Hi, everyone. I have a word of encouragement I want to share with you, that the Lord wants to strengthen your heart. Some of you might be in a season where hopelessness is at the forefront of your mind, and where you’re at currently is not where you thought you would be or where you want to be. But I have a verse that will encourage you. Proverbs Proverbs 13:12 says, “Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a desire fulfilled is a tree of life.” I want you to know that you’re not alone in those feelings of hopelessness, actually many people in the Bible experience this hope deferred that you might be experiencing.

For example, Israel, God’s chosen nation, endured 400 years of slavery, and when God finally delivered them out, they were on their way to the Promised Land. As they were on this journey to the Promised Land in the wilderness, they began to become really discouraged, and hope deferred was a real thing. They began to want to go back to Egypt, the place where they were first enslaved, and they forgot the promises that the Lord had made to them. What did God do about this? God actually reminded them of His covenant towards Israel. He reminded them of the breakthroughs that He had given them in the past, the way that He had delivered them in the past. And as they began to be reminded that the Lord was with them and the Lord was not going to stop His covenant towards them, they began to press on towards the Promised Land.

They were in the middle of the desert. They didn’t see the Promised Land yet. They actually went through it for 40 years, through this wilderness, trying to get to the Promised Land, but because the Lord reminded them and was faithful to them, they were able to press on. Look at the power of this testimony. The Lord wants to encourage you through testimonies. Sometimes when we are feeling down or discouraged, we tend to micro-focus and look at our current circumstances. And that’s all we can see, but the Lord wants to strengthen your heart by reminding you of the faithfulness and the past that He has given to you. He wants to remind you of the ways that He has shown up, and the Lord wants to strengthen your heart as you lean into the testimony.

If the Lord has done it before, He will do it again, and He wants to encourage you. So Lord, I just thank you for the testimony and the power of it, and that you will do it again in the lives of everyone watching this. And we just pray for strength, strengthened hearts, that this hope deferred will actually turn into a tree of life. Amen.

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