From one year to the next

For auld lang syne = for times long past

Kinda why I bought the Rod Stewart Christmas album this season.  Ya know, for the good {old} times.  I tried to like John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John’s 2012 Christmas collection, but it may be the worst Christmas album (and accompanying video) ever.

Here is Rod’s smooth version of Auld Lang Syne.  For the New Year!   :)

Now-I am pressed for time, so let me just say this:

We are leaving 2012 in a few short hours and will meander into 2013 (some more quickly than others) with a few circles of a clock’s hand.  Though I have tendencies towards setting grand resolutions and starting revolutions and always wish to eschew all I haven’t loved about the year just past, though you know me to leap headlong into whatever is next – really, today is Monday and tomorrow will be Tuesday.

And Tuesday will be as fresh as Wednesday will be and Thursday and every day we are given, so let’s not put too much pressure on it.  Let’s not expect everything awful to suddenly be better, but let’s do remember that the mercies of the LORD are new every. single. morning.  Every one of our mornings, fresh!

The start of a New Year is really available to us every single day of our ever-loving lives.  Is that not amazing?  :)

Lamentations 3.22-23  Because of the LORD’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.

I found this print recently and “pinned it” because it really does give us perspective:

Pinned Image

In 2013, I will fall.  I will get back up.  I will make mistakes.  I will try to do better next time.  I will cry.  I will laugh.  I will feast.  And I will fast.  I will have times of sweet peace and security.  And I will have to trust God in vicious storms and not lean on my own understanding.  It will be good and it will sometimes be bad.  There will be high points and probably some devastation along the way.  I will scribble out things I had inked with great certainty and erase penciled-in plans when the wind blows a different direction.  I will rejoice and I will trust and I will sing and I will believe and sometimes I will also totally want to throw in the towel.

Many years of living tells my the preceding paragraph is a true and certain prophecy.  But those same years also give me the unapologetic and unmitigated confidence to declare: He will be faithful.  God’s faithfulness will not take a hit at all, ever.  And one year from today, I will be able to look back at 2013 and say with no reservation:  He remained faithful, as always.  Just like I can say about Him today – at the end of 2012.

I was reading from an 1893 school book today (I am weird like that) and came across Daniel Webster’s eulogy for John Adams called “In Favor of Independence.”  Though there had not been a recorded or written record of John Adams’ speech concerning the Declaration of Independence, Webster shares what he says was said during those crazy days for the revolutionaries.

It begins:

Sink or swim, live or die, survive or perish, I give my hand and my heart to this vote.

And ends with:

Sir, before God, I believe the hour has come.  My judgement approves this measure and my whole heart is in it.  All that I have and all that I am and all that I hope in this life, I am now ready here to stake upon it; and I leave off as I have begun, that live or die, survive or perish, I am for the declaration.  It is my living sentiment and by the blessing of God, it shall be my dying sentiment, – independence now, independence forever!

I have decided to adopt his impassioned and whole-hearted oration for my journey into 2013:

Sink or swim, live or die, survive or perish, I give my hand and my heart to 2013.  By the blessing of God, great will be the faithfulness of the LORD.  This much, I already know to be true!

How about you?  What are your plans for the New Year?  Join me???  :)

3 thoughts on “From one year to the next

  1. Awesome. Agreed. With ya, sister. Although I also have trouble not making resolutions. Sigh… Perhaps I shall call them “goals”? Nah, same thing. And I hate disappointing myself! However, I can wholeheartedly join hands with you and John Adams; let’s jump in, confident of the faithfulness and blessing of the Lord!

  2. Well said and done as always, Honey. I used to go to “Watch Night” services, all my life; and at the end of the evening of gospel quartets sweating and singing the notes off they would have us either pray in the New Year or write down our New Years Resolutions. I usually failed at both. I would kneel on the floor with my face in the seat of the wooden pew and try and pray in the New Year. It was important that you did, because if you didn’t pray in the New Year, then your year was going to fraught with unholy crapiness. So I would try, but mostly I would be watching the clock so that finally I could get up off of my boney little knees, the ones I still have to this day. There was a reward at the end though, the reason to stay awake. We would all go out to Village Inn Pancake House for breakfast after the service. Pancakes always made it a good year.
    An so I reflect on the past few New Years. Some I have slept into the New Year. Some we have been with friends, not so much as of late, it’s too much effort to get dressed up. :) But most have been with family, like last evening, December 31, 2012. Dess and Ryan and Storm graced us and yes, when our IPhones told us that there was 90 seconds to the new year, we all rushed to the special toasting glasses and we popped the top on our sparkling cranberry juice, because I don’t see the point, really in waking up with a headache the next morning all for the sake of celebration; and we clinked our glasses to the New Year. And then we returned to catching up on season 3 of our Walking Dead Marathon. A show that Jeanie hates and only endures for our sakes. She mostly was on her laptop and we alerted her when to plug her ears and close her eyes.
    So there you have it, nothing super spiritual, nothing really spiritual at all but I do know this: whether I am kneeling on a hardwood floor or sitting in front of my flat screen watching survivors of a zombie infested world, God is in me and surrounds me and will be with me in 2013 like He was in 2012. Through all the good and the bad, and there was both in 2012. But NOTHING that I do will whether praying in the new year or watching TV will be able to separate me from His mercy and grace and love. So HAPPY NEW YEAR to all of you, my friends and family! And however you brought in 2013, may you be blessed and may God’s grace ever abound in you! This is the longest post that I have written in 2013. I think I’ll also put it on Facebook.! Originally a comment on Jeanie’s Blog http://www.jeanierhoades.com I just love her writing and her too. :)

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