Hope and Patience

Something made me get up last night as I was drifting off to sleep and felt I needed to read my bible. In my bible cover I have a journal that I've been writing in for a decade! I turned to the first page and I realized then why I needed to get up.

"To hope means to desire with expectation of fulfillment. God is raising our level of expectations and increasing our hope for the future so that our faith may be activated to free us from what we see, strengthen us and give us peace."

Below is a portion of a devotional from Jay Kesler:

[Longsuffering] This quality of courageous patience is one of the fruits of the Holy Spirit (Galatians 5 : 22 - 23). In the King James version, the term is "longsuffering." It seems that significant character change is not possible without pain; look what it cost Christ to buy us the ability to change. Perhaps it's not possible for us help another person grow without pain, either. But there's a special power in the kind if suffering that takes place when a person stands, day in and day out, for what is right. It's the kind of power Jesus displayed when he was reviled but did not revile back. The person who desires change doesn't try to force it, but chooses to live the best way he or she can under the circumstances, trusting in God for daily strength and the final outcome.

2 Corinthains 4 : 7 - 18

Isaiah 40 : 29 - 31

I've been feeling overwhelmed by thoughts of my Dad. Mostly memories and dreams. One dream inparticular was Dad making pancakes like when we were kids. He would ask us which ones we wanted and we would deliberate and make our decision. Sometimes silver dollars, or "Pink Panther", or Mickey Mouse but most of the time it was regular ones because there was a lot of hungry people to feed and they were the quickest. I have a very strong hope to move back to California and be with my family and take care of Dad. I need to be with him as much as he needs me. God's timing is better than anything I could have tried to make happen by myself though.