A look back, a look ahead

2011. What a year. In my world, it was an amazing year. It definitely didn't start that way! It started with a whole lot more questions than I had answers to. My wife's part-time youth ministry position was cut by the church, for no other reason than money. We were deeply hurt by this choice, and it led me to wrestle with plenty of questions as to what God was doing in this church, whether I was supposed to be there, and ultimately, if serving full-time in church ministry was truly what I was supposed to be doing. Deep huh? Well, to make an extremely long and complicated story short (just ask if you want the long story), I'm still serving the church, and while not all of the questions have been answered, most have.

So the year started with lots of questions and a whole lot of trust in God to provide, and in His own unique and perfect way, He did. We found out in March that we were going to have a second child! Which was an answer to many prayers we prayed, and prayers we didn't realize we were praying! Throughout the course of the months, we saw God's hand directing and leading us in ways we didn't expect.

Then came the last 2 months of the year. The unexpected blessings. On November 21st, Emily Claire Harmann entered the world. Of course, she has been a great blessing and joy bringer to our family! But we were overwhelmed with love, gifts and food from the congregation and our friends. When Christmas came around, the gifts we received were more than usual. And usually, I'm thinking about how unnecessary all of the gift cards and other gifts are, but are very sweet. This year, I'm thankful and rejoicing, because it is a reminder of how God provides in unexpected, surprising to me ways.

So looking ahead to 2012, what do I expect? I expect laughter. I expect joy. I expect challenges. I expect tears. I expect God to work in ways that He's already planned out, but not in the ways I expected. And I will do my best to look for His hand of blessing in my life and rejoice every time I see it!

I resolve.....

I've been thinking a lot this week about New Years' resolutions. And on New Years' Eve, I thought it would be fitting. As I've pondered resolutions, I've come to a conclusion. They can be summed up in one thing. I want to do/be better.... A few examples:

I want to be better at not shoving food in my face....
I want to be better at exercising to rid myself of the extra weight from shoving food in face....
I want to be better at being organized....

Now, these are good, noble things to attain. But something's missing. Or, should I say, someONE is missing. If it's up to us to make changes in our life, we'll fail. In the next week, gyms will be full of people hard at work on their resolutions....but if you go back in 3 weeks, there's will be less people and if you go back in 6 months, there will be even less!

So what to do? Well, I've discovered a few things. We must make resolutions daily. But, we must make resolutions that WITH GOD'S HELP, we'll change. And my New Years' resolution is that with God's help, I seek first God's kingdom. If I start looking at things through God's eyes, my attitude changes. My heart changes. The way I care for my body changes. The way I love my family changes. All those things I want to change will change.

How does this happen? I'll be imperfect at it. I know it. But here are my action steps toward striving toward the goal.

Each morning, I will get up at 5:15, and spend 15 minutes in quiet meditation on God's Word before my walk.
During my day, as I'm making choices, I will pray for God's guidance and direction.
In the evening, I will make my family my focus for my time and attention.

These three things aren't the end-all, be-all, but for my life, these 3 are steps in a direction to help me maintain my focus on seeking God's will and direction. I pray that in this upcoming new year, you seek God first in all things!

Christmas is about.....

This Christmas, I have definitely been doing some pondering, praying and thinking about what Christmas is about. An insight that came to me in this process was the amount of trust. Let me explain. Mary trusted that God had a plan in allowing her to be the mother of Jesus. Joseph trusted the same way. The Shepherds trusted the word of the angels singing in the heavens about a baby born in a stable, and immediately hurried to Bethlehem. If you didn't have that level of trust, do you just up and leave your job, your sheep you are supposed to be tending, to go see a baby? Or what about the Wise Men? They traveled a long way (how far, we're not sure) to see a baby. Why? They trusted that the new star in the sky was the fulfilling of a prophecy.

So where does that leave us believers, some 2,000 years after the birth of the Savior of the world? Do we have that level of trust? I know some days, I start off with a high level of trust in God and His plan, and 5 minutes later, I'm not there. I pray daily that God would allow me that level of complete and total trust in Him. The past few months for me have been an opportunity to see His hand. We've been blessed in ways that cannot be imagined or explained other than God's provision. And so it's been my opportunity to remind myself that while money seems tight, things break and there's the ups and downs of life, God provides in His own unique way, in His own unique time. Just as in His own unique way, there was no fanfare for the world to know the Savior, the Son of God, entered the world to redeem it, just a beautiful serenade by angels to Shepherds in the field. It's one of the qualities of God that I am so intrigued and amazed by. His unique way of doing things. But the funny part is, it's not unique. It's perfect. It's just not the way I think things should be done!