Thinking About New Beginnings

As we draw the year 2014 to a close and look forward to the start of a new year, many of us are thinking about "new beginnings".  Some may call them "resolutions"...being resolved to do something new, different, better with our lives in the new year.  That may involve giving up something to gain something better. Or it may mean that we have to take a step of faith and leap into the unknown to achieve the goals and plans we are dreaming of.

Whatever it takes, we know that in order to make something different or new happen, we have to take action of one kind or another.  Step out of our "comfort zone"..."get out of the boat"..."turn over a new leaf"...all types of catch phrases that denote deliberate activity to get from here to there.

I know that I want to see some new things happen in this upcoming year...positive things that will enhance my life in a meaningful way.  I have some "secret" desires (don't get excited)...just some things that I hope I will be able to accomplish...but it is going to take some major effort on my part and a lot of prayer to see it through.  I say "secret" because I don't want to speak it out loud just yet...I need to get my "ducks in a row" before I can take action and "go public".

It is also time to select my "One Word" for 2015....that One Word that will become the byword for my life for the year.  Last year the word was "strengthen."  I have decided that I want to be more careful what I ask for this year. That one was painful.  Not so much in the physical sense, which is where I probably need it still...but the strengthening came in doses of excruciating emotional and mental anguish...extreme feats of growth and development that I did not bargain for.  God never let me break down completely under the strain...but He sure had His hands full of a blubbering,weak, sad and weary child all too often. No, I don't want another word like that again. So I am giving it a lot of thought and prayer before I select a new "One Word".  (But...didn't God know what He was doing in directing my steps to that One Word?...Yeah, He did...)

I know I have quoted this verse before, even recently , but I keep coming back to it:

"Do not remember the former things,

Nor consider the things of old.

Behold, I will do a new thing,

Now it shall spring forth;

Shall you not know it?

I will even make a road in the wilderness

and rivers in the desert..."

Isaiah 43:18-19

Yes, I am looking forward to "a new thing"...that "road in the wilderness and river in the desert", as long as God goes with me. Of course He will.  He has never left me alone...not even during my time of "strengthening".  He was always there...and He always will be.

This could be the start of something wonderful! Won't you come along with me? Who knows what adventures lie in the road ahead?  Wherever it leads, God is already there waiting at the end of the road. So, we can't go wrong.  Let's go!!!