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John Hembree

An Everyday Expression of Hope and Its Potential

An Everyday Expression of Hope 

If It Weren’t For Hope…

November 14, 2012 by John Hembree Leave a Comment

A beautiful quote of promise, of character and of heart break.

“Great hopes make great men and if it weren’t for hope the heart would break.” Thomas Fuller

Yet we as people continue to press forward.

Last week I was at lunch with a friend of mine and he and I were talking about ethical situations we might one day face. As we batted the issue around hypothetically, he then grew more somber in tone and said, “When my brother passed away at the age of four, my mother and father had to decide to end his life by ceasing to keep him alive by a life support system.”

His brother was four years old and he himself was seven. His father and mother were in their twenty’s, young, still trying to find their own way in life.

Now, within just a few days, this young four year old child went from healthy to the threshold of death. A father who had lived life fully but by christian standards. Now the father was helpless.

Yet, through the passing of his four year old son, this wayward man found a path of hope for himself and for his family.

I am intentionally leaving out a lot of details related to the story.

I could not keep myself from asking this question to my friend. “What kind of loving God would allow the death of a four year old little boy to bring a father back to God?”

A God that would allow the death of His son as well so that He might express his love to us all.

In that I can hope and find hope.

And I can find great hop and hopefully be made a great man.

Because if not for that hope, the heart would break.

JHH

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