Monday, December 2-Hope

Jeremiah 33:14-16

The Israelites were living in despair.  They knew their time was over.  Babylon was advancing on Jerusalem and Jeremiah had prophesied and grieved.  They were doomed.  In the middle space of waiting and grief and uncertainty, the Lord speaks with a word of hope and this hope is a person, “I will make a righteous Branch sprout from David’s line.”  From David’s line that was seemingly dead, God will bring life.  God is able to bring life out of death.  When all seems lost, God is still working, still faithful and the believer still stands.  We all stand in a lot of middle spaces. 

The holistic middle space of living between Jesus’ first coming and His second coming.  Looking at the world and seeing the injustices and unrighteousness and remembering there is a hope that God has, is and will bring life to the dead spaces.  We also stand in a lot of individual middle spaces of loss, grief, and fears that we carry.  This promise still stands.  In the middle of the darkness, there is light.  In the middle of despair, there is hope. 

 In the middle of the waiting, there is a branch sprouting.  In the middle of death, there is resurrection.  This is the hope we stand on, a righteous branch will spring up.  This is what carried the Israelites and what carries us today.  May we stand in that hope and carry that hope to a world filled with hopelessness.  

 What areas of your life are you lacking hope?

 How can you invite Jesus into those spaces?                                                    

PASTOR TABITHA MARTIN