I bent to pick up a card from the wet carpet, the last act in cleaning the tiny office in my flood-ravaged mobile home. I was cold and tired after another long day of sorting through the water-damaged treasures of my life from before the flood. On a winter afternoon, the light was fading fast. I had cried for the past, but the future looked like a roiling gray cloud filled with hailstones waiting to fall.
I squinted at the card in my hand. It was one of many I had pinned up for inspiration. Water had faded the writing, but I could make out the words of a Bible verse I had copied from The Upper Room on another, more secure, day. "Yet hope returns when I remember this one thing: The LORD'S unfailing love and mercy still continue, Fresh as the morning, as sure as the sunrise" (Lam. 3:21-23, TEV).
I read the words again and sighed. They don't say that I will not have tough times or that everything will be all right because I am a good person. I smiled. I know I can trust God. I know the passage is true. "Hope returns." With that promise, I was comforted.
