The Infinite Power of Hope

My thoughts on President Uchtdorf’s talk “The Infinite Power of Hope”

WARNING: This will probably be very depressing post since things have “got me down” at the moment. Life isn’t looking fun, pretty or comfortable and I truly needed this talk, but I have a bunch of “issues” with it.

Ok, I would have died has I been his mother at that train station. My worst fear of all is to loose a child. I had an experience where I thought I had lost my daughter and I almost threw up it was so hard to deal with. We had come home from soccer, and because some of the neighborhood kids were on my son’s team I was the carpool driver. That also meant that I had all three benched in my van in. I know I counted noses before we left the soccer fields, but when we got home and after about 15 minutes of getting dinner on the table I couldn’t find Jessica anywhere. Steve had just pulled up and I was about ready to send him to the fields to go get her. She was maybe three years old at the time. I literally was in a panic. She wasn’t anywhere in the house or yard. I grabbed the kids and we hit our knees. I’m not sure who thought of it, but someone said, “Did you check the car?” I of course said, “YES” Duh! I’m not a dumb mom. But then Kray said, “But she wasn’t sitting in her car seat, but in Chris’” Chris’ car seat was in the very back, not the front bench. She had fallen asleep and slumped over so that her head couldn’t be seen above the seats and of course her feet were too short to be seen when you looked under the benches. She was strapped into her car seat asleep, slumped over so that she was “gone” from view. I’m sure she had no idea why a crying, hysterical mother unbuckled her and just held her for the night.

Pres. Uchtdorf wonders how she managed to go on in the face of her fears. You do because you HAVE to find your child. There is no other option. There was no option for me. I HAD to find Jessica, NOTHING else mattered. I don’t recall what emotion I had, but I know that it the most horrifying few moments of my mother career. (And I’m sure my teens will give me a few more.)

What is the “infinite power of hope”?
How do we get or find it?

“Hope is a gift of the Spirit. … This kind of hope is both a principle of promise as well as a commandment, and as with all commandments, we have the responsibility to make it an active part of our lives and overcome the temptation to lose hope.”

Well, I guess I’m a sinner today. I feel as if I have lost a lot of the hope I had. I know things are supposed to work out, but this part of the journey is a very rough one and I’m not sure I can hold on much longer. I cling to the promise of the principle of hope, but to have it, as the commandment says, is hard. I have hope in the atonement and the resurrection—that part is clear, but the part of having hope for the daily things in life is where I struggle.

“The adversary uses despair to bind hearts and minds in suffocating darkness.”
Boy do I feel that today.
“Despair drains from us all that is vibrant and joyful and leaves behind the empty remnants of what life was meant to be.”
You know I would love to have some joyful days right about now.
“Despair kills ambition, advances sickness, pollutes the soul, and deadens the heart. Despair can seem like a staircase that leads only and forever downward.”
I know this all too well. It seems like I’m on a long staircase down and I don’t know where the up side is.

“Hope, on the other hand, is like the beam of sunlight rising up and above the horizon of our present circumstances. It pierces the darkness with a brilliant dawn. It encourages and inspires us to place our trust in the loving card of an eternal Heavenly Father, who has prepared a way for those who seek for eternal truth in a world of relativism, confusion, and of fear.”
I totally get this, and on an eternal plane it is great. I believe it, I hope it, I trust it, I know it. But what about today? What about the situation I find our family in today. Where is the hope when for many long months the situation hasn’t changed? How much longer can our family sustain this level of hope until it is gone? “Endure to the end,” it says, but the end had better come because I’m nearing the end of my rope. In fact I’ve added other sections to my rope…

“I wish to speak today of the hope that transcends the trivial and centers on the Hope of Israel, the great hope of mankind, even our Redeemer, Jesus Christ.”
This isn’t the type of hope I’m struggling with at all. Watching my sister, my grand niece and then my mother die, there is not wiggle room in my life for this type of hope. I know, I mean I KNOW, without any shadow of doubt that the atonement has worked in their lives and that they are their already, waiting for us to join them. My only hope is that I live worthy enough to join them. I’m sure that is their hope too.

“Hope is not knowledge, but rather the abiding trust that the Lord will fulfill His promise to us. It is confidence that it we live according to God’s law and the words of His prophets now, we will receive desired blessings in the future. It is believing and expecting that our prayers will be answered. It is manifest in confidence, optimism, enthusiasm, and patient perseverance.”
This is what I’m having trouble with. It is so hard to wake every morning to the same troubles and move forward. He has promised total healing and yet, six year later…. He has promised a new job, and yet, months later we are still waiting and the offers are not coming…. He has promised that family life will smooth over and yet I’m still looking up boarding school on the east coast… I want hope and peace in my home today. I’m tired of uncertainty, physical pain, anger and frustration in my home. My prayer each morning is, “Let me get through the day without killing someone.” And most of the time I truly mean it.

I don’t struggle with the eternal hope, but the temporal hope of blessings we have asked for and need so desperately TODAY. I’m not sure my “hope jar” has anything left in it. I wake every morning, take a big swig and pray it will be enough until my eyes close at night. Many, many nights the eyes never close because the heart and mind are so full of the daily struggles our family faces at this time. I’m tired of living in despair, frustration. I know how it feels to have my heart bound my “heart and mind in suffocating darkness.” It has drained most of the joy in my life and left me with “empty remnants of what life was meant to be.” It has killed “ambition.” And I truly feel like I’m on a downward spiral.

I have to cling to this promise, “No matter how bleak the chapter of our lives may look today, because of the life and sacrifice of Jesus Chris, we may hope and be assured that the ending of the book of our lives will exceed our grandest expectations.”

“The things we hope in sustain us during our daily walk. They uphold us through our trials, temptations and sorrow. Everyone has experienced discouragement and difficulty. Indeed, there are times when the darkness may seem unbearable. It is in these times that the divine principles of the restored gospel we hope in can uphold us and carry us until, once again, we walk in the light.”

These are the two promises I have to hold to every morning or I would walk away from all this. Many times I say, “This isn’t worth it. My heart is too broken. My spirit to wounded to make it through this day.” But I say a prayer asking for strength to make it through one more day, in the hope that tomorrow those promised blessings will come. I’m just not sure how many more days I can hit my knees and utter that prayer.

“This type of hope in God, his goodness, and his power refreshes us with courage during difficult challenges and gives strength to those who feel threatened by enclosing walls of fear, doubt and despair.”

This sums up my life right now: “There may be times when we must make a courageous decision to hope even when everything around us contradicts this hope.”
“When frustration and impatience challenge charity, hope braces our resolve and urges us to care for our fellowmen even without expectation of reward.”
Must have hope then because through all of this I have charity for those around me. I haven’t stopped serving my fellowman and I don’t do it for a reward but because it is just what I do. But I do feel frustrated.
I hold the same hope his mother had, “sustain[ed] our family and me and [give] confidence that present circumstances [will] give way to future blessing.”
This is the hope that I have to live with every day. I have to have hope that eventually these trials will end and the blessings for going through them and making it to the end will come. I just wish (dare I say hope?) the end will come soon. I too, take to heart Pres. Uchtdorf’s words.

“And to all who suffer—to all who feel discouraged, worried, or lonely—I say with love and deep concern for you, never give in. Never surrender. Never allow despair to overcome your spirit. Embrace and rely upon the Hope of Israel, for the love of the Son of God pierces all darkness, softens all sorrow and gladdens every heart.”