Last night was the first night of the Florida Film Festival and Renee the movie(which is about my daughter) was the opening feature film. You can find 
out more about it and watch clips at the website: reneethemovie.com It’s a pretty big deal. It’s a pretty crazy thing to me and to our family! Just thinking about it I am taken back, remembering a very dark time in our journey with my daughter when I had lost all hope. I had given up and resigned myself to her death because of her addictions, serious problems with cutting, severe depression and suicidal tendencies. “Agony” barely describes the depth of what I felt. It’s rough to keep on living and going about your days while your heart is dead and you are breaking into a million little pieces inside, isn’t it? Many of you who are reading this know exactly what I am talking about.
So, when I read the quote below again today, I am reminded of how much it encouraged me the first time I ever read it, about 6 years ago. It reminds me how much we need to have hope! I pray the Lord God himself, the God of ALL hope, will somehow give you a sense of renewed hope if you have lost it or if it is leaking out of your heart.
BUT, (and this may sound strange) not hope that your child will one may be “OK”. . . . instead, I mean Hope that YOU will one day be OK. That God will be with you no matter what. That he will empower you to do the impossible. He will carry you through. He will redeem it all. And of course He will never stop trying to reach them, oh, no! But our hope must be in who He is and what he wants to do in us during this trial.
“You can live 40 days without food,
7 days without water,
And 7 minutes without air;
BUT you can’t live a moment without hope.”
I really like what the Bible says about hope, “May the God of hope fill you with joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.” (Romans 15:13)
I very much agree. One of my favorite quotes that we just studied in Hebrews is in Hebrews 11:1: “Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. “