Today I am going to do something I don’t think I have ever done before. I am going to post before my day is done. (Then I am going to go to a party.) As you can notice by the date on this, it is New Year’s Eve. This year has been an incredible year. One filled with steps of freedom. As transparent as I am on this blog, I must keep anonymity and confidentiality; so I cannot tell you about everything that has happened. If I had to sum it up in one sentence. I think I would say this is the year I learned radical love. This is the year I have learned it is better to be the voice of the weak than to stand with the Pharisees and scorn them.
I used to scorn anything weak. I remember a few years ago, my pastor was teaching some sermon about us being weak and he made us all turn to the person sitting next to us and say “I am weak.” It was so hard me. In my mind, I added, “But I can life 300 pounds!” Today I am so okay with saying I am weak. At least comparatively speaking. I definitely cannot do any of my life on my own. God has had me out of my depth for a very long time. Laura can’t even begin to live this life without Him.
He is worth it all. Every single bit. And when I think I can’t continue, He sends another weak person to encourage me. I would rather share my strength with the weak than stand with a Pharisee any day! This is the year I quit trying to fix people. I remember starting this year and having such a hard time listening to people’s pain in group without trying to fix them. Not so much anymore. I have learned Jesus is the Healer. I have witnessed He is powerful enough to deliver anyone from anything.
I wrote 95% of a novel this year and published it. Pretty crazy! I learned my blog doesn’t receive one or two visits a week or month. Instead this entire year, it has received thousands. I have only looked at the stats once. I don’t plan on doing so again for a very long time. What I looked at wasn’t very complex. Maybe half of them are spammers, but this I know. God has given me a voice.
And I know one more thing. There is only one reason He has given me a voice. It is to be a voice for everyone who does not have one yet. For widow, for the orphan, for the poor, the lame, the blind, the weak, the prostitute, the publican, the sinner. My voice isn’t for me. My voice is for them. May I never forget and try to build my empire. Instead may I only amplify the voice of the weak!
Come unto Me, all you who weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
This coming year I do have a resolution. I don’t do resolutions much because I generally think I will change when I am ready to and not at some forced time of the year. So my new year’s resolution is that I send out Christmas cards next year to at least my closest friends and family. I figure this way, I will have kept my resolution until at least December 24 – most of the year. Nice, right?
But in all seriousness, this year does have a theme. The theme is to live 2016 in the spirit of the verses the Apostle Paul wrote to the Corinthians. Some of these phrases I have learned. Some I know. I read them as if for the first time a few weeks ago. I have no idea how I missed them for so long. But I know them because His Spirit has taught them to me. What I do not know, I pray He will teach me. I have nothing, but I possess everything. I am poor, yet I make many rich. May riches of the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with us all throughout the coming year! May the grace of Christ the Savior and the Father’s boundless love with the Holy Spirit’s favor rest upon us from above!
We put no stumbling block in anyone’s path, so that our ministry will not be discredited. Rather, as servants of God we commend ourselves in every way: in great endurance; in troubles, hardships and distresses; in beatings, imprisonments and riots; in hard work, sleepless nights and hunger; in purity, understanding, patience and kindness; in the Holy Spirit and in sincere love; in truthful speech and in the power of God; with weapons of righteousness in the right hand and in the left; through glory and dishonor, bad report and good report; genuine, yet regarded as impostors; known, yet regarded as unknown; dying, and yet we live on; beaten, and yet not killed; sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; poor, yet making many rich; having nothing, and yet possessing everything. – 2 Corinthians 6:3-10
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