There’s Always Hope No Matter What

1 God Had a Plan In October 2020, I was one of four women asked to speak at the meeting of our women’s ministry on its third anniversary. We were asked to speak on the topic of being a servant. Before the meeting, each of us was given individualized questions that the members of the ministry wanted us to address. As I was searching the scriptures in response to one of the questions, I stumbled across Romans 12:11, which says in part “be fervent in spirit serving the Lord.” And that was a wonderful answer for that question. But I kept on reading, and the verse that followed, Romans 12:12, jumped out at me and resonated in my spirit: “be joyful in hope, patient in tribulation, and consistent in prayer.” God illuminated that verse, specifically “be joyful in hope,” and I knew that it was a revelation from Him and that flesh and blood did not reveal that to me. I believe God chose me to carry the message of hope because I have always held on to hope, no matter what it looked like. I’ve sat in a courtroom where my son was falsely charged with a serious crime and the prosecutor, police, and probation officer joined forces against him, but I held on to hope and stood on God’s Word, and God was faithful to come through; charges against my son were ultimately dismissed “in the interest of justice.” I had instances of unjust actions taken against me at work by a newly hired executive officer who wanted to make a name for himself; the plan was to use me as a scapegoat for something that I had nothing to do with that had caused him embarrassment. I stated my objection to this injustice orally, but it fell on deaf ears, and again in writing, also typing up some scriptures that addressed my situation. I let it go but held on to hope and stood on God’s Word. And God came through. As a matter of fact, the newly hired executive who came against me was subsequently fired, and his firing made front-page headlines in the LA Times. I have countless other stories of hope and standing on God’s Word with the expectation that He would come through, and God has been faithful. Hope is what has kept me during the difficult seasons. Hope is my anchor. Although I likely had read Romans 12:12 numerous times before that meeting, when I read it on that occasion, it leaped into my spirit. Wow! I said to myself. This verse holds the key to overcoming life’s challenges. And when I read the first part of the verse, “be joyful in hope,” I knew I had to do something with what God had revealed to me. And so I dubbed it The Hope Project. The Journey Begins I started this God-inspired Hope Project by sharing Romans 12:12 with others. I also started jotting down scriptures dealing with hope as I ran across them. I knew that God wanted me to do something with the topic. Then in 2021, I began to focus my attention on hope as it relates to children and youth, especially as it pertains to young people who have experienced hopelessness as a result of childhood trauma. In 2021, my sister told me about a training program for LA County Juvenile Probation Department staff on the topic of the science of hope as it relates to children and youth. I had the opportunity to listen in on the training, and this was another wow moment for me. The presenters, Casey Gwinn, JD, and Chan Hellman, PhD, spoke about the science of hope and how it can change lives, including lives of troubled youth, when put into practice. When I heard their presentation, I knew that this was a godsend. I did more research on the topic and was convinced that combining the science of hope theory (practical) with the spiritual is a blueprint for victory. In a nutshell, scientific research has proven that hope can be measured (science of hope) and that hope is a learned way of thinking about oneself in relation to goals—not only in formulating goals (willpower) but in taking the necessary steps to achieve those goals (“waypower”). Hope is what links someone who has a troubled past to an expectation that better days are ahead. The theory behind the science of hope is that hope is the sum of the mental willpower and waypower that one has for their goals—as the saying goes, “where there’s a will, there’s a way”. The science of hope strategies are embodied in the companion youth devotional. In July 2022, I received a generic email about a writer’s challenge workshop. Since I knew I would eventually share the message of hope through written form, I paid the $20 registration fee and signed up, as I sensed that this workshop was another godsend. The three-day workshop ran July 25–29. The sessions were only forty-five minutes long but powerful. God spoke to me during this workshop, and I knew I had a God-directed mandate to immediately start writing. So I gathered my notes and started on the morning of July 26, 2022, the second morning of the workshop. That’s how the Hope Project started.