Hope Is the First DoseShembull

“Recovering from Your TMT”

Sooner or later, all of us suffer what I call The Massive Thing, or TMT. These life traumas cause us tremendous pain and produce a sense of being lost or out of control. They trigger emotional and even physical problems that reach into every area of our lives. They are, in every way, massive things.

My TMT?

One evening in 2013, I got a phone call: my son, Mitch, and his friend had both died of knife wounds.

I don’t need to tell you the whole story of losing my son but let me just say that it made me infinitely sad, hopeless, tormented, lost, and faithless for a while. Your massive thing will likely do the same to you.

In a world where TMTs are not only possible but common, it seems impossible to align two things Jesus said.

• In John 16:33, he promised that in this world we would have trouble.
• In John 10:10, he promised that he came to the world to enable us to have an abundant life.

How do these things square up?

They square up because of hope.

The Bible says that faith is the evidence that the things we hope for are really true (Hebrews 11:1). And hope is the light on the path back to happiness so that we can still live while we’re waiting to get there from here.

I have recovered from my TMT, though it was by no means quick or easy. In these devotionals, I will begin to introduce the treatment plan for TMTs that I describe more fully in my book Hope Is the First Dose. TMTs leaves us hammered, comatose, with our nerves crushed. The treatment plan can bring us back.

What would you identify as your “massive thing”? How has it affected you, and where are you in the process of trying to recover from it?