Practicing Hope Part 3

~ DanaeASmith

Today’s post is the third and last installment of a three part series brought to you by TheReddingProject’s first guest blogger Luke T. Jones. We ended Practicing Hope 1 asking the question how to sustain hope. Last week, Luke shared about an unlikely mentor, JP, who aided in the revelation in Practicing Hope 2. Today, Luke ties it all together with some practical steps.

So what are some things we can do in our everyday lives to sustain a towering inferno of hope? How can we walk in unshakable faith? Here are 5 exercises I personally do in my life and have worked for me. Some of these might be familiar to you if you are a Bethel student; for others this may be new. I encourage you all to apply them to your lives as an exercise you can do with Holy Spirit together. REMEMBER, these principles are not magic pills and are to be done out of partnership with God. That being said, let’s look at five ways we can all practice hope:

  1. DAILY DECLARATIONS OF THE WORD OF GOD. If Faith comes by hearing the Word, and is the confidence in what we HOPE for, then to me the first step in cultivating radical hope like my mentor JP, is declare the promises of God over my life everyday. Declaring Bible scriptures like 1 Peter 2:24, Philippians 4:13-19, Deuteronomy 1:11, and many more are a great way to release a fresh flame of hope each and every morning. Also declare prophetic words you’ve received from peers and prophets. Remember, the root of hope and faith is the Word of God!
  2. FEASTING ON TESTIMONIES.  The second thing I do is live completely drenched in testimonies. This looks like watching youtube videos of breakthrough and miracles, reading lots and lots of books by fiery revivalists and successful people, listening to other people’s stories, hanging out in places where the miracles are happening, as well as sharing all of the amazing things God has done in my life with others. Revelation 10:19 tells us that the “testimony of Jesus is the Spirit of prophecy.” The Hebrew root word for testimony ‘uwd [Strong’s 5749] literally translates as ‘to repeat, duplicate, or do again.’ In other words, any written or spoken account of ANYTHING God has done releases His power to do the same thing over again. Living in a constant barrage of testimony is one way to renew the mind and stirs  the flames of hope as we live in expectancy and awe of our all-powerful God to move on our behalf. When I constantly see, hear, and experience God’s works, it acts like fresh logs dropped on my hope fire. Live in the land of testimony!
  3. LAUGHING AT THE LIES OF SATAN. This one may sound silly to non-Bethelites, but it’s actually very practical as well as good for your heart! The Bible says in Psalm 2 that God laughs at the plans of His enemies. One of the strategies of Satan to discourage and bring Christians into hopelessness is to lie to us about everything under the sun. In Steve Backlund’s class, we laugh at the lies of the devil at the start of every day. This is a useful tool that helps us break off the devil’s lies that keep us down and release God’s truth to build us up and to keep our hope-fire a raging!
  4. DREAMING WITH GOD: PLAYING THE WHAT-IF GAME. This one is something that’s come in really handy lately. I call this the “what if game with God.” NOT like the what-if game you’re probably thinking of. The what-if game with God is just the opposite. Instead of dreaming up regretful situations and scenerios, I dream up world-changing, history-making situations that only God could orchestrate. Here’s an example: “What if today…is the day I get so much financial breakthrough….I can effectively end world hunger FOREVER!” Or, “What if today….I  get so much healing anointing….when I walk into a hospital EVERYONE gets healed.” These may sound stupid, but I’m telling you they will change the way you think about what’s possible, and train your mind to dream big. Playing the what-if game with God in this context is another log on the fire of hope. Here’s one for you, “What if today is the day you get filled with so much hope…disappointment NEVER has power over you again?” In the words of my mentor JP, “Hey, it can happen!”
  5. PROPHESYING OVER YOURSELF. This is an off-shoot of our first principle. The only difference is instead of you declaring what God has already said, here you are declaring FRESH rhema words from God over yourself. You’re listening to Holy Spirit and speaking over yourself in conjunction with what He is saying in the moment. Remember, faith and hope are connected to the Word of God!

If I had to narrow this post down to one sentence, it would be this: Don’t let go of your hope. Like JP, we can live in radical expectancy that everything God has promised can happen at any moment. You have a part of play in hope. Hope can be sustained and maintained. It’s not just some ethereal thing based on circumstances. It’s something we can cultivate in partnership with Holy Spirit to live lives of unshakable faith. I encourage everyone who has stuck with me this far to try doing each of these five things for the next five days and see what happens. I bet you won’t ever be the same again. I haven’t. All thanks to a little boy who wanted to see angels just like his friend Roger.

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