Hope

Welcome to my blog! I'm so excited to share my thoughts with you and to hear your thoughts as well. For my first post I will share a note that I wrote a while back on my facebook page. Feel free to follow me at my new page www.facebook/brittanynelsonmusic.com. Grace to you! ~ Brittany

Do you ever wonder if you're the only one to feel a certain way or experience a certain thing? For instance, am I the only one that gets to a place where I can no longer hear one more word come out of my child's mouth because if I do My brain might actually melt and ooze right out of my ears or possibly explode into tiny little pieces all over my already messy abode? Am I the only one who reaches such a low place that my four year old has more wisdom for my situation than I do? Am I the only one to actually question whether or not I am loved simply because my house seems irreparably dirty or because my children are all having a meltdown at the same time? I'm probably the only one to feel such things. But just in case I'm not, I'll just write a few things that I'm learning that help me when these things happen.

I'm learning that there is hope. Hope, joy and peace are available for me. Hope is the confident expectation of good. Romans 15:13 says that God is the God of hope (the confident expectation of good). "Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace through believing, so that you will abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit." Where do I get joy and peace? From the God of hope. How do I get this joy and peace? Through believing. Believing what? I'm so glad you asked. Through believing that God is good and that you are righteous in His sight. There is no peace when you see yourself as being full of sin. It does not fill me with peace to focus on my failures. In fact, it fills me with dread, fear, and depression (and hopefully we all know where those things come from. Here's a hint: they are not from God.) Peace and joy comes to the one who sees herself as The Father sees her, which is pure and spotless. Ephesians 1:12 says that when you listened and believed the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation, you were sealed in Christ with the Holy Spirit of promise. It is the Holy Spirit who empowers us to abound in hope (the confident expectation of good).

"But," I hear you ask, "I just yelled at my child and saw the most horrified look on their face. I feel like the worst parent on the planet. Don't I have to go beg God for forgiveness and mercy and promise to do better next time so that maybe He will have mercy on my soul and help me to not completely screw up my kids?" Okay, maybe you didn't ask that, but I sure have. If you have done that in the past, let me ask you, how is that working for you? If the only thing you can do is go "search your heart" for wickedness and ask for forgiveness over and over then what, may I ask, are you focusing on? Your sin. Your self. There is no hope there. Our hope is in Christ Who has covered us forever with His blood. If there was not one thing we could do to earn salvation then there is still not one thing we can do to keep it, or lose it.

So, what do we focus on? I'm so glad you asked. We focus on Jesus and what He did for us. Whenever I need encouragement and I am questioning God's love for me or His provision for me, I go to the cross. It is there that I see a Father Who spared no expense so that I could be with Him. He gave the very best He had, His Son. He didn't have to. He wanted to. Why? Because He loves me. That's it. That settles it for me. God so loved the world that He gave His Son so that whoever keeps the law, goes to church, reads her Bible for an hour each day, fasts once a month, serves in the church and asks for forgiveness each time they screw up might have eternal life. Hmmm. We know that's not right so why do we live like that? Whoever believes in Christ: believes that He was perfect when we could not be, believes that He was our spotless sacrifice so that now we are clean, believes that He has made us righteous. When you focus on that truth you begin to have joy, hope and peace. Why, because suddenly you realize that you are not loved because of what you do and you are not rejected because of what you do (or don't do as the case may be). The more you believe that you are loved, the more you are able to love. Suddenly, you have peace even in the midst of the storm (and oh how stormy those tantrums can be). Suddenly, you realize that angry, depressed, fill in your blank person is not who I am. I am seated with Christ in heavenly places (Ephesians 2:6). I am the righteousness of God in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:21). As Jesus is, so am I in this world (1 John 4:17). This is a picture of abounding in hope through the power of the Holy Spirit.

I am still getting this myself. Lord knows I am not all there yet but every day I am getting closer as I put my focus on Jesus and what He accomplished for me. When I screw up I apologize to my kids and I thank my Daddy in heaven that there is more than enough grace for me to be the mom that He's created me to be.

"Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace through believing, so that you will abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit."