Hope Anyway

 

Hope is a dangerous thing.

I have found the crushing disappointment that comes after misplaced hope is the gateway to cynicism. Hoping in people who let you down spectacularly or outcomes never realized makes you never want to try again. It just costs too much. 

When all hope is lost, the energy required to have courage and begin again is sapped.

Faced with tremendous losses in her own life, Leeana Tankersley is a trustworthy guide to regaining hope in the midst of crushing defeat. She opens her heart on the pages to expose her vulnerable woundedness to point out the path back to a firm and lasting hope.

Her hope is not placed in achieving goals or arriving at a state of happiness, but in the Lord. When we rest in his sovereignty and stop fighting for our own way and simply fix our gaze on him, we can regain the audacious power of hope.

Each chapter covers a different threat to hope- grief, disappointment, rebuilding, vulnerability, wilderness, endings, etc. Using her personal stories, she guides the reader through how to honestly grieve and sit in the pain of dashed hopes to begin placing your hope in someone rather than hoping for some outcome. 

"Hard-won hope is a product of disappointment. We don't possess it because things went well. We earn it because things did not."

It is one thing to have a Pollyanna outlook with a blind hope. It is something totally different to grieve the losses in our lives and get to the bottom and find we still have not lost the Lord. We naturally want to bypass pain but in so doing we miss the fact that the pain in our life is creating something more lasting than naïve optimism. 

Leeana marshals all her resources to come to a place of healing and hope in her life. I think it's important to note though, several factors allow her the space to do this intense emotional work that not every reader will have access to. Some of her experiences seem to be primarily enabled by secure finances. Getting alone for two hours of reflection in nature is not possible for some, however helpful it may be. Also, her community of supportive friends is essential in her process, and this is not easily replicated by those who are more isolated. I'd love to see more resources like this come from those who are under resourced and struggling for hope. Those books will likely never be written because they cannot get the time. However, for those who are more resourced this book is an excellent guide to finding a pathway to hope again. 

Someone who has their hope planted in the Lord cannot be defeated even at their lowest point. They are hard-pressed but not crushed, perplexed but not in despair, persecuted but not abandoned, struck down but not destroyed. You cannot stop someone who's power is found in God's strength not their own. Hope in God makes us effective against the enemy, and dangerous for the Lord.

I received an advance copy of this book from the publisher. All opinions are my own.