Epiphanies for the New Year!

Maybe it was turning 40 that did me in, but I am realizing more about life NOW than I ever did before! Let me take you along on the journey of a few epiphanies that I have had this year, ones I want to apply both now and in 2023. Maybe you can relate to these, and may God use it to make us better servants for Him!

First, football season is exciting for our country, the United States, as we cheer on our home team! I will be honest in that I was never a true fan, though the Buffalo Bills have been improving each year and were recently voted the team with the biggest and most loyal fan base. This year I had an incredible epiphany: I actually enjoy watching football, especially when the Bills are playing and particularly when they are winning! My husband who is from Ecuador prefers to watch soccer games, but even he is taking a liking to the exciting world of American football! Now, I still don’t completely understand how people can be so extremely passionate about “their team” winning, to the point of sacrificing in freezing cold temperatures, tremendous crowds, and dressing from top to bottom in full team gear with props and face/body paint to top it off! I saw a bumper sticker on a car a week ago with the Buffalo Bills emblem and then the saying, “We are one big family.” I think in those words I find my answer: we all want to be a part of something bigger than ourselves, and as the motto goes, “BILLieve” together. It seems helpless: sitting on my living room couch and cheering on a team I have no control over, but somehow “they” can represent US: our city, town, or region. It feels good to be a fan and have others “on my side” who will support each other and the team through thick and thin. The only add-on lesson here is may I never scream louder for this earthly team than I do for my heavenly one. I dare not look forward to a football game more than I do getting together with other believers and seeing people come to know Jesus and be forgiven as I have been. The next time you watch a sports game, just remember “they do it to get a crown that will not last; but we do it to get a crown that will last forever” (1 Corinthians 9:25). Cheer loud for your team but cheer MUCH LOUDER for Our God and the many missionaries and believers around the world!

Second, the world is full of busyness and I am a doer, as Martha was in the Bible. A great book I went through a few summers ago is entitled Having a Mary Heart in a Martha World by Joanna Weaver. I admit that my epiphany to do less is not easy to swallow, because if I do, do, do it humanly feels like I’ve accomplished more. It is none other than God who has slowed me down and spoken over my life, “Do less, pray more.” I cannot express how simple yet profound that statement’s impact has been on my heart. My first thought was, “If I follow through with that philosophy, not enough people will be reached with the good news. I need to have a full calendar in order to bring God glory.” As most of us learn by mistakes, such has been my experience. When I fill up my schedule to overflowing and ask God to bless it instead of waiting for His still and faithful voice to guide my steps and plans, what can I expect? I have found myself overworked and underused. It may appear that I am making progress by all the events or gatherings I have, but I am not always present the way God wants me to be: spiritually ready to hear Him, receive His word, and give beyond my own capacity from the overabundance of His work in my life. In the book I mentioned above, the author reminds the reader that we would probably be amazed at how little God wants us to do each day for Him, and how HE multiplies it. My husband is a great source of wisdom in this area, praise God, and he is constantly pulling me back from the treadmill of busyness I put myself on; with love and discernment he reminds me to STOP. I don’t have to constantly be on a street corner preaching the Bible to be a witness for my King. I’m realizing it’s in the slowing down, the prayer and consecration of each moment, the unhurried and steady rhythm of my life giving glory to Him, that people are won for Christ. The crux of the matter is my trust in HIS Spirit to go before me and work, and when I join Him it’s just icing on the cake. The pressure is off because GOD is drawing the lost, the seekers, to Himself. I’m a missionary for my Savior only when I can surrender “my” finite plans to Him and PRAY for HIS infinite ones to break through.

My last big epiphany was a result of the blizzard of 2022! Here it is: disappointments come but they don’t have to bring discontentment. Currently as I write this we are stuck in this storm that wreaked havoc on Buffalo, New York for the past few days. I have never seen our road with 3-4 feet of snow left unpaved, but the conditions were so bad that trucks are just now starting to catch up with snow removal. Christmas Eve services were cancelled and now it’s Christmas Day and we don’t believe we’ll be going anywhere! As my children try to grasp their first Christmas without the tradition of visiting with everyone at grandma and grandpa’s house, I ponder the men and women who were out on front loaders and dump trucks spending their Christmas Eve and Christmas Day in snow removal efforts. It’s not always going to turn out the way we had hoped, but always consider what someone else is sacrificing and the urge to complain and harvest discontentment can be thwarted. Here I am warm and cozy and yes, stuck. Stuck inside while others have to brave the elements. Haven’t I wished for slower days, a break of sorts? Here is my answer to prayer, yet how quickly I forget to thank God and only desire things to return back to “normal.” It could be so much worse. May I not criticize or question God’s plan for my day today. I’m right where He wants me, and I can seek to better know and give Him glory even in this.

These are three big epiphanies. The first: HIS eternal MISSION is the best to be about, not just a temporal sports team. God’s team affects ETERNITY and HE always WINS in the end! The second: PRAY MORE, DO less. MUCH easier said than done, but God can bring about such a transformation even in the busiest of us, like me, who seem to be wired to do the opposite! Third: disappointments need not lead to discontentment. These epiphanies are not rocket science by any means, but the practical implications are HUGE and so beneficial if we ask Jesus to help us live by these truths in our day-to-day. 1 Corinthians 8:1-3: “We know that we all possess knowledge. Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. The man who thinks he knows something does not yet know as he ought to know. But the man who loves God is known by God.” Let us simply strive to KNOW Our Heavenly Daddy better in this new year, and the rest will fall into place as we surrender to HIM.

Jesus, thank you for the spiritual epiphanies You gave me through the daily grind of life in this world. I dedicate this coming year, 2023, to YOU. Do with me something bigger than my own dreams and mission. I want to be a part of YOUR GREAT commission to reach the lost! Give me a spirit of fervent prayer that I may desire to speak to You about all things, at all times, and with all people! I want the verse “Pray without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:17) to come true in my life this year! Amen.

Dear one, I wish you a HAPPY NEW YEAR and MANY unexpected blessings in the days to come! Leave a comment to let me know you were here and any epiphanies you are uncovering!