Hope | Michelle Courtney

I believe in the sun when it is not shining.

I believe in love even when I cannot feel it.

I believe in God even when he is silent.

When I first saw this on a print in a shop, I cried. It touched me so deep emotionally, and

I wasn’t sure why. My husband purchased the print for me, and it hangs in our living room.

Every time I passed it, I cried and would become so emotional.

It’s not a beautiful print of flowers or pretty colors, no pictures of people or animals, not even any special fonts, nor does it have a beautiful frame to outline it.

Just plain and simple.

So, I decided to pray and ask God, what it was in me that was causing such emotions to rise up, what do I need to learn from it.

I believe in the sun when it is not shining……DEPRESSION

I believe in love even when I cannot feel it…..LONELINESS

I believe in God even when He is silent………DESPAIR

Have you ever experienced any of these feelings? I have. Have you felt them more during these times of uncertainty? I have.

I did some research on the print because it is listed as “author unknown”. I also found out it was written on the wall of a cellar by a Jewish prisoner in the Cologne concentration camp during the Holocaust of WWII. I cried again.

HOPE, that’s what it is, HOPE. Despite circumstances.

Psalm 42:5

Why are you downcast O my soul? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God.

For I will yet praise Him, my Savior and my God.

I have learned to have hope in a God who gives;

Beauty for ashes

Gladness for mourning and

praise instead of despair.

God never promised our journey would be easy, but He did promise He would NEVER LEAVE US!