If you are anything like me…you are a list maker. I have a daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly list. It might be my OCD…yeah, I can admit that. And like anyone else, I had goals and plans for things to do this year!

BUT guess what!  I might have checked off one major item and a few miscellaneous items, but the bulk of my list remains intact. 2020 gave me a swift kick in the gut and butt.

We saw dreams deferred.

We witnessed plans cancelled.

We grieved lives lost .

We stood in confusion to what was happening all around us and to us.

For some of us ALL our plans went up in smoke.

So what do we do now?

As the year starts to wind down and a tender chill hits the air we must start to reconsider all the plans we had. Do we still want them? Were they even that important?

I realized that everything that hit pause and most that were just canceled I no longer desire. I am wiping the slate clean for 2021. I am making different decisions.

I look at this season where everyone was “sent to their room,” as my neighbor calls quarantine, as just that—a call for us to sit still and re-evaluate our lives. Our world was moving too fast. We were running aggressively. We were living erratically, and the world started to spin out of control. And it all had to STOP!

Everyone was required to take a deep breath. Find their center. Find their voice. Find their purpose. Find their faith. Find their families. Find their relationships. Find each other. It’s not over, nor is it easy.

I know just as this was the year of yes for me and my family; next year will be the year of decisions.

What decisions do you have to let go? What decisions you must make?

Lesson:

Take a moment to let things go that you cannot and should not take with you into the new year.

“...when your decisions are on public display, everyone learns to live right.”

(Isaiah 26:7-10; portion of the reading;The Message Translation)