New Year's Resolutions

I'm honestly not one for making New Year's Resolutions.

I don't particularly like to set myself up for failure.

It's not that I don't think goals are good. I do! I just usually already have goals I'm working on and don't feel a need to add any new ones to my already perfectionist personality.

This year is a bit different.

I am making one resolution and only one.

I Resolve (is that how you say it?) to read through my Bible in one year.



I am in need of this discipline so desperately. Not the one year part, but the RESOLUTION of getting up earlier than the kids every morning (no more excuses) and spending REAL time with the only One who can help me set healthy goals anyway.



You see, I've been hammered down to almost nothing in the last 2 years. I am more than happy to kiss 2010 (and 2009 for that matter and lets just add the last half of 2008 to that as well) goodbye. They have been sort of hellish in the soul arena and I won't miss them. Depression has been the theme for those 2.5 years and I'm frankly tired of it. I'm tired of feeling like Eeyore and worrying what the world around me thinks.



The only way I'm going to get out of the rut and off the dark ground is to look up and grasp my Savior's feet and admit that I can't go on this way anymore. He is going to have to pick me up and carry me in order for me to move forward.



The image of a Father cradling his child while walking down a hot dusty road is one I was trying to explain to my growing-skeptical Precious Jewel. As I was explaining to it to her and watching the tears streak down her face, it hit me full force: I had climbed down out of His arms myself and was trying to run ahead and "do it myself." I've been in His arms before in a place of brokenness and it is a scary and peaceful place at the same time. Scary when looking at the world, but peaceful knowing whose arms are wrapped around you. I've placed my security in people and have been sorely disappointed.



Dear Precious Jewel has become lost in some of the same hardships of this past couple of years. Gone is the sweet girl laughter and she has been replaced by one that I didn't think I'd meet until she hit Jr. High. I told her the other night that I was partly to blame. I had not been letting God speak to me. I had been trying to do it on my own and I believed I was seeing some of my "results" in her. I hugged her and we cried together and I promised I'd love her no matter what and take her hand and we'd walk the journey together to find again the JOY of life. Joy that can only be found through peace in Him. It's time for me to stop fighting and I pray that she too will soon stop, but that is in His hands.



For this year, I run to Jesus, my High Priest, to find the grace I so desperately need in my time of need and it is there that I can live in rest.