What if it Keeps Getting Better?

“May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.” Romans 15:13

There I was in an airplane with Ross on the first leg of our trip to Portugal. Stressed, anxious, and sleep-deprived after weeks of planning to be away from the kids. Once again I was questioning the complexity of our lives and why we do so many things. Instead of being amazed and grateful for this tribe of friends and family helping us, I was thinking we must be nuts to have a life this busy. A life that requires 13 different people to make everything happen without us for 9 days.

(That’s what our enemy wants us to think though… that our biggest blessings are curses. But that’s another topic).

Then the pilot came on the loud speaker and announced that the seatbelt sign would be on for the entire flight as a huge storm was coming and there would be turbulence. Great. I made Ross send a quick email to our lawyer friend so someone would know how to access our will. Would we even make it there? Was this a huge mistake?

While waiting for the flight to take off toward my potential demise, I came across an article written by Katie Davis, (the girl who adopted 13 girls from Uganda). In it she described a time she was swimming in the Nile with her daughter, when all of a sudden the current changed and started taking them further and further out. She was able to hang onto a tree branch while watching her daughter get swept away. As she clung to the branch, she remembered there were falls up ahead and imagined all the worst case scenarios. Minutes later, as she got herself to shore, her daughter came running up the beach safe and sound. She was okay. Later on, her husband walked her up a hill so she could see the view of the river from above. It turned out there were several reasons they weren’t in much danger and were actually safe all along.

This drew me back to a thought that doesn’t cross my mind very often because I am VERY prone to fear and preparing for worst case scenarios. (Hello enneagram type 6).

But when it does, I am filled with hope and peace… like flying up 30,000 feet above my situation and suddenly having new perspective… His perspective.

The thought is this:

What if it keeps getting better?

I’m not talking about every moment, day, or even year. We all know that’s not how life works. . . Not many things in life are perfectly linear. Life is very topsy turvy.

But what if, over time… over the long haul… our lives, our relationships, those things that feel impossibly hard… what if they keep getting better?

Or as the author I mentioned above put it, “what if I was safe all along?”

I think we were made to hope, not to fear. I think we were made to trust that the God who made the heavens and the earth holds us all in the palm of His hand and that we are always safe with Him.

In the verse above, Paul writes:

“May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.” Romans 15:13

God IS hope. He wants to fill us with Himself. And not just fill us to the tippy top, but to the point of OVERFLOWING. How? By the power of the Holy Spirit.

This is good news for us! We don’t have to strive or try harder, we just have to open ourselves up, surrender, and let the Holy Spirit come in.

Now in order for us to be filled up with hope, we do need to empty out the things that block that hope… like fear, anxiety, and control. Those things have to go in order to make space.

As Melissa Helser sings in the song “We Make Space” … “bye bye clutter! Bye bye bye bye bye bye bye bye…”

I’m still learning how to make this more natural through challenging days and seasons, but I am learning how push against my natural tendencies of fear and anxiety through surrender and trust… to make myself decrease so that He may increase. That’s when the hope comes, and the joy and the peace bubble up to overflowing.

Even when things don’t go my way, I would rather be found hoping… confident and secure, instead of being in a constant state of worry and fear.

What’s the benefit of getting let down when you were already expecting things to be worst case scenario? Being right?

I’d rather be let down in a state of hopefulness, peace, and trusting in my Savior’s love and provision over my life.

But what if we won’t get let down? What if it DOES keep getting better, more free, more resilient, more attuned to the Kingdom of God all around us?

I think I would sleep better for starters. I think my eyesight would expand beyond the fears and see more of the beauty.

When I’m flying in an airplane 30,000 miles above the earth, I want to look out the window and ENJOY looking out the window… with confidence that we are going to land safe and secure. (Whether that’s safe on the ground or safe in death… I will still land secure!) I want to take in the beauty all around me. When I’m eye level with the waves of life that look like they’re going to take me under, I want to be filled with hope and peace because my Savior sees me and holds me.

Whether we are like Katie, looking down and realizing we were safe all along, or down in the muck with no hope in sight… may we stand firm on a bedrock of faith and smile because in the grand, kingdom scheme of things, it WILL keep getting better because that’s the story we are in whether we can see it or not.