How will you mark the end of the year?

Judging from the number of articles in the media on how to deal with a hangover, there will be no shortage of lively celebrations happening!

Others will prefer to spend the evening quietly at home with family or with a small group of close friends rather than partying. Perhaps this last year has presented so many unresolved challenges that putting on a happy face is one thing too many.

Lord, you have been our help,
generation after generation.
Before the mountains were born,
before you birthed the earth and the inhabited world—
from forever in the past
to forever in the future,
you are God.

Psalm 90:1,2 Common English Bible translation
Whichever way, the transition from one year to the next is more than just changing the number at the end of the date.

You can suspend experiencing the end of the last year and the beginning of the next by using it as an opportunity to reflect, a little like stretching the pause before the clock strikes midnight.  Doing this allows the transition to become an opportunity to experience grace, and the step into the future, more intentional. It’s like stepping out of the restrictions of clock-determined time (chronos) and opening yourself to God’s time (kairos), unrestricted space, the place of opportunity, of choice. In this way you might see the ending of one year and the beginning of the next as the gift of lovingly accepting lessons learned from what has been, and opening yourself to embrace, in trust, what is going to emerge.

May you feel Christ blessing you as you move from this past year to the one ahead bringing you peace, and giving birth to hope in your heart.

Mācītāja Ilze