Quote:

"Hope is a battle. Every day. Some days, it's harder to find. But it's always there."

— Reverie Adams, Undrafted

Context:

TJ Collins from the novel, Undrafted, is a boy who lost everyone he loves. Reverie Adams, TJ's best friend, does everything she can to comfort him.

TJ is going through so much pain, I can hardly imagine what it would be like for me to have to go through that. With a vigilante tracking his every move, it makes things even harder. Plus caring for his younger sister, Riya, through all of the pain. Making sure she stays safe and away from the Archer. His love for his sister gets to the point where TJ had to rob a warehouse for food.

By the end of Drafted, (book 1 of the duology) his life feels over. He gets kidnapped, and later rescued, but while he was away, he feels hopeless as he got tortured for information he didn’t have. Even after he gets rescued, nothing will ever be the same. He and everyone else knows it. He is hopeless.

By the end of Undrafted (book 2) his life feels completly ruined.

And sometimes, our lives feel ruined and out of control.

Hopeless.

I think there are two versions of hope: Big Hope, and Little Hope. And no, I don’t mean that however hopeful you create the difference between Big Hope and Little Hope.

For me, the Big Hope is what relates to God. How all our hope is in Him. All my hope is in Jesus. –David Crowder. And also Psalm 62:5 is a great reference on finding hope in God, and God alone.

He’s in complete and total control, and while, sometimes we’re like TJ and our life is spinning out of control, we need to have hope in God that he’ll work all of it out– because He can.

Then the Little Hope I think of is more ‘earthly’ things. “Oh, I hope this or that happens.” or “Man, I was really hoping that was going to happen.” Things that we can have some control over.

I’ll use Naomi as an example from the Bible.

If you’ve ever read the book of Ruth, you should know that, in chapter 1, Naomi becomes widowed. Because she was no longer married, she had to go back to the town of Bethlehem.  There, she had people call her “Mara”, which means bitter. The reason why she had people call her that is because she felt hopeless, like TJ did in Drafted. She no longer had a husband, which means she didn’t have a way to get money.

But Ruth, her daughter-in-law, trusted God, and had hope in Him. In the end of the story, Naomi regains her hope in God, and the story ends beautifully.

So, all in all, when you’re like TJ or Naomi, and when life feels hopeless, trust in God, because everything is working out for the good. He loves you, and doesn’t want you to lose hope in him. 

Psalm 62:5— "For God alone, O my soul, wait in silence, for my hope is from Him."‭

Written by: Hannah Grace