Welcome 2020!

Confession: I’m nervous to share my word for 2020 with you.

As I prayed over what I would focus on, what word I would claim as this new decade began, I kept feeling God set this one in front of me. Almost as if I was sorting through this stack of flash cards with worthy words like Intentional, Steward, Resilient, and one that I DID NOT put in the stack kept rising to the top.

Receive.

Really God? Isn’t it better to give than Receive? That feels icky, selfish, hard to post/boast about. Oh. Got me there. I’m afraid people will judge me, Lord. Oh. I don’t have to tell them?* Right. This is for me...

Fighting with God about accepting the word Receive hilarious to anyone else? 🙈

But I did fight with Him. I kept trying to pick something new, and he would just nudge that flash card in front of me again. Finally I decided to look the word up - just see what I was signing up for. Did you know there are multiple definitions and uses for Receive? I finally felt my heart soften when I read “to welcome.”

Okay, Lord. I see you. 

This is the year I welcome whatever you have dreamed up for my life. This is the year I open my hands to Receive what you have for me instead of grasping so tightly the picture in my head of who I am supposed to be and what my life is supposed to look like. It’s time to release the pieces I have desperately clutched and hoarded for the last three years. Slowly all the things I’ve thought defined me have been stripped away but one.

I am loved by Him.

Receiving that love when I have felt so unworthy of it, imperfect, lacking in so many ways... well, it’s exactly the point, isn’t it? He knows the darkest parts of me, and He loves me just the same. The ultimate gift. 

It is not easy to Receive, is it? Especially when we feel like a hot mess who doesn’t deserve good gifts. But He loves to give us good gifts! It’s also not easy to Receive, to accept, to welcome when what we are Receiving isn’t what we wanted or expected. But maybe when we choose to Receive it, it becomes the best gift of all.

In the last two months of 2019, I feel like I became a sort of blank canvas. Not in a depressing way, but an exciting way! An anything can happen way. What colors will transform that fresh canvas into a work of art? What comes next?

I’m ready to Receive it, Lord. Without clinging to what was “supposed” to be. Help me keep my hands open, Lord. I welcome this new year, new decade. I’m excited. And scared. But mostly excited.

Happy New Year, friends! Do you choose a word for your year? Share with me!

(Also, maybe this is the year I’ll learn to spell Receive right the first time. 😉)

*I didn’t have to share my word. But I am. For accountability. And to show His goodness as this year unfolds.