The Year of Glory

I'm updating my blog from my phone, which is weird for a couple of reasons. First, I now have a phone that's smart enough to be able to do that, and second, my phone just has one of those Swype keyboard things that I had never heard of before I got this phone that's probably smarter than I am.

Yes, it's 2013, in case you didn't know. I'm having trouble grasping that fact. Actually, I can still vividly remember being 15 years old and telling my sister how weird it was that it was almost 1996.  ...what happened?

I started 2013 out right by getting sick. And even with a day off for New Years, I still worked 50 hours this week...while having a cold that's starting to seem suspiciously like a sinus infection. I'm not complaining, just explaining why my brain hasn't fully realized that it's no longer 1996.  I mean 2012.

I feel the need to do a year end/year beginning blog, but I'm not sure about this year. Last year, several of my close friends moved away. I dealt with minor depression. I had some hard financial moments. A lot of things changed. Other things didn't.

Last year I managed to meet some of my goals, but I failed miserably on other ones. My writing was pathetic last year, but my running went well. I'm not sure I can maintain both running and writing at the same time. I want to get back into writing, but I'm scared to make goals.  I want to possibly run a full marathon this year, but I'm not sure I'll be able to. I'm afraid of failing, as usual. I know I'm very capable of failing. That can too easily become an excuse.

About 11 or 12 years ago I got assigned to the preschool program at Ridgecrest Conference Center.  I had worked at Ridgecrest the previous year, but not in preschool.  In fact, up until that summer, I thought I was bad with/didn't like kids.

I went along with it, all the while thinking it was going to be a bad summer. I went through training and all of that, still thinking  it had been a huge mistake. The first say with the kids, I stood off to the side and observed, thinking I'd just be useless. But there was this Hispanic kid named Luis who was very shy and who barely knew English. He sat in a corner and cried. No one noticed, but I saw Luis. All I did was pull BROWN BEAR, BROWN BEAR off the shelf. I sat next to him and read it to him. He stopped crying. He got attached to me. The rest of that week, he blossomed into a happy, playful child. And I figured out I had a gift for working with kids. I was 21 years old.

Now, I made plenty of mistakes that summer. I still do. I can't be perfect, but I can still use what God has given me to bless others.  And when I really think about it, as well as I know myself, I figure God still has some surprises about how He will use me.

This is the year of Glory. And I don't really understand Glory, which is probably a good thing. It's too big for me to understand and too big for me to handle. So it makes sense to give it to God.  He can handle it better. He is the only one worthy of it, and He didn't design us to keep it. The world it's such a frustrated place mainly because people keep trying to take what only God was meant to have.

And I'm one of those frustrated people, just relying on grace, which, thank God, is sufficient.

I really don't know what 2013 holds. I hope to go on a mission trip overseas. I am thinking of running a full marathon to possibly raise funds for that trip. I hope to work more on some recording projects, reevaluate what I want to do with my writing. ...and...I don't know.  Because I don't know what God has in store. It might be something I never imagined. I once thought I had no desire or talent to work with kids, so who knows what other surprises God might have. All I know it's that it's not about me. And so I have no business being afraid. If I fail, there's grace and redemption. If I succeed, it's not by my power...and probably not even by my own plan.

I was thinking about my accomplishments from last year. On the surface, completing the half marathon seems to be the biggest accomplishment.  But...I can't define a whole year by a moment. Last year's greatest things were probably simple...like getting laughs from a grumpy kid, or spending time with dear friends, or just rejoicing even when friends left...because it was such a gift to know them.  That was 2012. 2013 won't be made up by just grand events, either. The little moments will be just as important...if not more so.

Regarding blogging and my new intelligent phone, I will try to get into a regular blogging routine again. Fiction Friday is coming back, but not every week. I'll shake it up somehow, because that's how I roll.  ...yeah...

So stay tuned and stay awesome, and I'll try to figure out what year it is.