Not in the Outcome

 
 Hope is an interesting thing, sometimes in my own life I connect hope to a hope in a specific outcome, not necessarily just in something I want, but also in something I feel the Lord wants for me as well. Yet when we place our hope and faith in specific, quantified outcomes we lose faith in the true matter at hand, in our Heavenly Father and his actions in our lives.
   Yes I believe that Heavenly Father will follow through on His promises and His directions, if He is directing you to do something we would all do well to follow that direction, yet it shouldn't be just to get what we want, we should be following Him because we know He loves us and wants what best for us and as we follow Him we will learn and grow in ways we never thought we could.
    Sometimes we are afraid to follow the direction we receive, because we're afraid we interpreted it incorrectly, or we have past experiences that we prepared what we could, but things still didn't work out quite the way we thought they would. This is ultimately where faith comes in, the outcome shouldn't matter, we followed the Spirit, we know we'll end up just where we should and if it doesn't work out the way we expected we know that Heavenly Father's comfort will only be a prayer away.
   Sometimes faith requires action without logic, acting because we feel we should, not because we see the end. Two farmers needed rain. One farmer spent his time on his knees praying for rain while the other farmer started on his knees, then went to prepare his field. I hope that we will all choose to be the latter farmer, that we will have courage to go prepare whatever field Heavenly Father has placed on our heart to prepare and that we will learn that He is at the beginning and end of every direction He sends to us.

Remember faith is in God, not the outcome.