Happy Endings

The other night I was reading to my daughter from her Little Princess Devotional when my daughter asked me a question:

What is hope and faith?

We had just seen recent blockbuster Cinderella.  Therefore, with fairy tales fresh on the mind, I explained hope and faith in the best way I thought an eight year old could understand.

Hope is to believe in a happy ending.

"Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen."  Hebrews 11:1 NKJV

"Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see." Hebrews 11:1 NIV  

Biblical "hope" is having a confident expectation of a positive outcome.

Therefore, to have faith is to believe or have a confident expectation of a positive outcome when the evidence is not yet seen.

In the movie Cinderella, there is a point when Cinderella nearly loses her hope.  She almost can't believe in her happy ending.  But, we all know what happens, don't we?  Yes.  Her fairy God-mother shows up!

Sometimes in our lives, we may nearly lose all hope.  We may even feel like we can't go on and there is no use in trying.  It is at those times that we must not lose our hope.  We must continue to believe there is a happy ending.

Cinderella almost gave up.  If she had, it would have cost her a prince and a happiest of endings. Her prince came to her rescue and so will our Prince.

I love this picture of hope as believing in happy endings mostly because it is so simple and child-like.

The Lord says in His Word that we are to have faith as a child and come to Him as a child (Mark 10:15).  Believing is child-like faith.

I understand that life can be hard and your circumstances may look dismal.  In fact, perhaps you are at that place where you have almost lost all hope...hopelessness.  If that is you today, my hope and desire is to encourage you to have hope.  My aim is to encourage you that God has a good plan for you.

We play a part in writing our own stories.  Yes, we make choices daily.  We decide in what direction the plot will turn.  However, as long as our pens are in sync with the Author, we can rest assured He is guiding our story towards a happy ending.

This is the great mystery.  How do we write our own stories when there ultimately is a divine Author.  I may not be able to answer that question, but I do know the Author and I know He is good.

Sometimes our happy endings look different than how we would have written them, but He is a better writer than us  We need to trust the Author.

I trust the Author.

Lord, I trust you.  I pray my pen is hand in hand with Yours.  I thank you that I can be confident for the things I hope for because I can be confident in You.  Thank you Lord for happy endings.  I believe.  Amen. 

Hope...Believe...Trust