“But as for me,

I will always have hope;

I will praise you more and more.”

Psalm 71:14

A couple months back I went to the Bay Area with two friends because a friend was recording a song in a home recording studio. At one point my friend Joanne got a word of knowledge (insight from God into someone’s life) for the woman across the street. After Joanne prayed for the woman, we all were invited inside to pray for her mother, on her “deathbed” in the kitchen. We prayed and the woman felt better, but well, I probably should have just yanked that woman off that bed and made her stand – staring despair in the face and grabbing on to faith and hope. Faith activates healing. As Jesus said in Luke 18:42, “your faith has healed you.” Sometimes we need a good yanking to get out of moping and into HOPING, which leads to healing.

People are dying of hopelessness, tiredness, and despair often long before they ever die of “diseases.” This is atrocious. Jesus came to give us life and life abundant. Hope is ALIVE!!!!!!!! And it gives LIFE!!! What I’m saying is: God wants to HEAL US. We must stop partnering with tiredness, despair, and gloom. And we must stick up for others who have lost sight of hope.

Jesus is HOPE. If you are struggling with hopelessness, stick your head in heaven and inhale deeply. God wants you FULL OF HOPE. That is His design for your life. YES! It’s really a scrumptiously, brilliant design!!! And it’s easier than you think. haha. infinitely easier. wa ha ha ha ha!

Here’s my Dr Seuss-ian poem about that. I pray it stirs your spirit, lifts you to your feet, and empowers you to let Hope squish squoosh squash tiredness in your own life.

Hope is a happy elephant that sits on tiredness.

Caridad was sad, too sad, so sad.

In a bed, waiting for dead sad.

Now seventy, her levity

Was twiddle-whicked,

Thumb-flicked,

So                    faaaaaaar away, more than a day

Hiding, like a flea in a dog’s mane

Hiding, like a clear thought in the not-so-sane

Kidney disease,

Kidney dizzies

And other “stuff” full of fluff

Her daughter, weary

Eyes bleary

The doctors’ words, gooshed and smooshed

The hope

The dream

To see their native

Phillipine (s)

One last time,                   time,                    time

The very word tocked  a rhyme

“time” the daughter said

eyes picturing her mother dead

The word, it scurred, and blurred

And fell down there, on their tile floor

In their kitchen

Somethin’ was missin’

And when we prayed

Her hope got up

Caridad sat up (because I asked her to)

Grew tired,

Hope was fired.

And despair, mouthing “beyond repair”

Was there. Unwelcomely welcome.

I hate the tiredness.

Holy Spirit unwiredness

Seeing not the kidneys,  oh please

Not dying from a disease

Of the body, not shoddy,

Not shoddy, that body

The Truth, a sleuth

Seeing that before one’s body went shoddy

So much, of much, much much, indeed

Would not be from the physical,

No, that was not the seed

It was tiredness

The enemy’s liar-ness

Taking life, and Jesus’ to-be wife

From her fullness, royal coolness

I should have had

This Caridad

Not just sit-up,

but GET UP

Yanked her out of her bed

Of dread, that bed, so overfed

With tiredness snacks

Yuck. What muck. So stuck. Waiting for “luck.”

Her name means charity

What clarity, what severity

To compel love,

the dove

On my shoulder,

better to be bolder

To stand up,

For sitters, for quitters, for bitters, for scared of Hope jitters

And take my pet elephant, Hope

And squish, squooosh, squash the mope

Strong, heavy, immovable

Never seeing things “undoable”

In the room, kill the doom

And let Hope have power

To heal, to save, to shower

The hopeless with laughter

The depressed with haha-hafter

Appily ever hafter. Hat is.

Just perfect, the Father.

My Dad, so glad.

He’s loves Hope, shabbity showpe.

And Caridad.