Hope

I lift my eyes to the hills
Whence cometh my help?
My help comes from the Lord
The Maker of heaven and earth

Ok, I'm quoting that from memory, half from the Bible, half from songs people have written from the Bible.

And it's a funny passage, because I've heard it interpreted different ways. Some people say/sing it in a way that kind of makes it sound like our help comes from the Lord via those hills. (Cue: Climb Every Mountain from The Sound of Music). I've heard others say something along the lines of the opposite, that people were building false altars on the high places, and the psalmist is saying, "Ya'll can go to the hills, but MY help comes from the Lord."

Either way, I think we all pretty much mean the same thing. Our eggs are all in one basket: His. (nice little Easter touch, eh?)

I recently hit a roadblock of faith. I need God to move. I need to see Him move. I don't want to pull a Hagar/Abram/Sarai type of stunt, in which I have a pretty good feel for what God is going to do but assume He needs me to take over. But I also see that I have some responsibility to walk in what He does give me to do. (That whole thing we made up that isn't really in the Bible but is maybe sort of true: God helps those who help themselves.)

So I shut down and gave up and stopped trying for a month or so. And the nearer I stayed to the Lord, the more grace I had for what wasn't changing. But I wasn't always near. And the farther away I got, the more sarcastic and snippity I was, and nasty, and spewing and flailing. And nobody likes me like that. And one day I just said, "This isn't working."

I don't think God wants me to sit on my hands and stew. And I don't think He wants me to take over and assume He's apathetic. I think He wants me near, and nearer, and still near. Everything else is details.

So my baby steps are just that, and I'm holding His hands, and if I let go, I will fall and get a bloody lip. But then He'll give me a popsicle, a red one, so my friends don't all know what a mess I am, maybe. And we'll try again.

It's like that with everything. The point is not winning or succeeding or losing or failing. The point is nearness. The rest is background.

My hope is in the One Who made heaven and earth. A thousand may fall at my side, and 10,000 at my right hand. But my hope is in the Lord. He will not allow my foot to stumble.

Here's an old song that doesn't fit the modern American church:

Let sorrow do its work
Send grief and pain
Sweet are Thy messengers
Sweet their refrain
When they can sing with me,
"More love, Oh Christ, to Thee"
More love to Thee
More love to Thee