“Blessed are those whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the Lord their God.” Psalms 146:5 NIV
The psalmist in this verse is encouraging everyone who reads this verse or hears it to put their trust and hope in God. We often put our hope in other people, whether they are people we know or people we look up to. The challenge with this is that they are people, human and as people and humans we are not perfect. We let others down, others let us down. By placing our hope in others and not God, we are setting ourselves up to be disappointed, hurt and discouraged.
When we place our hope in God, we are placing it with the only perfect being. We could argue that even when we place our hope in God, we can be disappointed or discouraged. However, if we are willing to look at what is going on, what we are disappointed or discouraged about, we usually find that our disappointment or discouragement is occurring because we wanted a certain outcome and we didn’t get what we wanted.
Since God is perfect, not us, He knows what we need and what is the perfect outcome for each one of us. The result we are looking for may not be the best result for us and since God knows that, He gives us what we need, what is best for us. Those who place their lives, their decisions, their hopes in God are blessed and they will tell you they are blessed, if asked.
Where do you place your hope, who do you want help from, others or God?