A WORD of the Year Informs my Days and my Life
/Here we are again, friends. Another year has past, and for many it’s a time for the infamous “New Year Resolutions.” But a few years ago I turned away from that often hopeful, but dreaded “setting up for failure,” tradition to a new thing altogether.
And thank God, because 2020 has destroyed any expectations and traditions I may have expected to rehearse again this year. So my yearly quest to discern my God-given word of the year stood me in good stead during this year of amazing change … never quite knowing which end was up.
So may I rehearse with you my journey out of resolutions into receiving — out of the self-effort-laden “to do list” into the revelation-unfolding rest of the Word for my year.
In my own words…
Resolutions are no temptation to me anymore. I’ve given up trying to change myself by my own self-effort. The indwelling Christ is my “Game-changer” and my “Life-changer.” And a few years ago, He brought a lovely “new thing” to my attention … the idea of a word for my year. So for the past several years, I have had my word. But my word had never stuck until in 2016 when I stepped aside and allowed the Lord to “give” it to me, rather than try to come up with one on my own.
So each year my word just seems to “find me.” Every year it has appropriately come in the midst of my “all too real-life” circumstances. At the end of each year, as I was thinking blank thoughts of what the coming year could hold, there it would be, my word for my year. And can I just say, it was right every time. Here is briefly what the last several years have held:
In 2016, my blood pressure had shot up because of everything going on. In the midst of it all, the Lord reminded me of advice I had received years before, “let life unfold.” So “unfolding fullness” became my “mantra” for 2016. And each day I journaled how the previous day had unfolded and prayed about the unfolding to come.
Then in 2017, overcome with thoughts of inadequacy to face what was ahead, I welcomed the Lord’s word for the year, “daily bread.” I knew Him as my Provision and Sustenance for each event as it came.
In 2018, as my blood pressure shot up again, my word came: “rest, just rest.” I found myself drawn into rest over and over again, often because of sickness or medical procedures for my husband or myself.
Then again as 2019 began. . . I began to fear there would be no new word. I was just blank. Nothing seemed to be unfolding. But I knew better than to go looking for one. Then one day, as in the past, my word found me — “Wait …wait on Me and My timing.” And the Lord actually set me up to wait on Him. Wait on Me came through a retreat message I was preparing. The same Word grabbed hold of my soul through long and recurring bouts of vertigo and dizziness and the resulting diagnosis of past strokes as the cause of it all. And without my consciously realizing, the same message sustained me through my twenty hyperbaric treatments that followed. *
So now for 2020. I wrote at the beginning of the year:
Only God knows what this coming year holds. I have been waiting on Him, again feeling blank and thinking that maybe I will just live out more intentionally all my previous words. Then all of a sudden, I think my word came. It just seemed to be plopped into my mind: WRITE!
And the interesting thing is that as the pandemic began to ramp up in March, I wrote and wrote and wrote on my blog.** And then again I wrote lessons for my ZOOM Bible class in the fall. This wasn’t the “writing” I had thought it would be… not my devotional book that is still simmering in my soul. But Write I did. And it was God’s speaking Voice writing through my keyboard.
So now for 2021. Again…who knows but God what this year will unfold? But I believe I do have His Word for my year … Write and Submit. So maybe this is the year for my devotional book. We will see as God unfolds the year ahead.
And so I again pray . . .
Thank you, O God, for this past year. May all my “words” keep coming together to shape and form me into Your image and glory while I’m still walking with You on this earth. And if this year’s word truly is Write and Submit, may I wait on You for every word, because You are my Bread and You are my indwelling Fullness for everything I face. I rest and receive it all from You. And because I am already submitted to YOU, O my King, I will follow Your lead in submitting my writing wherever you open the door. In Jesus’ Name. Amen.
What about you, my friend? Does a word keep coming to you? Ask the Lord about it. Maybe that’s the Word HE is giving you for the year ahead. He IS the Word, you know!
And as always, I would love to hear what you discern. Consider leaving a message below.
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*If you are interested to hear more details about God meeting me in my dizziness as I waited on Him, check out these a few posts:
Starting from Scratch: a Retreat Meditation
**If you are interested in some of my pandemic posts, check out a few of these:
A favorite song to inspire you to seek the Lord for His WORD for your year, always consistent with His “Ancient Words.”
