Rise:
The Secret of Hope
“Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you believe in Him so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.” Romans 15:13
A secret is something that is not yet revealed. There is always a keeper of the secrets, the one who protects them and is in charge of giving them to those who ask. Why do I call it a secret? Because the hope we see in this world is fleeting and is based on changing circumstances. There’s no secret about that. What makes this hope so different? The secret must be revealed to us because the secret of hope is God Himself. The Keeper of the secret is the Holy Spirit. The One Who delivers the secret is Jesus.
In one of the stories of The Phoenix Chronicles, Lydia Green is living a brutal life with seemingly no way out. She had promised her dying mother that she would escape her abusive husband. A year after her death, Lydia is still with Silas. Listen to her thoughts: “When the door slammed behind him, loneliness overwhelmed her. She saw herself standing on the edge of a rocky cliff, looking down at the roaring waves below. They seemed to raise higher, their frothy tips opening like hands to catch her. If she took one step, it would all be over. She would finally be able to rest. The only person who kept her away from it was her beloved daughter. Yet the more time went on, the more she wondered if Nikki would be better off without her.”
Hope brings security and a feeling of safety, that what is seen is not the end of the story. Hope is belief in something higher than the ordinary that could sustain the soul in the worst of circumstances. For the time being Lydia’s daughter kept her from going over the edge. But her daughter was not strong enough to change the pattern of abuse Lydia suffered at the hands of her husband. She needed what only God could give. God’s character guarantees the power to lift her out and bring her into something better. I wrote later in Lydia’s story: “Jesus had come in and shouted to the waves to be still forever and left her with peace beyond her understanding. Was this what Mama meant when she told her to rise? But Mama didn’t know how much she wanted to give in to the death that haunted her every day. Jesus saved her from it”.
Though my stories delve into dark places, there is always a glorious light running through them. My message is clear: God is our only hope, no matter how bad our lives are.
You’ll find Lydia’s story in The Phoenix Chronicles and Trilogy of Hope.
The Secret of Hope
