"Now hope does not disappoint..."

Do you ever find yourself discouraged with whatever season you are enduring right now? Things in life may not be turning out how you expected or how you planned, or maybe the job you have doesn't give you the satisfaction you thought it would. Do you ever find yourself looking at life circumstances and when you look around, you all the sudden find yourself in a "funk"? I don't know about you, but I know I've experienced the "funk" and I was reminded about where our true contentment lies when I read the following excerpt from "The Purple Cellar" in her post titled "Our Vital Need for Hope".

"Contentment is a choice, although at times it is hard to believe that. It just makes no sense. We would give anything to get out of the funk in which we find ourselves. But picking ourselves up by our purse straps just isn't going to do it. We need an answer; we need help. And if we do not get it, what starts out as a mild case of the blues can spiral down into depression, which leads to discouragement, and then, finally, to despair. There is a common thread in each slide we make down this awful spiral—a loss of hope. Each time we move a little lower, it is because a little more hope has died.


The key, of course, to not losing hope is to place our hope in the right things. If we set our hope on something, even a very good something, that we want in this life, we may well lose our hope, because there are no guarantees that we will get the things we want in the here and now. There is only one thing of which we can be sure, and that is God's presence and all the blessings that come with it. Our hopes will find increasing fulfillment if what we hope for is to know more of Christ. Our hopes will be realized if deeper intimacy with our heavenly Father is what we seek. Our hopes will not disappoint if we long to be free of our enslaving sins. We can bank our hopes on any and all of the things God has promised us in his Word."

I've recently been enjoying some posts over at "The Purple Cellar" blog on the topic of contentment. One post spoke that "Contentment is Always an Option" and that no matter what circumstances we find ourselves in or what season we are experiencing, there is always an option to choose to be content. But we have to be looking for our contentment in the right places, we have to be placing our hope where it will not be disappointed.

What a wonderful reminder to set our sights on the things above, to set our hopes where they will not be disappointed. And, the one place that our hopes can safely rest are in the promises of God's word. We find true contentment when we seek (and find!) an intimacy in knowing our Savior and seeking after the things that please Him.

"Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. And not only that, but we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance; and perseverance, character; and character, hope. Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us. For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly."

Romans 5:1-6