LOOKING THROUGH THE DOOR TO 2025
Wow! We’ve reached the end of this civil year, and we are all staring wide-eyed and innocent into an open door named 2025. You know me. I’m beginning the year by pondering the Glorious Impossibles of 2024.
Yet, a new civil year is beginning.
What will it be like?
I wonder.
KEEPING GOD’S CALENDAR
So many are pondering the fact that a year is turning on the civil calendar. However, I’ve been on God’s calendar all year. If you have followed my blogging at all you will know that my time thinks Hebraic. If you are interested, you can look back at the Glorious Impossibles I wrote about in past years. Start with last year and follow the trail to the year before at the bottom of each post. https://theinseasonlifestyle.com/those-glorious-impossibles-for-2023/. You will see that I’ve been believing in Glorious Impossibles for many years. I believe it is in keeping God’s Calander that helps them to come about.
For me, the year turned its pages back in what the world was calling October. Keeping that precious calendar of God had me constantly looking at my daily life and examining the path I was traveling on. It helped me to keep living in the moment. I didn’t have to wait until the end of the civil year happened. When you think Hebraic, you find yourself examining your steps through life all year long. I’m so thankful for having discovered the amazing process. As a matter of fact, I’ve written a devotional book that is about meditations during these fall days each year. It is called CHRISTIAN MEDITATIONS FOR ELUL and is for sale at Amazon.com.
Keeping God’s time, God’s way, makes all of life a great adventure. You must let go of all of your fears and anxiety and trust that He is going to catch you every time you fall. When you get to that point, and it has taken me so many years, all you must do is jump! Soon you will find yourself laughing in your Father’s arms. Life will be your playground, because He created it to be so. Just keep your eyes on Him and all the blessings will fall in place.
GRATEFUL FOR LIFE’S UPS AND DOWNS
That isn’t to say we didn’t hit a lot of hard places over the last year. 2024 was full of bumps as we traveled through some perilous journeys. Temporarily, we lost a lot of close friends. They were people we will miss until we reach eternity ourselves. We’ve also been through huge battles within our nation. I am hopeful as we turn the year that some of the wrinkles are being ironed out of those problems.
On a personal level, my husband struggled through recovering from triple by-pass surgery. He is making great progress, but as he has said, once they take your heart out of your body for awhile and then put it back in again, it is hard to be the same. It has taken time, but the healing is taking place. Thank you, God.
A YEAR OF GLORIOUS IMPOSSIBLES
I am thankful for so many things concerning daily life which were accomplished during the past 365 days. A big accomplishment for me was publishing Exodus to Freedom. Sales have been good. My marketing skills have improved. God blessed me with my first writer’s conference. It was the most amazing experience. Friendships which will last a lifetime were created, not to mention the knowledge and information they poured into us.
May God continue to bless and prosper The Southern Christian Writer’s Conference and their amazing staff. I feel better equipped to carry on the art of the written word. They gave me the confidence to step into all the rest of the year. With great pleasure I enjoyed book signings and sales at The North Shelby County Library, Nichol’s Nook in Springville, The Chelsea Craft Fair and The Southern Christian Writer’s Conference. There are plans for more such adventures in the future.
I’m so grateful that two of my short stories are about to be published in two upcoming anthologies. God’s Glorious Impossibles will soon be published in a new anthology collection created by Sandi Herron called Heartlifters. God Always Keeps His Promises will be published in an anthology by Christian Writers For Life in a book entitled Prayers That Moved Mountains. To add a cherry on top of the ice cream – I was interviewed for the Facebook page of Southern Christian Writer’s Conference. It has been a great year as far as reaching many of my writing goals. The IN SEASON Lifestyle blog is growing and thriving. Our weekly bible study is always a blessing. So many more plans are in the work for 2025.
TRUSTING FOR THE FUTURE
Another huge blessing is the fact that I finally feel able to retire from a long professional life spent working in the world of architecture and property management. That career served me well. I am happy that I was able to know the people I met along the way. Their friendships added a great amount of value to my hard-working days.
I didn’t expect to work those last two years, they just happened when a good friend invited me to have fewer hours in exchange for a great learning experience. I’m glad I did it; but also, I’m so very happy now to become unscheduled, unencumbered and living out all my time at home now.
From the home front memories, I’m grateful for the family trips we enjoyed this past year. My favorite week of the whole year was the time spent during The Feast of Tabernacles with family at an amazing old farmhouse. I still go there in my mind because of the great blessings of peace we felt during our visit. Once a daydream believer; always a daydream believer. We will go back, hopefully some time in 2025.
THERE IS NO PLACE LIKE HOME
In the famous words of Dorothy from The Wizzard of Oz; “there is no place like home.” Don’t think for a minute that I’m not busy. I happily find myself working where my heart lives. My typewriter is going to get very tired of having me here! There are plans for more writing conferences and many more books, short stories and blogposts in the future.
I’m also getting the extra study time I wanted for digging deeper into a series of new bible studies I had hoped to get around to. It is true what they say, you blink, and the day is over. Time is passing swiftly as I pursue my deepest heart’s desires. I never tire of studying God’s word. He has blessed me and pointed me into many new directions of study for the upcoming year.
Finally, I’m basking in the freedom to pursue all my favorite hobbies which I never had time for before. They include cooking, working in the yard, tablescapes, long walks, reading, photography, horseback riding and visiting with family and friends. Who could resist having more time to visit with grandchildren? God has blessed me beyond measure with my grands.
MARY OLIVER SAID IT WELL
All my life I’ve loved and admired the earthy poetry which Mary Oliver wrote. I think I’m looking at living out the next year in a similar way to the lines of one of her poems:
“When it’s over, I want to say all my life I was a bride married to amazement. I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms. When it’s over, I don’t want to wonder if I have made my life something particular, and real. I don’t want to find myself sighing and frightened, or full of argument. I don’t want to end up simply having visited this world.”
Mary Oliver expressed my feelings about the coming year so well. That is exactly how I feel while looking through that door that leads us to 2025.
As I pondered all of these things I was delighted to see a lovely, deep red cardinal light on the banister of my front porch just outside my front door. He is back! We are old friends. It has been a while since I’ve seen this old friend visit our front yard. Long ago God whispered in my heart that Cardinals mean answered prayers and that they are signs proclaiming He always keeps His promises. This last year has been a testimony to that fact. The beautiful bird stopping to say “hello” today is a sure sign of a great year coming up in 2025.
Please know that I am praying for God to bless you all. May the desires of your heart conform to the purposes He brings to you. Live so that your days will be richly blessed and the generations after you will know that you lived and sigh.