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In 2 Corinthians 4, Paul is talking to people whose lives have become hard and whose stories are messy. When he writes in vs 1, "Therefore, since through God’s mercy we have this ministry, we do not lose heart," we should realize that when he wrote those words, "through God's mercy we do not lose heart," he wrote them because people were losing heart.

And the reality is that life is not always easy.

So here's the challenge that I get from 2 Corinthians 4.  Let's be honest about our story--the mess and the difficulty--but in the midst of the honesty,  don't lose heart. Don't let your hearts get hard.  Don't stop taking the risk of love.  Don't give up. Don't lose heart. Sometimes life is just hard, but that doesn't mean it can't be good.  Even when we get stuck in hard days, we hope, because when God is the author of our story, then hope is the story of our life. 

And in fact, hope is birthed in the crucibles of life. This idea of a crucible is woven throughout scripture. In Proverbs 17:3 it says,  The crucible is for silver and the furnace for gold, but the Lord refines the heart.  In 2 Corinthians 4, Paul is talking about the crucible experiences of life.  Here is our problem. We want change without the crucible. We want glory without the pain. We want resurrection without death. But there is only one path. The crucible leads to change. Pain leads to glory and death leads to resurrection life.  Don't lose heart. Hope is the story of your life!