High Hopes

Let all that I am wait quietly before God, for my hope is in him.

Psalm 62:5

The first ten years of Mark’s and my marriage were definitely not a perfect ten. One of our biggest problems was my unfair, high hopes and expectations of my true “knight in shining armor” husband.

Unfortunately for Mark, he had a very tough act to follow—my daddy. My sweet but “all man” daddy not only fixed breakfast with fresh fruit every morning for our family, he also polished our shoes left outside his bedroom door. Can you imagine the reaction from my new husband when I took my shoes to him right after the honeymoon was over? He wasn’t in the habit of polishing his own shoes very much, since he’s a physical education teacher and coach who wears tennis shoes almost every day. And then his young bride shows up with these expectations.

It wasn’t like I had come into marriage unprepared. I had read so many Christian books on marriage. I was marrying a wonderful Christian man, and I was a Christian, too, so what real problems could we have? Surely our Christian marriage would be perfect! It didn’t dawn on me until much later that the authors of those Christian books had much more marriage experience than I had. I am grateful that those first ten years are behind us and that our marriage grows sweeter and more precious every day. We’ve learned to work as a team even though we still see many issues differently.

There is really only one perfect person we can put our hope in at all times—the Lord Jesus Christ. He will never disappoint us.

Let our hopes be high in Him! Study more about hope that doesn’t disappoint by reading Romans 5:5. Consider the difference between hoping for something and the certainty of our hope in God.