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| New Years Eve 2011 |
2011 was a rough year. Rough as in I spent a lot of it feeling pretty ill, confused, frustrated, overwhelmed and exhausted...
The year started off with getting bad news in an emergency department and every time it looked like things might be going up, some new crazy circumstance found it's way back to disappointing me all over again.
Why, when it rains, does it pour?
...and to use a completely opposite analogy, why, when you're so thirsty for something to refresh you, does it seem like God has shut the heavens up and not a drop falls when you seem to need it most.
I felt like a withered tree for alot of 2011, not every day, but consistently enough for me to feel like summed up in one word, the year of A.D. 2011 kind of..um...sucked.
I felt irritable and overwhelmed and God and I weren't on the best speaking terms we have been in the past. Now, don't get me wrong, God himself never stopped speaking to me... I just stopped listening to Him. I stopped talking to Him for long periods of time as well, other than to be a total grouch and complain and shake my fists and cry some bitter tears here and there.
But this is where the whole withered tree thing comes back to me.
You see, I spent most of the last twelve months trying everything I knew to try and get some nourishment back into my roots, without ever really getting close to the source. I never really abandoned God but I ignored Him plenty and instead blamed him for the rotten circumstances of my year.
But stubborn as I am, He has a way of getting my attention...usually when I get to the point where I'm actually desperate enough to try anything, even listen to Him. If only it didn't take me that long...but I am grateful always, that He takes me back, sits me down on His knee and then tells it like it is.
On the first day of the new year I was in a good place to be I guess, sitting in the pew at church and some of the words the pastor said kind of jolted me and I felt God nudge to reconsider a verse I'd heard and read so many times I almost had it memorized by heart.
"But his delight is in the law of the Lord; and in his law doth he meditate day and night.
And he be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever doeth shall prosper. " (Psalm 1:2-3 KJV)
I'd heard enough good teaching on this nugget of gold to know that the verse wasn't talking about getting all kinds of sweet blessings and cushy living just for being a Christian. It's about so much more than that. This verse is about how we will be constantly sustained if we stay close to the source of God and His word. When he is what sustains us, then trials come and go and blessings come and go, and regardless of the weather, we stay leafy green, our roots drinking up the sweet water, strong and able to withstand anything.
I had known this and I had forgotten it. Frankly, I hadn't wanted to remember it, but there it was staring me in the face; the only resolution I could make for 2012 that would make any kind of difference at all.
I wanted this new year to start off differently than the last one had... but not because I had figured out some way to make everything turn up roses in my favor for the next 365 days. Quite the opposite. I wanted this year to be different because I wanted to be different. And this all may seem elementary to those who've figured out the knack of sticking close by the still waters and walking right next to the shepherds staff 24/7, but like I said, stubborn can sometimes be my middle name. More often than not, I have a lot more in common with the half-wit sheep who wanders off from the safety of the Shepherd's guiding and had to have a search party sent out, than with the rest of the flock who's figured out how to abide in his familiar voice. I get spooked and take off instead of being still and resting inside the safety of His promises.
Praise the Lord He's always willing to lead me back and teach me the same basic lessons over and over and over.
Who can say what the new year will hold for any of us, foolishly I started out with nail biting anxiety that perhaps if I tried hard enough or found a way to orchestrate it so, I could take things into my own hands and finagle them into something safe, manageable and predictable for myself. Too bad that's not what God has promised for any one of us, instead His promise is to sustain us with living water, to watch over us like a shepherd, and to never leave us or forsake us...even a spooked sheep and withered tree like me.
