Happy New Year--Almost!

We still have a couple more days before New Year's Eve, but I thought I'd post a few thoughts about the coming year while they are on my mind.

This morning I spent time reading some Amy Carmichael for my devotion time. Amy lived in the late 19th Century and into the 20th. As a young woman, she committed to being a missionary in India and, at some point after arriving there, she fell and messed up her leg. These days, the injury would have been easily repaired, but back in the day she ended up unable to walk. Did she come home? Not a chance. She spent her days bedridden, but God wasn't finished with her yet.

The woman journaled daily about the insights from the Bible God had brought to her mind, and from her writings I gather she had many a visitor whom she counseled, encouraged, and prayed over. What a blessing to have her writings now, over a century later.

I also journal, but I doubt anyone will ever have a notion to publish my writings after I'm gone. Come to think of it, I'm not sure I'd want them published. Some are way too personal.

This morning as I looked toward the coming of 2013, I read Amy's words about trusting God. She said that according to Young's Concordance, the word trust can be read as meaning 'to lean on.' I immediately had a vision of leaning against God through every day of my life in the coming year, much like the disciple John leaned against Jesus at the last supper. Many a time I've set out on my own without pausing to pray for God's guidance and surrendering it all to Him, and many a time things haven't worked out.

As we enter 2013 with talks of the 'fiscal cliff' looming, a new healthcare plan taking place, and an economy that is still wobbling, I can't think of any better place to be than leaning on God. I can lean on Him for the big stuff going on in Washington D.C. and I can lean on Him for my writing and possible future contracts. I can lean on him for help in losing those five or six pounds I gained over the past month or so (I've already started working on that!) And I can lean on Him for my health and for whatever lies ahead that I may or may not be prepared to face.

And that gives me peace.

Happy New Year!