Embrace the gift of hope this holiday season
"Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction."
- Romans 12:12 (NIV)
Is your long-desired gift waiting for you in that stack under the tree this year? Or, is it a gift too large or elusive to fit under the tree?
Christmas is a time of hope; however, many people get disillusioned this time of year. The thing they long for can't be found under the tree, nor can their desires be wrapped in a package.
The mate they want is long overdue, the career they were planning has taken its place on the back burner while a son or daughter goes to college, or there just isn't enough cash to leave their existing job and start a business of their own.
Some are looking for a healing in their bodies and are reminded by the daily aches and pains that each day is one more of disappointment and discouragement. Many are waiting for the salvation of a loved one. The situations are endless.
The Christmas story starts with a disillusioned old priest, Zechariah, who has been waiting a lifetime for a child for him and his barren wife Elizabeth. Then one day, while he tends that alter of incense in the temple, he receives an angel visitation. The angel informs him that he and Elizabeth will receive the long awaited dream of a child.
This will not be any ordinary child, but one who will announce the way to the Messiah, Jesus Christ, who gives us hope.
This shows how God brought back to life Zechariah and Elizabeth, and will not leave our lives empty and barren either. God has already set in motion a force that will bring those barren dreams of ours to pass - it's called hope.
If we would operate in hope, it would dissipate our despair. We would see this spiritual force lift our spirits and help hold us to our dreams - even if they take a lifetime to fulfill, like Zechariah and Elizabeth's.
God's appointed time is awaiting our dreams, wrapped in the gift of hope. We won't find hope waiting under the tree, for there is no gift box big enough to contain the height, depth, length and breadth of it.
Won't you join me in receiving the greatest gift there is this year? The gift of hope.
• Annettee Budzban is a Christian author, speaker, life coach and nurse. She is available to speak at your church or group. She can be contacted at (847) 543-8413; P.O. Box 532 Grayslake, IL 60030; or Annetteebudzban@aol.com.