When Hopes are Dashed

Today it has been courageous to just breathe. 

This morning on my garden rounds, I was dismayed. (I’ll blame it on the dog.) A whole stalk of happy, healthy, newly burgeoning strawberries had been lopped off at the base. There they lay—picked clean from their roots. The immature, pale fruits were still radiant in their early growth, not yet shriveled by the loss of connection—but it was only a matter of time.

And today, I feel just like those strawberries.

Severed and lost.

I thought I’d been growing. I thought healing and hope were finally taking root. My tender expectations had begun to sprout—only to be abruptly severed. This isn’t the first time. Just the latest in a long line of many, many hopes followed by losses. I suppose this is part of life: we hope, we invest in that hope, we begin to see the fruit... and then, suddenly, some unexpected twist cuts it all down. What once seemed like vibrant promise becomes waste. A sour, unripe, unpalatable reminder of what could have been.

Like Job, in my grief I feel like water poured out. I know God has been with me—and still, today, I find myself asking why I was born. Wondering whether it might’ve been better if I hadn’t been.

Does that make me faithless?

Is acknowledging pain and suffering a sign of weakness? Of sin? Of self-pity?

Some might say so. I ask myself those questions, too. I wonder—where are you, faith? Hope, have you left me entirely?

But then I remember: “In all this, Job did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing.” (Job 1:22) Even when Job cursed the day of his birth, God did not condemn him. That tells me—this grief, this questioning, this aching lament—does not disqualify my faith. It is part of faith.

I still believe joy comes in the morning. But that doesn’t erase the pain of the night. Like a woman in labor, or like Job in his suffering, I do not curse God—but I do cry out for relief. I grieve what’s been lost. I struggle to imagine a future that doesn’t hurt. And still, somewhere deep in the ache, I believe there’s something worth clinging to—even if I can’t see or feel it right now.

Maybe that’s what these moments are for: to remind us we can’t do this alone. Not even just with God in the quiet of our closet. Yes, we must turn to Him there—but then, we must also turn outward. To serve. To be served. To carry and be carried. That is where the manna is found—not in abundance, but one bite at a time. Not enough to make it all okay, but just enough for one more step. Or sometimes, just one more breath.

And today—for me—that was the bravest thing I could do.

Just to breathe.