Myths About Hope And Where It Actually Comes From
9/24/20
Hi there!
Hope- it can feel rather elusive sometimes, can’t it? It feels like this foreign thing and at the same time, our responsibility. I will admit that I often take on the sole weight of trying to create my own hope, my own positivity, my own mindset. I hear it around me all of the time! Manifest your future, fix yourself, work on yourself, think positive thoughts, be better, do better.
The commonality amongst these statements? The weight is all on YOU.
Now I am sure some of you are confused. Aren’t we responsible for our own mindset? Aren’t we in control of our actions and choices and thoughts? Well, yes and no.
The more I venture into adulthood, the more aware I become of the invisible forces in this world. And also, the more aware I become of just how small I truly am compared to them.
I am often tempted to believe that I can control things about myself, that I can create my own will power and determination. I am tempted to also blame myself for each perceived failure on my part to do those things consistently. And with that, I am about to dig into a concept that may make some of you uncomfortable and may even be controversial… but to explain hope, I have to be completely honest. So here goes!
Gosh, where to even begin?! Life is complex, people are complex. But we give ourselves a lot more credit than we should. We love to buy into the idea that we can do it all on our own. The problem with this? When we inevitably let ourselves down, we carry shame and blame on our shoulders. So why do we allow ourselves to engage in this disastrous, downward spiral?
I have a theory, so hear me out:
Satan, as I have discussed in brief multiple times, is sly. He is manipulative all for the sake of misleading us and corrupting us.
While yes, we have individual ideas, thoughts, and feelings, can we truly believe that there is not a war at play for our souls? I can assure you that there is indeed just that; invisible and powerful forces battling constantly for our allegiance, our purposes, our actual lives.
Consider this: Maybe, just maybe, the negative thoughts and temptations that plague you do not always come from you. Maybe you don’t choose them and maybe it isn’t your fault when they come. Maybe they do not define you and are not tied in any way to your identity.
Consider this also: You alone cannot change. You alone cannot muster up the courage to be positive, to believe in tomorrow, to cling to hope when there is none in sight. You don’t have the dimension, perspective, or power to lead yourself down ANY path whether it be a self destructive one or a productive one.
Think I am crazy yet? Good! Now allow me to explain where I am coming from…
For as long as I can remember, I have known the deep and beautiful love that comes from my relationship with Christ. And at the same time, I have known fear, temptation, and soul-destructing forces. You cannot really have one without the other, but some people can get away with having neither. Unfortunately for me, I have never been able to exist in the middle. I believe or I do not, and so I believe. And I am unable to escape the spiritual warfare that comes with chasing after the heart of God because of that.
As a young child, this was utterly overwhelming to me. I saw God’s heart in everything and I saw Satan’s rebuttals in everything as well. I was easy to manipulate and scare because I was so naive to the world. I had hideous nightmares, some that would occur for years at a time. I had disturbing thoughts, things that I knew nothing of from my own experience that would somehow pass through my mind. Things that any 4-6 year old child should not even know exist. And at the same time, I had beautiful realizations about God, the world, existence. I would have sudden knowledge that wasn’t my own, I would have dreams of the future that came true. There was a loving, warm, nurturing presence within me that gave me a purpose and identity that no one necessarily taught me. In fact, you can be taught your worth or value all day long but that doesn’t always equate to you believing in it. However, I always inherently understood it through that presence.
As I got older and learned to overcome Satans initial tactics, he devised a new game plan- to prey on my maturity. By this I mean I would learn things on my own accord, from my own personal experience. And he would take those things and twist them to his advantage. Instead of using his voice to scare me into immediate compliance, he started playing the long game; using what sounded like my own voice, he would slowly and in small, seemingly harmless doses, begin attacking my beliefs or affirming the wrong ones I devised myself. He knew that I didn’t subscribe to his intimidation and that I would be more likely to trust myself, and so I did.
I would be plagued with negative thoughts about self image. I would be tormented with guilt over even the smallest mistakes. I would be shamed for any and everything, constantly and endlessly. And it made me very tired, to say the least. And the worst part? I blamed myself entirely, because I believed the lies surrounding me. It was easier to subscribe to the narrator in my head who said I wasn’t good enough rather than the one who said I was worthy regardless. It was easier to let my limitations and shortcomings define me because they were more tangible.
Ultimately? A negative thought would come. Sometimes it was my voice and sometimes it was the voice in disguise. But Satan tricked me into believing that my mental state was solely my own doing and my responsibility to fix, even though he was manipulating it the entire time and then using my failed attempts to fix it as more ammunition to destroy me.
I recently discovered that while I do have a personal supply of will power, it will never be enough to match the forces that are against me. And because I bought into the narrative that I alone had the responsibility to choose joy, clarity, and success, I stopped relying on God for those things without even realizing I had done it. I felt like I was simply not worthy of coming to Him and asking for hope, that it was wrong to even ask for because it was “my job.” I felt like praying for joy, peace, freedom, and positivity obsessively must get annoying after a while. I would almost imagine God sitting at a distance, waiting for me to get my own mental health together first before He would have anything to do with me. And yet, more lies from the enemy.
Do you have a similar experience? Are you someone who can’t help but believe something, someone who feels that constant inner tension of existing in the first place? If so, I am here to tell you to let yourself off of the hook. I am here to tell you to take peace in the fact that the weight is NOT solely sitting on your shoulders; that your inner battles are not your doing or your fault, that you yourself cannot break free from the chains that bind you but there is a God who can do just that.
We dig ourselves into messes; we believe untrue things, we lose our identities in the sea of content and public opinion and media and societal trends. We either wrap the chains around us on our own or we sit still while Satan does it for us. But the end result? We are trapped with no hope, fooled into thinking we can make our own. Sometimes Satan lets us come up for air, sometimes he takes it easy. Because like any other toxic relationship, you are less likely to leave if it isn’t all bad. So we wander aimlessly further into darkness, barely recognizing what is taking place and thinking all the while that we are in control of where we are going when we are actually slaves to the enemy.
The true and only source of hope, joy, peace, and freedom? God. So why do we allow ourselves to carry around guilt and shame that is not ours to carry?
The only way I can explain the freedom that I have received in Christ is by living it; knowing the truth that I will have bad days, that I will give into temptations, that the empire I spend a lifetime building could be swept away in a single day and yet, I will still have the supernatural strength to get up and start again the very next day. Let me tell you something- that isn’t my doing. Because when I am left to my own devices, I carry shame and guilt on my shoulders and disappear into darkness. Even with Christ, I will have bad days and seasons. Some days, I will have no motivation to get up or do any of the things I love. But because of God, I no longer see that as a failure that I need to carry the weight of. I simply take another step forward and watch God fight for me.
Let Him fight for you, too. Because your life will change so beautifully when you do. Let go of the mess you are in, the temptations and sadness you constantly fight and lose the battle too. The bad news? You will never win. The good news? It isn’t your battle to fight.
You are so intricately, indescribably beautiful. Do not resolve to living in chains, creating a half-rate version of hope when the full version is not only free, but available right here and now for you to have. Stop falling for the lie that you are in control when in truth, we all must serve something. Instead of serving the forces that desire to destroy you, serve the ones that intend to bring you life and life fully. I love you all so much. Thank you for reading and have a great week!
Till next Sunday,
-Lexi Cummings
