Dear Love,
I was there during those first steps,
Cheered every move,
I wiped off every fear of falling,
Made walking a familiar groove,
And when it was mastered,
I just knew,
That I wasn’t needed anymore,
So I was made to bid adieu
Years passed by and time saw a broken leg,
There came a memory of me,
helping you take those first steps,
So, I was brought back,
but a bigger, sturdier version,
And I was asked to wipe off every apprehension,
I did it and saw the legs walking again,
But then I was made to leave and not remain.
Years passed by and time saw the grey head,
I was remembered again, but this time on the sick bed,
So, I was brought back to see the oldage dread,
“Those legs aren’t weak!” is all that I said.
Love, like me trusts in the weak and makes them strong,
Your Love mends,
Every broken bone, every wrong,
Love doesn’t see the trembling steps,
Instead it sees the robust legs,
Legs, that are capable of the fastest sprint,
Yet needs to be impelled to break free from the splint,
Your Love incites courage and deters fear,
As You watch the race and shout out cheer.
Love,
The Walker
Footnotes:
This clause from the “Love chapter” is closely associated with the previous one, “Love believes all things” and the yet it is very distinct from the other. “Hopes all things” means to looking for the best to happen in the future, while ‘believes all things” is mostly pertaining to the present. In the original Greek text, the word hope is ‘elpizo’ which is translated as ‘trust’ or ‘expect’. We have a lot of expectations on people even if we say we have none, don’t we? But when these expectations are on us, we tend to retaliate. And, what happens when people don’t meet our expectations?—we write them off as a lost cause.
When I initially moved to UAE with my husband, I was super excited to meet new people and live in a new culture. Little did I know that I was stepping into days of loneliness and culture shock. The idea was to socialise with my husband’s friends and make them my friends. Afterall, we all need community, don’t we? And my next idea was to be actively involved in church. Both these ideas were indeed great but both went South in a blink. I absolutely did not fit into my husband’s friends’ circle. Neither did I fit in the church. As a result, I had zero friends and no community here. I expected nothing good to come out of this place or people here. And honestly, I just tolerated the monotony of life, my husband’s friends and the church. I wrote them all off as ‘hopeless’. And I never saw myself being happy in this country.
It was only recently that this verse struck me. Plainly, ‘to hope all things’ means that we never consider another a lost cause. It means we never give up on each other, even when the other falls short of the expectations you set. Hoping all things yields a willingness to encourage each other as fellow runners in this race called life. Our aim as a Christian: Nobody should be left behind. Afterall, we are all work in progress, aren’t we?
Like the walker that cheers us on when we take our every step, let us cheer the ones around. Yes, you may be abandoned at some point of time but remember that you are placed in some people’s lives only for a season. After that season of cheering them on and helping them run, God places you in another person’s life. Maybe, another land altogether. So, hope for the best and don’t strike off people from your list just because they fall short of your expectations.
Seasons change, people change, but God does not—He is our greatest hope.