Hope for the best, expect the worst......hmmmm

I have never been one to deal with disappointment well. I have high expectations for myself and those around me. I have learned over many hard years to take the stand more of, well, I'll hope for the best, but expect the worst. Jim can't stand this kind of thinking because he thinks it is glass half empty mentality. I choose to see it as something that will allow me to not be disappointed. That was until I read the following from my pastor's blog the other day.

You can read the whole blog here (and I think you should), but the crux of it was that he was having a conversation with someone who pulled out the phrase - expect the worst, hope for the best - and touts it as a horrible phrase. {OUCH} He goes on to say that the phrase completely takes away from your faith, because expectations are a form of faith. He states clearly, you can't have hope for the best when you have faith in the worst. {Double OUCH}

He gives modern day examples of how we can't hope for a job that you think you won't get, or look for your children to do great things, but ultimately think that they might fail. He gives biblical examples of faithful men that believed God would work greatly on their behalf. David believed he would defeat Goliath, and he did.

Why is it so difficult for me to step out, believe wholeheartedly that God could move greatly on my behalf, or in the lives of those I love? So, out with the old, in with the new. Disappointment or not, my new outlook is to have the faith that He can and will move the mountains placed before us all.