Tag Archives: perseverance

The Living Hope

A result oriented entrepreneur, business executive, a believer, student studying for academic laurel, parenting couple, and many more need to have a living hope until the set goals and objectives are achieved. We are still on the subject of HOPE as an anchor of our soul if kept undying or alive. All boils down to achieving our goals if we can steadfastly stick to the relevant road map with God being the beacon; concerning    whatever be the ups and downs along the route. Living hope is a recurring impetus to forge ahead, knowing that God is faithful to see us through. Any one with weak or false hope is most likely going to end up being a quitter.

As in Hebrew 6: 19-20, it says,  “But beloved, we are confident for better things concerning you, yes, things that accompany salvation, though we speak in his manner. For God is not unjust to forget your labor of love which you have shown  toward His name, in that you have ministered to his saints, and do minister. And that we desire that each one of you show the same diligence to the full assurance of hope until the end, that you do not become sluggish, but imitate those who through faith and patience inherit the promises.” (NKJV). The relevant application of this passage is that we know as Christian believers that Jesus is interceding for us before God. Jesus told his followers that they should feel free to ask for any need of theirs through him and  will be granted to them their heart’s desire.

Christians have a living hope that makes their ultimate possible by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Believers are looking forward to their salvation or as it is pleasantly expressed “Where will you spend your eternity-Heaven or Hell?” They tend to determinedly work towards it in the hope that the death and resurrection of Jesus had cleared the road to salvation. Christians are training and developing themselves and others to ensure their eternal salvation. It is this living HOPE that kept Apostle Paul going in spite of the suffering he went through throughout  his missionary journeys. Let us consider the  beating and imprisonment he endured. He and Silas were beaten severely and kept in prison under maximum security. Following the expression of the living hope in them, they both held vigil where they sang praises and prayed God loudly.The Almighty God showed forth His acceptance of the worship and responded with an earthquake that broke the stocks on them and yet they refused to escape from custody, Act 16: 18-28.

Hope is always the force behind endurance  and perseverance  as recorded in Thessalonians 1:3 “As we pray to our God and Father about you, we think of your faithful work, your loving deeds, and the enduring hope you have because of our Lord Jesus Christ, (NLT).

                                    FALL SEASON IN LIFELEAVES FALL FREELY IN FALL SEASON TO STARTWITH FRESH LEAFAGE FORFULL FRESH SPRING FOLIAGEThere is more than seven after six. It is a local saying that assures us that failure is not the end of life. However, life is like a train in transit but has to stop for some passengers to alight at their own destination and still has to bring in fresh passengers whose destination would be ahead. When it reaches the end of the ‘to’ journey, it would return via the same route having to stop at the fixed stations for more passengers to disembark and embark. For seasonal weather, the cyclical journey goes into eternity. Human life is patterned into a mould that fits the train movement until it becomesobsolete, written off and scrapped. We are born to die is a common knowledge that man has been grappling with without solution. He has times of high and low tides in life, so, the seasons can come with hardship or pleasure. No matter what, if one does not allow the heat of sunshine Summer to kill or debilitate him one would transit to fall season where dress code starts changing to accommodate changing weather that will again gets more unbearable if one fails to adapt to winter coldness. As the season of harsh coldness advances it can lead to freezing if care is not taken. Unknown to unsuspecting people, it is cleansing the air of all dirty substances hanging in the air as rain falls. Debris hiding in sewage pathway is being cleared by erosion. By the time Spring season springs in, the air is clean, drainage is free of stagnant water which prevents breeding of mosquitoes and other harmful insects. At the advent of Spring season, life returns with freshness. Nature brings fresh flowers like daffodils and fresh lilies with poppies throughout Antelope Valley at the north end of Los Angeles County which gets celebrated. In other words, man’s life is full of ups and downs. It is only those who cannot re- invent or restructure themselves after a failure or disaster that would sink rather than swim across the sea of problems besetting them that do perish along with their problems. I join all American citizens to doff my hat to the revered President Abraham Lincoln (1861-1865) who after vicissitudes in his political career got vote to become the 16th President of the United State in America. The current Nigerian President was once a military Head of State. He was ousted but at the return to civilian government, he started contesting in every Presidential election and was failing since 1999 only to succeed in 2015 Presidential election. He seemed to have favorably weathered the political storm to emerge at the country’s ASO ROCK, an equivalent of the American WHITE HOUSE.So ‘Fall season in Life’ stands for just a chapter in a person’s life. Like the old folks’ song “Nobody knows the trouble I see, nobody knows my sorrows. Nobody knows the trouble I see, Glory Hallelujah: Sometime I’m rich, sometime I’m poor, O yes Lord. Nobody knows the trouble I see; Glory Hallelujah!!!”. Therefore, death is a means to an end and not an end in itself. Man can get to FALL season in his life and go into winter bitter cold; if he remains resilient he would be able to spring back to life’s freshness and buoyancy. “Circumstantial Homelessness” is a fitting scenario. (Ref: ValuPlus Poems: Focus on Behavioral Tendencies. Pg 24 Copyright 2008 by Emmanuel Osindele). In other words, at the end of a dark and cheerless night, there is always the dawn of a new day. 

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