarching noonday demon of depression, I do the little things and big things that He has called me to time and again.

And I cry a lot. But that's okay. Because we have tissues. :) 

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*This was meant to be a 5-minute exercise, but once I FINALLY got started, I had a hard time stopping myself, so I'm more than a little bit over. Just pretend it was 5 minutes, okay? I won't tell if you won't! :)

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