Hope Chest

I often find it difficult to cope with the aching loneliness I feel in my heart from time to time. It is a feeling I know will never truly go away until I am married someday. In the meantime, however, I have recently discovered some new, slightly unusual, ways to ease the ache.

Whenever life has gotten overwhelming, and the feeling of loneliness begins to become unbearable, I do several things.

The first thing I do, is make a conscious decision to give the desires of my heart over to God, and I pray that He would give me the strength to do so, and ask for His peace and comfort. When I truly make that decision, God never fails to give me His peace and strength. Hiss faithfulness is never-ending. When I am able, I also often pull out my guitar, and sing songs of praise and worship to my amazing God.

Another thing that I do, is I write. For a long time now, whenever I am having trouble praying, I would write out my prayer. I would write to God. I always seem to able to organize my thoughts through writing even when I can't in any other way.

All of these things above I have done for quite a while now. Recently though, I have begun to do something that is a little different. Of course I still do all of the things I have always done, but I have also begun to write letters. Letters to my future husband.

I am trying to make sure I always go to God first, of course. God is my hope, my strength, and my everything. But after I talk to God, if I feel like I still need someone to talk to, I write these letters.

In these letters I have begun to pour out my heart and soul. I express my love for the man whom I may or may not have met yet, but whom one day I will marry, and live my life with until the day I die. In these letters I am completely unguarded and vulnerable with my heart. I express my dreams, fears, frustrations, and weaknesses. I talk of both the joy and the pain in my life. I talk of my past, and my hope for the future.

And it feels so good. I know that all they are is unread letters right now, but it helps my heart to be at rest knowing that one day a man whom truly cares for me deeply will read them and see my heart for what it is.

At the public school that I take a class at right now, I am going to take wood shop once a week now. In that class my project is going to be a wooden chest. That chest is going to be my hope chest. When it is finished it will contain all my dearest possessions. The things I have from my mom, my favorite childhood books, all my scrap-booking things that I have been collecting, my old diaries, old writing notebooks... And these letters. All of these things I will save in this chest to remind me of the joys of the past, and the hope I have in the Lord for my future.