Ruthless Hope!!!

Hope and trust.

Conjoined twins.

It's been mentioned over and over in the 40-now blogs I've posted on hope.

So, I don't know why I was struck this week, by this sentence, which uses the following underlined phrase, in such a haunting way.

Beginning a new devotional plan in my YouVersion Bible App (Ragamuffin Reflections from Brennan Manning), I stopped reading with this sentence/underlined phrase:

Through countless hours of silence, solitude, soul-searching and prayer, I learned that the act of trust is an utterly ruthless act...

I've read a lot of Manning.

I've read his Ragamuffin Gospel, several times.

Never, did I pick up or underline this sentence prior.

Neither, did I realize, come to find out later, that he had also written a book, which he titled, Ruthless Trust.

The two words combined seemed odd to me.

They didn't juxtapose well together.

I often treat faith as a passive noun.

An attitude more than an action.

Add ruthless as an adjective, and, well, it changes EVERYTHING about faith...and HOPE!

It makes them both much more active.

Harsh, almost.

Because, as we all know, to be ruthless is to be without mercy, to show no pity, take no remorse.

To have ruthless faith thus would mean, I never let up, let go, leave behind, or run ahead of the SOURCE OF MY TRUST.

NEVER!

Ruthless faith finds nary an excuse or justification to "take a break."

It holds tightly to the CONVICTION, a KNOWING, that never stops for a moment to grip HOPE without wavering.

It only makes sense that hope is also without pity.

No matter what, we cling to it tenaciously.

We keep pounding on Providence's door, with the unfailing promises of God,  waiting for our God to swing it wide on the hinges of peripety.

How can we have ruthless trust (ruthless hope)? Because we know the God who loves us and we are certain of His faithfulness toward us!

Then Manning says this:

I will trust to the degree I know I am loved...

How much more can God prove His love to me than through the cross?

This thought changes everything about the tenacity of my hope!

Hold fast!