Trapped Between the Past and  Hope Deferred for the Future. 

 She has created a prison for herself in her own mind, and the only key to open the prison doors, and on to freedom, is time, and yet it is this same time which is also her prison from which she cannot escape.   She lives in the natural looking back of what was, and in the Spiritual of what is to come.  The present doesn't seem to have any life of its own.  

The 80’s was the best decade, then the 90’s came and a slight slope downward had begun.  Life wasn’t just fun anymore; it was more work than fun.  It was doable, though, that was until May of 2006 when life took a deep dive downward.  She thought it was a temporary turn for the worse.  Everyone knows that good and bad times come and go, and neither is permanent.   She did not know that her partner had been dealt a fatal blow with that event of 2006.  She knew he was hit, but she never thought of it as terminal.  She tried to carry hope for both, because she knew Who was in ultimate control and He was a Benefactor, not an adversary.  She knew she had an adversary, and he was sly and brilliant, but she underestimated the damage he could do to her present and her future.  Her hopes were still high, and her trust was stable and sure. 

Hope kept getting more difficult to maintain with each hit from the adversary,  but again, she trusted in the GOD that she knew at that time.  Sadly, she was learning about Elohim from distorted sources.  Unexpectedly, the spring of 2012, was the genesis to the exodus of a life that had appeared to have no happy ending.  In an unlikely place, the true YHWH introduced himself to her in a most real, live, and burning bush way.  He gave her an assignment and promised her that she would succeed.  She had seen and come to know a completely different GOD of the universe from that day forward.  With that hope in her mind and her heart, she worked with vigor and vitality, all while the fires in the fiery furnace of affliction kept burning hotter and hotter. She knew this was God, refining the gold in her, and He gave her a road map as to the kind of woman He would build her to be.   

She was so full of life and hope, that she failed to notice that her partner did not have that same desire and hope, as a matter of fact, his hope for the future had a terminal disease which was about to enter both of their lives in the same year.   She saw this disease as just more weight to her words to help others in the future, while it was the anchor that was sinking her partner’s ship. 

She assumed she had enough hope in her to carry both of them into a wonderful future.  She was gravely mistaken.  Again, she had no idea at the power and ability of her adversary to fatally wound her partner, where even her optimism could not resuscitate life back into him.  He was losing the will to live and hope, and in 2014, it had gone completely and permanently.

As things continued to get worse, life continued its downward slope, with each year spiraling south with greater velocity. At every years’ beginning, she still knew and trusted in the Jehovah Jireh, because He was the great provider.  She believed that one day all the different kinds and colors of threads GOD had carefully weaved into her life would eventually fall into place,  creating a masterpiece tapestry of purpose.  She wanted the weight to her words bring Glory to GOD, hope to the despaired, clarity to the confused, and directions to Paradise for the lost. 

The problem that began to take even her strength and resolution down was the hope deferred of her heart living in spiritual, and mixed signals she was getting from her mind and body living in the ugly details and damning fact of reality.   The great divide was growing an ever-widening chasm that she could not transcend.  Every day she mourns the past when she was a magnificent dreamer, and all had appeared to be going well.  All during the day, Jehovah Rapha, the  GOD who heals teaches her more about Himself, reminding her of His power and ability to change everything in her life in a flash.  Every night ends the same way, though, another day had passed, and He did not do for her what He kept forcing into her heart to hope for against her own will.

 She is, however, grateful for the short periods of coolness under the shadow of His wings as moments of  respite from the fiery flames of the furnace of affliction. Sadly, the ugly truth is He hasn’t turned down the heat from the furnace, and the burns from the flames are  beginning to severely damage not only her, but the faith and trust she had always put in her Elohim, the creator of the universe and the Playwright of her life.  Her dream is still alive, only it's on life support, but we all know the GOD who resurrects that which cannot live on it's own and calls that with is not as if it were.  (Romans 4:17b )