“I’m not afraid to pull the big sister card, if I have to.” As I sat with a friend, eating tacos at our favorite local spot, I found myself saying these words. This was January of 2022, and I was in the process of figuring out My One Word for the year. I went through a series of words, but nothing felt quite right. The word “sister” had been on the list of words I was praying through but I didn’t understand why or what that meant for me.

Wrestling with anxious thoughts is a large part of my story. Being anxious about nothing seems impossible with a brain full of "what if" thoughts and scenarios. If I'm being honest, many of my words over the years centered on fixing myself in hopes that my anxious brain would finally get some rest. I believed that change would come by having the correct thought pattern and just white-knuckling my way through the rest.

To say that 2020 and 2021 were tough years for our world is a gross understatement. We all found ourselves navigating uncharted waters. For those of us who are extroverts, being isolated and removed from social settings was extraordinarily difficult. If you are an extrovert much of your energy is gained from being around other people, and when that gets removed, you find yourself with little to no wind in your sails. That was me…feeling alone at sea.

"See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?" Isaiah 43:19

It's time to choose a new word for the new year! This is one of my favorite practices and helps me see what God is doing in my life and how He continues to shape me. Looking back at prior years, I love seeing how the thread of my words weaves together. That's the cool thing about My One Word: it's not simply selecting a new word and discarding the old. Instead, previous words prepare us for what lies ahead.

As we near the end of this retreat experience, chances are good, a host of emotions have made an appearance - joy mixed with disappointment, awe alongside angst, regrets amid hopefulness, and confusion with bits of contentment and clarity mixed together. Taking a step back and reflecting on the condition of our hearts and souls awoke feelings and experiences that have remained dormant, overlooked, or disregarded. There was growth worth celebrating and reminders of God's faithfulness, circumstances whose impact would've been shortchanged if we didn't slow long enough to notice. This time of reflection perhaps brought to the surface blind spots and patterns that keep us stuck in a cycle. 

We engage in the spiritual practices of stillness, prayer, and reflection not to shed more light on ourselves but to see ourselves in light of who Christ calls us to be and the full life He invites us to experience if we trust Him. Christ's love is abundant and never runs empty, so we are free to give it away.

God wired us for relationships, but for connections to flourish, they need the safety of love. The deepest parts of our souls long for this type of connection while fearing the authenticity and investment it demands. There's an inherent vulnerability in knowing someone else and, in turn, being known by them. Without trust, we resist sharing our true selves; unfortunately, due to the brokenness of this world we navigate our connections guarded and suspicious. Our capacity to give love to others hinges on our ability first to receive God's love for ourselves.

The expression of our lives flows from the condition of our hearts. What gets formed on the inside eventually expresses itself on the outside. We all experience times when our actions and words don't align with what we believe or who we are. It catches us off-guard, and we wonder, "Where did that come from?"

As we prepare to celebrate the beginning of a new year, we must be faithful to finish this one. So, rather than rushing to the future, we start by reflecting on the past and remembering. There were things we encountered that brought joy and others that prompted tears - circumstances that evoked celebration and contentment while others elicited pain and loss. Every encounter left a mark; every experience left us different in some way. Yet, all of it, both the good and the bad, mattered because God wastes nothing.

Over the course of the past four weeks, we’ve slowed down during the holiday season to reflect on Jesus Christ. Doing so was intentional because understanding Christ more clearly provides us with an enduring hope as we reside in the space between His arrival and eventual return. It enables us to celebrate both the baby in a manger, and the man who preached love and forgiveness who then ultimately lived it out by heading to the cross, the empty tomb, His defeat of death and the presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives. It also provides us with strength to abide in Christ’s love as we continue to walk in faith and obedience, bringing His Kingdom to earth in the places around us. Finally, it deepens our longings for His return when everything will be made right, and it is this final promise that concludes our time together this advent season.

Rest for our souls, the burden of worry lifted, and the presence of the Holy Spirit in our hearts. These are some of the unfathomable and gracious promises Jesus declared over us. Yet, to experience the depth of these promises requires us to embrace another - Christ’s abiding love. It serves as the source we draw from over and over again - knowing it never returns empty. But, what does it look like to abide in the promise of Christ’s love? This is what we want to explore during our time together.

This week, our time together will focus on the promises of Jesus and how they provide us with enduring hope, unshakable security, and a peace that passes all understanding. So far, we’ve witnessed a compassionate Jesus promise rest for our weary souls and that because He cares for us, we need not worry. Fully embracing these promises is easier said than done - life happens and we hesitate, doubt, or forget His faithfulness to us, which is what makes today’s promise of a helper in the Holy Spirit such a gift. The Holy Spirit provides comfort and wisdom by reminding WHO we are and WHOSE we are.

Yesterday, we explored Jesus’ promise of rest for our weary souls and how it's found in an abiding relationship with Him. Yet, we often resist slowing down and embracing His rest because worry directs our steps. Jesus speaks into our worry with His next promise that reveals the thoughtful care He provides us.

This week, our time together will focus on the promises of Jesus and how they provide us with enduring hope, unshakable security, and a peace that passes all understanding. We start our exploration of these promises with an invitation from Jesus to rest; which is ironic on a Monday, at the beginning of a work week, smack dab in the middle of the holiday season.

A prayer of forgiveness was how Jesus responded to the enraged and unruly crowd, chanting, "crucify Him!" And, as always, He took it a step further by giving them a visible example of forgiveness and showing the lengths He would go to ensure that prayer was answered for everyone.

Moments before Jesus is betrayed, arrested, and eventually crucified, we see, in John 17, Jesus doing something He rarely did - praying for Himself. He's not teaching the disciples how to pray or praying about the concerns and circumstances of others; Jesus recognizes the impending crisis and chaos coming His way and that leads Him to seek out God's presence and strength. These recorded words give us a unique behind-the-scenes glimpse of the Son praying to His Father in a time of need.

This week's time centers on the prayers of Jesus and how they provide insight into Jesus' mindset, nature, and heart. Through it all, we see that the impending cross was in the background of each prayer, standing in the shadows of His life and ministry. Nevertheless, Jesus knew what awaited Him, and in today's passage, we see Jesus' troubled soul meeting a willing spirit.

Jesus understood how simple, yet at the same time incredibly complicated, our connections with others can be. Nevertheless, the oneness of believers was such a priority to Jesus that it served as the topic of His most extended prayer, and it's this prayer we want to meditate on today.

Happy Monday, and welcome back to our Advent Meditation devotional series, where we're spending the days leading up to Christmas reflecting on Jesus Christ and the hope His arrival and eventual return brings us. This week, our time together will focus on the prayers of Jesus and how they give us profound insight into the things that occupied His mind and burdened His heart. They reveal what matters most to Him. Prayers put to words the emotions, thoughts, and concerns rumbling deep in our souls.

Very few words in the English language evoke more emotion than the word freedom. Something inside us feels liberated and joyful whenever we hear it or experience it firsthand. We picture chains being broken and the world's weight taken off our shoulders. So it is only natural for us to yearn to be free.