What is hope exactly? This word is thrown around a lot in different ways, but what do people mean when they mention it? Consider this: four years after the pandemic, we’re living in a new dispensation that we’ve never experienced before. The things that are taking place are new, yes, but we have to know how to navigate them. Admittedly, moving forward, dealing with opposition, and facing challenges are all difficult tasks. But today, I want to advocate for hope.

Undoubtedly, there’s a lot of hopelessness in the world today. Many things can cause us to be in a place of negativity, despair, and depression. A few years ago, the tragedy of the pandemic impacted all of us and is still affecting the world today. Jobs were lost, businesses were lost, relationships were lost, people were lost. Life is too unpredictable to imagine a financial safety net or relationship counseling will save you from trials or resolve situations. When life becomes worrisome, what you thought might last forever can crumble, and you can begin to feel utterly powerless.

This is when hope comes in. Hope is usually thought of as a positive feeling of expectation, but it can be an action. When you hope, you believe that something good will happen. Listen, you

do not have to be the most experienced, the most trained or the most knowledgeable to face the difficulties that occur in your life. It’s okay to hope for the extraordinary.

People will try and talk you out of it, and some will see you as ridiculous. As far as they know, what you’re hoping for has never been done. But don’t base the decisions in your life on what someone else says or believes. Sometimes people will even try to talk you into doing something based on their fear. But if it’s not working for them, why would that work for you? Let hope come in and override what’s around you.

Whether or not you are currently dealing with a difficult situation, I can confidently say this: you will. The rug can be snatched from under you in a blink of an eye. There will be things in life that you will be unfamiliar with and unaccustomed to, or you might believe that a situation that’s been present in generation after generation of your family will conquer your life too. You will be tempted to receive fear and shrink back.

This is where hope comes in again. It doesn’t matter how old you are or what level of abilities you seem to have. Your situation is not bound by what makes logical sense. When you hope, you will see the path to victory that fear obscured. Abandon your ideas of inferiority. Abandon your feelings of inadequacy. If you’re focused on whether or not you’re measuring up, you can’t properly evaluate a situation.

So, what if you find it hard to hope? Do not fixate on the sickness, the broken relationship, the estrangement. Do not hold it up and allow it to be magnified in your heart or mind. It’s too easy to become hopeless when you are obsessed with the very thing that went wrong. Don’t believe the lie that there’s no way for you to come out of perilous situations. You are capable!

Factor God into the situations of your life. Impactful thinking and unadulterated hope won’t be accessible if you are simply “playing church.” Just like soldiers prepare for battle and students prepare for tests, you must go home and prepare. Welcome God in, invite Him in, allow Him to intervene. This private time with God will uncover revelations that will guide your path and give you hope.

Carve out time to you deposit God’s power in your day-to-day so that way you can create an arsenal of hope. When you face pain or difficult situations, you can make progress by refusing to

believe things will run a natural course. Fear does not have to be your first response. Choose hope today and overcome hopelessness!