Below is the text from the Moment in Faith I gave this morning at the 8:00 and 10:15 services:
A year ago, this Sunday was Easter Sunday which means that today is my one year anniversary here at Hope.
Though I have been a Christian all my life, this past year has felt like the beginning of my story rather than somewhere in the middle.
Over the past year I have told virtually everyone I know and even complete strangers the story of how I came to Hope, but now that I’ve told that story, now that I’ve been here a year, I’m ready to move on to another story, the story of how God works sometimes quietly and sometimes aggressively to bring you to a place where He can remake you.
The message is not lost on me that God sent me to a church named Hope. For hope, especially in our darkest times, may be the only thing that sustains us.
Hope is faith. It is faith and belief that even when the world seems against us, we know that God has a plan and that because God loves us so much, that plan is the spring to our winter. It is the promise of new life when the world looks so gray.
St. Clement of Alexandria said that “If you do not hope, you will not find what is beyond your hopes.”
I know that I have always lived in a state of hope but that never could I have imagined the wonderful things, the wonderful people, the wonderful world that God has introduced me to this past year.
Every person I meet these days whether it’s here or out there is a blessing to me. And I realize how blind I was, how much I took for granted. How the world passed me by and I barely noticed it.
Have you ever driven to work in the morning and part way through the drive suddenly realized that you have no memory of the last mile or so? You were awake but not seeing.
That was how my life was before I came to Hope. I was awake, but not truly seeing. Now I’m awake and aware.
This year has been the happiest year of my life, despite all the tears I have shed. God is changing me still and I can’t wait to see what happens next.
In Philippians 3:12, Paul writes, “I have not yet reached my goal, and I am not perfect. But Christ has taken hold of me. So I keep on running and struggling to take hold of the prize.”
I am so glad that I get to undertake that same journey here at Hope.
Thank you.
