2018: A Year For Hope (Prologue)

Have you ever lost hope?  If being honest, I know I have – at least for some things, or during long dry seasons.

I have lost hope for things longed (even prayed) for to have happened by now, and yet here I am … eyes weary from straining to see something emerge on the far horizon.

Dreams that I eventually gave up watering, that now hang sun-shriveled on the vine like snap peas I forgot to pick from last summers garden.

I think we have all lost hope, and yet hope is what is needed now more than ever!

Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life.  ~Proverbs 13:12

In 2014, no – earlier than that.  In 2010, the Lord gave me a strong desire to start blogging.  I didn’t know what I was doing, so I started by writing about what was on my heart at the time.  I started again in 2014, testifying about the God who rescue me from an abusive past. And now, at the close of 2017, here I am ready to start yet again,  But this time, with some specific instructions:  a weekly post on the case for hope (not of hope) in 2018.

HOPE – a desire accompanied by confident expectation

Expectation for good.  Expectation for the thing desired.

A dear friend spoke something over me in 2017, which evolved into a word picture that I sketched and am now attempting to bring to life in watercolor (to be revealed in future posts).I hope you will consider returning to this blog series periodically throughout 2018, and I would greatly appreciate your prayers as I seek to speak the voice of hope to a heart-sick world. 

Until next year and the inaugural post of this 52 week series, praying God stir up in us the seeds of hope for greater things in 2018.

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All sketches and watercolors posted on this website are the sole property of the author and are for exclusive display on the website PuttingHopeToWork.com.