Truth and Dare

My friend posted a beautiful scripture yesterday from Lamentations 3:22-31. 

It prompted me to read the whole chapter, because I enjoy context, and v 19 really hit me.  It said, "The thought of my suffering is bitter is beyond words.  I will never forget this awful time, as I grieve my loss. 

YET I STILL DARE TO HOPE, when I remember this, the unfailing love of the Lord NEVER ENDS."

whoa.

All those times crying in my pillow, in my shower, in my cookie dough are real times. Real suffering that is bitter beyond words, an awful time, as I grieved my loss.  My loss is different from yours, probably, and most definitely different than the author of Lamentations who watched his country and countrymen be destroyed, but nonetheless, it is loss.  

Loss is gripping, and painful, and all encompassing.  It stills you and stunts you.  And if you are not careful, it becomes you.  It has become me.  

Plainly speaking, loss sucks.  There is no beauty in it.  There is nothing lovely in it. It is deep and wide and dark and empty.  

And yet....

And yet I still dare to hope....WHEN I REMEMBER THIS....

The unfailing love of the Lord never ends.  By his mercies we have been kept from complete destruction.  So if you are looking for the silver lining....this is it.  Your loss is painful, but you are not completely destroyed. You are alive, and standing.  You cannot see beauty in your loss, but can you dare to look beyond your loss? Can you dare to hope? Can you dare to remember Great is his faithfulness, his mercies begin afresh each day, I say to myself, "The Lord is my inheritance, therefore i will hope in Him!"

And there it is ...this is it...the Lord is my inheritance.  The Lord is beautiful and lovely and deep and wide and full and whole.  Your inheritance is not your loss, it is the Lord and the fullness of His glory, his goodness.  

The Lord is WONDERFULLY GOOD to those who wait for him and seek him.  

So we wait, and we seek.  We seek and we wait.

For when life is heavy and hard to take go off by yourself.  Enter the silence, bow in prayer.  Don't ask questions.  Wait for hope to appear! Don't run from trouble.  Take it full force.  The worst is never the worst.  Why?  Because the Master won't ever walk out and fail to return.

Do you dare to hope and remember that the unfailing love of the Lord never ends?

***Scriptures in red are from the Message version and the NLT version of Lamentations ch3***