Dear Neighbor,
Proverbs 13:13 says, “Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but desire fulfilled is a tree of life.”
What is your hope and desire? My hope is for all things to be made right. To live in a world where everyone loves their neighbor as self. However, this is not the world that I live in. I live in a world of strife and continues conflict. In fact, we are so accustom to it that we do not realize all of the conflict that we are in. There is conflict in almost every area of life. My hope is in Jesus Christ, the resurrection of the dead, the new heaven and earth, the life everlasting, amen.
The desire of my heart is to see my children come to the Lord, for them to follow Jesus Christ and be regenerated by the Holy Spirit. However, my children are not following the Lord, they are each going in the way of the world; therefore, my heart is sick and I confess that I am struggling to have joy. I have joy in the forgiveness of my sins and the promised resurrection of my body and the life everlasting in the new heaven and the new earth. However, my heart is sick with regards to my children, I worry about them and my relationship with them is strained. This is even causing strain in the relationship with my wife. She and I did not ask for the difficulties that we are having with our children. We raised them in the church, yet they have gone the way of the world. There is much of life that is like this; therefore, hope is deferred and my heart is sick.
Michael Peek, BSN, RN, MTS
