I have been listening to this song on repeat for several weeks.  I blare it in my care, I listen to in my earbuds as I work out.  I play it in my classroom as I set up for my upcoming school year. 

I listen to the chorus, to the verses and let them soak down to the trenches of my soul.

And let me tell you, I need these lyrics, like a balm to my wounded bleeding soul. I need to hear these words over and over again.  I need them everyday.

I need the reminder that He is the source of my strength and courage. Everyday. Everyday I need it. 

A year ago, I drug myself back to school, figuratively kicking and screaming the whole way.  I didn’t want to do it all over again.  I didn’t want to climb the mountain of changes and challenges that stood before me.  My life seemed so disappointing and not at all that I wanted it to be.  I was angry, sad, and depressed.  

Now, coming into this school year, I feel so much more hopeful.  Not because of anything I have done, I didn’t just decide one day that life wasn’t disappointing.  I didn’t just wake up one day not depressed or anxious anymore.  However, I did stop believing the lie that I had to figure it out and do it on my own. 

I let his truth start soaking into my soul again.  When I began doing that, it was as if the whole world began to open up again.  Anything was possible. All was not lost.  God began revealing all that he was doing in my life and those around me. 

It made me braver in my prayers and voicing my hopes and desires.  It made me dream a little bigger and bravely give over those dreams to the Lord.  It freed me from placing my hopes in my circumstances and in him who controls them. 

Friends, it doesn’t make those hard things less hard or less painful, but it gives you strength and power.  Hegives you strength and power, that you won’t have on your own.  He gives you a hope that doesn’t rest on the outcome of those hard things.  He gives you a hope secure.

He is the source of hope, strength, power, and courage when we have none left.  He is the one we can look to at all times to work on our behalf. 

That’s why I am listening to this song, over and over.  So that, THAT truth, that HE makes me brave, will be an anthem to my weary soul, when things inevitably get tough, when I will surely be anxious and fearful.