Luke’s Gospel tells us Elizabeth, the mother of John the Baptist, was barren for many years. I can picture Elizabeth averting her gaze and hastening past the crowd outside the gates as the years got long and the hope faded. I can understand how she might have grown weary of the journey—tired of the eyes that watched her and wondered what she could possibly be hoping for, tired of the whispered questions and growing assumptions. I know that tiredness. But I know too that, in that silence, there is a hope that even if God has not answered us the way we wished, he is still good. I know that there is a reality beyond my own dreams that is eternal, a reality that God’s will for me is always leading me back to him, even when it may not look like every dream of mine come true. This hope in God’s goodness is more than hope, really. It is a lifeline, as vital as our next breath. It keeps our quiet hearts going when it seems we cannot bear the looming question over our lives for one more moment. It is a hope I have often clung to in quiet conversation with God.
—from the book Who Does He Say You Are? Women Transformed by Christ in the Gospels
by Colleen C. Mitchell
